The Playboy Cars-1970

Daimler-Benz, the oldest manufactory of motorcars on this planet, at least, is a house of legendary puissance. With the advantage of founding by the two men most authorities credit with the actual invention of the automobile, Carl Benz and Gottlieb Daimler, the company has moved across the years since 1886 with an air of sure and unflagging competence, turning out, in good times and bad, an extraordinary variety of fast, well-made, long-lived automobiles. Convinced from the beginning that racing is valuable both as laboratory and as publicity producer, D-B put together an unparalleled string of successes in a straight line, from a one-two-three sweep of the French Grand Prix in 1914 to the stunning triumph of Stirling Moss and Denis Jenkinson in the 1955 Mille Miglia, when they ran a Mercedes-Benz 300SLR roadster over 1000 miles of Italian roads at an average speed of 97.8 mph, the permanent record for the course. The 300SLR was a blood relation of the gull-wing 300SL, a world sensation when it appeared in 1952 and a modern classic now.

The designs that have made Daimler-Benz history have come at milestone intervals: 1894, the Benz Velo and the Daimler Vis-à -Vis; 1902, the Mercedes-Simplex; 1910, the Mercedes-Knight sleeve valve; 1911, the 200-horsepower Blitzen Benz; 1921, the supercharged four-cylinder Mercedes; 1930, the Grosser Mercedes; 1936, the 260D, the world's first (text continued on page 160) production diesel passenger car, and the supercharged eight-cylinder 540K; 1952, the 300SL; and 1968, the 300SEL 6.3, widely held to be the best sedan automobile available today on the world market. It is about time for a new Wunderwagen from Stuttgart-Untertürkheim, and, with either great good luck or eerily competent timing, because 1970 looks like a year that will be uncluttered with sensational new models, D-B has brought forth the C-111: a Wankel-engined, gull-wing, 44-inch-high two-seater 165-mph sports car.

The C-111 will have been given its first public display (at September's Frankfurt auto show) by the time you read this. It will have been a major sensation. Indeed, it will no doubt have been the sensation at Frankfurt. And there will be lamentations and the rending of garments when Daimler-Benz officials say that there are no plans to produce the car for sale. They'll maintain this position stubbornly. They'll argue that the car is strictly an experimental vehicle, built as a design exercise, to work out some ideas and to give the research people, soaked in anonymity, the reward of seeing a wheeled and tangible result of their efforts. That is no doubt the truth; it's just that I doubt it's the whole truth; and I'm happy to say, emphatically on no one's authority but my own, that I'm sure Daimler-Benz will make and sell the C-111. There'll be a lag in time before the car comes onto the market--a year, perhaps more--but it will come. It will be sold in a limited edition, priced in five figures but not stratospherically: The publicity value of the C-111 is going to be so great that to make money on it would be vulgar. It would be easy enough to do, because early indications are that the market resistance will be minimal, indeed. The mere rumor of the car's existence, months ago, drew thousands of dollars in deposit checks here and abroad. (Don't send yours; they are being returned as fast as they come in.)

C-111 is a dull designation for an extraordinarily exciting motorcar. I first saw it being parked outside a country hotel near Stuttgart. At the wheel was Dr. Rudolf Uhlenhaut, the renowned design engineer and research-development specialist whose stamp has been on every high-performance and racing Mercedes-Benz since the 1930s. He had come by (continued on page 293)Playboy Cars--1970(continued from page 161) for dinner. He had driven the C-III from the road circuit at Hockenheim, around 75 miles distant. How fast? someone asked, and he said, 150, 160. Kilometers? No, miles an hour. This on open roads, in ordinary six-P.M. traffic. Uhlenhaut is a superb driver who has fully extended 200-mph Grand Prix cars, and 150 on an autobahn is not extraordinary for him, but he is a knowing and intelligent man and he would not do it in any but an extraordinary car. We looked at it, the body not yet in final form but basically in the mode dictated by present convention and its own performance. Gull-wing doors, surprisingly heavy but to be eased by stronger assistance pistons. The Wankel engine behind, looking strange and small. Comfortable, firm-holding seats with an adjustment range to accommodate anyone. Small steering wheel, stick shift, instruments canted toward the driver. Surprisingly full rearward visibility.

Next day, at the track, early on a wet morning, nailed to the passenger seat by a double harness, Dr. Hans Liebold driving. Acceleration? One might say blindingly adequate: 0-60 mph in five seconds. The 3.6-liter Wankel puts 335 hp into the clutch and the car does 161.2 mph at 7000 rpm. The engine can be turned to 11,000. Braking? The biggest disks that can be fitted to 15-inch wheels. The car felt solid, safe, secure, even on vertical banking under a g load so heavy that the wheel arches were slammed down on the tires and blue rubber smoke fogged the interior.

When Dr. Liebold gave me the car, I drove it rather less forcefully. It would certainly be--if only Daimler-Benz were going to build it--a precise solution to the problem Dr. Uhlenhaut stated to me: to make a very fast, roadable sports car that would be truly comfortable. Because the Wankel engine is small, the C-III can be roomy; and because the engine is rotary, it produces no vibration, or none that is perceptible, at any rate. And it's not nearly as noisy as a comparable standard 335-hp engine.

Two new Mercedes-Benz engines are scheduled for the coming season, and there is no doubt at all about that. Excepting perhaps Rolls-Royce, no one has taken more out of in-line engines, and particularly in-line six-cylinder engines, than Mercedes-Benz, but the new pair will be V8s, a 3.5-liter and a 4.5.

Announced some time ago, but only now beginning to appear in quantity, is the XJ Jaguar, the most striking new model out of Coventry since the E-type. Delay has been due to the chaotic British labor system, to use the term loosely, and to Jaguar's difficulty in developing an air-conditioning system good enough to cope with Texas summers. The air problems have been worked out, but the labor juggernaut, capable of shutting down an entire plant on a rumor that a handful of men are going to be fired, still lurches on.

The XJ6 is the best-looking Jaguar in years, smooth-flowing, bright but not brash, lots of glass but not a greenhouse, a handsome interior treatment notable for white-on-black round-faced dials, clearly marked rocker switches and, of course, the masses of leather and walnut without which it is absolutely impossible to sell a high-priced car on the United Kingdom home market.

Power is provided by the trusty six-cylinder double-overhead-camshaft engine that made the Jag reputation back there in the 1940s--actually, 1948--and it's still a wonder, old-fashioned and technically out of date as it is. Down the years, it has been refined and re-refined (the factory long ago passed the quarter-million mark with this engine) and it is now dead quiet and turbine smooth. The whole car is remarkably quiet and its handling qualities are comparable with the E-type's. I drove an XJ about 1500 miles in England and France a few months ago and I liked it better than the E-type in every way. A new engine, a V12, will be along soon.

Another British high-performance machine just now beginning to appear here is the Jensen FF. The Jensen is a direct descendant of the 1933 Railton, first of the Anglo-American hybrids, a Hudson engine and chassis carrying British bodywork. The Railton begat the Cadillac-Allard, and the Cadillac-Allard begat various things, including the Jensen, which uses a 330-hp Chrysler engine and automatic transmission. The Jensen people argue that the FF is the most advanced motorcar on today's market, and they have a case: It is a four-wheel-drive gran turismo car, running the most sophisticated f.w.d. system known, a system good enough for 200-mph race cars, the Ferguson Formula, coupled with the most advanced braking system going, the Maxaret, which was developed years ago for aircraft landing gear. When any wheel is just on the point of locking, the system cuts off the braking power for a split second, instantly reapplies it when the wheel rolls freely again. Together, the two systems make it impossible for any wheel, or any two, or all four, to lock under either power application or braking. The Jensen FF offers standards of handling on winding wet roads that were new to me; and the last of eight hard stops from 100 mph was the same as the first: like running into a wall of taffy.

The Aston Martin is England's premiere luxury sports car, the name a famous one almost since the company's founding, in 1922. The car is in limited production, being, like the Rolls-Royce, a small part of the parent company's affairs. It has probably been sustained by the personal enthusiasm of one man, David Brown, whose primary business is gear making. The Aston reflects Brown's view that a high-performance automobile need not be Spartan, and it's the most luxuriously fitted out of vehicles in its class, masses of leather and top-grade carpeting, with electric-powered window winders and air conditioning standard. Power steering and power brakes, too. The engine is a holdout: all-aluminum six-cylinder in-line, showing 325 hp.

The new Rover 35 S is very well braked, too, with four-wheel disks almost 11 inches in diameter. This is the Rover 2000/TC body running the 215-cubic-inch (3525-c.c.) aluminum V8 used by Buick and Oldsmobile in 1961. Rover bought a license for this engine some years ago and worked it up to produce 184 hp, enough to run the 35 S to 115 mph. It's an impressive sedan, thoroughly comfortable, fast throughout the whole range, splendidly responsive and roadable. Price, around $6000.

De Tomaso's Mangusta is an Italo-American hybrid, a superhigh-performance Italian chassis and a superbeautiful Ghia body powered by a word V8 midengine. Very much sexier-looking than the Jensen--indeed, so much so that it makes the Jensen look almost dowdy--it's hard to get into, awkward (pedals far offset to the right) and uncomfortable. Not at gunpoint can Italian designers be made to pay attention to things like heaters and window winders, but they do make going automobiles, and the Mangusta does 0--60 in seven seconds flat and 90 in 13 with no strain.

Somewhat less costly superior automobiles are available from Alfa Romeo and Fiat. The 1750 Alfa Romeo Spider is a sports car in the grand tradition. The designation 1750 is one that the Italians take very seriously, since it was carried by the best-known and most admired car the house has produced, the 1750 Zagato-bodied roadster of the 1930s; the 1970 version is an altogether acceptable successor. Body is by Pininfarina. The engine is a bit over 1750 c.c. and develops 132 hp at 5500 rpm. It's thoroughly refined, double-overhead cams, sodium-cooled valves, beautifully finned sump for oil cooling, five-speed transmission and so on. A second Spider is the Fiat 124, one of the great successes of the decade, a motorcar justifying the strongest superlatives. A better-handling automobile is hard to imagine; the 124 is fast, quiet, responsive, good-looking and tremendous value for money.

The Swiss have made few automobiles, the Martini, out of business in 1933, probably the best known. An ultralimited production hybrid is being produced in Basel now, the Monteverdi, Swiss chassis, Italian coachwork, American engine: the Chrysler 440 V8. This is a 150-mph gran turismo, restrained and elegant in line and meticulously finished. Monteverdi anticipates selling not more than 15 or 20 units to United States clients during 1970; price, around $21,900. Two-seater and four-seater versions are available.

The four-passenger configuration is rare in high-performance cars out of the European ateliers, but Lamborghini does a special-order model, the Espada, at around $21,000, Bertone bodied and, oddly for its type, thoroughly roomy for four people and their weekend luggage. (The almost-flat back light, carrying the sensual roof line out to the tail, lifts for baggage stowage.) The V12 engine puts out its 365 hp extraordinarily decorously and quietly, all things considered. The Espada will do 150 plus with a full crew, having got to 90 in 12 seconds; but instruments and such nonessentials are frivolous and braking undependable. At only slightly illegal U.S. speeds, however, the Espada is safe, comfortable and the most glamorous rig available for quartet weekending in the country.

Five Maserati brothers--Alfieri, Bindo, Carlo, Ernesto and Ettore--set up a racing-car store in 1926, and from then until 1961, the name was a fixture in Grand Prix and sports-car competition. Maserati means gran turismo now, and the Ghibli is top of the line, the engine a double double-overhead-cam V8 pulling 330 hp, five-speed gearbox, wishbones in front and a rather archaic hard axle behind, the whole beautifully metaled in the unmistakably Italian line and ticketed around $19,000. With four decades of racing history, it would be strange if the Ghibli didn't handle, and it will exceed 100 mph by a margin sufficient to cope with most emergencies. The car is quiet and unfussy, and attention has been paid to the little things.

Right or wrong, most of the topsiphoned layer of people who have tried a half dozen of the circa-$20,000 GT motorcars come back to Ferrari in the end, and the 365 GT 2 + 2 is the place to be now. This is an extension of the 330 GT (a ten-inch-longer wheelbase) but varying in no real essential from that lovely motorcar, pulled by the 320-hp V12 engine a lot of us would buy just for the noise it makes, never mind the exquisite refinement the years and the millions of high-speed miles have given it. The legend counts, too, the one man, Enzo Ferrari, making the one car as he, and he alone, wanted it made. The last time I drove a 300 GT, the hand brake stuck, the gas gauge registered full no matter what and the driver's-side window winder wouldn't, all failures that would ordinarily have spoiled the day for me, but they didn't seem to matter beside the going, the stopping and the pointing of the car, the way it seemed to arrow straight into the middle of whatever slot I aimed it at. In a well-ordered world, everyone who enjoyed driving would be given a Ferrari for an afternoon, as everyone who appreciated food would be taken, once, to dinner at Pyramide.

Someone has wisely said that when you pay more than $6000 for a car, you're paying for envy. As far as sheer go is concerned, you can buy 14--15-second quarter miles for a lot less than $6000 on the domestic market; for example, in the Plymouth Barracuda, now generically referred to as the 'Cuda, and, engined by the 426-cubic-inch hemispheric combustion-chamber V8, the Hemicuda, a quick automobile. The 440 V8, with three two-barrel Holley carburetors, pulls 390 hp at 4700 rpm and is a strong, solid engine, offered in Plymouth's Barracuda, Road Runner, GTX and in Dodge's Challenger, Coronet R/T and Charger R/T. The Challenger and Barracuda, incidentally, have a roll-over structure built into the roof panels, something that will eventually be universal.

Another muscle car is the Ford Torino (ex-Fairlane) Cobra, a very stout high-performance four-seater, pleasantly clean in line and replete with identifiers: Cobra decals, matter-black hood and grille, hood locking pins. The 429-cubic-inch four-barrel engine that is standard on the Cobra is optional on the rest of the line. The NASCAR version' of the 429 is alleged to put out 375 hp as detuned for the street. Staggered rear shock absorbers, four-speed transmission, wide tires come with it. The GTs are dressed with something that Ford is pleased to call a Laser Stripe, and it's intriguing: a strip of paint that diminishes in opacity and intensity from end to end. All Ford's bucket seats this year will have high backs, the best way to go for headrests. The AMC Javelin will have them, too.

One of the few basic mechanical innovations turned out this year is Oldsmobile's valve rotator. Standard practice calls for the mushroom-shaped inlet and exhaust valves to joggle straight up and down as they open and close. Eventually, deposits form and interfere with the airtight sealing between valve and seat that is essential to performance. Turning the valve slowly (about as fast as the second hand on a clock)as it bangs up and down scrubs the matching faces clean. Mercedes-Benz has turned its exhaust valves for some time, but Oldsmobile will rotate the inlets as well and the engines should run forever. (Another good thing is Mercury's automatic front-seat latch for two-doors: It releases--via solenoid--as the door is opened.) The 4-4-2 hardtop, sports coupe and convertible optionally sell a 455-cubic-inch four-barrel high-compression engine roofed by a fiberglass air-scooped hood. Oldsmobile has a splendid array of new grilles for 1970: vertically pillared, horizontally barred, honeycomb and egg crate. The W-33 option for the Delta 88 Royale, the big 455 V8, high-performance springs, shocks and so forth, turns out a fast car that handles remarkably well for anything so big.

American Motor's AMX will be a couple of inches longer for 1970; the reason, a stretched hood carrying what is becoming the mandatory ram-air opening, functional with an optional performance package: a 390-cubic-inch V8, power brakes in front, 15x7-inch wheels, special shocks, nonslip differential, heavy-duty cooling system. The car is a half inch lower, too, even a little more: .53 inch. The Hornet is aimed at Maverick and Volkswagen, tops Maverick with two-door and four-door configurations, 6 and V8 engines. An even smaller thing, the Gremlin, is on the way for AMC. GM and Ford have ultrasmalls in the works, too.

Where will it all end? The Mercury Cougar Eliminator rams, too, with the 428 4V engine, the scoop matte black and the whole engine lid so businesslike one looks for pin locks. The hood-pin bit originated on the Southern stock-car tracks; at high speed, rear-hinged hoods occasionally lifted and ripped off. Hood pins, usually themselves fastened to the car with airplane control cable, made a positive mechanical lock, less trouble to use and more nearly certain than the six-inch straps that used to do the same job. Better-looking, too.

The Montego Cyclone Spoiler really has one, rear-mounted on the two-door hardtop (the only configuration available). Four-speed manual transmission, the hot 429 V8, disappearing headlights, instruments canted toward the driver.

There's no envy money in any one of these cars; that's to say, you can't spend $6000. Inflation or no, and despite the obvious fact that nobody in Detroit or Hong Kong ever put a five-dollar improvement on a product and failed to charge ten dollars for it, the domestic vehicle offers stupendous value for money. I have a Pontiac Grand Prix SJ that does have a few dollars, only a few, of envy money in it, but this thing will do a standing quarter mile in 14 seconds and run within a hair of 120 miles an hour; it delivers a splendid ride over any reasonable road and with the air on and the windows tight, it's as restful as a hammock. True, the local dealership concedes total bafflement over a chassis vibration that comes in at 62 mph, the turn indicators may or may not indicate and the starter can't budge a hot engine; but still, the hand brake and the fuel gauge both work.

Chevrolet has a new entrant in the sweepstakes this year, the Monte Carlo, which will remind you of the Pontiac Grand Prix. It's a four-passenger two-door hardtop, running engines from 250 to 360 hp and intended to go up against the Thunderbird. Naturally, it has the longest hood Chevrolet has ever built.

Pontiac is spreading around such good things as the windshield radio antenna, exclusive with the Grand Prix model last year and standard now. There's a new six-cylinder engine, 250 cubic inches, 155 hp, regular fuel. The Grand Prix 1970 has a rather less aggressive-looking grille and the new plastic gas tank. This last will show during the year on Catalina, Executive and Bonneville station wagons for California only.

Buick is doing nothing basic to the Riviera in 1970 and not much with Le Sabre, Wildcat and Electra 225. They'll all have windshield antennas, hidden wipers, front suspension geometry that gives positive camber on rebound, variable-ratio steering. Disks in front and interior hood locks are optional. The Skylark has been restyled, with a performance model--GS 455 Stage One--that is quicker on a road circuit than the Pontiac GTO or the Oldsmobile 4-4-2. All General Motors intermediates now have the beefed-up, interior-girder doors.

Cadillac will pretty much sit this one out, except for boosting its engine size--already, at 472 cubic inches, the biggest production-passenger-car engine in the world--to 500 in the Eldorado, which will, presumably, continue to be the quietest automobile in the market.

A return to separate body and frame construction shows up in the Continental, which has been using the unitized frameless system. The separate system is quieter and the 1970 will be built on a wheelbase an inch longer. Taillights will be at back-light level and the interior has been set up as befits a luxury limousine: a loud-speaker in each door, electric roof, six-way adjustable seats. The Mark III continues largely unchanged except for details: hidden wipers, redesigned wheel disks and the new tamper proof odometer, which will make it likely that used Lincolns from here in will show honest mileage.

Sometimes I think German machines are less fallible than others. I suppose that anyone armed with the facts would, statistically speaking, run me up a pole; but out of a considerable experience with Porsche, some with Mercedes-Benz and a little with BMW, I do have the feeling that with the Germans, as with the Swedes, the little things go wrong less often than with us, the British, the French and the Italians. The BMW is an example, an automobile superior to others in its class on almost every count. The 2800 CS is the top of the line, a two-door four-seater hardtop. This is a fast, almost incredibly roadworthy, luxurious and solidly built sensible-sized car: 0 to 60 in nine seconds, 127.5 mph top. And the BMW factory in Munich, unlike some one has seen, is confidence-inspiring, with quality-control procedures obviously more stringent than necessary.

Part-German is the Opel GT, child of General Motors Germany. It looks like a squeezed Corvette--wheelbase is 95.7 inches--but it's a full two-seater. The Opel makes no pretensions about being a 2 + 2; there's not even a vestigial seat in the rear, only a shelf; and the trunk, what there is of it, is reachable only from inside. Foot space is tight for the driver and it's easy to get on two pedals at once. An attractive package, though, from turned-down nose and hidden lights to spoiler tail.

The Lotus Elan Plus Two is, of course, a Colin Chapman design; and Chapman is demonstrably the foremost race-car designer working today--but the Elan Plus Two isn't a race car. It goes pretty well, though--115 mph top--and the handling is no less than superb in every way. It steers, sticks and stops impeccably: ten-inch four-wheel disks, apparently totally fadeproof. Little things have a tendency to break and come off and some judgments would find the price a trifle high, just this side of $6000. Pedigree is always pricey, I suppose.

A sports car in the traditional British mold is the Triumph TR6, a convertible two-seater that can serve as transport and go racing, too. The engine is a six-cylinder in-line, 2.5 liters, 104 hp. The TR6 is a civilized sports car, showing lots of room for people and their portmanteaus and, wonder of wonders, a top that can be raised by one man using one hand. Remarkably little wind noise with it up or down. Top, 119 mph.

Sweden has turned out some splendid automobiles by Saab and Volvo since the War. The Volvo 1800 S now runs the two-liter engine used in the 144 sedan, a rugged, almost unbreakable unit that will show 115-mph top speed at one end of the spectrum and 30 miles a gallon at the other end. The body, made in England for Swedish assembly, is done to first-cabin standards, good attention to detail, excellent seats. The beltline is high, there's not as much glass as is currently fashionable, and the seats are low so that the effect is similar to that of the 356 Porsche. Some people would not like the resultant tucked-in feeling; others, I among them, find it secure and happy.

The top note about the Datsun 2000 is that it is rugged and quick. It runs like a thief--0--60 in 9.3 seconds--and will leave a Porsche on a long straight. The car is noisy, full of vibrations and ride is stiff, but it handles decently and it's great away from the lights.

The Toyota 2000 GT has been pretty universally commended since the first one came off the boat on the West Coast. No one who has driven the 2000 seems to want to denigrate it in any particular. Finish is impressive, the engine turned out like the best Italian, the body up to top British standards. Fast (125 mph+), comfortable, good-looking, very well turned out two-seater, pleasant to look at, a delight to drive.

Not yet in sight but coming soon are the mid-engined VW-Porsche, sports cars, one with engine by Porsche, the other VW, about $4000/$3000.

Out of sight, practically, is the domestic convertible, the ragtop famed in song and story. Not many men, and almost no women, are keen for 70-mph top-down motoring, and convertibles are expensive to build, complicated to work and dangerous in accidents. They'll be phased out until they're as rare as seven-passenger touring cars.

All in all, perhaps, not a vintage year, but not really the year of the locust, either'.