Quote:
Originally Posted by Thumper
So it IS a flat six. Ford was using a water cooled V6 car for some smaller midsized models (British Ford), and they were conventional front engine RWD. Up until Chevy's Corvair, the Porsche 911 was the go to RWD flat 6 sports car.
Ralph Nader may have killed the Corvair. Maybe Chevy could have widened it and limited suspension travel to make it a little more stable, but the damage was done. "unsafe at any speed" was a rather blatant exaggeration. I rode in my uncles Corvair and he pushed it into some curves, and got some 4 wheel drift for me. Serious sideway G-forces- I was about 9 years old. That was FUN!
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That would be a hoot for a 9 year old!
Actually, Chevy came out with their Flat Six in the Corvair three years before Porsche came out with theirs in 1963.
Regarding Ralph Nader, the Corvair community now has fun with him. It wasn't he who killed the Corvair, it was the Nova, Camaro and Mustang that brought about the end of the Corvair in 1969. They were selling those cars by the bucketful. The Corvair's time was about done.
A little history on Corvair handling and Ralphy Boy....
"NHTSA went on to contract an independent advisory panel of engineers to review the tests. This review panel concluded that 'the 1960–63 Corvair compares favorably with contemporary vehicles used in the tests. The handling and stability performance of the 1960–63 Corvair does not result in an abnormal potential for loss of control or rollover, and it is at least as good as the performance of some contemporary vehicles both foreign and domestic.' "
"Journalist David E. Davis, in a 2009 article in Automobile Magazine, noted that despite Nader's claim that swing-axle rear suspension were dangerous, Porsche, Mercedes-Benz, Tatra, and Volkswagen all used similar swing-axle concepts during that era. Some contend that Nader's lack of an automotive engineering degree or a driver's license at the time he wrote Unsafe at Any Speed, disqualifies him as a critic of automotive safety. In response to Nader's book, Mechanix Illustrated reviewer Tom McCahill tried to get a 1963 Corvair to flip, at one point sliding sideways into a street curb, but could not turn over the vehicle."