Notorious Flops
The Chrysler Airflow was truly a remarkable automobile. They moved the engine over the front axle and the passenger compartment forward as well. This left the rear wheels behind the cabin, which gave better weight distribution, handling and ride. The body was all steel with a steel cage frame. It also had hydraulic brakes and safety glass. They had early problems getting it into production, which generated negative rumors. Along with that and unusual styling, customers stayed away.
CLICK HERE to see a promo film of one driven off a 110-foot cliff and driven away
The 1958 Edsal is the poster child of failure. But contrary to popular belief, it wasn’t its controversial styling, It simply the wrong car during a recession. Ramblers were hot sellers during that period. Shortly after its introduction much of Ford’s top brass lost faith in it. The Falcon based 1960 Mercury Comet was originally slated to be an Edsal.
Built from 1947 to 1951 the Frazer never made many sales. It was an almost indistinguishable slightly larger version of a Kaiser. Kaiser-Frazer always built more cars than they could sell and re-serial numbered left over cars and sold them as the next years model. When Kaiser-Frazer introduced the all-new 1951 Kaiser they used slightly re-styled left over bodies for the 1951 Frazer. The re-styling was so successful many orders went unfulfilled after they ran out of parts. A 1952 model was considered but dropped.
The Henry-J was not a particular success and the Allstate was just a Henry-J in drag. Only southeast Sears stores sold Allstates. Although they were better trimmed and a better value the experiment was a flop.
After WWII Willys had success-selling jeep based vehicles but the Aero Willys sedans didn’t make it in the marketplace.
The Hudson Jet was Hudson’s entry into the Compact car market. They bet the farm on it and when it flopped they did not have enough cash to replace their aging 1948 step down design.. They had little choice but to merge with Nash.
The AMC Pacer, in spite of its controversial, styling was AMC’s best selling model buy a large margin in 1975. After that it sold at about the same rate as other AMC models.
Nissan Cube. What is there to say, that thing is just plain ugly. The stylists tried to get too edgy
Pontiac Aztec. An other case of the stylists trying to be edgy. Buick offered the more conventional styled less ugly Rendezvous, and it sold well
The Cadillac Cimarron. Built from ’82 to ’88. When first introduced, GM’s J bodied cars were a flop. The Cadillac, Buick and Oldsmobile versions were drooped after a few years. Later the Chevrolet Cavalier and the Pontiac J 2000/Sunbird went on to become successful
The Cadillac Catera was a German build rebadged Opel Omega made from 1997 to 2001. Although the car sold poorly in the U.S. other versions sold well in other countries.
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