When I first shot this 1978 Cordoba in 2010, it was in excellent condition. It had been the then-owner’s mother’s car, an anniversary present from her husband. The daughter kept it garaged, but drove it daily to her job, which is where I found it parked. I went inside to ask permission as it was on private property, and she told me its touching story.
I ran into it again the other day in a parking lot, and was dismayed to see how it had aged. It is now her son’s car, and obviously not garaged anymore. The body is still fairly solid, but the vinyl roof has taken a real beating, including its underlayment and even the steel. It still gets driven regularly.
Kids these days…except he’s probably at least 50. Oh well, nothing lasts forever. And I doubt he has kids. This family heirloom is likely going down with its owner.
I was quite thrilled when I found this Cordoba parked next to an industrial building. I went into the office and found the owner, a woman likely close to retirement. She told me that car’s touching story: it was given to her mother by her dad as a 10th anniversary gift. And on their 25th anniversary, her dad offered to buy her any car of her choice. She turned him down to keep the beloved Cordoba. And the daughter continued to use it as a daily driver, but obviously it was well cared for, even if it did sit outside while she was at work.
I found it here in a store parking lot next to a park with a disc golf course. The current owner, the son, was just getting out of it so I was able to ask him about it. He’d taken possession of it not long after I shot it in 2010, and he still drives it whenever his Audi is out of commission, which was currently the case. And I got the impression this was not a rare occurrence.
I should have asked him to pose with the Cordoba. Let’s just say he rather looked a bit like it, having aged more rapidly beyond his likely years and missing quite a few teeth. Very unlike his buttoned up mother. So it goes with families.
In 2010 I was rather surprised to see how solid the vinyl roof was given that it spent some eight hours a day outside. For what it’s worth, some deterioration is noticeable, with the vinyl having lost its color and luster on top, thanks to the sun’s brutal rays.
Now the vinyl is almost all gone. And the damage has gone down two more layers below it.
There’s some kind of underlayer between the vinyl and the steel; I’m not sure what it’s made of. Vinyl roofs are most definitely outside of my experience and knowledge base.
Here’s a closer look. The underlayment is cracking and breaking apart, exposing the steel roof. I thought that might be a seam in the steel, but it’s clearly too jagged for that. Hmm…
Here’s the other blister further back near the rear window. And that seam again. I’m not an automotive oncologist so Stage IV vinyloma is not my expertise. Is there a qualified doctor in the house? But it does not look good.
The vinyl on the C pillar gets less sun, so some of it is still hanging on, barely.
And the other side of the roof isn’t doing much better. A cancerous lesion has formed, and it’s likely to spread soon. At least the opera lamps have been spared.
A few other body parts are missing, but none vital.
The sealed beam headlights have been replaced with these LED light boxes. Calling Doctor Stern!
Actually, only three have been replaced. Gives it that appropriate piratical look.
The rich Corinthian Leather® is looking a bit poorer too. Speaking of, don’t miss Jason Shafer’s superbly researched article on the origins of Corinthian Leather. There was a comment left at CC a little while back (in response to another comment) stating out very sincerely “That leather really did come from the town of Corinth, Italy”. Oh my…I guess classic history and geography are not taught much anymore. If he’d read Jason’s article he’d have known that Corinth is in Mississippi!
Here’s how it looked when his mom was still driving it. Ricardo Montalban would have been happy.
But hey, it still runs! And apparently quite reliably. Good to have a Cordoba in reserve whenever that pesky Audi craps out.
But let’s end this on a high note, with a couple of shots of this fine little Chrysler in its prime. I’m assuming you all know the Cordoba’s story and place in automotive history, if not head down to one of the links below. The very abbreviated story is that in 1975 Chrysler finally got the message that the 1969 Grand Prix and 1970 Monte Carlo sent loud and clear over the bow of the Big Three. And the belated response was not bad, although of course highly derivative. It rather saved the Chrysler brand’s bacon given that its big cars—the only kind they made then—were in the dumpster thanks to the energy crisis and fuselage fatigue.
The proud Cordoba emblem is still on the front of the hood, so let’s not count it out totally yet.
Related CC reading:
Curbside Classic: 1978 Chrysler Cordoba – The Fine Little Chrysler by PN
Automotive History: The Origins of Corinthian Leather by J.Shafer
CC Update: 1977 Chrysler Cordoba – Still Attracting Attention by Eric703 (an update of the Cordoba below that’s been much better cared for)
CC Capsule: 1977 Chrysler Cordoba Sin Cuero Corintio by R. Kim
Curbside Classic: 1978 Chrysler Cordoba – Not a Keeper by GarryM
CC Capsule: 1976 Chrysler Cordoba – The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of by G. Solis
Curbside Classic: 1976 Chrysler Cordoba – Fine Corinthian … by T. Klockau
This had been a terrific looking Cordoba. That said, the last fifteen years has taken its toll upon many of us.
My wife has told me a story about a trip she made as a child with her grandmother and her grandmother’s husband. It was in a white Cordoba of this vintage (I’ve seen the pictures and it was sharp). Somehow they got lost, stopped at a police station for directions, and a helpful cop had them follow him to wherever it was they needed to go. Mrs. Jason said it was quite the trip as it was raining heavily, the cop loved the gas pedal, and the trip involved driving through a grassy median.
Appropriately for their Corinthian leather equipped Cordoba, this all happened in Mississippi.
I should scan pictures of that Cordoba and her grandmother’s other cars. All were white, with the best looking being her ’59 or ’60 Impala.
It never ceases to amaze me how parking in a garage can benefit a car over time. I think that generally this is due to more than the simple act of enclosure; since we’ve all seen pictures of completely destroyed cars that have resided for years, unattended, in parking garages, warehouses, etc. No, garaging I think typically comes with the benefit of having an owner who cares enough (or is in a position to care enough) about the vehicle to take care of it. Keeping a garage space (in a garage that is not otherwise full of non-car) is part of the equation for attentive ownership. This often also comes with habits such as periodic washing, some level of maintenance, keeping the interior free of garbage and other discarded items, etc. It’s a whole package of behaviors, of which keeping the car indoors or covered somehow during bad weather and times when it’s not in use is part.
Those “headlights”…Remind me again, there’s no annual state inspection in Oregon, right?
I agree. It’s a whole set of behaviors that affect a vehicle’s condition, and not just one singular item. Pride of ownership encompasses a lot – whether it’s with one’s home, vehicle, etc.
I sort of understand when a once prized vehicle becomes a daily drover due to one’s finances and things like this happen, but the owner also has an Audi? I get that things may carry baggage with them with regard to their prior owners, but this seems inexcusable. If I had inherited a ’77 Volaré coupe from the most toxic of parents, I wouldn’t have treated it like he treated this Cordoba.
Okay… What I wrote above has been nagging at me independent of what others have said in the comments. To be clear and as a Cordoba fan, I was disappointed to see the car’s current condition. That said and as others have pointed out: a ) the condition actually isn’t that bad (Thank you, XR7 Matt for your thoughtful take on this); b.) Fifteen years is a long time; and c ) No one actually knows the circumstances except the driver.
It would be shortsighted for me to assume the owner deliberately neglected any aspect of this car outside of using it. Additionally, it’s possible that he held onto it knowing that no one else would have prized he grandparents’ former car the way he would enjoy and at least get to hang onto it.
As a car fan, I think it’s fair to have an emotional reaction to the relative decline of orn car’s condition. What isn’t fair, as others have astutely pointed out, is to make assumptions (like I had) about what caused it.
I hope the owner is in good health and enjoying this token of some part of his late grandparents.
” It’s a whole package of behaviors”
Just a very basic initial thought. Perhaps this involves some degree of depression? Family-related depression? Laziness, neglect, and depression, can be confused. I’ve seen people with depression, ignore tasks that seem routine, or logical. If one is not a doctor. I would not be passing judgment, either way. Privacy issue. Not my business.
Yeah, my comment was really just the product of my thinking that the state of any individual’s car care is usually a combination of factors that go beyond simply where it’s parked. But that said, sometimes it could be simply or mostly where it’s parked.
47 years altogether is a heck of a long time for a Chrysler from the 1970s to survive, particularly outdoors. In fairness, I think that one would have to have taken particular and directed efforts to preserve that vinyl roof, the paint quality, and the upholstery (even Missouri leather has its limits). Hard to do that when a car is actually being used.
That doesn’t explain the headlights though. 😉
For most people, seeing that roof deteriorating day after day, year and after year, would result in a call to action at some point. To get it fixed, to save the whole car! Simply putting $5.00 adhesive metal tape over the most damaging holes in the sheet metal, would go a long way.
People suffering from long term undiagnosed depression, may let the smallest things go, a long time. Or not even think about it, as it faces them every day. Depression and mental health issues, are fairly common. This benign car, can easily be the manifestation of a person. And the basis for neglect? As others have no idea.
Either way, I’m not a doctor. Qualified, to be sure.
I see what you are saying, but there is an entire population of people who views cars, pickups, etc. as something to use, not to look at. As luck would have it, I just had a conversation with a coworker about the pickup attached below. The coworker’s father is a farmer and thinks nothing of buying a nice pickup, only to never wash it. It is something to use, an implement.
Maybe there is depression or whatever with the current owner of the Cordoba, but I think the truth is much simpler. The Cordoba was simply “cheap car” and nothing more.
This picture is what sparked the conversation just now. This pickup, a 1970 Ford F-100, was purchased new by my father. This picture was taken the day he traded it. Never did it see a garage or a washing. He routinely overloaded this thing and, other than oil changes, it had no maintenance performed to it. That’s just how my father is. Anything automotive is just a tool.
Of course. You are speculating as well. But how do you possibly know either way? These topics often lead to posts that are critical of the owner, allowing this neglect. Or make implied side remarks about their lifestyles.
Could be a combination, of all of the above. Who knows?
When you, me, Paul, or anyone here, has no idea for the rationale behind the years of neglect on this car.
Maybe ask the owner? As a simple courtesy. They may just tell you why.
About 10 years ago there were three late-’60s to. ’70 Buick Electras or LeSabres parked in a nearby 1950s-suburb house driveway (I believe all the same model year, I didn’t know my Buicks well enough to determine year). I assumed two of them were being used as parts cars to fix up the third. I expected within a year only one would be left. Instead, those cars just stayed there and never seemed to move, and they just got rustier and rustier. The house itself usually had all the curtains or shades drawn, but one time when I drove by the living room window was uncovered. Random stuff piled up five or six feet high in there. Not long after that, the Buicks were gone and the house looked empty. Drove by earlier today and looked again but can’t remember which house it was anymore; none of them stood out.
Sometimes life just gets in the way of good intentions – like trying to preserve an old car.
We still have my wife’s 1995 Thunderbird that she had bought new. For years, we kept it garaged, even renting a space in a nearby apartment building since we don’t have a garage at our home. A few years ago we stopped leasing the garage space because we thought our resources were better spent elsewhere… and since then the car has been sitting outside in our driveway.
Now the paint is starting to fade on the roof. It was inevitable, and it’s sad to see… but life has become a bit challenging, and neither of us view preserving the Thunderbird as a top priority right now. I suspect a more intense version of this scenario happened with this Cordoba. It’s a shame, but sometimes that’s just how it goes.
Yes, it is really common to put off non-necessary repairs until a little more money comes in. Only for many, that extra bit of money either ever comes, or shows up right as the furnace goes out. An old car is often just too far down the scale of needs.
Sad to see it like this .
-Nate
And this is why not to have a vinyl / padded top ! especially if you have no garage & or your car spends to much time all day out in the sun ! Now that rust will let water in the trunk & take out the quarters & trunk floor ! it would be nice to strip the top off fix rust & paint it if the trunk has not suffered yet ? this would keep it going till something major happens Its a shame todays kids are just not car people ! what a shame
To be fair, the mid-seventies were the depths of quality control at bad ‘ole Chrysler, a time that rivaled The Forward Look years for an abysmal level of assembly and parts (although GM and Ford products were only marginally better). Still, this one lasted way longer than most, and it’s a shame what happened to it over the last fifteen years.
Short of complete storage in a climate-controlled facility, it’s hard to tell if there would have been any way to save the metal underneath the vinyl top on this grand Cordoba. I vividly recall how vinyl tops were installed on E-bodies over unfinished roof welds that, soon enough, would begin showing through.
Vinyl tops were one of those options where the installation actually cost ‘less’ than the finishing required of a steel top, with one of the best examples of the difference between the NASCAR special 1969 Dodge Daytona (zero vinyl roofs) and the similar 1970 Plymouth Superbird (all equipped with a vinyl roof).
I had to stop looking at the pictures. I’ve often worried about the fate of my cars after selling. On two occasions, I reluctantly watched my treasured LAND YACHTS being towed away (sold only in an effort to save them). I find heirlooms are no longer given the R E S P E C T we feel they deserve. I have numerous family heirlooms from four generations with NO interest from younger family members or even a Historical Museum.. YEAH! I’m a Sentimental guy, STILL Rolling down the hill waiting for 🤔? Best Best to all my fellow Barn Finders.👋 And remember, you often don’t realize what you’ve got ùntil it’s gone.
On the other hand, 15 years is a pretty good run, and longer than most of these cars lasted from new.
My VW spends winters indoors and summers in the driveway. I’m still doing sping maintenance on our family’s seven daily drivers, then hopefully have some time for VW
This story reminds me of the Ply.outh Valiant I documented recently and its own rapid aging.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/curbside-classic-update-1975-plymouth-valiant-looking-ready-to-retire/
Shame to see a car deteriorate like this, but I get it. My own classic daily driver has had a few areas that have gotten worse even as I’ve fixed up other aspects of it.
All things considered if it weren’t for the vinyl top and ripped driver seat and the godawful LED headlights, it doesn’t look all that bad. The paint looks a little dirtier but the condition of the paint looks about the same, there’s no rust anywhere except where the vinyl is torn(and I can almost guarantee there was rust there in the old pic, it just was still covered), it’s straight and undented and it’s still managed to hold onto the original wheel covers.
Inside the worst decay in 15 years is the Corinthian leather tears, otherwise both mom and son kind of kept it a pig sty, with all sorts of junk scattered about, or filling the aftermarket consoles storage bin to the brim.
Give this car a bath, clean it out(including tossing the aftermarket console and steering wheel cover in the dumpster) and probably just take the nuclear option and just peel the old vinyl off entirely and repair and paint the roof grey to look like the vinyl top from a distance and it’s an above average survivor for a Cordoba.
Going back to Jeff’s comment, I agree that garaging a car is a part of a collection of behaviors that are part of a person’s personality. That usually extends to maintaining their personal appearance and their dwelling. Of course one has to have the resources available, and many people would rather use their garage for the storage of “stuff” instead of housing their vehicles. Many people don’t have a garage or carport available. And many people don’t think that cars, even family heirlooms, are really that valuable and worth the effort of preserving. I rotate my cars between the garage and being driven and parked in the driveway and street. I have good covers for them and try to keep them clean, waxed, and covered. I’m sure that my neighbors think that it is my OCD being displayed, as my driveway looks like a haunted house in an old movie with the furniture covered in sheets! However preservation is much better, easier, and ultimately cheaper than restoration, so I don’t mind the hassle of constantly covering and uncovering my cars. But I’m a car guy, so I don’t mind spending so much effort in this area. I guess that I could spend a bit more time keeping up the yard and house.
If I had a four car garage (2 spots for cars and the other half for “stuff”) plus covered space for our high-roof van, I’d either be living in a community that I wouldn’t like, or have discovered a few extra trailing zero’s at the end of my bank balance. So 2 of our vehicles, and pretty much always “my” car in 35+ years of marriage has sat outside year-round. So keeping cars outside is not just about one’s attitude towards them. But I’ve never kept a car for over 20 years, nor have I ever had one with a vinyl top.
Tough roof, from my experience the vinyl outlasts the metal underneath factory fitted toupee tops were cars to avoid,
The underlayment reminds me of thick body filler in the way that it is cracking. Seen similar of body panels by cheap shops. The seam sure reminds me of the seam used on other Mopars at the time. My 73 Polara has a roof seam that is then filled with body filler before the vinyl roof. After removing my vinyl roof, and the body filler, I was greeted with surface rust all along the seam. This Cordoba very much reminds me of that.
Like Jose I am a car guy. My most precious cars are garaged while all others are covered. Only the 626, Focus, and Mazda 3 are uncovered for obvious reasons being daily drivers. I get my two washed every week. My wife’s car is tougher to catch available. My neighborhood has a lot of walkers in the later evening hours and many are familiar with my washing habits now and make comments. Especially so when they see me using a toothbrush in the seams. Two different neighbors, both women, knock on my front door once in awhile to ask me to take a look at their cars.
Currently the Focus now had fading clear coat on the roof only. I am going to my body shop in the next week to get an estimate on repainting that section. They did my badly faded spoiler already. All that for a 21 year old econo car? Yep, what can I say. Same goes for the faded top surfaces on the 626 when I got it 14 years ago. I may let Maaco if I do the prep and can supply the BC/CC paint for quality.
I think these vinyl roofs had some kind of foam padding under the exposed vinyl, so that is probably the second level of degradation.
It is good to see a late 70s Chrysler from the good end of the bell curve. Even then, the there were good ones, and those could be really satisfying cars. And I’m like most here – this makes me sad, but I understand.
Looking at the “good pictures” from 15 years ago makes evident that the vinyl top was starting to go even back then with a seam on the lower left going and something on the upper far end lifting as well. It was far from perfect back then already and deterioration happens much quicker on the tail end than the beginning.
Who knows what the man’s “Audi” that didn’t start that morning actually is. For all we know it’s clinging to life as well and the man is doing well enough just trying to get to his job using two fully depreciated cars with minimal registration and insurance expense, something we used to celebrate on this site. Somehow I doubt his normal whip is a leased 2023 Q5…
But hey, anyone here who has the money, time, space, and inclination to rescue and fix this car is surely welcome to have Paul slip a note with their unsolicited serious offer and phone number under the wiper. Surely with a restored roof and new vinyl and paint along with four sealed beams it’s worth at least $3,000 to the vast horde of Cordoba collectors out there, the same value as if it was kept in a bubble in a garage since 2010. 🙂
I’m probably as or more nostalgic than most about stuff but unless this “family heirloom” was passed down with a trust fund and a mandate to maintain it to perfection along with paid for covered storage and maintenance personnel it’s just doing what most cars will do – provide transport to someone other than whoever picked it out or loved it originally until it eventually is all used up. I thank my lucky stars that I have no ancestors who would be so thoughtless as to burden-guilt me with their choice of anything going forward. If I want something, great, if not, then give it or sell it to someone who can use it.
I know it’s not just a car, it’s a Cordoba (!) – we’ve all had our chance to buy one or more (or many) Cordobas over the years, but how many of us actually acted upon it (or even looked for one, ever)? Not me, so I certainly can’t and won’t fault this fellow for not expending vast amounts of his money and time on this Cordoba even if prices on everything have been falling rapidly since earlier this year, no, he couldn’t possibly have a good excuse…Here’s to hoping he isn’t going to lose his job anytime soon.
I overall tend to be in your camp, I’ve inherited some “heirlooms” from deceased relatives, some of which I’ve kept, some of which I did not. I think if I bonded with a family member over the object in question I’d feel awfully reluctant and guilty to discard it, but if they simply just left it to me without any real bonded attachment I’d probably just be more inclined to treat it as something to do what I will with (keep, sell, use up for utilitarian purposes, throw away etc).
With this Cordoba I’m really in the non judgmental camp to begin with because as I said previously I don’t think it’s deterioration is any different than how it would have ended up looking if the mom were living and still owned it, and relatively speaking it’s really not that bad to me. Where I don’t agree is it isn’t *just* transportation at this point, You can get rid of this Cordoba and buy an old depreciated Corolla with the proceeds and have something far more reliable and cheaper to own and use as just a car, but for reasons openly this owner knows stocks with it, whether it is it’s inherent traits that appeal to him, sentimentality, or maybe just liking the car for exactly what it is as is.
Those LED lights always look hideous on an old car, especially after the sun turns the cheap plastic yellow
I didn’t think it was possible to make stacked rectangular headlights worse, but there you have it.
The irony is those cheapass LED things aren’t any better than regular sealed beams; they just increase glare all over the place, including into oncoming traffic.
With routine maintenance like that, it is also somewhat telling on how this otherwise rather nice old Cordoba has went sharply downhill over the last 15 years.
I love old cars for their colors, varied styling, relative simplicity and occasionally more “rugged” aspects, so these Modern headlight retrofits to me literally ruins one of the very best aspects of old cars. I’m sorry but I’ll take glass universal halogens over the plastic HID/LED with DRL garbage of modern cars any day. Trying to make that modern look work on old cars just looks stupid and terrible and introduces multiple new failure modes, not to mention it doesn’t even work.
You are actually correct, Paul, those are seams between the roof panel and the quarter panels. They were finished with filler, and as others have mentioned, the vinyl roof cars did not get finished as well at the factory before the vinyl was installed. When the vinyl ages enough to start cracking, then water gets into the whatever padding it may have and it is downhill from there. It is worse here in the south, where the timetable moves much quicker, and causes them to rust from the top down. I always loved the look of a vinyl roof, but they were truly rust accelerators.
They are difficult and therefore expensive to restore properly. That is why you see many vinyl roof equipped cars turned into slick tops. The feature Cordoba does not have a frenched style back glass, but it does have another complication that I did not see mentioned; a sunroof. I don’t have any experience with Chrysler products, but my GM and Ford experience tells me that to replace this vinyl roof you would need to remove the band around the front edge, which likely would require removing the headliner and sunroof.
So, many vinyl roof equipped cars are not unlike what today’s “connected” cars will be in a couple of decades, not feasible to restore. As to why people don’t take care of their stuff, I will leave that to you philosophers.
By complete happenstance I found this great pic of a Cordoba found through assembly stages clearly showing the seams in their raw unfilled form
Great find, Matt!
I own a ’74 Challenger, and sold my ’73 Challenger. When I removed the vinyl top on the ’74, the seam between the roof and body was filled with LEAD, which I had to grind down to make it smooth. The ’73 seam on the other hand, just had a skim coat of bondo. It just goes to show that you’ll never know what went on during the assembly! I’m in the “no vinyl top” camp. 🙂