I was very happy to spot this Pacer “in the wild,” though it was apparent its destination was the same as mine…the first Classy Chassy Car Club cruise night in Coralville. Still, it gets extra cool points for being seen in its natural habitat and not in a parking lot amongst a bunch of other CCs.
It’s amazing to see one still running under its own power. I think this calls for a discussion of the peculiarities of the Pacer’s styling. For instance can anyone think of a car that had a larger greenhouse to body ratio? It must have been like driving around in a fishbowl.
Well, there is one that comes to mind…
Awesome! It probably looks more like the Pacer than any other actual car.
My mother bought one new in 1975, just about the time I got my driver’s license – it was actually very good to drive as the greenhouse allowed a large field of view, especially when shoulder-checking for lane changes. It was also very easy to reverse because the hatch also allowed a good view of what was behind. To be honest, other than it being grossly underpowered it was a good car for a novice driver.
I made many road trips in the Pacer, and I remember it being one of the nicest cars I’ve ever driven on the highway. It wasn’t fast, as it topped out at about 87 MPH, but it could cruise forever at a comfortable 80 MPH, and as I recall, had really good highway MPG.
Really, other than being underpowered and yielding really poor city mileage, the Pacer was a pretty good car for the time.
Funny…my Dad always thought that being underpowered was a huge plus for a novice driver’s first car. 🙂
So did mine! I never was given anything above 90 hp when I was driving cars loaned to me by my parents. Imagine a Scout Traveler with the four cylinder – It couldn’t get me in too much trouble.
Of course, the design inspiration for the Pacer is well known. It was thought that this design would appeal to baby boomers everywhere.
Considering the Atlanta Falcons used a Pacer to raise money recently the sighting of a pristine Pacer under its own power just got a bit rarer. I have never seen an AMC Pacer outside of a car show and I was hoping to have seen one in Portland by now.
Warning, the following article is poorly written and not for the weak of heart.
http://msn.foxsports.com/south/story/hammer-time-hawks-invite-fans-to-pound-the-pacer-042614
That’s a shame 🙁
It looked to be in really good shape when bought. Only 59,000 miles too.
Hawks. Not the Falcons. Basketball. They were playing the Indiana Pacers in the playoffs.
Yea, I meant the Hawks, I hate the Falcons too, I think that is why I got them mixed up. Love the Braves though.
The Pacers or some radio station promoting Pacers games raffled a Pacer off years ago and it was recently for sale on the Indy Craigslist. It had the stations logo and an ugly paint job but supposedly was in great shape otherwise.
What a bunch of fools–that Pacer lasted 35-odd years, only to have this happen. Whoever approved that stupid stunt should be forced to drive the Zephllante for the rest of his or her life…
I second this punishment. Though I would give them the custom Caddy Seville from a few weeks back.
Wonder the reaction of the person that sold it. I can’t imagine they saw this coming…unless told upfront.
I hate publcity stunts like that. Doubly so when it’s a rare, vintage car, even if it is one that doesn’t have many admirers.
+ 4,000,000!
+4,000,001
The Cadillac Seville of recent CC fame is much uglier why not use one of those.
That’s a crime unforgivable!
I hate crap like that smashing something to bits is just wrong.I’d rather see it turned into a hot rod/custom car than destroyed.Anyone got a scruffy Pacer with a bit of rust(not to serious rust though) and a spare 401 from a Javelin and some Big Bad Green paint?
One more reason to dislike the Falcons.
There was an attempt to sell the Pacer in the UK but it failed miserably.A road test along the lines of “We test the Pacer and wish we hadn’t” didn’t help.LHD,a big(by UK standards) 6 cylinder engine which was slow and not so thrifty and a Jaguar price tag without the prestige ensured it was a flop.The last straw was the wide passenger door that let the passenger step out into oncoming traffic.
There’s a lot of arguments about whether the Pacer bought AMC a few more years or sent them to an early grave.A sad car after the beautiful early Javelin,AMX and the handsome Rebels
I’ve got the doors mixed up as there were some RHD converted Pacers which added to the confusion which side the long door was on!
Pretty ironic isn’t it. The Pacer is still ridiculed for it’s wideness and weight but indeed by 2014 standards it’s pretty contemporary.
Unfortunately no contemporary car has that kind of visibility. If modern cars were more like the Pacer, there would be no need to mandate rear cameras.
If modern cars were more like the Pacer, we’d all die in rollovers.
Pacers are stable though, and were originally designed with an integrated roll bar for impending federal rollover standards which didn’t come to pass. Which brings up another point. If modern cars were more like the Pacer, we wouldn’t need electronic stability systems to keep them from rolling over.
So many lessons to be learned from this unloved car.
I wonder how common rollovers are…other than in the Blues Brothers, that is.
“This is car…um, what number are we?”
“Five five…”
“Car fifty-five. We’re in a truck!”
Nonsense! The Pacer was a very stable car with full-sized-car width and minimal front and rear overhang. Also had rack & pinion steering which was a first for an American car of that size.
My brother has owned a Pacer since 1987. It has many innovative features that were a decade or two ahead of their time, including cab-forward design (not used until the 1990s) and door frames that integrated into the body. Granted, the build quality was typical 1970s malaise era and they did have rust issues . . .
Oh nooooooo, or we could get killed by a meteor coming into the atmosphere at 35,000 mph and slamming into the car roof and turning me into a human jelly and bone fragments too!!!
OHHHHHH…NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!
Please protect me from everything!!!!
OHHHHHH…….so scary!!!!!!!!!
“Rollovers”…..the “you’ll shoot your eye out” of cars.
But then the safety police were able to move on to SUVs!
I’ve never had the, er, pleasure of driving a Pacer, and I know AMC cars aren’t known for their roadhandling excellence. But given their short wheelbase and (extremely) wide stance, I would imagine a resistance to rollovers would be one of the few items in the Pacer’s favor.
I seem to remember that the UK RHD Pacers used the existing rack with its pinion on the LHD side, with a chain connected to the steering column and wheel on the RHD side of the car.A somewhat Heath Robinson lash up to say the least. I suppose you could say it was a bit like steering by reins!!!!
It was quite a common conversion to RHD on many cars.Rather crude but it seemed to work OK.A lot of the conversions left power window and mirror switches on what was now the passenger side,really useful!
Nice catch Tom. I always felt the Pacer would have been much better received if they had managed to introduce the wagon at the same time as the standard hatchback. The wagon had more palatable lines, and was more practical for carrying capacity, than the much maligned domemobile. By 1977, the Volare/Aspen wagons and AMC’s own Hornet, surely already curtailed whatever hope for significant compact wagon sales the Pacer wagon had.
Unfortunately, for their size, all Pacers look significantly overweight. IMO, the versions with slotted alloy wheels carried their visual weight the best. While the versions with body colored wheels covers, and whitewalls, were the least attractive.
I agree, I like the wagon better, especially in Limited trim with leather seats, woodgrain and those “starfish” alloys like the one you found!
Edit: Just noticed the 4Runner in the background. Nice twofer!
It’s amazing how much the wagon extension improves the Pacer: it actually becomes a halfway-attractive, halfway-useful vehicle. I’d say it upgrades the Mirthmobile’s overall Mirth Rating from “Gut-Bustingly Hilarious” to a much more respectable “Mildly Amusing.”
The dismal mileage and lack of HP would guarantee the wagon was still not competitive even by 1976 standards — e.g. the windows still wouldn’t roll all the way down, making elbow-in-the-breeze driving impossible — but at least the Pacer would no longer give the impression of having been a car company playing a cruel prank on its customers.
They recognised the problem of the windows – the door trim is taller than the outside panel!
One of my favorite cars of all time. I love the oddball styling, which I think looks sleek and progressive for it’s time. I could delightfully study it’s details for hours. I consider most of the pacer’s neo-classical inspired contemporaries to be ugly.
These were a rare sight when I was a kid, but boy did I get excited when I spotted one! I’ll always have a spot in my dream garage for a pacer. I just need one of these and a gremlin X V8 to accompany my pinto. Then my car collection will be complete. (I know, I’m weird)
There is a red one just like a few blocks from me. Its a womans daily driver. And no its not the same one.
This might not be the time/place, but does anyone have any thoughts on the Equinox pictured (I figured there would be some sort of size comparison mentioned)? I’m thinking of buying a new one and would like some insight. A relative just bought one and loves it; a coworker bought one last year and hates it. Both “downsized/downgraded” and I would be also. Any thoughts? I’d love to hear.
A friend of mine downsized from an Enclave into an 4 cylinder and leather Equinox, he likes the mpg increase and the car overall is very nice.
I thought they seemed nice also, basic but nice. I love the Enclave but many people I know who have these Lambda(?) vehicles get 17/18mpg–that’s V8 territory. The Encore seems too small. I haven’t heard anything on the ‘Anthem’ lately…
The Lambda SUV’s are still heavy, they are almost as big if not just as big as a Tahoe/Yukon, my friend complained about the mpg, but he drove it hard. Around town they aren’t going to be that much better than a BOF SUV, what they do offer is great ease of driving and parking compared to a BOF SUV, plus more or the same interior space for less money.
It’s amazing how utterly normal the Pacer looks relative to the Corolla and Equinox. Weird.
IF one would to modernize a Pacer, which engine/tranny to use?
I would like some sort of 4 cylinder or v6 turbo diesel with lots of torque as Pacer is pretty heavy with all the glass and the shape really isn’t friendly to high speed. I would like the modified Pacer with lots of torque so it will feel light .. something like the VW turbo diesel I4 with 290 lb/ft torque or something like that.
I’d find a RX8 Drivetrain and swap that in. Probably not the most efficient or reliable setup but a modern rotary would be so fitting for a Pacer.
I know this will sound like a broken record, but SBC FTW! Those things fit everywhere, including places where rotaries once fit… Plenty of HP and torque, with fuel injection should yield plenty of power and fuel economy.
Any SBC and a 4 speed autobox would be what I’d go for. I bet there’s someone out there that makes swap kits for them, too…
the gold wagon one looks surprisingly nice, at least the wagon was a little bit less weird than the hatch.
i would like a gold pacer wagon with a jeep grand cherokee engine and chrome era consistent rims.
they don’t do golds as nice as this anymore, the golds on alot of these newer cars look a bit mustardish.