Sometimes, you see a car that’s really worth photographing. Unfortunately, sometimes it’s parked in a dingy, poorly-lit, underground parking lot. These are some of those sightings.
The Rapier was the Sunbeam edition of the Rootes Group’s Audax line of cars, also sold under the Commer, Singer and Hillman marques. The Audax cars had been styled with the help of Raymond Loewy’s design firm, thus explaining the resemblance to the famously beautiful 1953 Studebaker coupes. The Rapier was intended to be the sportiest of the Audax cars and was available only as a two-door coupe or convertible.
These were manufactured from 1956 to 1967 and the mild revisions along the way make it hard for me to pin down an exact year. I believe, though, this is a 1958-59 Series II, powered by the Rallymaster 1.5 four-cylinder which produced 73 horsepower.
I’m not sure what the story is behind the tail affixed to the bumper. The Sunbeam Rapier was based on the Hillman Minx, after all, not the Hillman Mink.
This is a VN Commodore wagon, manufactured from 1988 to 1991. I’ve shared with you the story of how Holden heavily reengineered the Opel Omega A/Vauxhall Carlton to make the Commodore and how this was Holden’s first application of the Buick 3.8 V6. These VNs are quite scarce nowadays, largely following the traditional trajectory of used Commodores and Falcons: initially owned by families and fleets, they’ll change hands a couple of times and then end up being hooned to death by bogans. You can generally gauge the depreciation of a Commodore or Falcon by its owners: once you start seeing guys with rat’s tails behind the wheel, you’ll know the car has depreciated as far as it can.
I knew someone around twelve years ago who still had one of these VNs, which were becoming rare even then. Australian cars’ build quality wasn’t exactly spectacular in the late 1980s and early 1990s and even the Japanese, bar Toyota, had issues with quality control. This lady had gotten many years of faithful service out of her VN but it was ageing poorly with numerous cosmetic issues. The worst, by far, was the sagging headliner which made the cabin look like a Moroccan harem (albeit trimmed in dull gray mouse fur). It drooped lower than any headliner I’d ever seen droop.
This is the only Mitsubishi i-MiEV I’ve ever seen in person. Its rarity can be chalked up to two reasons: it looks like a background vehicle in some 1990s sci-fi film, and it was extremely expensive. The i-MiEV was really a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it affair here and I doubt many people even realize it was sold here. Until Tesla, we weren’t really big on electric cars. What little demand there was for them earlier this decade shifted to the far more, well, normal Nissan Leaf.
Our Brendan Saur will probably be able to use his encyclopedic knowledge of BMW paint colors to tell us this 4-Series’ shade. Truly a stunning color, even in the ghastly lighting of an undercover parking lot.
I don’t have any more to say about the final generation of Toyota Celica that I haven’t already said, other than this car looked so much better without a rear spoiler. This angle best shows off the daring, angular, concept car lines. Hell, this is probably the only photo where the parking lot lighting doesn’t look that bad.
Well, there we have it. A bunch of cars I wish I’d seen literally anywhere else but instead had the misfortune of seeing in a parking lot. Now I think it’s time for a walk around the neighborhood to hopefully spot some Curbside Classics in the clear light of day.
Cool assortment, Will! I like the Studebaker Hawk-esque frontal styling of the Sunbeam Rapier. It also looks so tiny compared to the other cars parked around it. This is opposite my personal experience with cars of its vintage, that often seem larger / taller than cars of today.
I would say the side trim and fin treatments are riffs off the Hawks as well like this 57 Silver Hawk.
Don’t forget that the Audax range (Minx, Rapier and Singer Gazelle) were styled by Raymond Loewy
Explains everything! Thanks, Roger.
The Rapier adopted the square grille in February 1958 when the s.II came out. For it’s day the 58″ high Rapier would have looked quite a low car (excepting roadsters and the like) but as in the US the general trend was for lower rooflines over the next decade or so, some saloons even going just below 52″.
The Ford Pinto was exactly 50″ tall (52″ for wagons) and I think it was the lowest car ever marketed as a sedan (the Chevy Vega notchback and wagon were 52″ and the hatch 50″ but it was always referred to by GM as a hatchback coupe)
It helps (or doesn’t help, depending on your perspective!) that it is surrounded by SUV’s, a Honda Odyssey in front of it, and the 5th car in front and to the left looks like a tall-ish Mazda 121 ‘bubble’ car from the early 1990s.
The wheelbase is 96″, length approx 160″ and width 60″; small by today’s standards, but ‘family car’ sized in Britain at the time.
I would be parking as far away as possible from other cars in one of those!
Haha, the color of that BMW 430 is quite literally called “Mint Green”. It’s a BMW Individual color – and obviously special order only and very extra cost.
I suppose “very” enough to convince most customers who like it to go for plain white or German Leasing Silver and get a wrap…
Ordering an Individual color adds significant time to the build process, and most Individual colors have a special finish.
From the dealer perspective, more outlandish colors will ultimately lower the car’s resell-ability and thus resale value when the car is traded or turned in. There’s a much narrower demographic of buyer looking for Mint Green than there is Alpine White 🙂
The Rapier is a series III – the wider rear numberplate trim is the distinguishing feature. The s.IIIa is almost identical, but the door trim with the three horizontal pleats above the chrome trim were replaced with a plain finish on IIIa. That makes the date 1959-61. The s.I Rapier was actually the first ‘Audax’ model to appear in late 1955, some month’s beforer the more mundane Minx.
I like the extra width on the VN compared to the Carlton. Still the same, neat and smooth shape overall otherwise.
I love those Audax cars. This one (the hardtop body and those great colors) is one of the coolest we have seen here.
Fantasy garage material for me!
Whether finned or skinned of the fin, they are to me the only fine-looking Audax. The wagon gets a look-in, but I’m afraid the sedan is a bit of a frump. Sorry, kiwibryce.
I’d have the first model, unfinned, with the last model’s mechanicals for some go. And some stop.
Attaching a raccoon tail to one’s car was a fad among hot rodders back in the day. I’m sure that’s what the Rapier’s owner was going for. Typically the tail would be attached to the antenna, but I’m not sure that car actually has an antenna, so the rear bumper is probably the next best thing. That actually doesn’t look like a raccoon’s tail, either, but do you even have raccoons in Australia?
At first glance I thought it was a faded “Got A Tiger In Your Tank” give away promotion gift from the Esso (nee Exxon) gas stations of the early/mid 1960’s.
“Back in the day” in this case was pre-WWII. It started as a collegiate fad in the 1920s and petered out by the 1940s – right around the time hot-rodders started putting fuzzy dice on their cars instead. Kinda anachronistic on a 1960s Sunbeam.
“anachronistic”?
Well, it IS attached to a British car…..
🙂
The Queen has been informed. She was not amused 😉
No raccoons, it’s probably a fox tail.
Nah, brush-tailed possum. Big, fat, scratchy, angry bastards, massive tail on them. They’re everywhere, and they’re also protected.
They have a habit of “hitching” a lift from cars that were parked near trees, so this sight is not entirely uncommon downunder. I’ve even seen it on freeways. You get used to it.
The VN Commodore has got to be the most generic-looking car ever made, bar none…
Especially in wagon form.
The production Anonymous Car.
When photos first appeared in ’88, I mistook them for those of unfinished mules.
Forgetable they were, but their nastiness was memorable. Flimsy. Crap-handling. Shocking NVH. 2Dollar Shop interiors, (where they REALLY looked like an incomplete mock-up). Bad paint, gappy assembly. (Very irritatingly, they were also memorably reliable, reliably economical and in ’88, unforgetably quick – the last being their only point of any actual memorability – but not becuase of this absolved from the rest of their mortal sins which remain unforgotten).
Their memorable awfulness is now as forgotten as their forgetable forgetableness, which makes the rare sight of one now seem memorable.
But when I really think about it not really.
My Father bought a 4 year old Rapier (circa 1962??) for his “Go To Work” car. Dad recalled it as being a short, nimble car with quick (for the time period) steering and super easy to parallel park in the narrow, congested streets of the French Quarter here in New Orleans.
Dad had it for all of 3 months……until my Mother drove it and decided that it was going to be “her” car. She recalls it as being “sporty” and unique looking; quite the change from the heavily finned station wagons that prowled the streets of our “The Dick Van Dyke Show” suburbs.
Dad said, ruefully: “Well, it WAS kinda slow for me.” What Mom wanted, Mom got.
The rapier would be a rare sight in a British shopping centre car park, indeed in a classic car rally arena.
That BMW colour is perhaps best described as ” challenging”
Perhaps the fur on the Rapier is the “mall mole” 🙂
The Sunbeam is behind a Honda I can’t identify. Anyone know what model that might be?
Previous-generation Odyssey, the “global” model sold outside of North America. I wrote about it here:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cc-capsule/cc-capsule-2004-08-2008-13-honda-odyssey-worlds-sexiest-minivan/
Ah, and I was thinking maybe it was some sort of Accord station wagon not available here in the States. Although in a way I guess the Odyssey sort of is an Accord wagon.
It seems Bowie Maryland is ground zero for Mitsu iMiEV as they seem to be everywhere.
I would rock the mint green Bimmer.
‘I would rock the mint green Bimmer.”
+1 for sure on the Bimmer, I find the mint green much more attractive than the “German Resale Silver” that is found on 95% of the BMW’s on the road today. The local BWM/Mercedes/Porsche/Audi dealer is on a main thoroughfare about a mile from my house and I pass there frequently. It is a rare occurrence indeed when more than one of the cars in the front row is any color other than black, white or silver. I will admit to my current driver being triple black but, in my defense, it was purchased used.
I like the Rapier but you all knew that, they arent very common here but there seem to be more of them left than the garden variety Minx or Humber 80s, Those VNs were claimed to be quick in their day by some I had a little race with one up a long passing lane between Orange and Bathurst NSW the Commodore might have been near new but my 245 Centura blew its doors off the roar from the Buick V6 was very audible at 110 kmh when he stood on it beside me but by 160 he was in my mirror well behind, they werent great cars better than the previous effort but far from great.
Bryce, any man who has done 100mph+ in a six-cylinder Centura and – self-evidently – lived to write about it, is deserving of respect.
(For readers elsewhere, the Centura was the European Chrysler 180, a two-litre sized car but sold in Oz with a cast-iron 4 litre Chrysler “Hemi” six wedged in. It handled about as well as you’d think).
What a find that Sunbeam is.
I’ve been guilty of making quite a number of posts with ill-lit beauties in parking garages. Hey, the conditions are what they are. One must make the most of things, especially in the presence of a ’59 Rapier!