QOTD: What’s Your Favorite Automotive “Forbidden Fruit”?

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– Posted on December 24, 2024
Press rear 3q of a gray 1990 Eunos JC Cosmo coupe

1990 Eunos Cosmo / Mazda Motor Corporation

 

Once upon a time, before automotive type approval standards began to converge, each major automotive market offered some unique products that were strictly for local consumption, and which were not (and in many cases could not legally) be exported to the U.S. Being off-limits, these “forbidden fruit” have come to occupy an outsize place in the enthusiast imagination, bolstered by film and TV appearances and video games like the Gran Turismo series, which made stars of cars many players would never see in real life.

I’m sure many CC readers have strong opinions in this area. Here are some of mine.

Mk1 Ford Escort Twin Cam

For many Americans and Canadians, it may come as a surprise to learn that there were two rear-wheel-drive generations of the Ford Escort before the more familiar FWD Mk3 car turned up on these shores in the fall of 1980. The Mk1 Escort, which went into production in the UK in late 1967, was one of Ford of England’s customary exercises in aggressive cost optimization, but it was decent fun to drive, and the up-spec models could be reasonably pleasant for a modest price. It was a big hit in the UK, and competitive in the European C-segment. Ford considered bringing it to the States, but opted for the larger Pinto instead.

Front 3q view of a white 1969 Ford Escort Twin Cam two-door sedan

1969 Ford Escort Twin Cam / Manor Park Classics

 

Since the Mk1 Escort was RWD and shared the same Anglia/Kent engine family as the Cortina, Ford of England wasted little time stuffing the related 1.6-liter Lotus Cortina twin-cam engine under Escort hoods. This wasn’t just an engine swap — Ford upgraded the body shell, the drivetrain, the suspension, the brakes, and the wheels to cope with the extra power. A Mk1 Escort Twin Cam had 109.5 net horsepower against a curb weight of less than 1,900 lb, and unlike so many sporty Fords of this era, you could tell it was developed by engineers rather than product planners: It drove and handled like a sedan racer (and could be made into one with little difficulty), but it could easily be mistaken for a rental-car-grade Escort 1100L, with the slightly flared wheel arches the principal giveaway.

Lotus DOHC engine in a white 1969 Ford Mk1 Escort Twin Cam

The famous 1,558 cc Ford-Lotus DOHC engine / Manor Park Classics

 

There were several hot Mk1 Escorts sharing this same “Type 49” uprated shell and running gear, including the 16-valve Cosworth-powered RS1600, but the Twin Cam, which was only produced through June 1971, seems the one to have, even though on this side of the Atlantic, you’d be constantly having to explain what it was.

1968 Ford UK ad showing a B&W photo of a Mk1 Escort hanging its tail out on a muddy rally course, with the headline, "The Escort Twin Cam: The fastest thing on Ford wheels"

Cover of the 1968 brochure / Ford Motor Company

Porsche 959

I’ve never been all that fond of Porsches: The 944 was closest to being my speed, but the apologism for the older cars’ trailing throttle snappishness and various eccentricities puts me off, and the newer models have too much Posh Lifestyle Brand baggage, even without touching on a certain misbegotten SUV and exceptionally ugly sedan.

Overhead view of a silver 1988 Porsche 959

1988 Porsche 959 / Simon Clay via Classic Driver

 

The rare Porsche 959 is another matter. Conceived as a street-worthy Group B homologation special, it was high-tech back when that was still novel: sequential twin turbos, computer-controlled full-time four-wheel drive, ABS, double-wishbone suspension with electronic shocks and hydraulic ride height control, plus of course 450 PS DIN. The 959 was also a product of the era in which high-end German auto engineering still accepted no excuses. What makes the 959 so impressive to me is not that it was fast or sophisticated, but that it did almost everything astoundingly well, including being reasonably comfortable and compliant on regular roads. (The “Comfort” spec cars even had air conditioning.) Also, while its relationship to the 911 series is hard to miss, it looks different enough to make it immediately clear that it’s not just another Carrera — even in places like Los Angeles, where Porsches are not what you could call rare.

Rear 3q view of a silver 1988 Porsche 959

1988 Porsche 959 / Simon Clay via Classic Driver

 

Since the Porsche 959 was common wall poster fodder in its heyday, it’s perhaps a bit cliché, but unlike a Lamborghini Countach or Ferrari F40, it’s an exotic dream car that wouldn’t leave you wondering where all the money went if you had a chance to drive one in the real world.

Eunos Cosmo

One of the ultimate exponents of the Japanese bubble economy was this slick high-end Mazda personal luxury coupe, built from 1990 to 1995 and sold exclusively in the Japanese domestic market (JDM) through the short-lived Eunos sales channel. Known as the JC Cosmo, from its chassis code, the Eunos Cosmo was the last descendant of Mazda’s first rotary-engine coupe, the Mazda Cosmo Sport, aimed at the kind of affluent Japanese yuppies who bought Toyota Soarers in the ’80s.

Press front 3q photo of a yellow 1990 Eunos Cosmo coupe

1990 Eunos Cosmo / Mazda Motor Corporation

Press rear 3q photo of a yellow 1990 Eunos Cosmo coupe

I don’t love the color or either of the stock alloy wheel designs, but this is nonetheless my kind of car / Mazda Motor Corporation

 

A little over half of JC Cosmo production actually had the two-rotor 13B engine, shared with the FD RX-7, but the real star of the show was the available twin-turbocharged Mazda 20B-REW engine. With a displacement of 1,962 cc, the three-rotor engine was officially rated at 280 PS, but the actual figure was probably more like 300 hp. It was mated exclusively to a four-speed automatic, since the Cosmo was pitched as a high-end luxury car, not a GT like the FD RX-7. The JC Cosmo chassis had less technological overkill than some JDM coupes of its time (no four-wheel steering, for instance), but LJK Setright called the three-rotor Cosmo “a magnificent drive” with “the ride of a large luxury car, but all the eagerness of a sportster.”

Free-standing Mazda 20B-REW three-rotor engine

Mazda 20B 3-rotor sequential twin-turbo engine / LA JDM

 

The final Cosmo made no pretense of fitting into Japan’s cheaper-to-own small car class, so its overall width of 1,795 mm (about 70.7 inches) is about 4 inches wider than most Japanese-market cars of its time, giving the big coupe a pleasing longer-lower-wider stance that doesn’t always come across in photos. I confess I’m not sold on the grille, which reminds me of the silly pencil-thin mustache that used to be David Niven’s trademark, but I love the wedge design. The beautifully finished interior featured showy electroluminescent instruments and an optional touchscreen control panel with the world’s first automotive GPS navigation system.

Press photo of the 1990 Eunos Cosmo dashboard with the main instrument panel illuminated

Plush leather, discreet wood trim, electroluminescent instruments, lots of toys; the padded panel in the center stack covers the touchscreen controls / Mazda Motor Corporation

 

I know that many JC Cosmo fans really want it to be a kind of Mazda Skyline GT-R (and a lot of the ex-JDM imports that have trickled into North America in the past decade smack of having been someone’s Gran Turismo DIY project), but for me, the appeal of the Cosmo is the promise of effortless rotary power in a car that looks and feels like it came from some late ’80s or early ’90s cyberpunk anime — something like Bubblegum Crisis or Ghost in the Shell, where characters have cybernetic implants, but still listen to music on compact disc — a stylish retro-future epic from an alternate timeline where the bubble economy went on forever.

Your Favorites

Having said all that, I again put it to the group: What’s some of your favorite forbidden fruit?

To keep everybody on the same page, to qualify as “forbidden fruit,” it needs to be a desirable car or truck model that was not offered in your market when new. You can also include desirable but unavailable versions of cars that WERE officially offered in your region (e.g., a Mercedes-Benz R107 450SL 5.0), or that only showed up in your region as gray-market imports, with no official factory support.