To British and European eyes, big American cars were rare and exotic iron, offering a combination of gargantuan dimensions, enormous displacement, and indulgent power that nothing on the other side of the Atlantic could match. In 1964, the British magazine Autocar tested a new 1964 Cadillac Coupe de Ville, greeting it with a mixture of respect and a lingering trace of awe.
This review falls into a category of vintage road tests that we could call “polite gawking.” You could buy a new Cadillac in the UK in the 1960s, but very, very few Britons could afford such a thing, and demand was small enough that the importers didn’t bother contriving a right-hand-drive conversion. No one reading Autocar in 1964, even industrial potentates like JCB founder Joseph Cyril Bamford (from whom the editors borrowed the test car), was looking to cross-shop a Coupe de Ville with a Humber Super Snipe or Daimler Majestic Major. On the other hand, almost no one reading American car magazines like Car and Driver or Motor Trend was really in a position to afford a new exotic sports car, which hasn’t stopped those from being cover-bait for decades — fantasy beats reality nine times out of ten.
The irrelevance of the Coupe de Ville to most British readers was emphasized by the price: £4,123 17s 3d in pre-decimal currency. At the time, the exchange rate of the USD to GBP was fixed at $2.80, so the British price was equivalent to a dizzying $11,547, or around 60 percent more than this identical car would have listed for in the U.S. — the consequence of international shipping, import duty, and UK purchase tax that was almost as punishing as the cost of feeding this beast on pricey British super-premium fuel. To put this price in perspective, the popular Ford Cortina 1500GT, which was considered a middle-class family sedan in Britain, listed for about £800 ($2,240) in four-door form.
1964 Cadillac Coupe de Ville / Bring a Trailer
At such lofty prices, the Cadillac invited comparisons with some local luxury models that offered a higher standard of Olde World craftsmanship. Autocar conceded:
While the detail body finish, inside and out, is not so meticulous as one expects of European equivalents, and under its bonnet the Cadillac really looks no neater nor better arranged than less pretentious American cars with big vee-8 engines, this must be related to its retail price which, in this country and with a stiff import duty included, is still far below what must be paid for the classiest home produce. Moreover, as a dynamic object it represents the highest standards attainable today in most important respects, as well as having several luxuries incorporated, or available as extras, that cannot yet be had at any price on European cars.
As expensive as this Cadillac was in the UK, it was not in Rolls-Royce territory: The Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud III Autocar had tested a year earlier cost £5,964 18s 0d ($16,701) with air conditioning and electric windows.
The 1964 Coupe de Ville had a new powertrain. For 1963, the familiar Cadillac 390 cu. in. (6,384 cc) V-8 had gotten a new shorter, lighter block; for 1964, it had been bored and stroked to 429 cu. in. (7,008 cc), boosting gross output by 15 hp and a whopping 50 lb-ft of torque. On the 1964 De Ville and Sixty Special, this was paired with the new Turbo Hydra-Matic transmission, giving much smoother shifts and better off-the-line performance. Motor Trend‘s test of a 1964 Sedan de Ville had managed 0 to 60 mph in just 8.5 seconds and the quarter mile in 16.8 seconds. While Autocar didn’t match the 0 to 60 mph time (their test car was after all borrowed from a wealthy private owner, so they might have been reticent about experimenting with drag strip-type staging techniques), their quarter mile ET was just 0.2 seconds off, and they managed an even higher top speed: a two-way average of 121.5 mph, to the 115 mph recorded in the MT test.
This kind of performance needed no apologies in the UK in 1964. The aforementioned Silver Cloud III, with a 380 cu. in. (6,230 cc) all-aluminum V-8 and the license-built version of GM’s older Dual-Range Hydra-Matic, was 1.1 seconds slower to 60 mph, 0.7 seconds slower through the quarter mile, and 5.7 mph slower flat out. About the only big British luxury car that could run with the Cadillac was the Jaguar Mark X, and then only with manual transmission. The Coupe de Ville was a match for a fair number of contemporary sports cars as well, at least in a straight line.
Attractively detailed, and far less plasticky than Cadillacs would become not too many years later / Bring a Trailer
As expected of an American luxury car, the Cadillac featured an assortment of gadgets and warning lamps seldom seen on British cars of the time, including the new Twilight Sentinel automatic headlight control system, but the true wonder was the Coupe de Ville’s fully automatic heating/air conditioning system (which Tom Halter has described in detail). Observed Autocar:
But of all the Cadillac’s contributions to motoring ease and well-being, the latest form of air-conditioning is surely the most outstanding. Called Comfort Control, it demands only that the driver selects an appropriate temperature on a small dial and slides a quadrant lever to Automatic, and a sensitive, all-electronic thermostatic device maintains that temperature, whatever the conditions outside. Indeed, one could set this where required on taking delivery of the car, and never need to fiddle with it thereafter.
Well into the 1980s, air conditioning was far from universal even on very high-end British and European cars, and as owners in hotter climates can attest, its power and sophistication often left much to be desired. For 1964, fully automated Comfort Control system was a dazzling luxury.
Comfort Control Air Conditioning and Heating System was a new Cadillac option for 1964, listing for $495 in the U.S. / Bring a Trailer
As the first page mentioned, the last Cadillac Autocar had driven was a 1961 Series 75, whose size made it rather like driving a parade float. The Coupe de Ville was still enormous — four and a half feet longer than a Ford Cortina — but the editors found it relatively easy to manage:
While some of the larger American cars are still somewhat unwieldy and not much fun to drive on British roads, memory of the giant Cadillac limousine tested in 1961 was still sufficiently fresh to remove any qualms about handling this considerably smaller 1964 coupé. Of course, it felt enormous at first, after stepping straight from a small British saloon, but the outward visibility is practically panoramic through the deep windows and over the boot and bonnet, which are so low that the road surface can be seen within a yard or two of the car.
Like the Autocar tester, this Coupe de Ville has cloth-and-leather upholstery / Bring a Trailer
Interior comfort went almost without saying:
Electric controls shift the bench front seat (with divided backrest) to and fro, and raise, lower or tilt it. These ready adjustments, together with the variable steering-wheel rake, should enable almost any driver to combine an easy, relaxed posture with a proper field of vision. On a long run the ability to change one’s driving position slightly from time to time helps combat fatigue and cramp; ideally, the Cadillac could do with one more adjustment—for varying the backrest angle relative to the cushion, to exercise the spine. The seats are very comfortably shaped and sprung, trimmed in an attractive cloth weave with leather panels, and provided with centre folding armrests front and rear. There is plenty of legroom behind, and easy room for three abreast.
Lots of room, but Autocar feared that getting at the spare tire (towards the front of the compartment) “would represent quite a problem” / Bring a Trailer
Given the ample power, the editors were thoroughly impressed with how effortlessly it was delivered:
From cold start to hot stop the big vee-8 engine is a paragon of unobtrusiveness, with a surge of instant power always in reserve. One comes to regard it as an almost silent source of energy, like electricity, that one can switch on or off and regulate at will. It seems scarcely conceivable that some 340 b.h.p. are being developed beneath the bonnet by such violent means as internal combustion. … In top this car can exceed 120 m.p.h., still with very little mechanical fuss or other disturbance.
With air conditioning, a 1964 Cadillac had a 3.21 axle rather than the standard 2.94, giving sharper acceleration and gearing that was a tad busy compared to Cadillacs of later eras: about 23.5 mph per 1,000 rpm, compared to a sleepy 35.8 mph/1,000 rpm for the 1979 Eldorado. It wasn’t really noticeable except when watching the fuel gauge, where the cost of all that seamless power became all too clear.
Big, but relatively graceful and effortlessly powerful / Bring a Trailer
Autocar explained:
At our overall figure of 10-9 m.p.g. on super premium fuel the Cadillac de Ville covers only 40 miles or so per pound sterling in this country, which is somewhat costly motoring one-upmanship; it becomes much more logical when the car’s capacity is fully employed. With a 21½-gallon tank capacity the safe touring range is, say, 200 miles when the car is driven hard. Some discretion with the throttle pedal, resisting the temptation to display the car’s accelerative powers at every opportunity, naturally extends this range considerably.
Their mpg figures are Imperial, and translate into a harrowing 9.1 miles per U.S. gallon over 929 test miles. (Motor Trend had averaged “slightly better than 13 mpg” over 2,000 miles with the air conditioning running.) I don’t have average British petrol price stats close at hand, but a fuel cost of £1 ($2.80) per 40 miles would indicate a price of around 64¢ per U.S. gallon, which I think was about twice the average gas price in the States at that time. A very expensive way to travel, and even thirstier than the Silver Cloud III, which had managed only 10.2 miles per U.S. gallon in Autocar hands despite being almost 500 lb lighter and a fair bit less powerful than the Coupe de Ville.
The new-for-1964 429 had 340 gross horsepower and 480 lb-ft of torque / Bring a Trailer
Autocar lamented that the Cadillac 429 engine was “a somewhat intimidating spectacle with no aesthetic appeal.” I would have to agree: This was an impressive engine in many respects, compact in size and surprisingly light despite its enormous displacement and output (its dry weight was only 595 lb), but to look at it, it was just another big V-8 lump. You can tell that nobody at Cadillac since the early ’30s had given much thought to the idea that someone might want to pop the hood just to show off the machinery. A pity, even at lower American prices.
Autocar was surprisingly complimentary about the Coupe de Ville’s road manners:
It has been said often before that when it comes to driving them the best big cars feel much smaller than they appear. This is certainly true of the Cadillac, a major contributor being the power-assisted steering. This combines the virtue of requiring very little physical effort despite relatively high gearing by American standards (3.8 turns of the wheel lock to lock), with outstanding precision and sensitivity. There is no perceptible lag in response, particularly for self-centring, and the car is extremely stable at high speeds, being scarcely affected by side gusts. It is much less of an embarrassment than one might expect in average country lanes; if they are very narrow, however, one must be prepared to stop instantly, due to the car’s width.
However, they had some reservations about the ride:
On normal roads the low-rate suspension is very soft and comfortable, while providing excellent stability for rapid cornering, without heeling over much. It provides the essentially “boulevard ride” expected of this type of car, which is not at its best over rough stuff. Once or twice it was “caught out” by a succession of waves or bumps on a public road, bad ones causing quite a build-up of pitch and wallow. Nor was it any too happy over the washboard and pavé surfaces at the MIRA proving grounds, but these are special circumstances that cannot take precedence over the car’s usual habitat, where it would be difficult to better for restful motoring.
1964 Cadillac Coupe de Ville was 223.5 inches long on a 129.5-inch wheelbase / Bring a Trailer
The editors reserved their harshest criticism for the brakes, which they found easily overtaxed, remarking:
If the U.S. manufacturers were faced with our road conditions, coupled with the general freedom from speed limits outside built-up areas, no doubt they would provide their cars with brakes to suit. As it is, these are still the weakest feature and the Cadillac can be acknowledged only as better than most of its compatriots in this respect. One quick stop from maximum speed stretches their capacity to the limit, and fast driving over give-and-take roads can fade them out quickly until one learns to use them as little as possible, holding them ready to meet any sudden emergency.
Looking at the specifications, you can see that Cadillac had really reached the practical limit for drum brakes. The 1964 Cadillac braking system had big finned drums (12 inches by 2.5 inches front and rear), a dual-circuit hydraulic system, and front splash shields (which Autocar found reassuringly effective in preventing the brakes from being washed out temporarily by deep puddles). However, a swept area of 378 square inches was marginal for a 5,000-pound car. It’s too bad Cadillac lagged behind some U.S. rivals in adopting disc brakes; the big four-wheel ventilated discs added to the Corvette for 1965 would have been a great improvement.
Autocar noted, “Since 1959 the famous fins have been clipped down year by year,” but fins they still unarguably were in 1964 / Bring a Trailer
Not too many years later, British testers probably couldn’t have resisted making some snide remarks about the Cadillac’s extravagance and perceived engineering shortcomings, but this review contains almost none of the condescension found in the earlier road test of the 1962 Ford Thunderbird by the German magazine Auto, Motor und Sport. Despite their test car’s enormous thirst and mediocre brakes, Autocar came away genuinely impressed, concluding that “behind all the sophisticated gadgets for gracious motoring and the flashing performance of this great car, the hardware’s just as good as ever” — the tail end of the era in which Cadillac really did represent the Standard of the World.
Related Reading
Vintage MT Road Test: 1964 Cadillac Sedan DeVille – The Fastest And Best Classic Cadillac (by Paul N)
Carshow Classic: 1964 Cadillac Sedan DeVille Four Door Hardtop – Every Car Has A Story, But Some Are Just Better Than Others (by Spridget)
The Inflation Adjusted Prices Of New Cadillac Coupe DeVilles (1949-1993) And In Price Per Pound – The True Cost Of A Cadillac Over The Decades (by Paul N)
COAL#2: 1964 Cadillac Convertible (by Jose Delgadillo)
Cold Comfort: The History of Automatic Climate Control (by Tom Halter)
I have read this exact test before, and it really highlights just how far behind all those European makers were on comfort and convenience at the expensive end of the market, in fact, not even close to being of the US Cadillac-level standard. A hard-seated roary-six-cylindered power-assist-less top-line Mercedes 300SE was an emporium of punishment next to the Caddy, and even a Grosser 600 didn’t have a/c nearly as good.
However and however.
Autocar had not not yet suffered the insults of the Australian car-journo invasion, which was soon to take over CAR magazine to this day, which such revolt changed Pommy motoring journalism for good (and in my view, for good, in the other sense of improving the breed). That is, this review of the grand Caddy contains practically all of the polite qualifiers that one could fit within one’s word limit, which is how the Brit press then operated. One needs only to re-read the quoted words regarding this grand US 2-door pile’s encounters with pesky bumps: between the excuses, one can JUST detect the fact that the thing has crapulously useless dampers! To be clear, they made similar declensions for domestic failures too. (“It is only only in rare circumstances that the Ford Popular will fall over upon cornering, and even though it occurred to our tester on fourteen occasions during the test period, the driver’s injuries required only minimal stays at a reputable hospital.”)
And it must also be observed that it would be a bit declasse to knock the personal car of Mr JCB himself (Conservative, and father of a recent huge backer of Brexit et al). Borrowers cannot be choosers, what what.
Still, it remains a fascinating historical artefact, this test, and is well-worth reading. If nothing else, it shows that the over-sized American car of parody had some inherently good engineering, and, sized sensibly, it might have one day made a really good car altogether (though of course, that day never eventuated).
*declinations, not declensions!
Justy, as I didn’t know what a declension is, I supposed it would be a declination….and there it was in my thesaurus. So, perhaps you were less erring than you thought.
The consistent impression I’ve gotten of Cadillacs of this vintage is that there wasn’t anything terribly wrong with the handling that firmer damping wouldn’t have mitigated. I’ve dealt with other softly suspended cars (albeit generally not quite so gargantuan) that were of a similar nature: They weren’t scary or treacherous, but some kinds of bumps and road surfaces would prompt a series of relatively polite but firmly worded letters of protest from the chassis. In terms of potential hazard, I would be more worried about the prospect of running out of brakes.
Aside from not wanting to offend JCB, I suppose the other question about borrowing a privately owned car was what sort of condition the dampers were in. Stock shock absorbers didn’t have a terribly long life (built by the lowest bidder, etc.), and their performance — not great to begin with — tended to deteriorate further with wear.
As I mentioned in another thread on CC, my father bought a 1967 Cadillac and immediately had the OEM shock absorbers replaced with Monroe-matics and the bias ply tires with B. F. Goodrich radials. I was too young at the time to understand or appreciate the difference, but Dad was most impressed with the upgrade. It may have been the best handling Cadillac in town.
US manufacturers typically installed an “export” suspension with higher rate springs and heavier duty shocks, for obvious reasons. One would have to do some digging to confirm absolutely that Cadillac did that to all of theirs (including this car). But it seems to have been pretty universal.
But if you arent in an export market for that brand you get the regular US car picked from the dealers lot and shipped, which is how a lot of US cars got to NZ or they were troop imports to the Deep Freeze base then sold here at a vast profit,
Thanks for this test! As the former owner of a 1963 model, I think the testers were pretty much on the mark about the car’s capabilities. These had very few faults, although they were clearly engineered for American conditions and not for those of England – particularly with the brakes.
I have heard from more than one source that the 1964 with the 429 was a bit of a gas hog compared to the 1963 390. Thinking about it, I wonder if part of that was the modern THM compared to the old 4 speed HM, which had been an unusually efficient unit, though at the cost of smoothness.
The Cadillac of this era was a uniquely capable car that did almost everything well – at least everything for a car weighing 5,000 pounds with dimensions that seem almost cartoonish today.
The TH400 did lose the split torque function of the older Hydra-Matic in third and fourth, which I assume cost a little in cruising efficiency. On the other hand, adding 39 cubic inches was not free, particularly when paired with the higher numerical air conditioning axle ratio.
Another contributor to its thirst would probably have been the automatic climate control, which I don’t think had any equivalent of the “Economy” mode added in the ’70s. Depending on the weather conditions, I assume the compressor might be running quite a lot unless you turned the system completely off.
I think you’ve mixed up your Silver Ghosts and Silver Clouds…
Aaaack, asleep at the switch. (What’s especially embarrassing is that I had the Silver Cloud III road test in front of me while writing this.) Fixed now!
Road test or not, Cadillac WAS awesome then. Standard of the WORLD. How the mighty have fallen. What Cadillac and most other manufacturers build NOW is IMO totally CADILLACKING. Well, that’s my sob (definitely NOT Saab) story.
1964 was just about peak Cadillac. The decline started around 1969, almost imperceptibly at first, but a decline it was. Starting then every year featured a bit more plastic and a little less refinement. By 1975 I would think a typical European would have difficulty differentiating it from a Chevy Caprice.
I was shocked to see blackwalls on the UK test vehicle – but then maybe the white wall “tyres” were deemed a wee bit too much for UK tastes. Definitely more practical though, and easier to clean – but many Cadillac owners didn’t buy this car for practicality and few were out washing it and scrubbing the white walls every weekend!
White wall tyres have never been that popular over here, granted the would work on this particular car but would look ridiculous on a contemporary British car. Equally you have the issue of availability, white wall tyres may have been available from a big city importer but with import duty they would have been very expensive. In the case of Mr Bamford for whom money was seemingly no object this would already be seen as a ‘flashy’ car (not necessarily a good thing at the time) maybe the normal tyres toned it down a little in his mind at least.
They are identified as Dunlops, most likely radials. That’s not what Cadillac was installing in the factory. Presumably the owner wanted an upgrade. Good call.
Back in the day it was common for new car owners to drive to the tire shop immediately after purchase and swap the tires out for better performing rubber. There was a thriving business of “new take offs” as well.
It was also common to swap out shock absorbers at the same time.
They were Dunlop Fort, which was the same brand Rolls-Royce specified, but it doesn’t look like they were radials.
It would be interesting to see that car without fins. Seems like Mitchell spent the Sixties trying to get his sea legs with Cadillac. They didn’t have the flair of Earl’s ’57 and earlier cars.
“Dipswitch”?
The British don’t dim their lights from high to low beam, they dip them.
On old British cars the reflectors actually lowered to dip the beam, vacuum powered, 1920s tech but the name stayed,
I wish I could say I remembered this road test, as at the age of seven I spent six months in England, and spent many hours poring through Autocar and The Motor at the local library. I do remember coverage of one American car in particular, the Galaxie 500 raced by Jim Clark – and winning, against Jaguars and Lotus Cortina’s. One classmate’s parents had an American car, a yellow Studebaker. They were not American expats. Although we were living in a pretty posh suburb west of London, I don’t recall seeing JCB’s Cadillac, or any other American cars for that matter.
How strange. The first American car I remember seeing here in Cornwall, Wadebridge to be precise, was a pale yellow Studebaker, a Hawk it think. At the time, the late seventies, personally imported cars had a Q suffix on the number plate, this car did not it had a pre suffix plate so must have been imported prior to 1963. An old couple got out so I wonder whether it had been bought new by them, unusual but not impossible. Autocar magazine of January 1955 lists Studebaker Distributers Ltd, Euston Rd, London NW1 as suppliers of new Sudebakers.
I was there in 1964, in Surrey. Maybe it was the same car!!
I wish I could remember more of my grandmother’s black ’64 Series 62 4 window. The interior was black and white as in the photo, but maybe not the same. The fender-top turn signal indicators and their chrome spears were cool. Years later, a friend’s white ’60 TBird triggered the memory of its long, horizontal hood in front of my low head.
Peak Cadillac, the new 429 coupled with the equally new Turbo 400, last year of the X-frame. I think the 429 also featured new cylinder heads. That article presents an interesting perspective.
Bramford’s empire is still going strong, one of the world’s largest manufacturers of construction equipment.
What memories. In 1964 I was 14 & and car crazy. One of the ranch neighbors 3 miles up our dirt road got a new 64 Sedan Deville. And it had the optional automatic temperature controll. Wow! The car was white with somewhat champagne brocade seats. The owner would let his daughter inlaw load up his grandkids & me to drive 40 miles to a drive in picture show. At least three times as I recall. I was in hog heaven. My family had always owned Fords & never had ridden in a Cadillac. In my mind I can still see the control adjuster for the auto temperature control. Pleasant memories.
Not to be nitpicky about a typically fine Aaron Severson article, but there was one easily available way for Cadillac to upgrade their drum brakes: Use the aluminum front drums as Buick and Lincoln were doing. Yes, the 1965/Corvette discs would have been even better, but IIRC there was concern about brake squeal, pad life, and the lack of an effective parking brake with all wheel discs. So that’s a little excuse, anyway.
But there would have been no downside to aluminum drums, other than a slight extra cost, would there? Do you suppose Cadillac felt they couldn’t be seen copying Buick?
I suspect that brake fade just wasn’t much of a priority for our flatlander, Midwestern-based car manufacturers. They certainly showed they could lead the world in heaters and defrosters!
Drum front brakes by this time were only fitted to low powered cheap editions of British cars, 1965 saw then as standard fitments on most cars with any hint speed in them but radial tyres took longer to become OEM fitment.
At the risk of skewering some sacred cows, the Buick brakes had about 57 square inches less swept area than the heavier Cadillac. Using finned aluminum rather than finned cast iron front drums improved the front brakes’ heat dissipation ability somewhat, but the Buick brakes were not up to higher speeds either, as the German magazine Auto, Motor und Sport had found in their test of a 1963 Riviera months earlier: The Riviera couldn’t complete a single hard stop from 100 mph without the brakes fading so completely that there was essentially nothing left by the time the car had slowed to around 40–45 mph, and that was in a car 800 lb lighter than a Cadillac De Ville. As for Lincoln, the 1964 Continental (especially the heavier convertible) had alarmingly inadequate brakes even for American conditions, so that’s not what I would call a great role model in this area.
Cadillac’s drum brakes were quite substantial in diameter and swept area, but there was just too much mass, and aluminum front drums would have been only an incremental improvement.
I have always been a stickler for brakes, as I live in a hilly area. Drum brakes on a car this size is simply unsafe. The article mentions that the Caddy’s breaks were only good for one hard stop from speed. Holding hills with the transmission would be a requirement when driving on road like the Salmo-Creston highway.
GM, and the other US makers, waited far too long to introduce disk brakes.
Yes, I could never understand why American cars, being so powerful and so futuristic when it came to luxury gadgets, were so poor when it came to braking. Surely they could have pushed their suppliers to produce disc brakes in quantity years earlier than they did. Especially so for a luxury car like the Cadillac. Not that I ever read any old Cadillac tests back then, but Australian testers always complained about the braking abilities of American cars, and of the American-based locals in those days.
The difference between Dad’s drum-braked Falcon and my Cortina with power discs was night and day. Ten years later brakes were better still.
The primary reason by far is the same one why American cars were so big, so heavy, had so many power and convenience features and most of all were so softly sprung with weak shocks: they were specific and unique reflections of Americans’ driving habits, roads, cheap gas, low taxes and other priorities and tastes. Americans tended to tootle along at 60 or maybe 70, generally on the wide open and flat(ish) highways and freeways that covered most of the country. They prioritized comfort, convenience and a lot of car for the money. They spent a lot of time in their cars commuting, doing errands and just…driving to get almost everywhere. And they were in denial about safety.
These conditions were in most ways the polar opposite of Europe, where cars were driven mainly on weekends by the father to take an outing or to to prove his driving prowess in the mountains or on the autobahn/autostrada. They were a luxury item; no one who lived in a European city needed one. Almost totally different than in the US.
So Cadillac spent its money on automatic climate controls and such, and not on better brakes. They were…good enough.
Australia? A hybrid of the two. And clearly with more European-leaning expectations in terms of dynamic qualities.
FWIW, the early front solid disc brakes that were optional on American cars often weren’t much better than the drums. It took the development of low cost internally vented discs before they were really up to the task of a big American car.
I think American cars of that era reflected Detroit and Michigan more than the US as a country. Wide and flat with sweeping turns. Nothing like much of California with 4500 to over 7000 foot mountain passes, needing both brakes and taxing handling much more than Michigan. Much of it was the US preferences, but they really were much more fitting for Michigan than other parts of our country.
That’s largely true. But then the majority of CA drivers spent most of their time on freeways in the major metro area.
But of course CA drivers were the biggest buyers of imports, although that was more a reflection of their being open to new things than mountain driving in their VW.
It didn’t take Detroit that long. The earliest disc braked European car I could find in my digitized literature collection, as an example was a 1959 Jaguar, this at a time when discs were far from common, even in Europe. Many cheaper-Mercedes models had drums into 1964 or so, for example.
Furthermore, bottom shelf Golf-Rabbits had drums standard until 1975 or 76.
Studebaker offered front discs as standard on Avantis (optional on regular models) in 1963, only a 4 year lag.
Excluding the low-production 4-wheel disc equipped Corvette, Ford had them standard on ’65 Lincolns and T-Birds, optional on Mustangs. They became optional across the Ford line in 1967. My dad had a ’67 LTD so equipped.
By 1968, Ford made them standard on any model equipped with power brakes.
Chrysler had them optional across the board by 1966. GM was the laggard here,
not Ford or Chrysler. Now, I admit they WERE an option, and many, perhaps the majority of cars didn’t have them. That’s a failure of whomever ordered the cars, whether dealers or individual customers. That was on them, not the manufacturers. $90 or so was hardly a princely sum, even back then.Of course ,they became standard in short order and front drums were extinct in Detroit by1975.
To this day I still say that the 1964 Cadillac is the finest car that I have ever rode in.
This was the peak of the Detroit auto industry. The Mustang arrived the same year, and its success taught the Big-3 that customers didn’t care about engineering. The Mark III reinforced that lesson.
Thinking the door on this “coupe’ ” weighs as much as many of the ((too many)) cars I’ve owned.
The British equivalent of the US Interstate highway system, the Motorway officially opened in 1959 with a speed limit of 80 mph. At the time, very few of their home-market cars could even get to 80 mph. Even if they did make it to 80 mph, they did not last long at that sustained speed. Only Jaguar, Aston Martin, Austin Healey with overdrive, and Rolls-Royce & Bentley were capable of it without destroying their engines. Most American cars of the day with V8’s had no issues maintaining 80 mph, regardless of the make. I can see the President of JCB wanting a Cadillac for effortless cruising on the Motorways at the time, especially with Cruise Control, a feature Rolls-Royce didn’t get until 1973 or so. The fully automatic Comfortron HVAC would have been an added bonus for the owner, and genuine GM invention that was either licensed to others, or copied.
The first British Motorway was the Preston Bypass opened in December 1958, it was a full 8 miles! The M1 opened in 1959, there was no speed limit until December 1965 when 70mph was introduced as a ‘temporary’ safety measure. 70mph still stands as the limit for motorways, except where it’s a ‘smart’ motorway with traffic cameras which usually post a lower limit.
In the small print it says that the tyres were Dunlop Fort 8.00×15, so about an inch narrower than the tyres fitted to my 899cc Dacia. But even more shocking, those 40 miles that cost £1 petrol in the Cadillac cost me £5 in the Dacia 60 years later.
Yes, they were pretty darn good cars. The best new car makes the best used car.