AMC Pacer

(Photo by ic21985)

Unlike the Citroën DS in the previous post, which undoubtedly is a beautiful car, the AMC Pacer may be argued about.
Many things were special about this car.
As an answer to a growing demand for compact cars, AMC created the "first wide small car" (original advertisment slogan) in 1975. Despite only being 4,32 metres long, the Pacer was 1,98 metres wide, which lead to unusual proportions. The very high amount of glass (37% of the exterior) further contributed to the extraordinary appearance, as well as the passenger's door being 10 centimeters longer than the door on the driver's side.
Another speciality had originally been planned for the Pacer, but the intended use of a Wankel rotary engine foundered on emission regulations in the USA. Therefore, the only "strange" engine available was a 5.0l V8 introduced in 1978.
Unlike this oversized engine, the versions with six cylinders sold quite well, although they also consumed quite a lot of fuel for the size of the car. This was largely due to AMC attaching importance to safety features causing a high weight.
Today, the AMC Pacer is increasingly popular as a collectors' car. A well preserved example can be seen right below the one in an extremely sorry condition here:

(Photo by 731132)


(Photo by pontfire)