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It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?

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bygeorge
10/30/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
One can always rely on a little pussy to help sell a car, if all of its built-in attributes fail...
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Serious Mopar Jones- Incurable
10/30/08

@bygeorge: Nice, dude.
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Vipper Of Vipp
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
In '79 I was 13 and didn't have the $99 a month, so it would all have been academic to me. What I did have was a Suzuki dirt bike, and occasional access to Mom's year-old El Camino for running a mile up the road to buy eggs from the neighbor.

However even then I knew from a relative's experience that the Chevette was a reeking mass of shit.
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Serious Mopar Jones- Incurable
10/29/08

@Vipper Of Vipp: In '79 I was 3, hooning a neon-green Big Wheel. My parents never had a Chevette, but they did have several cars that cost $99- not a month, in total.
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Schm, enjoying his first desert winter. .
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
Wow, I didn't know that Bobcats sounded, so, feeble. Wouldn't last very long in the jungle. Then again, Mercury isn't exactly on the upswing. I say, small, fuel efficient kitty's for all!
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Rust-MyEnemy
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
It seems like the name Chevette was doomed from the start. The UK Vauxhall Chevette was a godawful piece of shit too. With a 1256cc pushrod engine. My friends Mum had one. She drove it over a railway crossing and all the side glass fell out.

Here's one, to act as a reminder in case somebody should try and sell you one as an "exotic import"...

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brandegee
10/29/08

@Rust-MyEnemyOnTour!: Wow, never saw one as a coupe!

I was quite small as a child. I know this because I once rode in a Chevette hatchback...in the way back. I think it was smaller than the parcel shelf in a Beetle, which is saying something.
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Serious Mopar Jones- Incurable
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
I don't even have to watch the ad- Chevettes were junk. I'd take the Zephyr longroof and make Bob Bondurant cry like a 9 year old girl.
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mechimike
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
I heard from someone "In the know" that the fully clapped-out Shitvettes, with power steering, A/C, and all the other goodies you could cram into the little shitbox, had a nasty habit of breaking crankshaft pullies. Apparently it was too much torque for all those accessories to be running off of the engine at once.

I drove two Chevettes, neither, thankfully, were mine. One belonged to a college roomate of mine, it was a blue 2 door automatic. It was slow, but at least it got crappy gas mileage. The other was a white 4 door automatic with only 29,000 miles on it, and this was but 5 years ago. It was someone's grandmother's car. I actually got it up to about 75 mph down one hill, and thought for sure I was going to die. Then I realized that if I did, I'd have died in a Chevette, and forever and ever that would be inscribed upon my tombstone.

Then I drove home as carefully as I could.
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LTDScott
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
Zephyr wagon fo sho.

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Mad_Science
10/29/08

@LTDScott, Porcubimmer pilot: I need you to stop posting pictures of Fox body derivatives.

You're going to send me into late-Malaise-Era 5.0 PCH in a big way.
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biasply
10/29/08

@LTDScott, Porcubimmer pilot: I have a strange sweet spot for these cars, brought on by an unkillable 78 'Mont I bought from a friend. I "rally-prepped" it myself with rear helper coils, hood pins, a piece of BBQ grill to replace the busted plastic one, and some gawdawful bright Hella ff1000 lights bolted to the front bumper. Tremendous hoonage ensued, including one occasion when a grizzled tow truck driver came to rescue me from an off-road excursion and quietly admonished me:

"Son, don't try to harvest corn with a Fairmont"
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Serious Mopar Jones- Incurable
10/29/08

@Mad_Science: The wagons are cool, but if was looking for a Zephyr DD/project, I'd have to go with:

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MushyHeirloom
10/29/08

@biasply: I've shot a '78 Fairmont wagon for DOTSBE... expect it as soon as Burly Mur'lee puts together the New England Edition.
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Mad_Science
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
Ads for wagons?

What parallel universe was this? Everyone knows wagons don't/can't/won't sell and it's definitely not worth wasting ad dollars on them.
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Van Sarockin, rogue trebuchet
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
Tough call, but I've got to go with the Chevette. The Zephyr's were some of the worst cars ever built. And a complete insult to their Lincoln forebearers. I should know, I used to have to do new car prep on them. Talk about jobs you're glad you no longer have...
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MushyHeirloom
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
Zephyrs go "meow"?
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Elhigh
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
The next year the Mercury Zephyr was renamed the Marquis (bullied and maligned little brother of the Grand Marquis). I had to drive a 1984 Marquis wagon for a summer. It stunk.

Literally. Evidently the previous owners had had epileptic children who went everywhere with full gallon jugs of milk and the kids had grand mal seizures at each stop light. The entire car, especially from the dashboard aft, stunk like days-old spitup from a colicky 6-month-old baby born to a woman you don't like.

From the dashboard forward, the car was merely wretched. The engine hated life and took every opportunity to die seriously. In its tenure with us however, it never managed to achieve the sweetest release, nagged to life at the sparkly end of jumper cables every once in a while and occasionally given the bitter heroic measures of Thrust Starting Fluid. That car introduced me to the miraculous powers of Thrust.

I hated that damned car.

Astounding. I've actually managed to remember a car that I never want to see again. Not even briefly.
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LTDScott
10/29/08

@Elhigh: Uh, no. The Zephyr continued until 1983.
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scroggzilla raids again
10/29/08

@Elhigh: So, your wagon had the "de Sade" option then?
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Elhigh
10/30/08

@SCROGGS!: Good one.
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Elhigh
10/30/08

@LTDScott, Porcubimmer pilot: You know, I knew that. Somehow in my head I decided the year in the headline was 1983. duhhh *wipes drool* This lapse of intelligence was brought to you by Wednesday Morning's Cold Coffee.
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Novaload
10/29/08

In reply to It's 1979. You Want The Chevette With Air Or The Zephyr Wagon?
Sure the Chevette had factory air, i.e. the air from the factory was in it.

Oh, you mean A/C? Sure. As long as you are on a downhill incline.
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dopplerd
10/29/08

@NovaloadMissesPolar: AKA a "decline."
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Novaload
10/29/08

@dopplerd: Not to be confused with a recline!
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