Wow that is pretty cool. Sad that the Bel-Air had to be wrecked for it though.
I often think of this video while tooling around town in my 1958 Chevy wagon. I think about it more when towing a trailer with said car at 60 MPH on the highway to Burning Man.
late stage capitalism
If you’re rich enough to go to Burning Man, you’re rich enough to buy a new Malibu!
Progress in engineering beating nostalgia and good old common sense solutions like throwing more metal at a problem? That can’t be right.
Thank you Ralph Nader!
Sooner or later
You’re gonna listen to Ralph Nader
I don’t wanna cause a fuss
Oh, but fast cars are so dangerous
Fast cars
Fast cars
Fast cars
I hate fast cars, fast cars
Buzzcocks - Fast Cars
I suspect it’s the lack of the Malibu’s newness that might appeal to @nixiebunny, and it’s penchant for crushing its faithful driver in an accident that worries him. Plus, a lot of people would be amazed what a vintage Chevy wagon in roadworthy condition sells for, if you can find one for sale. It’s not like they’re rolling off the assembly line.
I thought I somewhere saw a video of Smart vs <something HUGE>. don’t find it, though.
But here’s another nice one: Small Renault vs a Volvo estate car, the latter is not as old as the Chevy in the OP but has still no chance against modern cars.
The Volvos were fondly called Swedish tanks here, but they didn’t age gracefully : )
The fuzzy dice on the BelAir is a nice touch. But it makes me weep a bit that they wrecked an nice old car.
True, that. We have a couple Priuses, but they don’t tow the trailer very well, and they cost several times what a trip to Burning Man or a 1958 Chevy costs. Plus, the car is a big hit there. There is a constant stream of geezers giving us crap for taking such a rare, beautiful old car to Burning Man. They seem to forget that the 1958 Chevy wagon was the ugly soccer-mom car of the sixties.
I saw a picture of one that had been stopped behind a semi when another semi rear-ended them at speed. You could see a couple little pieces sticking out from between - just enough to tell there used to be something there. I don’t think even a first generation Hummer would have survived that though.
You can actually take any car with cabin air filters to BRC with minimal to no consequences. Just close it up tight when you get there and don’t open it for any reason. Take spare cabin and engine air filters with you and swap ‘em when you leave. Drive with the windows down as much as possible on the way back. When you get home run it through the car wash a couple of times then take a few gallons of WD40 in a garden sprayer with a long wand and spray the beejezez out of the undercarriage, engine compartment etc. Then take it to a professional detailer for the interior. Et voila’! Like it was never there…
Hummer H2 .vs. Ford F150 (I think?)
I hear the H3 is even crappier.
Also at least some credit also goes to Robert McNamara, who pushed now-standard automotive safety features like seatbelts during his tenure at Ford even when the market wasn’t interested in what he was selling.
Of course he also had a big hand in causing untold thousands of deaths during his tenure as Secretary of Defense, so his legacy is a bit more mixed than Nader’s.
And Robert McNamara, which is so weird. But, after World War II he was one of the driving forces inside Ford to deal with steering columns impaling drivers and adding seatbelts. His theory was that car manufacturers would want to keep their customers alive to buy a new car.
If you get a chance to see Errol Morris’ The Fog of War I highly, highly recommend it.
My parents had a '60 Bel Air when I was growing up, so it’s a bit had to see a '59 be demolished like that. I really have to wonder where they found a solid, rust-free '59, though. Those 59-60-61 Chevys were terrible rust buckets, especially around the headlights and the front wheelwells.
