Chevrolet Corvair. Where did saving a FEW DOLLARS lead to? Engineering error.
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- Опубликовано: 8 авг 2022
- Look at this picture. You are looking at a typical American car. At least, at first sight. In fact, this is a notoriously unsafe Chevrolet Corvair, a Chevrolet made for ten years, from 1959 to 1969. The car was known for being extremely unsafe, the fact that it could flip over at any bad turn, and was prone to excessive skidding. This was due to the design of the car. This is what remains on the surface. In fact, everything is much deeper and more interesting. In this video, we will try to explain where exactly in the design there was a miscalculation, what was happening during turning, and what journalism has to do with it.
#chevrolet #corvair #history
Hi! Did you know about this engineering mistake? Did you deal with this car?
I recall the solid steering column pointed directly at your sternum:) Add in no engine in front.."staked"
I'm glad you told the truth. I have owned several Corvairs over the years. I currently have a 1966 monza. They are great cars and quite fast, but you better know how to drive.
So you're saying the Beetle made this mistake also. Same thing.
I detect a strong bias against GM from you. You're just repeating what Nader said without any knowledge of automotive engineering what so ever.
Very biased video!
@@pto200 ~ Well said. Thank you for that comment! The Corvair is still a great car.
If was a failure it was marketing’s not engineering.
I actually owned a Corvair and drove it for over 3 years. At no time did I ever experience any form of handling problem and felt perfectly safe in it. The idea that it was a death trap is a crock of sh*t.
The US government tested the early corvair in the early 1970s against its rivals and concluded the corvair was not unsafe. Ralph Nader was not an engineer or expert in anything automotive just a lawyer journalist
It rolled over which was finally fixed with a $15 stabilizer bar. Ralph Nader was late to the dance, there where many issues documented already before Nader book came out.
@@johnsradios484 I grew up with my mother driving her first Corvair a 1960 4 door. Her last corvair was a 1966 4 door with factory AC. They drove just fine. She never had a time where she thought the car was unsafe. The most unsafe thing about a car is the driver.
@@johnsradios484 Inflation has greatly distorted our present-day perception. Back in 1959, $15 was not an insignificant item in the production cost; the "bean counters" would rightly demand of engineering why the $15 stabilizer bar was a needed feature. Like anything else, a "cost vs. benefit" analysis would be made to determine if the feature should be included, as likely the sale price would have to be raised to compensate for it. Me, I would have included it and raised the price to cover the cost, as doing so, even in the face of a few lost sales to price-sensitive buyers, is a better risk to take than adverse publicity over a product PERCEIVED as unsafe, even if the perception is based on the slander of a technically ignorant homosexual with an socialist agenda.
This is not unlike the pontification involved in the 1988 movie, "Tucker: The Man and His Dream". Yes, the Tucker '48 (not the "Torpedo", that was an earlier design of Preston Tucker) did have a great deal of innovation, like a pop-out windshield and disc brakes...and, it very BADLY didn't meet its original sales price goal of $1,000, having to retail at $4,000, which was more than some CADILLACS. So, for all his "Safety" innovations, Preston Tucker put out a vehicle that was a high-end "niche" car, which had no promise of mass appeal without somehow getting the production costs down considerably. Preston Tucker was w/o doubt one of the greatest engineers and innovators, but the man somehow had no business sense when it came to mass production and marketing.
He was a FAILED attorney at that. Every wonder WHY no law firm would hire him?
In the 1965 model year Chevy changed the swing axles with a rear suspension just like the corvette which eliminated the tuck under of the swing axle. I owned a ‘65 model and it was one of the best handling car I’ve ever driven.
Absolutely true. I've owned 2 Corvairs, a 1969 and now I have a 1966. Both handled securely and safely and among rhe best highway cars I've ever owned.
I had a '67, and it was a fun car to drive. You just had to know how to drive it and keep the tires properly inflated.
A lawyer-journalist who never actually practiced law!
Can't sell books without a healthy pinch of hyperbolic bs.
Yep, the late model (starting in the '65 model year) used a very similar design to the '63 and later Corvette- in fact, many of the components were shared between the two cars. I also note that the 1965 Pure Oil Trials, which compared almost all cars on power, handling, mileage, etc. demonstrated that on the skid pad, the Corvair was the second highest performing car IN THE WORLD! The first? The 1965 Corvette, that had the benefit of using 15 inch wheels and tires, while the Corvair used 13s!
The SUV's of today are far more prone to flip than even the '60-'64 Corvair. The '65 was one of the best handling cars on the road, and is better that most cars today!!! Radical changes to the rear suspension in '65, and the oversized drum breaks made it a delight to drive.
It’s true! With today’s vehicles every fender bender becomes a rollover!!!
I had a '64 Monza Spyder Turbo Convertible that handled as well as any other car I have ever had, even on mountain roads.
I drove the same car and really loved it. I miss it.
ACTUALLY THE EARLY CORVAIRS THEIR TALKING ABOUT EVENTUALLY WAS CLEARED by the government AND ADMITED THAT THEY WERE NO LESS SAFE THEN OTHER CARS IN THAT ERA .i drove my 62 corvair all the way from ca. to missouri and had driven a 61 corvair to work everyday in ca. in heavy traffic , not one accident . and drove corvairs to car shows and cruis-ins and won many trophies, and again no accidents . sometimes it's like john f. kennedy said . all we have to fear is fear it's self !! my 61 with a four speed was really great on gas mileage too. getting better mileage then many modern cars now .
I read the DOT report through a FOIA request, and used it for a college report. The gov't concluded that Nader was in collusion with Ford, who he used to create falsified footage showing the Corvair going wildly out of control and flipping over.
In the government's testing, they discovered that the Corvair was more stable than any of the dozen+ cars they used in their study, including the Volkswagen. It would actually steer itself out of a skid and back into a straight line, with no steering input from the driver.
John DeLorean's claims that it was unstable was just his fat ego, because he wasn't involved in its development. And it's egregiously untrue that no rear-engined car was ever built after the Corvair; has anyone heard of Porsche, and their famous/infamous 911 series of cars?
On the Inaugural Address of President John F. Kennedy on January 20, 1961, "Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate."
On the Inaugural Address of President Franklin D. Roosevelt on March 4, 1933, “The only thing we have to fear... is fear itself."
Yeah, as noted that was FDR but Kennedy also said "Ich bin ein Berliner". Some people said that translated to "I am a jelly donut" but they were wrong.
My first car was a 62 Corvair convertible.Being a dump kid ,I drove the hell outa it.Never rolled over and was a blast at the beech.I loved that car ,and wish I had it today
I had a 1962 Corvair that handled just fine! I owned a VW betle, and I was familar with a rear engine car, so the Corvair was a great handling car for me. The heater killed people, not the handling, and i almost died in one driven by a guy who had never driven one and we had a crash, so don't blame the car. The 65 and later model was even better!
I knew a mechanic that worked on VWs and Corvairs exclusively and he thought that "unsafe at any speed" was a crock.
The car had its virtues, but if you need special lessons to drive a car safely, it doesn't belong on public roads. GM should have put the improvements it made for '64 on the '60 model, or gone with the '65 Corvette-style suspension from the start.
@@davidmitchell7183 Given how neither vehicle was exactly a "barn-burner" when introduced, probably the problems inherent in the handling of a rear-engined, swing-axle vehicle at HIGH SPEEDS weren't expected to crop up. It should be kept in mind that ca. 1960, the Interstates were just getting started, and the USA was fairly much, at least east of the Mississippi, a "50 mph" affair.
I had two Corvairs, one being a 61 Lakewood station wagon which, in my high school years, regularly carried a Fender Rhodes, Farfisa Combo Compact, Leslie 147, Bogen CH50, and a tall Allen box with a single Altec 12"... to gigs all around town. And all in a single load... and it drove virtually the same as it did when unloaded. I agree with those who say this a bunch of Nader BS, regurgitated. My white 63 convertible was great too! And fun, fun, fun! Betta believe it was!
I owned 7 of them and I'm still here. And I drove them at "high speed" to be sure.
I was a teenager when I drove my dads Corvair. My younger brother bought a Corvair Monza when he got his license. They were fun to drive and as safe as any other car. Ralph Nader just wanted to get publicity for himself so he picked the Corvair because it was different.
I owned a 1962 and my brother owned a 1964 and a 1966. I lost control of my 1962 on the interstate in the rain. The car went sideways flattened two reflectors and went down into the grass. Never rolled. I was so shook up I got out and locked my keys in the car with the ignition on but not running and all dash lights on. Cost me 35.00 dollars to get pulled back up on to the pavement and I drove it home.
Tuck-under oversteer also happened on many Euro cars like the Renault Dauphine, Renault 8 and 10, Triumph Spitfire, Simca 1000, VW Beetle. It was a good thing that car manufacturers eventually stepped up and started to use different suspention geometries, anti roll bars and radial tires.
Later in the 1990's there were cars with other problems like the 1st Mercedes A-class and Suzuki 410/Jimny 4x4 that had a tendency to roll over in sharp sudden evasive manouvres.
Today there is still a car on the road that uses the rear engine layout, the Porsche 911, a car loved by almost all car enthousiast.
Personally i wouldn't mind owning a later model Corvair. In the hands of a good experienced driver it will be a nice car to drive.
Yes, the 70:s and early 80:s Skodas that were also rear engined also had a swing axle of the same kind as the Corvair, and they also rolled over pretty easily, the Swedish car show " Trafikmagasinet ' ( Traffic magazine " ) rolled one over in their debut season 1978, and later 2 Skoda experts should show that it did not roll over, but it did, but in the mid 80:s, the rear axle was changed, and the handling was fine from then on.
The Suzuki Jimny, the version that launched in the late 1990:s also rolled over in a slalom test, done by a Swedish motoring magazine.
Another car that liked to corner on it's roof was the first and second gear Ford Explorer, due to it being tall and narrow, they did not need a blown Firestone tire or a stuck cruise control (search for Runaway cars Ford Explorer to see ) to roll over, a sharp corner would do just fine.
I had one, absolutely nothing wrong with it, was no more unstable than a VW. The addition of an aftermarket sway bar eliminating the problem. If you drive at safe speeds there is no problem with this car.
The swing axle in the rear required a sway bar which was deleted, but could be added as an option. Thius equipped, the car handled competently. Like Fotd's Pinto this was a cost decision, not an enineering one. VW beetles used the same setup.
In 1965, GM changed to an IRS which made for a superior handling car compared to the Mustang. Today, Corvairs are in high demand weith collectors.
I owned a total of 8 Triumph Spitfires and 6 Triumph GT-6 cars. All of the Spitfires would tuck under a rear axle and spin out if cornered hard. Early GT-6 cars did the same thing until they came out with the Rotoflex axle system that much reduced wheel tuck under. I had some personal fixes that solved much of the tuck under troubles. I think the Triumphs had more severe cornering sudden oversteer than even the early model Corvairs.
Independent and unrestrained rear suspension is the culprit. An unloaded axle could articulate under the vehicle pushing the vehicle over and rolling it. The simple solution was the anti-sway bar which is a common part today. The Corvair was hardly alone, just the most infamous version. Ford made US Army Jeeps and the old US Postal jeeps were far more likely to roll due to a high center of gravity. The Army dedicated money and time to train troops how to specifically drive the Ford because it was so prone to rolling. Ironically Porsche used Corvair flat 6 engines in creating the 911. GM's powerplant was actually well designed for its era.
The thing that people don't know about Ralph Nader it's that Nader himself ad a 62 corvair 4 door ...and he use to love that car ...and also considering that many people didn't know how do drive a rear engine mounted car is that everybody use to put the same amount of tire pressure all around which was 35 pounds...but the trick was to put only 20 to 25 pounds of air pressure in the front and 35 in the back.. which causes the front of the corvair to bea little bit trickier to go around a corner at high speed..but if everyone would put 20 to 25 pounds of air in the front tires..it would be just like every other car....and to everyone that I talk about the Chevrolet corvair to all said the same thing... THEY USE TO LOVE THAT CAR.
I had a '64 corvair in 1977 and it handled great. I put Michelin radials on it which is what Chevy should sold this car with because the stiffer sidewalls prevented the tire from tucking under on hard cornering. Bias ply tires have softer sidewalls which collapse easily under a lateral load and could initiate some unfortunate vehicle dynamics.
There were no radial tires until the 1970's
@@fustyblatherskite2142 Michelin made radial tires in the 1960s.
@grant wright true, in the 1960 Michelin was just starting to be imported into the US. They were just beginning to be accepted around 1973. Car manufacturers were not using them in 1960s. Michelin tires back then were made in France. Also, in the 60,s, made in the USA was a big deal.
@@fustyblatherskite2142 "I had a '64 corvair in 1977"
@Eric Hensel which came first 1973 or 1977. I bought my first Michelin in 1973. Actually. I bought two for my 1971 Mustang. I still had Good Year Wide Ovals, biased tires on the front. Since biased tires and radials have different slip angles, mixing tires like that was unsafe!
Personally I loved my 62 model Monza Spider with the turbo!
Disk brakes were new back then for American cars.. My buddy showed me how easy they were to work on with his Turbo Corvair as compared to drum brakes. In the late 1960's, a local Chrysler mechanic met us at the Pismo sand dunes with his home built turbo Corvair powered dune buggy. It had paddle tires and the acceleration on sand was like nothing I ever felt before. The power was very impressive.
In Europe we had a lot of rear engine cars - VWs, Zaporozhets, Skodas 1000MB/100/105, Fiats and Zastavas 750. The main issue was that the front was too light, especially during winter. But our drivers found a solution. You had to put something really heavy, 50-70 kg+ in the trunk. A sack of sand, concrete block called "trylinka", or even a piece of a rail. Another thing - their handling was really poor if you had a roof rack. Put something heavy on the roof = even more strain on the REAR axle.
We use to put a cement block in the trunk of my mothers Corvair in the winter
I liked the Corvair as a kid, if people knew how to drive it, it would have been a great 911 contender. But alas, the people couldn't drive well enough to cope with it's quirks. I wish I had one today, they were really cool cars. Flat 6, air cooled, just great.
No one seems to mention that both the VW Beetle and the Porsche used the same swing-axle suspension, yet these cars never got the negative press that the Corvair received. Most of the accidents were (could be)atributed to the consumers not following the tire pressure differential that the manufacturer advised, which made the car excessively understeer. There was nothing "wobbley"about the Corvair's axles and every assertion by Nader was debunked by a Gov't. panel. Why didn't the othe cars w/ swing-axle suspension get a bad rap? I rode w/ my mother in her '64 turbocharged Corvair in many a Rallye race and she never had control issues and she would top 100MPH consistently. Nader found deep pockets and, like a dogw/ a bone, bit down and held on to his one and only bone.
I had a corvair it was a great car great on gas it was fun to drive and it was a safe car to drive. Mine didn't leak oil again fun car to drive distributor was easy to replace the point. By the way I used to drive the hell out of mine mountain road straightaways I had no problem with it handling.
Old Nader had a vendetta against GM. He knew nothing of engineering and used this an opportunity to sell books and make a profit. To be fair, he should have compared it to the Beetle, which had a similar swing axle rear suspension. Why didn't he ever mention that? At least The Corvair was later upgraded to independent rear suspension similar to the Corvette, which put it light years ahead of the Beetle.
Car wasnt unsafe,owners not looking to see what pressure to set the tires at was the issue,if you set the tires right it was fine.Are you Ralph Nadar's love child?
Swing axle in early models WAS unstable...a truly safe design should not require cheapskate "hacks" like tweaks to already low tyre pressures to prevent the thing from losing traction. Granted, this video is full of errors, like the VW having "easy handling" - the VW had the same rear end as Corvair...and it was a horrid little thing.
Corvair was a great design that was RUINED by arrogant decisions during development.
Hey was gay
I owned a 64 monza, I loved it!
In the end studies of this car it was found that even in the early models it was no more prone to rollover or the other things brought out in "Unsafe at Any Speed" than any other car built in the same era.
This video has some misleading information (along with some scenes of Ford cars). The Corvair can be broken down into 2 series. The first was the 1960 ( on sale in fall 1959) to 1964. The second was from 1965 thru 1969. Chevrolet was aware of handling problems and tried a fix for the 1964 model, before a major redesign for 1965. which was already on sale in the fall of 1964 before Nader's book came out in 1965. Chevy had hoped that the Corvair would stave off the new Ford Mustang, but that failed and they worked on the Camaro that was introduced in 1967, intending to cancel the Corvair. There was so much press about Nader's book that Chevy kept the Corvair in production until the end of 1969, probably for spite. So Nader's book, instead of ending the Corvair, actually extended it.
That’s true ! The Mustang is what killed the Corvair not that leftist idiot Nader
Fergieman
having 6 corvairs an been driving them for 45 years,,,,they dont roll easy,,,an i have a 62 700 4dr that is a blast to drive,,,started out with a 65 500 ,,still have it but radials are what makes them hang in the curves ,,
This was a new car and new thinking. Yes it has problems but they were addressed. I've driven one and it was fun to drive with NO problems.
Ralph Nader is unsafe at any speed.
Best to you.
I owned a 1962 Corsair spyder it was a great car with no problems
It is interesting that the front-engine Pontiac Tempest which used a rear-mount transaxle and swing-axle suspension garnered no such notoriety.
MY "67"CORVAIR MONZA 3 SPEED 95 HORSEPOWER IS A ENGINEERING GENIUS CAR😊. THANK YOU MR. COLE🇺🇸❤🙏.
Ralph Nader was a sensationalist. Like several journalists since, he hit on a topic that gave him media exposure and ran with it. The Corvair was as well designed and built as any other car in its class.
My first car was a used 1963 Corvair. It was the one with the two speed automatic transmission with no park. One time I passed a vehicle and when I pulled back into the lane, the car started "dancing" on me. It really scared me. It wasn't until I read Nader's book years later that I understood what happened. It was that swing axle. I would have put that extra part to prevent that on had I known. My dad could have done that easily. In any case, it had more issues such as I had to keep a window cracked as it would fog up the interior with oil smoke. That was the other problem. Air cooling might have kept the weight down, but it did not isolate the passenger compartment from potential exhaust fumes. I sold that and bought a 71 Ford Pinto with manual transmission. Traded one car with issues for another.
I still remember in the early 60s hearing Ralph Nader ranting about how dangerous this car was.
Three new stock 1960 red Corvairs drove through the jungles of Darien gap after crossing continent with two 4x4 trucks. No roads. Cut roads and made bridges with machete. On RUclips 👍
From 1960 to 1964 the car had a swing axle. From 1965 to 1969 the axles were changed. My Dad was invited to test drive and try to roll the car. He couldn't get it to roll over. Chevy got rid of the corvair because of the Camaro.
The only thing u safe is the idiots behind the wheel. The VW beetle & Porshe handled the same.
I saw Nader on Johnny Carson. In his usual way, Johnny introduced him and started an interview asking a trivial question. Nader’s reply was something like, ‘fine, let’s talk about why I’m here.’ And he talked about the car. // The video was inconclusive about the private detectives searching his personal life. In reality, Nader’s personal life was incredibly boring. He seemed to have no social life. He was always like that. // You want me to rate it? I drove a few in my work but never in dangerous situations. The flat floor and the crummy transmission was something that I remember more. It was a pretty design, though.
My late husband rolled his Corvair on the LA405. He got out of the car, walked to the nearest motel, called a hooker and became a changed man.
He said the crash made him want to experience everything a hooker could provide.
He was a great lover....
They fixed the problem, I had a 1965 it was an awesome car, Nader won't admit the problem was fixed
My first-grade teacher spent some months in a coma following an accident in which the Corvair she was driving hit an oil slick and spun out. There was considerable debate within GM over the car's safety from the start, with several executives having family members that were injured or killed in them. The NHTSA was correct in that even an early Corvair could safely carry out any normal driving maneuver that an Impala could do. But if pushed to its limits by an aggressive driver, or when put in an emergency situation like an oil slick, it was much more inclined to become unstable than most cars on U.S. roads. What the original car needed was not a rear anti-roll bar, but a front one, and a rear linkage that was the opposite of an anti-roll bar, something that forced one wheel down whenever the other was pushed up. It got those improvements, which had been extra cost options, as standard equipment for 1964, 4 years too late. GM trashed their reputation to literally save a few dollars per car. If they had added these items for 1960, and included a relief valve to keep the front tires from being over-inflated, they would have avoided all that bad press and legal risk. They would still have had a car that was not suited for the American market as family car; you had to give up air conditioning if you wanted a wagon, or if you wanted the turbocharged engine, which was also unavailable on the wagon; the gasoline heater compromised fuel economy; the sedan also had a much smaller trunk than the Falcon. The disadvantages of a rear engine simply made the car uncompetitive in too many ways as a family car, but it was beloved as a poor man's Porsche. Its best hope for a profitable niche was as a specialty car built and sold around the world, including in places where its nimble handling, excellent braking and phenomenal uphill traction, would be more valued than they were in much of the United States.
I have a ‘61 Monza and it corners better that many modern cars. There’s no body roll common on many other cars I’ve driven. Proper tire inflation and self-awareness (not jamming on the brakes as you corner) avoids any potential mishaps. Corvairs are a joy to drive, but like all cars, need to be driven with knowledge and respect. Too many people just turn the key and go and expect to be protected from the world without learning to drive defensively and to avoid and recover from dangerous situations.
Actually, all the cars of the 50's & 60's handle badly.
I was common for those cars to lean on turns, and curves.
It was sort of a joke on turns, that you and your passengers would lean to the one way or the other.
Drivers at that time would compensate, or brace themselves.
My father owned the corvair. He was a private in the Army back in the 60s, and if anyone was going to flip a car, it would have been him as a dumb private. The test driver for Nader's safe at any speed even admitted that they modified the corvair they "tested" so that it would flip. This is just a repeated farse.
My dad Had 3 Corvair cars and I learned to drive in 1, We never considered them to be und=safe but fun cars to drive
Thanks for Sharing... I Enjoyed this One
What ever happened to GMs key problem, there was a big lawsuit once, they knew about the weak springs with the ignition key but they didn't care to fix it, they rather wanted to save a dime on the spring. Many have died due to this oversight/bad engineering, GM still didn't care.
It’s too bad that you tube lets this stuff on there website, this is so untrue
US car makers cut a lot of corners on their economy models in the late 1950s and into the 1960s. The original Corvair was a particularly unsafe car, as I discovered with a friend who owned one in the later 1960s. On the other hand, it's tricky steering and easy way of loosing the rear end and drifting out of control was not much different than the Porsche models of that day. You just knew the Porsche handling tricks and allowed for them, where Americans drove the Corvair like any front engine/rear drive car. The second generation of Corvair (Monza) corrected most of the problems in the original, and it was a great car to drive and looked great as well. You could still break loose the rear end, but it didn't tuck a wheel under and roll over on you. Unhappily, by then the reputation of the original design was permanently linked to the Corvair name, and that killed a very nice car. I'd be glad to have a nice one today, but they are quite expensive now. GM repeated the small rear engine design again two decades later with the Pontiac Fiero, and it had none of the Corvair curse on it.
Ralph Nader was a lawyer, not a journalist. He even owned a Corvair.
I grew up in Winsted, CT in the ‘90’s, seven houses down from Mrs. Nader, his mother. She taught me how to make Lebanese bread.
Ralph’s sister Clair, even lived across the street from her as well.
Mrs. Nader told me about what GM did to smear Ralph’s reputation. There was no love for GM in that family. Their tactics were extremely underhanded and malicious.
Rose, (Mrs. Nader) even told me about GM executives who would show up at her house with a brand new Cadillac, that she could “have” if she made disparaging claims about her son in GM’s favor.
She was a sweet, but tough Lebanese immigrant, and of course she refused.
She was a wonderful person.
Crazy story! Odd I am watching this the day after you because I grew up in Winsted in the 90s too! And also lived in that same neighborhood, believe it or not. And I even bought a 1960 Corvair as my first car in 1995 when I was 17. I still have it. I didn’t live on Hillside Ave, but on Hillside Place which was a row of only 3 houses between Hillside Ave and Main St; right along the path to the Soldiers monument. It’s nice to hear you had a positive experience with Mrs. Nader. I always thought she seemed like a mean old lady. She would never buy any kind of fundraiser stuff we had to sell for school, Boy Scouts, sports, etc.😂
@@saewoody6366
NO KIDDING!
We lived on Hillside Ave, across from the old carriage house that faced Hinsdale Elementary!!
We lived just a few yards from each other!!
(Our house was the white Victorian in the middle between Norma and Madeline, with the “witches hat” spindle turret hanging off the second floor!)
Your house was in what I called the “thicket”. I used to ride my bike through there all the time!
@@saewoody6366
Mrs. Nader was very nice, but didn’t trust commercial charity. I guess it was from growing up in Lebanon. She thought it was too disingenuous and was too easily pocketed by the charity runners. She did have RBF, but that was neither here nor there.
@@saewoody6366
Was your Corvair light blue? If so, was it you who would drive up and down the street whenever Ralph Nader’s red Porsche was parked in front of his mothers house???
Someone was always doing that, and they’d do a uturn at the side of the carriage house, and we’d hear the chestnuts pop, and knew that it was “the guy in the Corvair”
@@saewoody6366
Winsted has gone downhill last time I drive through. It was very sad to see how many businesses on Main Street had closed. Henry Centrella sure didn’t help matters.
Actually, Nader owned and drove a '48 Studebaker Champion when he was in grad school.
I have a 63 Monza and like many others I can confirm it's reputation is more of a slander campaign to make a point than it was fact. What became the NHTSA did a study on the early models and found it to be no more hazardous than it's contemporaries at the time, in fact it is ahead of its time in many ways.
This video seems like it was make by Ralph Jr judging by the lack of research beyond the book, there definitely are much worse cars to be in at the time.
And by the way according to what ive found by asking the community any instance where tuck under would roll the car eould also happen if the axle was prevented from tucking. It is not perfect like any car but keep in mind modern SUVs and vans flip over way easier.
I have to wonder why at this late date - over 50 years since the last Corvair left the assembly line - are you trying to do a hatchet job on Corvairs now?
One thing you should know is that Ralph Nader's real target was Volkswagen. For whatever reason, he took aim at a potentially more vulnerable target, since the Corvair was more of a curiousity or niche car. He also never even drove one, so he was far from an expert. Also, FYI, before Nader, GM had already planned for the last model year to be 1966. The reason was that it was too expensive to build, and the profit margin was too low. Thanks to Nader, they made the car for 3 more years.
Also, FYI, I had a 1963 Corvair Spyder and I drove it hard - swing axles and all. I never even came close to turning it over. One would have to be TRYING for that to happen.
All in all, your video is full of biased and marginal information.
The first Corvair was supposed to have aluminum heads, not the cast iron that made production. This added 50 pounds on the back end of a swing axle, along with no sway bars was a recipe for disaster. All because of the accountants.
What a load of crap. I had two Corvairs and they were at least as safe as anything built back then. Nader was wrong and the Corvair was shown to be safe.
There was a reason that people in the know back then called them the "poor mans Porsche".
The Volkswagen Beetle was just as dangerous it needed to be carefully driven under 50 mph because the body was light and created lift which the Firestone tires were bias ply and dried out and lost grip. Beetles liked to flip just like corvair.
i have a 62 4 door drives like a dream ,,, radial tires are what all corvairs need ..i drive it more than my late models ..its do for some brake work but i do have dot 5 in it...
oh i did put my 66 vw on its side ..never any of my corvairs have 6 now,,,,,
Had to leARN HOW TO CHANGE A BELT ON THE SIDE OF THE ROAD RIGHT OUT OF THE SHOWROOM 😅. Nadler said unsafe at any speed means dont park in basement garage may burn down your house
Chevy took too long to correct the issue, they should have fitted all vehicles with the brace they sold as an option....instead they went after Nader and turned him into a victim.....let us also not forget what GM did with the Cavalier ignition in the 1990's another Chevy decision that cost many innocent lives....and the repair fir the problen was 20 cents.... sad how history repeats itself.
It's been said Ralph Nader got much of his "evidence" from Ford using drivers deliberately making the car look evil handling compared to the Falcon (base for the Mustang) to generate negative publicity for the closest competitor GM would have to the still secret. soon to be released Mustang. Studying the Ford videos clearly showed steering wheel inputs guaranteed to create wild swerving instability. The Yenko corvairs competitive racing efforts against Porsches etc. is testimony to their ability. I owned a 140hp 1966 and had no handling issues.
I would like the full story. So far the only thing I can see wrong with the car, and I paused to tell you I wanted the full story of the book, and haven’t seen the rest of the video, is that the rear suspension uses a swing axle changes the camber of the wheels as it travels over bumps an into potholes and while turning it changes as well. What it needed was an axle like the corvette had. They uses twin a arms and axles with two joints instead of one like the swing axle. The corvette rear suspension kept the rear tires in line with the road.
And that's what it got for the restyle in 1965, but by then the damage to the Corvair name was done. The weird thing is, VW had the same swing arm design, and they didn't change to IRS until 1968- three full model years AFTER Corvair made the change- and the Beetle brand didn't seem to suffer a bit for it.
It got the double axles of the Corvette in ‘65. In fact They were the exact components of the Vette , same part nos. and all as the’63 thru ‘67 Stingray.
The one difference: the Corvette used transverse spring whereas the Corvair used Coil Springs. The Corvair had to use Coil Springs as the Engine/Transaxle occupied the area that the Transverse Spring would’ve needed.
I owned a ‘66 , it was vandalized. I am currently looking for another One ( late ‘65 - ‘69 ).
Fergieman
I remember when the Corvair come out and it was junk then. I thought the first Mustangs were too.
The myth of Corvair's unsafe design has been debunked long ago. But in today's idiocracy it is very easy for B.S. to rise to the top. I owned a 1964 Corvair Monza in the 90s and used it for years on my 52 mile daily commute. I never encountered handling problems though I like "spirited" driving.
The boxer six was surprisingly torquey even with the automatic. My '64 in Lagoon Aqua with the upmarket chrome trim is one I still have dreams about.
Not necessarily so, tire pressures for the front were purposely lower (set by the factory) than the rears which were higher due to weight, but owners set front/rear pressures the same causing the car to handle poorly in evasive maneuvers on the road (known fact from another video) the fact that Ralph Nader also owned one is no coincidence.......
The only “engineering” mistake was some engineering manager or an executive above them demanding the cost cuts. Do NOT blame the engineers! The poor guy who warned them about any cuts probably lost his job for his trouble…..
The comments about inexperienced, young drivers is important. I almost lost my life, and that of my high school classmate, when driving a 1962 model Corvair station wagon. On a straight road, and with supreme confidence (at the age of 17!), I floored it to pass another car, jerking the wheel to the left. The car immediately went into an uncontrollable twisting action and we skidded sideways across the oncoming lane (!) across a grassy field and into a stand of Australian pines. (Good thing they weren't oaks!) I cracked my orbital socket, and my classmate was out cold with blood dribbling from his face. I was certain I'd killed him. Turns out he was out of the hospital sooner than me, but I still apologized profusely to his parents. Was the fact that it was a wagon that threw more weight to the rear, further destabilizing the car? Dunno. Maybe an engineer could explain. My conclusion: knowing how to drive is, uh, shall we say, an important element to driving any car.
I drove mine like a bat out of hell.
SUV Roll overs!!
Where's that outrage???
The US Gov supposedly cleared GM by saying it was no less safe than any other car when they tested it, is both damning of US car safety in general at the time, and poor form on behalf of the government. It was pretty clear that the bean counters cut a major safety item that would have made the car so much easier for the average driver out there, to drive it safely.
I'm a corvair owner of 60+years, not dead yet! If u read unsafe ,read all of it.
Spinner hub caps,automatic transmission power brakes and so on. Does Ford twin I beam ring a bell?
I think GM more than made up for it when they put the big black front-wheel drive in the tornado
Most amateur the automotive journalists these days: report partial truths and make up the rest, but say it with authority so that those who don’t know you’re full of it will readily accept it all as fact.
The handling “issue” was corrected in 1964. If people had actually read and followed their owners manual - ie correctly inflating the tires, there wasn’t a handling problem. Interestingly, Volkswagen was using and had been using the same swing axle design since it’s inception, but no complaints about the Beetle.
Big giveaway to these kinds of videos is when they have a bot read their copy for them instead of an actual human.
11:28 That's the '55 Chevy Montgomery Clift wrecked.
NOT an engineering error, bean counter error. A vast majority of auto problems and recalls are the direct result of the procurement people cheapening up the specs engineers call for.
Exactly, GM Inc. and their bean counters were the problem.
1965 and later had 4 link suspension
Nader was clueless and was only trying to make a name for himself at others expense. The car was supposed to be used to get groceries and be driven safely. Any car driven aggressively outside its handling parameters is asking for trouble. The car that replaced the Corvair was the Vega. Need I say more?
I'm a Ford guy and I say Chevrolet is unsafe at any speed
Yep, the massive understeer, horrible drum brakes, boat0like recirculating ball steering, rear license plate gas pipe, and no-crumple zone standard U$A cars were SO safe.
I saw one roll over at relatively low speed.
The Corvair has been proven to be as safe as any other car manufactured at that time. All videos used in this were of drivers purposely causing a roll-over. Ford did it a lot in their sales to promote Falcons.
The Corvair was fundamentally a good car but with many engineering features that were common on European cars(rear engines,swing axles,overstear,etc,) but not on American cars and made this more of a "drivers" car which required more owner maintenance ,with Ralph Nader GM should have countered with professional evidence instead of trying underhand tactics-it could have been so different
Suggestion The story about the Suzuki Samurai is a good-one.
Different handling characteristics? Yes. Unsafe? No.
This video is done by someone not in the US and most likely not of the age to have even seen the Corvair. There are many technical and historic mistakes made in this video. The story is much more interesting and complicated.
Porsche 911 s are squirlly because the engine is cantalevered so far back over the wheels
Seems to me anyone attempting such a commentary should have an understanding of the subject, unlike the author of this one. Not terribly complicated, nor requiring an infinite attention span. There's the truth, and everything else. Pick one.
GM then did what they still do today. Just look at how they go after the person rather than fix the problem. This attitude is wrong and will never prevail, well unless some judge was bought off or is biased.
Boeing seems to be going down the same path with the 737 Max. Optional safety accessories seems outright wrong, that *must* be included in the base price, be it the 737 or the Corvair (anti roll bars).
Discrediting Nader failed, he was way smarter than many of those in charge at GM. Just look at the stock price of GM over the last 20 years, it's not a hot thing to own either.
Wow!! Have you ever owned or driven a Corvair?? I have for over 20 years and have never spun out, rolled or felt in danger. Bias ply tires probably had more to do with handling issues than the design. Porsches weren’t able to reach high speeds??? I can make my Superduty flip over if driven beyond it’s capability. Corvair was exonerated of any “bad design” claims in 1974 by the way.
Ralph Nader was lawyer who knew nothing about automobiles. If an owner drove his Covair and had low tire pressure in the rear wheels he was in trouble. That is the main reason Nader wrote "Unsafe at Any Speed". If your rear tires were properly inflated, the handling was great.
After writing "Unsafe At Any Speed" Nader then wanted to write a similar book on the VW (rear engine, independent suspension, etc.) doing another of his typical hatchet jobs.
John Bond, the Editor of ROAD & TRACK, a former GM design engineer, read his book and then he took all Nader's complaints apart, one by one, and showed what a total automobile ignoramus Nader really was. Nader shut up. His book never was published, and Nader went on to other things....
I wish I could deal with such car it's a real classic 😎
All rear/mid engine cars are snarly in turns
Who is this Ralph Nader, my friend had one and so did my sister they never had any problem they both loved them.
They each had a Ralph Nader? Wow, that's incredible ! ! ! !
Solid conventional rear axle would helped I bet. Robert at 68.
How are you going to accomplish that with an engine in the way?
@@TheREALJosephTurner How 'bout solid rear axle/drive shaft to front wheel drive?..
@@bobmalack481 Huh? Then where does the engine go?
@@TheREALJosephTurner How about under the floor like a 90's Toyota Previa? LOL!!
My first car was a 1959 Mercedes-Benz 180 Diesel. Compared to contemporary North American products, its roadholding was superb and I always felt driving a North American car was like driving a boat in a cross sea.
How many DAYS did it take to get up to 65 mph in that 'Benz oil-burner? Probably sipped diesel, though, at a time when refineries couldn't give it away!
In the 1960's, The German car verses larger American cars, it's like comparing apples to oranges, the smaller German car will handle better, but the bigger, more powerful American car will accelerate better, and cruise better on the bigger American roads, which it was designed to do.
@@martentrudeau6948 You'll notice that all the aforementioned makes, with the exception of the RR Porsches, disappeared from the European and US markets in the 1970s and 1980s. Part of the reason being that, they, too, got considerably more "Autobahn" or "Autostrade", or "Motorway" mileage. The older rear-engine jobs with the swing axles simply weren't up to highway speeds. Also, EMISSIONS began to doom the air-cooled engine. Volkswagen foresaw all that and went to their excellent line of FWD vehicles, starting with the Golf (Wabbit) by 1975. There was nothing wrong with a rear-engine, swing-axle vehicle when they were designed; it just that consumer demand and better, faster highways made them obsolete.
FWIW, in designing its famed Chrysler and DeSoto Airflow models in the 1930s, Chrysler had seriously considered a rear-engine configuration, which did a lot to enable a far more "slippery" design. The trouble was, their flathead sixes and eights were just way too heavy and bulky to make such a mounting practical. Even some "creative packaging" couldn't overcome the problem of the vehicle being tail-heavy and prone to "swap ends" in a cross-wind. However, the research into how to configure the body and frame into a more aerodynamic package led to a lighter but much stronger car body. This was shown in a famous demo film, where a 1934 Chrysler Airflow was pushed over a 100 foot cliff, and, though considerably battered, was started and drove off! Had Chrysler had the money (it was the Depression, after all!) to design a lightweight engine for that RR configuration, there might have such a line of Chrysler products.
Alas, casting of non-ferrous alloys just wasn't "there" to produce such an engine. The Soviets tried it in 1940 with their V-2 tank engine, and though it was light enough to be useful in their famed T-34 tanks, it, well, didn't have a very long life...but then again, neither did the T-34s in combat anyway!
@@selfdo ~ Sound good to me, thanks Doug.
Yep, they cut corners and used the same suspension as all of the European sports cars and the VW
You dont know what you are talking about, A, GM did not cut corners American drivers at that time did not know how to drive rear engined cars and if you did not follow GM instructions on tire presures you put your self in jeppardy gas station guys also put tire pressures that were wrong .My first Corvair a 64 monza i owned before i came to live in USA i raced and never had any handling troubles i still have 2 1965 corsas super road holding and getting great gas milag Between my first Corvair and now i have owned 12 diferent models of Corvairs and have never had any handling problems,
@Ed Smith you missed my point the article said they cut corners on the suspension but they used the same suspension that all of the German sports cars use after GM discontinued the Corvair
OK ....HERES. MY OPINION.....I WORKED AT CHEVY. DELERSHIPS
I AGREE. THE. FIRST VERSION...
NEVER. SHOULD. HAVE BEEN.
BUILT.....THE T. Shaped SWING AXEL
WHERE. A BAD DESIGN..
.IF THEY HAD LIMITED. THE SWING
DISTANCE.....8T NEVER WOULD HAVE. BEEN. A PROBLEM......
DESIGN. TWO....WAS A. NICE
DESIGN.....
The Corvair and the Ford Pinto were both build on the cheap with if a small item were fixed would not have killed many people.
ford pinto only killed 27 people not bad for the millions sold
The Pinto was modified but the issue was not so much a problem with the Pinto as it was the time period that the Pinto hit the American highways. American roads were dominated by massive land barges that weighed more than a modern full sized pickup built today. The Pinto was far from being the only compact car on the roads then that were catching fire when involved in rear-end collisions with huge American cars and trucks. Add to that every car on the road back then had steel fuel tanks which would tear open during hard impacts and were susceptible to sparks . The Pinto bore the brunt of of what was going on in the automotive world then. Honestly the best safety design manufacturers came up with was the introduction of polymer fuel tanks that would not spark and would survive being distorted and hit without tearing open. One Ford retrofitted a polymer shield in between the tank and the rear of the car the issue was greatly diminished.
I wrote sainly, not safely as the censors put in.