I’m not really sure why I ended up thinking about this, but I couldn’t get out of my head that there have been at least two times in American car history where a super-cheap version of an already cheap car was offered without a rear seat, because cheap. The two cars I was thinking of that fit this exclusive and dazzling category of skinflintery were the 1970 AMC Gremlin and the 1976 Chevrolet Chevette Scooter. Both were designed to be the entriest of entry-level cars, and both, I think, accomplished their task well. But if you were buying these, things probably weren’t going super-fantastic for you, at least financially. So let’s compare these two, and see what may have been your best use of your scarce dollars!
Man, I do some important work here. I hope people appreciate it.
Of course, six years separate these two cars, so you’d never have been in a position to cross-shop these two at these prices when new. Sure, you could have gotten a Gremlin in 1976, but the base-base-base model with no rear seat or opening rear window was only available until 1972, and that’s the model I’m really interested in.
I suppose if you were someone who blew almost all of their money on a time machine and only had a limited amount of cash for a car, and were determined to buy American, then perhaps this comparison makes sense for you. Let’s say that’s my target reader for this: broke-ass patriotic American time-travelers in need of basic transportation. It’s important to know your audience.
Okay, let’s see how these two shitboxen stack up:
Wow, this is a trickier choice than I would have guessed! Each car has its own strengths and weaknesses. The Gremlin’s strength I think comes from the fact that it started out as a larger car that was truncated, brutally, aft of the B-pillar. As a result, it has a much larger and more powerful engine than the Chevette (a 128 hp straight-six as opposed to a 52 hp-four) so it has better performance, even when you factor in the power-soaking three-speed slushbox.
But, that also means fuel economy suffers, pretty significantly; highway mileage is about half that of the Chevette. Interestingly, both are still RWD, understandable for the Gremlin, given it’s minimal-development origins from the AMC Hornet, but a bit more inexcusable for the Chevette, existing well within the era of FWD subcompacts like the Volkswagen Rabbit and Honda Civic.
Price-wise, both are pretty damn close, with the Gremlin being about a grand cheaper, but both would be absolute bargains in the modern car market, at between $15-$16,000. Of course, both were austere stripper models without rear seats and all the luxury of a tollbooth, but cheap is cheap.
The Chevette did have one pretty significant advantage over the Gremlin, though: a rear hatch. On the more decadent four-seat Gremlins, the rear window opened like a hatch, but for the two-seater, that window remained sealed, so any luggage you crammed in there either had to go through the doors and behind the front seats, or through the rear window, destructively.
Of course, the Chevette lacked a glove box door, which the Gremlin generously gave you, and the Chevette’s passenger seat wasn’t adjustable, so there’s that. Man, that’s some penny-pinching! GM was so good at that.
You can see the four-seat one with its opening window in this old commercial, if you want a glimpse of real decadence:
The Chevette just let you load stuff in through a hatch into the pretty good-sized void where no rear bench seat resided.
You can see that hatch open in this commercial, which also claims MPG of 31 city/43 highway, but I think those were kind of unrealistic 70s-era numbers. I’m sticking with the ones I put in the chart, which are still impressive.
So which car would I pick, were I this broke-ass time traveling American? That’s tricky. I think the Chevette definitely wins on practicality, but even though I drive a 52 hp car as a daily now, and firmly believe that’s adequate, I have always liked that AMC straight-six. But with a slushbox? Hm. That would really sap the fun out of the thing.
I prefer the weird look of the Gremlin, and, yes, I adore the weird badge:
Is that enough to pick it over the Chevette? Honestly, I’m just not sure. Hey! Why don’t we do a little poll? This is the internet, not some magazine, we can be interactive!
I think the Gremlin has much more charm and character, but is less practical. I’d love to know what you’re all thinking, so please, vote away, and then explain your thinking in the comments! I’m dreadfully curious.
My family had both of these, though not these most basic editions. I don’t remember the Gremlin very well because my (much) older brother rolled it when I was still a young grade-schooler. The ’76 Chevette was still with the family when I got my license and became it’s primary driver. Oh, the joy of black vinyl seats and no AC. My dad liked it because it felt more fun than our big floaty cars going around a corner and he said it was easy to work on. I guess I’d take the Chevette.
That Six in the Gremlin will run forever, and was used in all kinds of AMC and Jeeps for years. You can fit a V8 in as well.
Good luck keeping that gas cap, I hear that they are frequently stolen.
The Gremlin is charming as heck, but we’ll take the Chevette for its greater utility, plus the novelty of telling someone that I own a two-seater ‘Vette.
Gremlin, fairly quick and I can fit.
appreciate the inflation conversion, but did equivalize the hp you listed? i imagine 128 gross hp still nets down to way more go than 52 net hp, and then there’s the contrast between no-cat and yes-cat.
much as i’ve always hated Chevettes compared to Omnis and Pintos, and even compared to Escorts, the big box of nothing on the back of that Gremlin is unforgivable.
Gremlin, cuz of the cool stripe
Gremlin all day. The Chevette was never offered with a five-liter V8.
I’m not a big power fan, but I am an orphaned brands fan, and few orphans get my motor running more than AMC. Ostensible econobox with a segment-defying snorty eight cylinder? Sure. Sign me up.
The Gremlin soldiered on, sort of, as the AMC Eagle Kammback, an extremely rare iteration of the broader Eagle line, until it was dropped for the 1983 model year.
Surprise from the ancient past: Gremlins were fast. Although they were available with a VW 4-banger, most had the I-6 and some even had V-8s.
They didn’t weigh jack squat, and with so little of it on the rear end, the rears would constantly break loose. If you really flogged it, the leaf springs would get squirrely and you’d get a festival of wheel hop.
Gremlins were the ultimate Malaise-era hoonmobile.
Oh man I never thought I would cast a vote for a Chevette over anything, but without a rear hatch, the Gremlin is less practical than a hardtop Miata.
The only reason I hesitated was the lack of hatch on the cheapo Gremlin. Stripping a car down to the point where it’s less useful at being a car is… not my favorite thing.
But the Chevette was such trash I’m going with the Gremlin anyway.
If I could find a pre-80 Chevette, 2-door, stick, in decent condition I would buy that today. Not ironically either. We had them as kids, a buddy had one as his first car, and while they are not high-quality, I know that I can fix what ails them nowadays and make a fun, and friendly, little car. Gremlins just never did it for me, but Chevettes were fun.
I find it so ironic that the most base of stripper base model Chevettes still had amber turn indicators in the rear.
This decadent luxury isn’t even available as an option on most of GM’s current lineup.
I suppose we could count the “business coupe”? Those were made by several automakers starting in the 1930s, either with no back seat or a removable one, ostensibly for travelling salesmen to carry their wares and samples. Buddy of mine used to have a 1952 Dodge Wayfarer business coupe, and it was indeed a stripper.
But as for today’s poll, I really can’t believe that sentient beings like y’all would ever pick a Chevette in any condition over even a basket case Gremlin. I’m not saying the Gremlin is all that great. I’m saying the Chevette is just that bad.
My Grandma had a 53 Ford business coupe. It had a bunch of cushions in the back and grandkids could configure however we wanted. Great place to watch Grandma scare the pants off Grandpa. EMMA!!!
My mother bought a new 1978(?) Chevette. I thought it was ok at the time. After not many years and not many miles one of the front wheels departed company from the car, which slid off into the ditch. It was something structural not just the bolts or lugs. Fortunately no injuries. Japanese after that.
Gremlin. Tuned up just like the one I “built” in Forza Horizon 4.
ALL THE UPGRADES.
I know it’s all in good fun here, but the roasting for buying cheap cars feels a little too real. I picked up a new Fiesta hatch SE in 2017 for $13k out the door, which is a better inflation adjusted deal than either of these tin cans. It was and continues to be an incredibly sound financial decision.
It just goes to show inflation doesn’t hit shitboxes as much as other automotive sectors.
Gotta go with the Gremlin, sorry Torch but in the 1970 1/2 AMC brochure where the Gremlin was compared to the Beetle, it overwhelmingly trounces it by have such Safe-Command features like, ‘suspended pedals, plug in wiring harness, foot operated parking brake, etc etc’, the lavish list just goes on and on. The Beetle never stood a chance.
Found some production figures and out of 22,000+ made in 1970, a whopping 872 2 seat/rear seat delete models were built.
I’m dismayed they didn’t tout the very obvious safety benefit of the fixed rear window, no intrusion of exhaust gases when sitting idling.
I seem to recall in a Car and Driver test of the 1970 Gremlin, AMC said one of the top customer complaints was people stealing the Gremlin Figure gas cap.
Fun fact, for the ultimate antisocial cheapskate the Chevrolet K-5 Blazer was technically available as a SINGLE seater. The passenger seat and the rear bench were both options. Soft tops were available from the factory too. The ultimate cheapskate Blazer was a single seat, soft top, 6 cylinder, 2WD, 3 on the tree manual. I couldn’t find pricing.
The Chevette could clearly carry a load. I come from a rural area, and while I was in college my parents told me one of the local crime family had been busted. This was not a mobster family, just one whose boys were behind most petty crime in the area. Anyhow, one of them was busted for rustling. When pulled over, his Chevette contained a stolen heifer.
Gremlin, no contest…Chevettes are junky trash…no thanks
“stripper models” Yes please
Thank you for doing extra polls every so often…it’s fun to vote!
You can fit 200s/Daisies on a Gremmy, and they look great afterwards with white letter tires. 4.2L at least has torque so you could tow SOMETHING with hit.
I suspect the base Gremlin was offered with a 3-speed manual transmission, as a no-frills base model offering an automatic transmission was practically unheard of in the 1970s for any car.
Automatic transmissions have only very recently become the ‘base’ option, purely because they typically are the only transmission option. A manual transmission increasingly now kind of a unique marketing point and are specified on higher-cost models.
Anyway, in a Gremlin versus Chevette debate, I’ll take a Gremlin. Not just because they’re sort of ironically cool now, but the guts of the thing were just better just by virtue of being shared with AMC’s larger models, even if that did impose some tradeoffs in fuel economy.
The Chevette was built down to a cost in a much more cynical manner.
If it’s going to have 52-hp it should at least be cute like the Pao. An ugly glub I can outpace on a bicycle in bad shape (me or the bike)? No thanks.
Gremlin it is.
When these cars were new, insurers often charged extra, sometimes significantly so, for 2-seat cars. The 2-seaters that were available around then were things like the Corvette, Datsun Z, Jaguar E-Type, MGs, Triumphs, and so on…all sports cars that were available for short money, and hence a nightmare in terms of loss experience. You might save a few hundred on the purchase price but you’d shell out way more than that in insurance over the life of the car because you were driving a 2-seater.
I took my drivers training in a Chevette, a d it was the most soul sucking driving experience I have ever had. Dangerously slow on Los Angeles freeways, noisy and raspy, and handled like a loose joint. Never, ever again. Let’s just say that by comparison, my dad’s Sprint felt like a freaking sports car. The Gremlin at least would work as Redneck Yard Art.