Fuel injection is a feature many drivers take for granted today. There’s no fiddling with carburetor jets and no rough running to ruin your day. You can expect any modern car today to start and run day in and day out. Decades ago, fuel injection might have been closer to magic than everyday technology. When Chrysler tried putting fuel injection into its early 1980s Imperial, it somehow did such a bad job at it that the company recalled the luxury barges so the vehicles could be fitted with old-school carburetors.
This failure hails from that infamous era when Detroit had to adapt to a rapidly changing environment. Multiple fuel crises, a slumping economy, environmental concerns, and safety concerns all helped steer future automotive developments. Detroit’s land yachts quickly downsized into vehicles that were comparably dinghies while just about everyone tried to figure out ways to achieve large fuel economy gains.
Many vehicles lost bulk, some vehicles gained diesel engines, others got front-wheel-drive, and manufacturers across industries looked into improving their vehicles through technological developments. This was an era when manufacturers toyed with power and fuel economy through the use of turbocharging and even motorcycles got in on that fun.
The carburetor was also seen as an enemy. Sure, carbs had proven themselves to be reliable fueling systems for decades, but they weren’t the most precise way to run engines. Some of the first gasoline fuel-injection systems to be installed into production cars were made in the 1950s, but those were finicky and unreliable. The 1980s brought on a revolution of fuel injection where the technology and reliability were finally there to deliver the performance automakers wanted.
But, not every fuel injection system was the same. General Motors and Chrysler both put out real stinkers, but Chrysler’s implementation was especially sad.
Chrysler’s Halo Car
The Chrysler Imperial was originally introduced by Walter Chrysler in 1926 as the marque’s flagship luxury product. In its early days, the Chrysler Imperial went up to bat against the likes of Packard, Pierce Arrow, Cord, and Duesenberg. As those brands faded away, the Imperial remained a rival for the likes of Lincoln and Cadillac.
In 1955, Chrysler went as far as to splinter Imperial off as its own brand so it really was like those aforementioned brands. Like a Cadillac didn’t have GM badges all over it, an Imperial was its own thing, free from the naming and badging of its parent.
Imperial was also a true flagship, introducing new and advanced technologies before they trickled down into Chrysler’s lower brands. Imperial was an early adopter of air-conditioning and power steering in the 1950s plus they also got Chrysler’s push-button PowerFlite transmission selectors. and the world’s first all-transistor car radio, developed in partnership with Philco. The 1949 Imperial Crown even got disc brakes, which was novel at the time.
Unfortunately, Imperial fizzled out in 1975 after sales plummeted and the brand just couldn’t compete with Lincoln and Cadillac. This left a giant hole in Chrysler’s lineup for a luxury halo car.
Winds of change came in 1979 when Lee Iacocca took the helm at Chrysler. He was tasked with reviving the storied automaker and among his plans was a new flagship bearing a still-famous name: Imperial. Iacocca had reason to believe he would succeed. Over at Ford, Iacocca took the Thunderbird and turned it into the 1969 Continental Mark III personal luxury car.
For the new Imperial, Iacocca decided to do something special. The new car rode on Chrysler’s J platform, which meant its siblings were the Chrysler Cordoba and the Dodge Mirada. However, Chrysler didn’t just slap Imperial branding on a Cordoba and call it a day. The new Imperial had a unique design featuring a throwback bustleback pioneered by Cadillac the year before.
However, while Cadillac basically forgot to design everything in front of its bustleback, Chrysler gave the Imperial a sharp front end and side profile that planted the Imperial’s look squarely in the wedge-obsessed 1980s while also nodding to the famed Imperials of years past. Chrysler could have stopped there, but there are other small details worth noting. Luxury buyer preferences shifted away from away from chrome, so the Imperial featured limited brightwork. Iacocca also wanted the new Imperial to be like the Imperials that came before it, so there were no “Chrysler” emblems on the car – a Pentastar made of Cartier crystal was the only nod to Chrysler being the manufacturer.
Aside from the styling, Iacocca was making two big bets with the new 1981 Imperial: He thought buyers in the personal luxury car segment would want a vehicle loaded to the gills with technology; and rather than spec’ing the car themselves by ticking option boxes, customers would prefer the car simply include all the would-be options as standard equipment.
Let’s start with the tech. The unibody platform underpinning the Imperial wasn’t anything special. The Chrysler J platform featured an engine mounted up front and drive wheels in the rear. Transverse-mounted torsion bars handled suspension duties up front while S-shaped leaves carried the rear.
How the Imperial stood out against its siblings was its slightly larger slze, but also what was under the hood. The only engine choice for an Imperial was Chrysler’s 318 cubic inch LA V8. This engine was a pretty proven mill that had already been in production for a while. It was also an option for the Imperial’s J-car siblings. So, how did the Imperial’s version of the 318 stand out? It carried 10 more ponies (140 HP net) than its siblings by way of Chrysler’s first “modern” attempt at fuel injection.
As Hemmings writes, this wasn’t just big news for Chrysler, but it was also a huge deal because it meant Chrysler was the first American automaker to offer electronic fuel injection as standard equipment. Chrysler took its fuel injection system seriously, too, and the engineers who worked on the fuel injection system were the same ones pinched for the Apollo space program’s electronics.
On paper, it should have worked, from Hemmings:
[T]he EFI was a fuel-metering system operating under the guidance of a combustion computer that monitored more than a dozen bits, adjusting the fuel/air mixture to optimum operation ratios depending upon surrounding travel conditions. In short, it was intended to improve fuel economy and drivability, especially when installed in conjunction with the three-way catalytic converter, EGR valve and feedback fuel-air-ratio control. Motor Trend, in an October 1980 article, was able to push the 4,000-pound vehicle, equipped with an engine capable of 140hp and 240-lbs.ft. of torque, to 50 mph in just 9.1 seconds, and reportedly achieved 23 mpg.
On the surface, the system was supposed to work perfectly. Chrysler spent three years testing it on several vehicles, amassing thousands upon thousands of test miles involving 24 new Chrysler patents.
Chrysler’s electronic fuel injection system blended a mix of mechanical components and computerization together. The system utilized two fuel pumps. The first was the lift pump located in the fuel tank. The second controlled how the fuel reached the engine. This second pump used injector valves and these valves were controlled by pressure produced by the engine. All of this was handled and monitored by the onboard computer systems. Those systems controlled the fuel-to-air ratio as well as spark advance. The computers made their decisions based on input from eight sensors that determined environmental conditions, demand from the accelerator pedal, vehicle load, and more.
All of this meant that the Imperial had a slew of unique parts under the hood, including a special intake manifold that Chrysler used to mount the fuel injection equipment onto.
Chrysler’s wasn’t alone here. Cadillac and Lincoln introduced their own electronic fuel injection systems in 1980. The mighty Pentastar brand also had prior experience in this field with its past, which included electronic ignition systems and computerized engine management systems. However, Chrysler’s electronic fuel injection was still more mechanical in nature than its competition.
The graph above shows many of the components of the system.
When Chrysler’s EFI worked, the development seemed to make sense. The Imperial’s Dodge Mirada sibling had to make do with getting 17.5 mpg average with its carbureted 318. But the Imperial? It scored 23 mpg despite being bigger and heavier while its fuel-injected 318 was sharper and more responsive. The benefits of EFI were clear.
Chrysler implemented technology elsewhere as well. The air-conditioner featured thermostatic temperature control, the instrumentation was all-digital with vacuum fluorescent displays, and the instruments were all push-button operated. Of course, the driver also got a full complement of power accessories.
While some of this tech would be dazzling even today, the fuel injection turned out to be a bit of an embarrassment. As the Truth About Cars Notes, the computer and its ancillaries for the fuel injection system were mounted on top of the engine, which meant the equipment got baked every time the engine was running. Excessive heat alone led to some EFI component failures.
If you pop the hood of any ICE vehicle today, you’ll note that your computers aren’t sitting right on top of the engine, but shuffled away in a place where it’s not dealing with the extreme heat cycles of being on top of an engine. Some other failures I’ve found were attributed to sensors gumming up.
Reportedly, since these systems used a combination of electronics and air pressure to operate, any sort of hose leak or bad connection meant that the system couldn’t run the engine correctly. And remember, many of those electrical connections were right on top of the engine, getting baked with everything else. As Hemmings writes, it was believed the best way to make the system last was to fuel your vehicle with premium unleaded gas and to constantly check hoses for leaks and electronic connections for corrosion. You also wanted to replace your fuel filters somewhat often to prevent the aforementioned gumming issue.
What was worse was that reportedly, Chrysler dealer techs weren’t always trained well on fixing the EFI systems and they were far too horrifyingly complex for the home wrencher to figure out.
Things got so bad that even the car’s spokesman, Iacocca’s friend Frank Sinatra, had a bad time. Sinatra was chosen as the figure to help lead Imperial sales into the 1980s. His involvement went deep, resulting in a “FS” special edition Imperial, and Sinatra even wrote a song for the car’s commercial. Reportedly, Sinatra did the deal for $1 plus the very first 1981 Imperial off of the line.
The Imperial FS was made to Sinatra’s exacting specifications. It was available only in Glacier Blue Crystal paint with an interior featuring either Mark Cross blue velvet or Mark Cross leather. No matter your interior material choice, it came in a similar light blue to the exterior. Visually, the Imperial FS wasn’t much different aside from neat alloy wheels and microscopic gold badges, but the interior was properly silly where the buyer got a full 16-piece cassette collection of Sinatra’s music plus a place to store 8 of those cassettes right there in easy reach. Of course, no special edition from a star was complete without a signature, and the handful of FS buyers gone one of those too.
Reportedly, even Sinatra’s personal car couldn’t escape problems with that pesky EFI system. One later variation of the ’80s Imperial included a limo and Sinatra reportedly got one of those, too.
The Solution Was Sad
Things were dire for the new Imperial right from the jump. Chrysler sold the Imperial for $18,688 ($62,557 today), noting that for the price, you got everything. The fuel injection system, the technology, and the lavish interior; you got all of it for that one price. In comparison, a Cadillac Eldorado of the same year was $17,550 ($58,747) while a Lincoln Continental Mark VI was $17,939 ($60,049 today). Chrysler tried to market the Imperial as a bargain, pointing out that the Imperial offered you more goodies as standard.
Chrysler thought the Imperial would sell 25,000 copies a year. That wasn’t just ambitious but would have been more Imperials sold in one year than any Imperial had ever sold. Unfortunately, it was the wrong car at the wrong time. Remember folks, this was the tail end of the Malaise Era. Buyers weren’t into giant, thirsty, and expensive ways to get around. They were even less interested in personal luxury coupes.
The year 1981 showed a somewhat small market for personal luxury coupes. Lincoln sold 36,000 Mark VIs while Cadillac moved about 54,000 Eldorados. The Imperial? Chrysler sold just 7,225 of them in 1981, a far cry from the 25,000 goal. The Imperial ended production in 1983 after selling just 10,981 copies. In other words, the entire production run didn’t even meet half of the expected sales for a single year.
Some of the poor sales could be attributed to the fact that the car wasn’t exactly a home run. Car and Driver notes that the amazing tech was largely limited to the engine and instrument panel while GM and Ford were experimenting in more areas:
Like the Eldorado and the Mark VI, the Imperial comes to market with more high-tech engine stuff than you can buy on other, lesser cars from the same manufacturers. Unlike those two, however, most of the high-tech stuff on the Imperial stops with the engine and the instrument panel. Both the Cadillac and the Lincoln are loaded with sophisticated electronic and mechanical features in the chassis and the interior that additionally set them apart from the common herd, no matter how you feel about the cars themselves.
But then Car and Driver, in its period review, kept noting downsides, especially the sheer size of the Imperial:
What kind of car will Frank and Greg and the burghers get when they plunk down their $18,311? A big, heavy car, to start with. A car built on the 1976 Aspen/Volaré chassis. A car with an entirely new fuel-injection system that seems almost too complicated and too ambitious for Chrysler, with its current dearth of people and money. A car that is probably better looking than the competition, at least from the rear wheels forward. A car that suffers a bit from the compromised front suspension and archaic rear leaf springs of the Aspen/Volaré, yet a car that is not unpleasant to drive with the cruise control set at 75 and the wizard stereo filling your head with a Strauss operetta.
Like last year’s Dodge Mirada, the Imperial is an imposing sight. The styling is crisp and purposeful, and if it weren’t for the egregious Seville-knockoff trunk, it would rank as a helluva tasty job. It’s just so big. It weighs 4000 pounds and it looks heavier than that. It feels heavier than that. There’s something ponderous and a little uncertain about the way it negotiates crowded streets and country roads. The steering is both overassisted and lacking in feel, and easing the wheel off top-dead-center at the approach to a freeway off-ramp produces a moment of fleeting imbalance, as though the car were afraid it might stumble on its outside front wheel, but then things settle down and it understeers around the curve with reasonable self-assuredness. But at the other end, the transition from helm’s alee back to top-dead-center, there comes another heartbeat’s breadth of disequilibrium, while the car grapples with the mathematics of returning to straight-ahead motoring.
The complaints didn’t stop there. The magazine said that the dashboard had far too many buttons with complicated functions, the seats were far too small, and the luxurious interior wasn’t even as comfortable as it looked. Reportedly, Car and Driver wasn’t the only one to feel that the Imperials missed the mark.
Then we get back to that EFI. As Hemmings writes, a lot of buyers fed up with the unreliability of their Imperials traded their cars in and washed their hands of the situation. Chrysler’s solution was drastic. It recalled as many Imperials as it could find and ripped out all of the EFI wizardry for a simple, but reliable carburetor. The conversion also included a new instrument cluster, and converted cars often have a little glowing asterisk in their instrumentation noting the cluster change.
The publication notes that it’s unlikely you’ll ever find an Imperial still out there rocking the factory-installed EFI system. That’s how rough things got.
Swing And A Miss
Chrysler tried pulling other levers like adjusting the car’s price and adding other special editions, but buyers just weren’t interested. The Imperial, which was supposed to be a technological marvel that put the Imperial name on the map and cars in the hands of America’s wealthy, fizzled out as a sad failure. Chrysler then killed the Imperial name again for years.
Thankfully, some good news did come out of this era. The Imperial flagship might not have worked out, but Iacocca did manage to save Chrysler, anyway. These cars also have a bit of a following today. It looks like if you find one for sale you probably won’t even pay near $20,000. Just don’t expect to find EFI computers cooking under the hood.
I’m also glad that the automakers never stopped making EFI better. Today, these systems are so good that most people will never need to think about how their cylinders are firing. Most of the time, you just hop in your car and go. But if you were around decades ago, “fuel injection” might have been a swear phrase and Chrysler might have been one of the ones to make you dislike it.
Update: Added additional information about how the EFI systems failed as well as a handy parts diagram.
(Images: Chrysler, unless otherwise noted.)
GM, and Pontiac in particular, ran into some issue with FI in their early cars and did much the same thing as Chrysler – retrofitted with the tried-and-true carburetor. We take it for granted today, but it was a long slog to get this technology to deliver on the promise of reliability and efficient operation.
Even VW took a swing at this with Bosch Jetronic, featuring Digifant management, and most of those systems are long gone in favor of Weber or Stromberg setups.
Per another article about this car, it was reported that Lee Iacocca inherited this car as it was so far along in the production process stopping it made little sense. The author noted that Iacocca expressed strong feelings of dismay about the car, but there was little he could do. So, being the salesman he always was at heart, he threw the kitchen sink at it.
The buying public wasn’t fooled by a tarted-up Mirada. It also caused some embarrassment when Iacocca had to talk to Congress about bailout money.
I am still trying to find a statement in a reliable source as to why VW called it Digifant. I love the name!
I think the fact that the American engineers couldn’t figure out something that the Germans had been executing flawlessly for decades at this point, and that Chrysler was too stubborn to just use Bosch’s off-the-shelf system, really speaks to the absolute dumpster fire that was American automotive engineering in the Malaise era.
However, given some of the other comments I’m reading, I wonder if part of the reason this FI system failed was domestic technicians who refused to learn how to service a new system, rather than actual design flaws. If an overheating module was the biggest problem, that’s probably rather easy to solve by relocating it.
Flawless is a bold statement to make about early Bosch fuel injection… I’ve wondered that same thing though. I think it was a gnarly combination of cheapy Chrysler electronics combined with totally untrained techs. Kind of like trying to explain to an ol’ timer that actually OBDII is pretty damn handy when it comes to diagnosing an issue.
Well, K-Jetronic may not have been literally flawless, but it was pretty damn reliable.
I’m with you on the OBDII thing. I want all the computers in my car. They make troubleshooting easy! ISTA (BMW) and DAS (Mercedes) literally walk you through troubleshooting steps. It’s so nice!
If you can’t tune your timing chain by smell, are you really a wrencher?
“wasn’t anything special. The Chrysler J platform featured an engine mounted up front and drive wheels in the rear. Transverse-mounted torsion bars handled suspension duties up front while S-shaped leaves carried the rear.” that sounds like a super kinky suspension for a full sized car to me, no other car at the time had anything like it. so the big C couldn’t do fuel injection right. After oh lets say Alfa had in it 74?
Chrysler had been doing the torsion bar setup since the 1950s, it was an established signature for them (and starting to get a bit old hat) by the ’80s.
what about S shaped leafs? I think the combo is unique?, never even heard of that, but I am often uninformed. Yeah, torsion bar alone was not special.
My grandfather, (previously) a lifelong Chrysler man, bought one of these when he and my grandmother moved out to Arizona to join the rest of the family. I remember that thing being in the shop almost the entire time he owned it due to the “computer” failing. I think he got rid of it after four or five months and replaced it with a non-Chrysler product. Quite the disappointment for him.
I must be in the minority here as I love these Imperials so much that I have one of each year.And my “83 is still fuel injected. The other two were dealer converted pretty much when they were new before I bought them.But my “83 still runs like a top.I can get 28 MPG believe it or not out of it,and you nay sayers will probably cry foul.But I’ve had most of these Imperials for over 25-30 years.Bought when they were just used late model cars.
My grandfather always owned Imperials and had a brand new “82.It was fuel injected and he could get some serious MPG out of his too.Riding in his “82 as a kid of 10 or 11 put a big impression on me.By 1983,Chrysler had all the kinks pretty much worked out of the fuel injection and they were good driving reliable cars.
A little known fact is that in 1983 Chrysler started offering their Imperial customers the choice of either the factory “Fuel Injection” or a carburetor from the factory,due to the problems with the earlier “81-“82 models.This was if you ordered the car new.Not many were ordered with the carb because the main selling point of the Imperial was its fuel injection system.These factory carbureted “83’s are super rare and I had a lead on one but the guy decided to junk it out instead.I have talked with other Imperial collectors and they have come to the consensus that only around 25-50 factory carbureted “83 Imperials were built.
Anyways,I’ll still keep my Imperials as I like them and that’s all that matters.Every time I get behind the wheel I think of riding around with my grandfather in one of the coolest luxury cars to come out of Detroit.
I think it was mostly a timing issue, had it come out after the recession was over and the economy was back on growth, and Chrysler was riding the positive PR of returning to profitability and starting to pay down their rescue loans, it might have stood a better chance.
In the Bustle Beauty Contest the Imperial wins hands down. When it hit the market I thought it was the wrong car for the wrong time, but it had style.
I am very interested in how you came about your FI car. Were you looking for that specifically or just a happy accident? Since you seem well-versed on these, do you have any guesses on how many injected cars might still be out there?
It’s always neat to come across people with an obsession for a certain model or type. Very cool!
I bought my fuel injected “83 off of the original owners son.From time to time I would see this older gentleman driving around in it.This was in the early “90’s and the car was less than 10 years old at the time.I saw it parked at a McDonald’s once and left a note under the windshield wiper blade with my phone number on it asking that if he ever wanted to sell to call me up.Well I never heard from him.But I would occasionally still see him driving around in it.But I’m not the type to chase someone down and beg to buy a car.If he doesn’t want to sell he doesn’t want to sell,period.But he did keep my note as his son found it when he was going through his fathers belongings after he had passed.His son called me up and asked if I was still interested in his fathers Imperial.Naturally I said yes and went to look at it and bought it.This was around 1997.
It is hard to say how many injected Imperials are still around.Not every one is converted because I have junked out a few over the years and two were still injected.Another one I junked had the factory authorized dealer conversion on it.Alot of injected Imperials are “backyard” converted.People will get a carburetor and intake plus a standard electronic ignition distributor off of a late “70’s-early “80’s Chrysler product and swap it over.The car will still run,but some of the dash electronics won’t register correctly.If you’re looking for an all original fuel injected Imperial to buy,I would look for an “83 model as by that time Chrysler had it zeroed in pretty good.
Good stuff. Surprised you weren’t tempted to yank those junked injected engines just to have some spares?
I did and still have all the parts that I took from the cars.Engines,fuel injection systems,dash clusters,etc.That’s why I bought parts cars.And the Imperial,being that nobody makes any type of reproduction part for it at all,you have to have a parts car.And here’s a little bit of useless info but here goes.When my grandfather had his “82,the bumpers are made out of aluminum in order to save weight.Both the front and rear bumpers are 3 pieces,each bolted together with one big piece in the middle and an end cap on each end.One of the end caps on my grandfather’s “82 Imperial started “peeling” the chrome off of it.He went to the dealer and had it warrantied for a replacement end cap.But Chrysler made him wait until they had enough “orders” for the end caps to be made and chrome plated before he could get one.So even when the Imperials were new Chrysler wouldn’t just have a part made for it at the drop of a hat.He waited something like a year before he got a new end cap from Chrysler.
It gives me joy that people like you exist. Congrats.
I had a 1977 BMW 530i with fuel injection. It was totally reliable. Actually one of the most reliable cars I’ve had. Not sure how Chrysler couldn’t get it right by 1981, especially on a luxury product!
I mean there is that local news guy’s reviews of late 70’s cars that have been posted here where he got a brand new Chrysler (New Yorker maybe) that came from the factory will all sorts of problems, including a rear window/door that leaked water into the interior.
So not surprised to see a Chrysler from this era whiff the basics.
Mediocre engineering.
Peugeot sold injected 404s and 504s since the late ’60s, and were reasonably reliable.
I don’t understand the need to reinvent the wheel. Bosch made excellent fuel injection systems and our 74 Volvo with EFI and assorted 70s and 80s VAG products with K Jetronic were very reliable with only 3 fuel injection issues across 5 vehicles and 25 years
I’m sure Chrysler thought they could save money by making their own. K Jetronic is pretty simple, around 1980 I wrote a functional description to be circulated to Rolls-Royce service technicians explaining the principles of its operation. I had an ancient W123 Mercedes with it later and it never required any attention.
As far as early FI goes I had two cars from this era with Bosch K mechanical and one with electronic L injection All worked flawlessly for the entire time of my ownerships.
“As the Truth About Cars Notes, the electronic gear for the fuel injection system was mounted on top of the engine, which meant the equipment got baked every time the engine was running. That alone led to some EFI failures.”
So why not simply relocate those electronics to a cooler part of the engine bay? Maybe by the battery, brake resevoir or the grill.
“The Imperial FS was made to Sinatra’s exacting specifications. It was available only in Glacier Blue Crystal paint with an interior featuring either Mark Cross blue velvet or Mark Cross leather.”
Why would anyone want Mark Cross when everyone knew the real luxury in the late 70s/early 80’s was SOFT CORINTHIAN leather?
“The 1949 Imperial Crown even got disc brakes, which was novel at the time.”
I hit a pay wall so I can’t read the link but for a long time I have been under the impression the Triumph TR3 had been the first mass produced car with disc brakes. So, for the record:
“So, which manufacturer was the first to outfit its cars with disc brakes? Some experts say that highly significant claim goes to the little manufacturer of little cars, Crosley. The Indiana-built 1949 Crosley was fitted with Goodyear/Hawley disc brakes on all four wheels. Unfortunately, the calipers, initially designed for airplanes, couldn’t stand up to the repeated use demanded by the automobile and thus proved quite troublesome. A little more than six months after they were introduced, Crosley went back to using the tried-and-true drum brake system instead. So, Crosley was the first. Or was it?
Back in England in 1902, Lanchester built a car with disc brakes that looked similar in design to our current disc-brake system. The main difference was that the disc was nearly paper thin and, I believe, made of copper, which made it quite troublesome. Although the brake pad was activated by a cable instead of hydraulic fluid, it was nonetheless still a disc-brake design.
Also, in 1949 Chrysler introduced an optional “disc brake” system on its Imperial, which was retained through the 1953 model. But the reason I placed the words disc brake in quotes is because these brakes did not incorporate a caliper clamping down on a disc, instead it relied on the engagement of a pair of discs rubbing against the inside surface of a cast-iron drum. I’d call that a true disc-drum setup but not a disc brake.
For years it’s been widely acknowledged that Jensen was the first manufacturer to adapt four-wheel disc brakes to its 1956 model 541 Deluxe— and it did, but it wasn’t until October that year. It was Austin-Healey, one year before, that fitted its 100S with the same Dunlop disc brakes on all four wheels. But the 100S was a limited-production competition-based model, and the Jensen was a true road car. And yet, if production versus competition doesn’t matter, then Jaguar had them both beat with its beautiful C-type race car built for Le Mans 1953 (which it won).
As to the 1955 Citroën DS (unlike the model 541 Deluxe, of which Jensen only built 53 examples), the DS was truly a mass-produced car. But wait. When did Citroën introduce its 1955 DS? That was at the Paris Salon on October 5, 1955. Only seven DS models were built that month, followed by just one in November, then 61 in December. With several changes still being made during those waning days of 1955, many historians consider these early cars to be somewhat preproduction models; just those 69 were built that first year but production really didn’t get going until January 1956. Production for the 1956 model year totaled 9,868, jumping to 28,593 units for 1957.
Then there was Triumph. It introduced its new 1956 TR3 with disc brakes in October 1955 at the London Motor Show. Several months prior, at Le Mans in June, Triumph fielded three factory-built competition TR2s. One car had drums all around, another had Girling disc brakes up front, and a third TR2 was fitted with Dunlop discs on all four wheels. Triumph did this to evaluate the effectiveness and durability of each brake setup before releasing a disc-brake system to the public. It wasn’t until September 1956 that the first production TR3 rolled off the assembly line fitted with Girling front disc brakes as standard equipment.
Although Triumph wasn’t the first to equip its race cars with disc brakes, it was only two years behind Jaguar and just a few months after Austin- Healey. It was far ahead of all the exotic car manufacturers including Ferrari and Maserati, as well as Alfa Romeo, Porsche, and even Mercedes-Benz.
So, who had disc brakes first? Well, it’s clear to see that the Citroën DS was the first volume-production car so equipped, while Triumph’s TR3 was the first volume-production sports car, and Jaguar the first race car. Crosley is unquestionably the first American manufacturer, but there’s little doubt that Lanchester deservedly gets to be crowned overall king.”
https://www.hemmings.com/stories/disc-brakes-which-car-had-them-first/
I don’t care how huge a pile of junk they were, I still love me some ’81 Imperial. If I ever had screw-it money, I’d restomod one with a Viper motor (because a Hellcat crate is too obvious and not nearly silly enough to be a properly ridiculous choice) and then upgrade brakes and other underpinnings as necessary. Interior gets restored but otherwise pretty much untouched – I want the full bordello experience.
No carb that had to meet emissions standards was ever particularly reliable. They all sucked. Pre-emissions carbs were largely fine, most of the time. I had the twin SUs in my Spitfire rebuilt, upgraded with engineering plastic bushings for the throttle spindles, and tuned 25 years ago, and I have barely touched them since.
Baffling that Chrysler felt the need to roll their own FI when Bosch would have just sold them a complete CIS or D-jet system that pretty much “just worked”. NIH syndrome in Auburn Hills? Developing this abortion could not possibly have been cheaper.
“I had the twin SUs in my Spitfire rebuilt, upgraded with engineering plastic bushings for the throttle spindles, and tuned 25 years ago, and I have barely touched them since.”
I also had twin SUs in my TR3 which leaked gas right onto the exhaust manifold and had other problems. Fortunately those problems were fixed with new cork and paper gaskets. Eventually those went out too and were replaced with modern silicone gaskets which were a more permanent fix. Once tuned they stayed tuned. I came to really appreciate the Skinners Union design
My friend who “upgraded” his TR4 (same engine) to fancy, expensive side draft Webers had nothing but problems. Sure they looked amazing but they sucked in every other regard.
Webers work great for one thing and one thing only – making max power on a race track. They suck at pretty much everything else.
SUs are wonderful (once rebuilt with proper quality parts and modern upgrades) as long as you don’t care about emissions.
Considering my crankcase ventilated right into the ground I don’t think emissions crossed ANYONE’S mind in 1956.
My ’69 motor had a very rudimentary PCV valve when it was built. Long gone at this point, so it dumps crankcase vapors to the ground as well. These cars emit more sitting in storage than a modern car does going down the highway at 70mph.
Yeah, I have a pair of Rochesters on my ’64 Chevy and a Carter on my ’61 Rambler, they’ve been fine, seriously, pretty much set it and forget it for 12+ months at a time, really don’t know what the big hangup is. But, once they started adding electronics to them in a desperate attempt to avoid switching to fuel injection (for some reason) to meet emissions, they just turned to garbage. The one in our family’s old Ford Tempo was especially horrible, car would have been mostly reliable otherwise had they just bitten the bullet and done FI.
Same thing with points ignition and mechanical fuel pumps, everyone knows the common wisdom that they have to be upgraded, but if they always start on the first turn after a few pumps anyway, why even bother? People just don’t drive their cars enough, is what the root of many of the problems probably are, put a few hundred miles on a week and it will be fine, let it sit so that the gasoline evaporates and leaves hand sanitizer in the bowl, you’ll have problems
Worse than electronics – the nightmare that is vacuum controlled emissions carbs. <shudder> Building a (cheap) price was the problem. Americans want to buy cars by the pound.
Electonic ignition I will disagree with. That is gold compared to points. Fuck points, especially now that they are mostly Chinesium. Mechanical fuel pumps have too many problems with modern gas – you need more pressure to avoid vaporization on hot days. But they are a lot less trouble than points, and I would not replace one that is functioning properly just because.
I dunno, Q-jets weren’t that bad even with the emissions stuff on them. It was the rest of the motors that usually sucked ass.
Um. I have been staring at these Imps for years as I quite like them but . The wheelbase. I never noticed how absurd the wheelbase is. Like the front overhang is fine, if a little absurd, but the rear looks like a bulldog goin number two. The wheels are simply too far onboard of the rear end, and it has the effect of making the car look like a child’s toy, y’know?
As much as I appear to be an evangelist of old tech (I mostly just hate the modern use of touchscreens and active safety systems that don’t do anything but annoy attentive drivers and enable the irresponsible to be even more so), I never missed carbs or—even worse—distributors. Of course, I’ve never owned any of these early domestic FI POS.
I was working in a GM dealership at the time. One of my jobs was checking in the new cars as they came off the truck. When the first car came off the truck with an EFI emblem on the side I pulled it into the service department and popped the hood. The mechanics all crowded around and one pulled the air cleaner off. They all took turns sticking their fingers under the cone of gas coming out of the throttle body and groaned! After dealing with computer controlled carburetors for a couple of years they were terrified of the thought of dealing with what they were looking at. As it turned out they were a great improvement.
GM TBI was pretty rock solid, not perfect, but there wasn’t much to go wrong.
There’s still plenty of TBI 305’s/350’s out there on 87-95 trucks (squarebody and GMT400)
Rockin the tibby on my ’95 454! I love that I can watch the injectors spray. They look like a pair of fucking fire hoses with the 454 injectors.
Haha totally agree.
When I was in trade school, we had a 454 TBI Suburban that was donated to the school by GM, and someone learning distributors for the first time either put the distributor back in wrong or hooked it up incorrectly.. needless to say those fire hose injectors became an intermittent FLAMETHROWER out of the top of the engine bay very quickly.
Truck survived fine though haha.
“Some of the first fuel-injection systems to be installed into vehicles were made in the 1950s, but those were finicky and unreliable.”
Fuel injection dates from the 1930s – in mid-1930’s production Mercedes-Benz Diesel passenger cars.
Later, Fuel Injection was used in German WWII Fighter aircraft – which were well known for their reliability.
And in the 50’s Mercedes-Benz used mechanical fuel injection in the racing and later road-going 300SL Gullwings – which were incredibly robust.
It’s the Americans who couldn’t manage it – because engineering precision and long-term/high-mileage testing was not a thing in Detroit.
(And who the hell decided to put a computer on top of an engine block?!? Even my 1972 Volvo 145E had the computer under the passenger seat!)
That is my bad. What I hoped to imply was that some of the first gasoline fuel-injection systems for production cars were installed in the 1950s, but that didn’t make it through. At least in my head, I didn’t want to go over every single historic application of fuel injection, but the most applicable for the subject. Fixed, thank you!
But yeah, the Germans had this stuff figured out decades before the Americans!
Couldn’t agree more. Hell, back during the era of the subject vehicle, my ol’ 73 VW needed a weekly tuneup and monthly major repairs, but the Bosch FI sailed through it all with flying colors.
The fully mechanical (diesel pump style) gasoline injection systems used by the Europeans in the 50s and 60s worked, but were *incredibly* expensive. No way would the US makers pay for that other than for a few of the highest performance cars like the FI Corvettes and whatnot. They could do it, but they couldn’t SELL it for prices Americans would pay. Bosch revolutionized fuel injection when they came out with the electronic D-Jet and later K-jet much, much simpler and cheaper systems that largely worked on fuel pressure from a simple relatively low pressure pump.
Though I have to think by 1980 that Chrysler would have been far better off to just buy in Bosch injection for this car rather than develop this mess in-house. Bosch was already selling 8-cylinder versions of it to Porsche and others. VW could afford to sell it on Rabbits, surely Chrysler could have bought the bigger version for their flagship product. But NIH was for real in Detroit in those days, I guess.
The 50’s Mercedes (direct injection) system was so robust that it would dilute the oil because there wasn’t a way to have it not fire the injectors when it was turning off? Not sure I’d call that robust, or would I call 300SL’s high enough volume to compare.
It was a complex system that needed specific care – but it was effective and reliable for winning long-distance races several years in a row.
I once talked to a guy who was running a track day with a 300SL (believe it or not). He had the hood open and spent a good amount of time explaining to me how its mechanical fuel injection worked. As I recall it even had a method to correct for altitude; simply mind blowing.
Fact: the more times “American” appears in an ad copy, the crappier the product.
Hmm…I think this was their 2nd failed attempt at EFI, lest we forget the 1958 Chrysler Electrojector by Bosch. Similar solution; have the dealer install dual quads instead.
It was, their issue was the paper wax transistors that would zap out when going by transformers on power poles.
One guy fixed that on his car with the factory parts with modern transistors and voila, it worked perfectly after.
You beat me to it! You are correct, it was the SECOND time that chrysler had to do this on their v8’s. The system on the 1958’s was the grandfather of all EFI that came after it. Yes I said EFI.. because each injector at each cylinder fired electronically.
Not sure if it was truly called a “recall” in 1958 or not… but there are maybe 1-2 that exist out there that work. They even put it on a Desoto or two.
I’m not sure I recall anyone ever being upset about EFI. I have many memories of my dad outside always fettling with the carb on our ‘74 Cortina and later our ‘86 Ford Telstar (rebadged Mazda 626). When mum got her ‘92 Nissan Bluebird, it was like the future had arrived, no more stupid carbs! Although weirdly I never recall a time fettling with the ‘85 Hilux, although that may have been EFI as it was an SR5…
My humble 1978 VW Rabbit had fuel injection and never has a moment of trouble for the 100K miles I put on the car. I know old timers hate EFI and love carbs but EFI is a game changer. The electronic controlled carburetors of the 80s were the worst of all possible worlds
I bought a motorcycle with carbs (no, not a Harley but a Suzuki) in part b/c I wanted to, once in my life, own something carbureted. Within a year, I no longer had the desire.
Having tried to fix a gas weedeater and two chainsaws, my love affair with carburetion died long before it even began. It was never, ever right. Low was too lean if the motor was warm, but wouldn’t start cold. High was at the razor’s edge of running when cold, but acted like it was WOT as soon as it warmed up. I hate the damned things.
Carbureted two strokes are just devil’s tools. They are the worst of the worst. As I replace my gas yard equipment they will all be battery operated.
100%. I still have an actual pile of really-close -to-functional chainsaws and it drives me nuts. I hate to go battery, because when I need them I usually need them in a big way, but it is what it is.
I have used small shorter battery chainsaws and have read a lot and seen a lot of videos on the bigger ones. I am sold. I can take one camping and not worry about smell and spills etc. I will buy one soon but I have a functional one in my shed so it will not be soon. I get what you are saying. I will even replace my mower and snowblower with battery electric eventually.
I have heard it said another cause of the EFI problems was owners not heeding the manufacturer recommendation to use premium fuel. Is there any merit to that?
Also, quoting your quote of the Car and Driver review:
It should be noted that the bustle-back Seville debuted in 1979 for the 1980 model year, meaning the bustle-back Imperial was only a year later in 1980 for the 1981 model year. With that in mind, I find it hard to believe the Imperial copied the Seville’s rear style motif with only a year’s notice.
That would imply Cadillac and Chrysler both had the same idea around the same time without knowledge of the other doing so, or one of them got wind of the other’s idea well ahead of time.
The truth of the matter is that they BOTH copied an Older Rolls- Royce design
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/21/da/3c/21da3c7c444ea774a13a3fbeb1c92c49.jpg
Rolls wasn’t the only one. The Daimler DS420 was in production from 1968 to 1992, lasting from before, during, and after Detroit’s take on the bustle-back.
And also Lincoln with the 1982 Continental – they were all inspired by Hooper-bodied pre-WWII luxury cars, especially Rolls-Royces, which, I believe was referred to as “razor edge” in their heyday.
American luxury cars had been using prewar styling cues all through the 1970s, with padded vinyl roofs, carriage tops, opera windows, coach lamps, wire wheels, etc, so most likely it was a question of everyone just kind of moving toward the next logical progression of the theme.
In GM’s case, the bustleback look had been kicking around their studios since the 1960s, starting with a sketch proposal for the 1967 Eldorado which, while not selected, lived rent-free in Bill Mitchell’s brain and he kept returning to the idea over and over again, having new variations drawn up, then signed off on the 1980 Seville as his last new product before retiring in 1977 (meaning the final design was frozen then).
I’m well aware they were all cribbing the bustle-back from much older cars. It was sort of the crowning achievement of the kitschy philosophy pervading American car design of that era. I did not know the 1980 Seville was frozen by 1977, which does leave some time for Chrysler to have found out about it since leaks and espionage weren’t uncommon among makes back then.
As for the Continental, I’d say Lincoln actually was following the trend. The Seville and Imperial were close enough in production that they could have been a coincidence, but the Continental was two years after the bustle-back Seville released so they had enough time to style their own take on it.
I have to say though, the Lincoln is my pick of the three, both for styling and function.
I’d have to agree, especially since GM’s studios had been sketching different takes on the bustle back look off and on since the mid 1960s, and designers did move between different automakers at least occasionally, would have only taken one ex-GM hire at Ford or Chrysler to bring up Mitchell’s interest to get the idea moving there, too.
I still think this does the styling the best of the three of them.
There is a tall tale about Sinatra or Dean Martin breaking down in this Gen Imperial, calling Lee Iococca because he was a superfan of the rat pack, and telling him to take his car and never talk to him again.
“Cadillac and Lincoln introduced their own electronic fuel injection systems in 1980.”
The Seville began its life with fuel injection for the 1976 MY, and was optional on the 8.2-liter engines.
GM and Ford executed their home-grown FI better than Chrysler, but it makes me wonder why they didn’t go to Bosch. Guess it was because of Detroit’s “not invented here” syndrome.
The GM FI system on the 8.2’s and Seville’s was a Bendix system if I recall. And it works just fine- parts are getting harder to source now, but it was never really troublesome to begin with.
I should point out that, while the Imperial was very much the sort of car Iacocca was known to favor and champion, development was already well under way at the time he came to Chrysler and his initial instinct was to kill or postpone it, due to the poor economic prospects at the time, but went ahead due to the sunk costs after making some tweaks to improve it and calling in a favor from Sinatra to help market it
I vaguely remember a C/D short take on the Imperial from the reveal that led with a quote from Iacocca saying this exact thing.
I understand he was sort of embarrassed to be putting that sort of car out under those circumstances (deep recession, high unemployment, high interest rates, recent taxpayer-backed bailout, recent memories of the second oil embargo – not an opportune time to be launching an expensive, thirsty, frivolous luxury coupe and he was afraid of how the company would be attacked in the media for spending their bailout funds on something like that instead of more pragmatic products).
Under normal circumstances, the Imperial was right up his alley, but he was able to read the market’s pulse and knew the timing was horrible