It Would Go Like Hell: We Channeled The Spirit Of Carroll Shelby To Make An Electric Omni GLH Hot Hatch

Critics tend to snicker at numerous cars attributed to Lee Iacocca; the Ford Mustang II, the Aries K-Car, and Lincoln Mark III are not seen as high automotive art by many. The objects of journalist’s praise were instead often creations of Lee’s industry executive arch rival, Bob Lutz. Cars such as the revived Pontiac GTO and G8, the Dodge Viper, the Saturn Sky, and V-Series Cadillacs that Lutz was reportedly responsible for were certainly more than worthy of this acclaim. “Often wrong, but never in doubt” was apparently Bob’s motto, and sadly with most of these enthusiast-oriented cars he spearheaded he was indeed wrong, at least from a marketing standpoint: sales smashes they were not.

Iacocca, on the other hand, was rarely wrong. He knew what the people would buy, and buy they did. It’s hard to think of anyone of a certain age that wasn’t connected in some way with one of Lido’s cars. I’m not even a fan of most of his products, yet I came home from the hospital delivery room in an 1965 Mustang, I took driver’s ed in Aries K-Cars, and Caravan cabs carried me home to the airport from college. Whenever Iacocca said something about where he thought the automotive market was headed, you were wise to listen.

Small Cars For The People?

In an earlier post, I mentioned a snippet from a Charlie Rose interview of Iacocca late in life where they asked if he could save the then-dying-for-the-third-time Chrysler Corporation. His response was that he could, by making the company build small cars people wanted to buy. I don’t think Lee is incorrect, but we must also consider that Stellantis currently has a reported 500+ day supply of compact Dodge Hornet hybids on lots today, and was in a similar situation with Jeep Renegades.

This either means Lee’s advice was wrong, or the vehicles Stellantis is providing for the segment now aren’t right. I’m going with the latter –  there are too many better competitors than the Hornet in the niche. Stellantis needs a unique small car, maybe a little EV that can offer an enticing degree of personality and performance that pods like the Nissan Leaf never did.

This does sound like a key to success for what was once the Chrysler Corporation; in fact, back in Chrysler’s darkest days of the late seventies, the brand’s one bright spot was a unique subcompact:  the first transverse-engined front-drive American made car. Developed jointly with Chrysler Europe (the remains of Simca), this Golf-style hatchback was sold as the Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon. I love the old-school Mopar fender-mounted blinker repeaters, by the way.

The first challenge to building the Omni was that Chrysler USA had absolutely no engines small enough to power the thing, and the 1.1 and 1.3 liter Simca engines used in the European version were deemed too small for the automatic-and-air-conditioning American buyers. The solution was to purchase engines from Volkswagen of America, a surprising move for a company that was now providing powertrains for what would amount to a direct competitor to the Rabbit/Golf. Admittedly, the VW version had fuel injection, and the company could move every Rabbit it could bring in, so this was just an extra business opportunity.

When VW introduced the Golf GTi, they likely never thought this also-ran from a dying Chrysler would ever try to compete with them. Boy, were they wrong.

No More Mister Nice Guy

By 1984, the Omni still looked virtually identical to when it was introduced six years earlier, but there was something stirring underneath this mild-mannered exterior.

In 1981, Chrysler began offering the American-built 2.2 liter four out of the K-Car in the Omni/Horizon, and if you’ve been paying attention to this so far you’ll realize that’s a motor twice the size of what the overseas markets offered. This thing was getting quick, and the only option was to make it even quicker. Lee Iacocca had by now taken over at the ailing Chrysler, and who did Lee reach out to while at Ford when he wanted to make run-of-the-mill cars into performance machines? Y’all gotta call ‘Ol Shel: Carroll Shelby.

Shelby’s creation was the 1984 Dodge Omni GLH, a moniker that literally was an acronym for “Goes Like Hell.” The high-output 2.2 liter four pumped 110 horsepower into the front wheels, far more than rival hot hatches like the aforementioned Rabbit GTi. Wider rubber, ground effects, and red accents created an eye-catching but still rather stealth machine that could pull 0-60 in 8.7 seconds.

Here’s a rather fun, memorable commercial for the car back in ’84. Wish I had that scale model …

The GLH was relatively quick for the time, but you can always make a car faster. For the second year of the hotted-up Omni, the 146 horsepower Turbo I engine from larger Chrysler products was offered in the GLH Turbo, a power boost that knocked over a second off of the original car’s time to 60. This was starting to get serious, and very quickly.

For the ultimate Omni hatch, Shelby put a “Turbo II” engine under the hood that was massaged up to 175 horsepower. As Carroll might say, the car did not “have any hitch in it’s git-a-long.” Dubbed the GLH-S (for Goes Like Hell S’More, said Shelby), this was a rather blunt instrument next to the more surgical Volkswagen rival, but the concurrent GTi was never going to see the acceleration times of this thing. Hoo-wee!

The Omni lived on until 1990, but the last GLH was sold in 1986, a short run for a car very long on fun. Later, Chrysler offered sporting little cars like the SRT Neon, but the original GLH has a certain basic charm that many new-school Mopar fans miss.

Raising Cain

A revived Dodge Omni sounds like an exciting little hatch, and I can see an EV revival of this thing in cute colors being the kind of hit that Stellantis would want. Of course, as Autopians, we don’t really give a shit about cute: we want fast. We want a new GLH. Don’t worry, the Bishop has you covered.

One of the most talked-about EVs of recent years has been the Hyundai Ioniq 5. This angular five door has a rather pleasing overall shape that many believe is covered in a bit too many “stylish” will-quickly-be-dated details such as a sharp, angular cuts on its flanks, lots of “ribbed” detailing and odd, camera-iris scalloped trims on the wheel arches.

If we clean all that techno-gingerbread off, we end up with a rather plain but balanced form quite similar to 1970s subcompact hatchbacks. In fact, it ends up looking a lot like an old Golf or Omni. Let’s lean into the look and add the graphic touches that would evoke the GLH:

Simple black trim, a fake grille, and a Hoffmeister kink on the rear door evoke the Omni’s design; the rocker panel moldings and pepperpot wheels are a nostalgic nod to the past. White or a lighter color would really help show off the detailing better, but come on, it’s a GLH, right? Can it really not be black?

In back, the taillights mimic the shape of the original car but with LED grids below. Most hatchbacks today wrap the rear glass around the upper sides of the car, but not on our Omni.

The interior of the original Omni was not particularly unique, but it did have a super deep-dished steering wheel and sharply angled back gauge binnacle, as will our revival.

The center console has a vertical “wall” along the passenger’s side just like on a 1970 Challenger. Sure, a shifter is unnecessary, but regardless we’ll offer an “L” shaped gear selector to fill the void on the console and deliver a true retro touch. Note also the flip-up, face-level vents and Pentastar-logo shaped door speakers grilles.

Bolt Outta Hell

Let’s not waste any more time: how fast could it be? I see this high-voltage hatch as being somewhat smaller than the Ioniq5, and while there could certainly be a front-drive, single-motor Omni offered, I know the GLH will need motors front and back. How much power? I’m hoping that each motor could produce least 250 horsepower, so if we could get the total in the vicinity of 600 horses we’d be nearing the idiotic level I’m looking for. With a weight in the 4000 pound range, zero to sixty would be in the mid-to-low three seconds. “Oh,” says the boxy subcompact, “do I have your attention now?”

If Ol’ Shel were alive today, it’s hard to imagine him thinking about range or volts or battery packs, but I somehow believe that he’d be smiling down on this silly little car. You don’t need gasoline to raise Hell.

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