The underpowered Subaru 360, the Bricklin, and finally the Yugo. Old Malcolm wasn't going to be satisfied until he had forced every American to take the bus.

Gull wing doors - the infotainment screen of the 1970s.

at least the DeLorean left us a iconic movie car.

The lines on the back window of the yugo are to keep your hands warm while you're pushing it 📉😁📈

The best thing about those early Bricklin's was the Ford 351 Cleveland under the hood...that motor is the most tunable V8 ever produced....

One of these turned up in the UK in around 1977/8 and we went or a spin it round the leafy country roads of Solihull I was driving a Jensen Interceptor FF and my friends were in the Bricklin . As a potential rival to the Jensen, it was very poorly matched but I do recall the sensation it caused when we stopped at the local pub .

Hi. Corvettes and SV-1s are very similar, fiberglass body over a steel chassis. Also C3's aren't really known to be any more or less prone to rusting than any other car from their era. Also, the 75 Vette was...a dog. It shipped with 165 horsepower and a 3 speed automatic. It was, literally, the worst year, as the 74 had 195 and the 76 180. One thing that should also be pointed out, is that at the time Chevy was selling aroundabout 40k 'vettes a year, so the notion that Bricklin would move 40k SV-1s at the time should have been laughable. Also, the only way you're getting a '75 C3 to 60 in 5.2 is if you drop it off a cliff. You should check your MY's for performance numbers because Motor Trend recorded a 9.6 second 0-60 time for the '75 during their testing back in the day. ( they've done...a lot ). www.motortrend.com/news/chevrolet-corvette-performance-history/ In addition, it's 16.4 second quarter mile at 87.5 Mph means it'd probably not be able to go much past 110mph either. What I'm trying to say here is as abysmal as the SV-1 was, the Corvette was just as bad if not worse. Context counts here, so I'll pull in a Ferrari for perspective. Specifically, so far as I know, the fastest one you could buy in 1975 , the 308 GT-B. It'd go 0-60 in 6.5, and run to the quarter in 15.6 seconds. Just over a second faster than the 'Vette. It's hand-built, expertly tuned, 2.9l DOHC V8 only managing 237hp in North America. So this is a top of the line Ferrari that can't even outrun a modern Hot Hatchback. OK, let's just toss in another car for some perspective, something common, like a 1975 Honda Civic. The little Civic had a whopping 53 horsepower, and would go 0-60 in 14.3 seconds, and finish the quarter somewhere after the 20 second mark. Just for some more american perspective, howabout an Impala. This was a very common family sedan and kind of seen as a normal benchmark for what most people would have had access too. It'd do 0-60 in 13.8 seconds, and the Quarter in 19.7. Putting the land barge barely ahead of the Civic. My point here is that *everything* sucked in the mid 70s, and these cars, the SV-1 and C3 *WERE NOT SLOW* for their time. By any stretch of the imagination. Just because *we* see them as sluggish, out dated, and simple doesn't mean they were perceived as that at the time. Chevy didn't replace the stingray with the C4 until '84. It took the Japanise until the early 90s ( Supra and 300ZX mostly, RX-7 to an extent ) to really start pushing hard on Dodge and GM to step up their game. That Ferrari I mentioned earlier is bested by a Hyundai Veloster Turbo or Fiesta ST, neither of which is seen as a particularly fast car. The SV-1, by today's standards is slow. By 1975 Standards was downright quick.

Fascinating! There were a few of the Bricklins running around my neighbourhood in the 70s. One of them was called “The Black Widow”. . . white with a spider on the hood. . .

I think Corvette's rust as much as Bricklins they are both fibreglass with steel underpinnings

Very interesting. I've never heard of this. Some creative feedback. Whoever told you to pause for 4 beats between points isn't a youtuber, probably a public speaker. You can let the flow go faster here, you won't lose us in an avalanche if too much info. We're invested in the interesting topic. Nice research keep it up!

Vettes were built with fiberglass in '53 first considered for use on a GM vehicle by legendary designer Harley Earl.

Fascinating and well put together, as always!

I think that many New Brunswickers will be surprised to discover that they live in the far NorthEast of Canada.

Great video as always

The police department in Scottsdale AZ in the early 1970's had one of these done up in full police livery for publicity.

The Subaru 360 sedan was sold in the US in small numbers. One was owned by someone I was stationed with at NAS Memphis in attack squadron VA-204. A dealer in Thousand Oaks CA had a fairly large selection of Subaru 360 vans and pickup trucks.

I love these car documentaries!! Adding you to my Patreon!

Fascinating

Great stuff I love car stories like this

Wouldn't rust in the same manner as a Corvette (10:10)? Wasn't the Corvette constructed in fibreglass too?

I never knew this I'm happy you shared it

Years ago an orange one came into the junkyard that my son worked at. Against my advice my son bought the salvage title piece of crap and brought it home. I’m pretty sure the thing had been in a flood and literally everything was out of order, every panel had stress cracks and the interior was completely thrashed. There it sat for a couple years until it was finally given away, thank god. After reading the Bricklin history, it amazing that they managed to make the almost 3000 cars that were produced.

thanks.. that was a good video. I am always looking for information on the sv-1. My dad helped build the car. and for a wild said it was the best car he ever drove.. He never had a issue with it. I dont remember it.. but I know a lot of people that had good stories about it

Well done. Just one thing. Wasn’t the corvette was also fiberglass? 🤔

A gullwing door on a car in eastern Canada is one of the silliest ideas out there. If you have not been able to park it under cover, make sure you take your snow brush with you, or you are going fill a seat with snow when you open the door to get said brush. Also, electrically-powered doors? You will want to make sure you keep your battery in top condition: the Canadian winter destroys batteries that are not carefully maintained.

'Do to the price of real estate in Detroit being prohibitively expensive'. That status surely didn't last long! (What Detroiters wished that were true today!)

Man do I ever wish my folks were still alive to comment on this. They worked there.

Interesting stuff! Fyi towards the end you may have meant "derided" rather than "derived", but well researched, paced and produced.

The Monkeemobile was _hideous_ - I wouldn't want anything from its stylist.

I am the proud owner of #1432, a 1975 Bricklin SV1. Bricklin got it right.

2:57 Anyone else notice the Ford Edsell in the right hand lane? Always nice to get an unexpected callback to an earlier episode.

"America's own (Mitsubishi) Dodge Colt and (Suzuki) Chevrolet Metro":)

You're very kind to Premier Hatfield. (BTW I'm Canadian) Not fully wron, but it was *not* gov't pragmatism in play. At multiple points, added funding could have been tied to defined, measurable cleanups or advances.

The Subaru 360 was never banned in the USA. It skirted the safety rules. Consumer Reports, the US equivalent of the UK magazine Which? rated it not acceptable. after which sales collapsed, but you still see them occasionally at car shows, legally registered and driven on the road. I remember when I was a kid in 1971, visiting San Francisco, and seeing a lot woth dozens of unsold 360s in storage.

The 360 was legal to import to the U.S. because it weighed under 1000lbs. It and the Subaru FF-1 were the first Subaru's imported to the US, and the company evolved into Subaru of America. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subaru_of_America www.subaru.com/company/50years/milestones#first-subaru-office That Pantera's taillights were borrowed from the Alfa 1750 Berlina; the Maserati Bora also used the same taillights.

We'll have to agree to disagree on your conclusion to this fiasco. Otherwise a great Video as usual!

7:28 Some might say Mr Bricklin didn't have to leave New Brunswick to play cowboy..

5:11 I can already see a problem: how do you get the raw -- or even finished -- materials all the way out to the middle of nowhere for a reasonable cost? Sure there's *A* railroad or two, but is that enough?

Now if Bricklin had talked to Reliant, maybe looked at the Reliant Scimitar he would have gained a lot of knowledge on big engine fibreglass cars and he prob could have gotten Reliant to do all the fibreglass at a far better quality and cost than what he was turning out. A note on the Yugo's, I had one of the 55 "Sports" and they were positively lethal machines, its mechanics were actually pretty good but the brakes, I went as far as sourcing decent Fiat sets of brake components for mine and it still was hit or miss the car would stop in time or at all and often had to utilise handbrake AND slamming it into 1st leaving smoke coming from the 4 drums and burnt clutch smells for miles around and it was just horrendous :( I was always surprised Bricklin never faced criminal charges. Any chance of doing a vid on Mr Sipani of India who took to India the Reliant Robin, Reliant Kitten, Austin Montego and other cars from the British stables and utterly failed every time? Also a vid on the very interesting and curious tale of Mr Agg of Trojan Racing/Cars who built his empire on Lambretta's and 3 wheel cars and often locking horns with Innocenti when he offered free gifts of free walking boots with every Lambretta sold which irritated the Italians immensely but he was a real salesman and a working class hero of South London where his works once were.

Greater good my foot it was done to big up some inflated egoes.

Interesting. New Brunswick must have had some manufacturing base to put together an assembly line with the requisite skilled workers. Surely shipping components and materials to New Brunswick then shipping the cars back adds to cost. The real “logic” is the government investor. Would the doors open with a flat battery? How can that be safe? I don’t understand parts of the narration. 6:10 “Hatfield was still able to endear himself to Bricklin”. Surely Bricklin had to endear himself to Hatfield? 17:10 “derived” should be “derided”

Why not use hydraulics and counter springs to move the doors up and down?

Bricklin needed Red Forman's foot threat done to him because of this car

rust in the same manner as the corvette? the corvette was fiberglass before the bricklin. I'm pretty sure the floor panels on the c3 vette were fiberglass as well until later production years. this is a pretty cool car though I want one as I'm also from St. John NB.

'North' in Canada (as in 'northeast' here) means northern areas of the six main provinces plus all of the three territories. None of the Maritime-Atlantic provinces (PEI, Newfoundland, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia) has a NORTHeast in Canada's realities.

Lessons learned from the Bricklin disaster: Businesspeople should NEVER design cars. Politicians should NEVER dabble in business.

That anyone remembers the DMC-12 at all is mostly because of it being used in some movie or other that came out in 1985...

Well done, but it would have been even better if you could have talked with some Bricklin owners.

my name is Justis MacEwan...I’m 16 years old and I live in quesnel B.C. I recently bought my first car wich just happened to be a bricklin. Guy didn’t want very much for it because he always thought it was a piece of shit...even though there are quite a bit of design flaws with the car...I gotta say it’s really fun to drive, and It may be the reason I have a gf right now lol...still does it’s job even today 😂

You know the "plastic fantastic" Corvette has a body made from glass fiber, or, fiberglass. So how can the body rust? You're usually pretty decent with your accuracy, so I guess we all make mistakes.

I'd known a bit about this car and its company from a few sources; but this video summed up rather well how much worse than the DMC-12 the whole affair was. John Z. Delorean was after all from the car industry, being for a time the heir apparent at GMC. Bricklin on the other hand... well there are much worse examples of incompetant outsiders (>ahem< the dale >ahem

wow scraping 5 year old car would be untkinkable nowadays, that's basically almost brand new :D 20+ year old cars still run fine

Most people don’t realise it, but the decline set in the 60‘s...

Did you mean 'derided' instead of 'derived'?

America's own Dodge Colt and Chevrolet Metro ? You could perhaps describe the Metro as being American since, although actually a Suzuki, it was at least built in the US, but the Dodge Colt was 100% Japanese, built in Japan by Mitsubishi and imported into North America by Chrysler which then sold it as either a Dodge or Plymouth Colt.

Be cool to see a modern version of the dmc 12 that has an engine that isn't wheezey and gutless.

An interesting car to make some mods on it and drive it.

5:10 the map looks weird like that.

The Corvette has always been made of fiberglass and doesn't rust

They are talking about me.

The Pantera taillights weren't original also though I don't remember from which car they were taken. Probably some Ford as it also has a Ford engine.

The man had cajones the size of VW bugs

It's a shame, because the Bricklin could have really been a solid car. The whole idea to put gull-wing doors on it was just stupid. Gull-wing doors are still stupid and useless now, which is why you hardly see them except on extremely high end sports cars that are hardly driven. The car looked great, and they could have engineered better airflow to get the cooling regulated. I would say that Canada should have taken over the factory, and continued production, but at that stage the car would have needed a years worth of re-engineering to get it right.

Putting your name to a car is risky, it's worked for some but not everyone. Glad Elon didn't name his car the Musk.

Canada or Quebec to be more exact had a real sports car designed the European style, with real sportive performance and this was the Manic GT, made near Montreal and here is a report about it. I saw it at the Autoshow when it was launched. You should look at it as this car would offer the best handling of any vehicle designed in North America. www.carthrottle.com/post/a2yde2y/

A lot of the video and stills were from another video "The Premier, the Promoter and Their Car" (currently on KZfaq at this link kzfaq.info/get/bejne/pNNiaa6UyJy2lJc.html). I would suggest watching this video where you get a little more insight about the vehicle and a different opinion and the effort to build the car. There is another video called "The Bricklin Story" (not on KZfaq at this time) that provides some additional insights. This vehicle was also featured on the series Chop, Cut, Rebuild.

This car was even worse than the Delorean. And Malcolm himself was (is) an event bigger joke: a con man like his car, all flash and no substance or competence. And the constant wearing of those shades: what a pretentious poser!

Methinks that last phrase should be "is often *derided* as one of the worst cars ever made"/

I know someone who owns 2 of these cars, REALLY strange looking cars up close and the build quality is laughable, they've been warehouse stored since new, both less than 1000km

5:14 What's up with that map?

10:00 Kenosha Krap! what a terrible engine... my god the 70's where terrible...nothing says "i got shut out by the big 3" like a team up with American motors.

bricklin looks better to be honest it has a more muscle look

What series of controversial motor cars are you talking about? He built one car.

Your viewers need to look at the Automoments Channel Bricklin documentary. It's more accurate and a better documentary.

Bricklin is a con artist. People give him entirely too much credit

Sorry, that's 'incredibly' expensive. Still.

At 10:15, you say that the Corvette rusted. The Corvette was ALSO fibreglass and had been since it's beginning in 1953. For such a transport 'authority/expert', you really ought to know better. More research before production.

The basic problem was that it was a very crappy car, hastily designed and built by inexperienced people from the top of the company to the assembly line workers.

One big difference from the Delorean, no cocaine being sold by the company owner 😂

And, if you think you are so important you might have the common decency to take your sun glasses off indoors.

So that is where Musk got his inspiration from...

American car last 5 years? Yea no. American cars were the best of the best during that era

10:10 "in the same matter as the corvette" i'm going to assume you're just f-ing with corvette guys with that one ....and yeah, it was those heavy electric motors not the woefully underpopulated amc engine there's no way those motors weigh more than a person in the passenger seat or a set of golf clubs.

Here's an idea-let's make a car designed in part by a wanna be cowboy,powered by an anemic AMC lump of iron,and built by unemployed Canadian fishermen and oil workers!What could possibly go wrong! At least John Delorean had SOME automptive experience! I knew something about Bricklin,but not what this vid shows.What a man.

Another schmart "wannabee magnate"🤣

The Bricklin SV-1; Every owner is a crash-test-dummy! .....definitely a dummy/sucker!

What is it with car enthusiasts and gull-wing doors?...

The Bricklin was resonably designed for a car that was hastily designed. It was poor quality control that was the problem with the car. Malcolm used American tried and proven parts for the car. The car had several issues but are all fixable. Far more fun to have than a boring Corvette or the copycat DeLorean. 2900+ cars were made and is the first car in automotive history to have powered doors and second car to have gull wing doors behind the 1950s Mercedes SL coupe. The Bricklin also has the highest bumper rating of any car made at 10 mph before damage.

Some questionable content here

I might be strange, but the main problem was to my eyes biblicaly ugly. And most importantly of all, this is not a sports car, in fact, no American is allowed to use the term sports car for anything America has ever made and ever will make. And I do include 2021 Corvettes.

DMC:12.. The 1st car to suck up the white lines👉🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮🚮

Its Fiberglass. It wont rust like the Corvette (Fiberglass) or the Ferrari.