Forgotten Classics: Lancia Flavias by Pininfarina, Vignale and Zagato

In the late Fifties, the Pesenti family that had taken over Lancia after Gianni Lancia's racing expenditures had bankrupted the firm sought a design to fill the gap between small V4 Appia and upper-crust V6 Flaminia. Engineer Antonio Fessia came up with an aluminum horizontally-opposed four, initially in 1.5 liter form, driving the front wheels through a 4-speed transaxle and with 4-wheel disc brakes (2 firsts for an Italian car). The flat four was the first for Lancia, which had gained fame with its V4 Lambda in the Twenties before producing V8s and then the first production V6 with the 1950 Aurelia.  The body design of the Flavia sedan, however, appeared to have been designed (unlike, for example, the Citroen DS) to show no hint of its advanced engineering. Instead, it was boxy, slab-sided and charmless. The year after production started, Lancia attempted to remedy this, not by restyling the sedan, but by launching 3 sports versions by 3 different carrozzeria: a coupe shown above by Pininfarina, a cabriolet by VIgnale, and a lightweight Sport by Zagato. The Pininfarina coupe turned out to be the most popular of the three, with production topping 19,000 units, most of these being the 1.8 liter.

The instrument panel signalled the deluxe GT character of the car, which substituted a steeply-angled floor shift for the column shift in the sedan.  The roof and side window design was similar to that on Pininfarina's Ferrari 250 GT 2+2, though the Lancia received horizontal tail lights...

Starting in 1962, there was also a cabriolet version designed by Giovanni Michelotti and built by Vignale.  The car's restrained lines seemed aimed at the same clientele of doctors or lawyers that adopted the Pininfarina coupe. The dark blue over tan color scheme of this example seems to suit its personality.

Unlike the PF coupe, the Vignale cabriolet used the same instrument cluster as the Flavia sedan, a decision that seemed to undercut the sporting character of the car. Though Flavia berlinas originally came with a steering column-mounted shift lever to go with the less-sportive ribbon speedometer; the coupes and cabrios had a floor shift controlling 4 speeds.

Of the 1,601 specimens of the Vignale Flavia produced, only 40 were confirmed to have right-hand drive like the silver example below, which also features the optional hardtop.  Production of the Vignale cabrio ended after 1967.

The Zagato-bodied Flavia Sport, also introduced in 1962, was aluminum-bodied, and equipped with either a 1.5 or 1.8 liter four and 4-speed transaxle, though some higher-performance fuel-injected 1.8 versions featured a 5-speed.  Just under 630 examples rolled out of Zagato's workshops, including 3 prototypes, and 512 of these had the larger engine. They all, however, had somewhat polarizing styling by Ercole Spada.  This included a folded version of the vaguely shield-shaped grille, and chunky proportions belying the car's light weight.

Like Vignale, Zagato adopted the Flavia sedan's instrument cluster, and it seems a bit more surprising in this context. 

The rear view shows off side windows that curve into the roof, recalling the Panoramica* show cars Zagato built in the late Forties and early Fifties, but unlike on those cars create a discontinuity with the front door windows.  The backlight is concave, anticipating a theme that would appear on some GM production cars, and the low rectangular shape of the rear wheel arch seem out of character with the car's sporting intentions.  The Zagato and Vignale cars, unlike the PF coupe, use tail lights from the Flavia sedan.

Production of Zagato's Sport ended after 1967, and Ercole Spada's proposal for a successor car reflected contemporary trends at the same time it suggested a design language that could be applied to the rest of Lancia's product line. 

The Flavia Super Sport Zagato prototype shown above and below, one of two built in 1967-68, represented Spada's response to the creased, wedge-shaped cars then appearing from Giugiaro at Ghia. Spada managed to include plenty of curves as well, in profile, plan and section. This car, from the Lopresto collection, is the 2 liter prototype from 1968; a 1.8 liter car to the same design appeared in the previous year.

This modernist take on the traditional shield-shaped Lancia grille gives the nose more character than the simple rectangle on Zagato's Fulvia Sport, or on the various 1960s Lancias from Pininfarina, Touring or Vignale.  Like the crisply creased and sleekly proportioned profile of the Super Sport, it could have served as a template for establishing a strong Lancia identity across the rest of the line.

Unlike the Zagato Sport, the Super Sport received an instrument panel designed for the car.

In the photo below, the 1.8 liter Super Sport prototype shows off its concave rear window, which is better integrated into the form than on the previous Sport model.  The 1.8 liter engine in it was actually a new unit based on the Type 820 two-liter, and with the same 80mm stroke.  Elio Zagato, son of founder Ugo, liked this car so well he used it as his personal transport for years.  It's possible to imagine a whole line of Lancias based around this design, including sport wagons, sedans, and spiders.  Instead, Fiat management decided to pursue a less risky path...

Not surprisingly given its financial trouble and a need to cast a wider net, what Lancia did authorize for production next was an updated Flavia in factory-bodied sedan form, and in coupe form with a thoroughly revised Pininfarina body.  It was the last Lancia designed before Fiat took over the company late in 1969, and was introduced at the Geneva Show in March 1969.  Engine displacement was increased to 1,991 cc, placing the car in the increasingly popular 2-liter class. Fuel-injected and carbureted versions were offered from the beginning. Your faithful scribe has been hanging out with this carbureted, 4-speed PF coupe for the last 7 years...

It's a 1970 model, and though at first glance looks like a light restyle of the 1962 design, there are almost no interchangeable body panels between the two. Drivers faced the same instrument layout, but initially the only wood was on the steering wheel.  Fiat changed that in 1971, reintroducing wood veneer on the dash. 

Our example has the Lancia Flavia nameplate flanking the trunk latch, with a small "2000" script above the right tail light.  For the 1971 model year, Fiat would rename the series Lancia 2000, and drop the Flavia nameplate.  Of the special-bodied models, only the Pininfarina coupe was continued once the 1.5 and 1.8 liter engines were dropped.  According to Richard Langworth, 6,791 of the the Flavia 2000 and 2000 series coupes with the Type 820 engine, were built.

As with the smaller, more rally-oriented Fulvia V4 cars, Lancia offered an HF version of the Flavia coupe, renamed 2000HF when this version was launched in 1971.  Only 1,229 left the factory before production closed for 1975.  Features included Bosch D-Jetronic fuel injection, a 5-speed transaxle, and power steering.

This 1973 example shows off alloy wheels and a chrome-framed, black-finished grille.  Under hood, the geometry of the engine is concealed, unlike on Lancia's V4s and V6s, by intake plumbing and accessories. One misses the visual clarity of the V-engined Lancias, but specialists liked the low profile and center of mass, and employed the drivetrain in a couple of mid-engined prototypes*

The HF has the wood veneer dash and instrument cluster Fiat brought back, but details are different from the dash in our 1970 car; for one, the 3 small instruments centered in the binnacle are now in a 2 over 1 arrangement.  Despite the 2000 HF's refinement, Lancia's sporting program was headed elsewhere under Fiat management.  A Fulvia HF* won the Monte Carlo Rally the year before this '73 HF was built, and the mid-engined Lancia Stratos* would win the World Rally Championship in 1974, '75 and '76.  In the WRC, Lancia's all-wheel drive Delta Integrales would take all Constructors' Championships from 1987-92, and 4 Drivers' Championships.  But the Stratos story has been told in our blog before*, and the Delta story will need to wait for another day.

*Footnote:  Zagato Panoramica bodies on Maserati and Ferrari chassis appear in "Body by Zagato Part 1:  Ferrari and Maserati in the Fifties", posted here on March 31, 2020.  Fulvia HFs were surveyed here in "Hi-Fi: Racing Red Elephants from Lancia", posted Oct. 3, 2016, while mid-engined Flavia-powered specials were the focus of "The Etceterini Files Part 15", posted Oct. 26, 2018. The Lancia Stratos is featured, along with a doomed effort to revive it, in "Lost Cause Lancias", our post for February 15, 2018. 

Photo credits: 
Top & 2nd from top:  bringatrailer.com

3rd:  Wikimedia
4th & 5th:  bringatrailer.com
6th:  RM Sotheby's Auctions
7th thru 9th: bringatrailer.com
10th thru 12th:  George Havelka

13th:  carrozzieri-italiani.com

14th:  classicdriver.com

15th thru 18th:  the author

19th thru bottom:  classicautoinvest.fr

Forgotten Sometimes-Classics: Renault in the USA

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Renault released its rear-engined, water-cooled Dauphine in 1956 and brought it to the US the following year.  By 1959, when the "Le Car Hot" ad campaign began, they were marketing the 89.4" wheelbase, 845cc 4-door as an alternative to VW's Beetle (94 inches, 1,200 cc, 2 doors). And for a brief moment, the promise of the New French Revolution ad campaign seemed to be coming true.  While nearly 120,000 new VW vehicles were registered in the US that year, Renault sold around 102,000 Dauphines.  But that was the stylishly rounded little car's best year here.  It turned out that the Dauphine was not well-adapted to life on the Interstate, and that Renault dealers were not as ready to provide parts and service as VW dealers, whose cars seemed to need less of both.

By 1962, when Renault produced the R8 with a 956cc inline four and radiator still at the rear, the lines had become more rectilinear to provide more interior and trunk space on the same wheelbase as the Dauphine, and its 4-wheel disc brakes were new to this class of sedan.  By 1964, they'd released a Gordini version named after their engineer, ex-race car maker Amédée Gordini*, with engines ranging from 1.1 to 1.3 liters, and producing up to 95 hp, twice that of the original R8.  Rally success gave the Gordini a certain cachet, and this California example survives in fine condition.  

Jean Rédelé's independent Alpine firm first produced his fiberglass-bodied A110 berlinette, based on the R8 drivetrain in a variety of engine sizes, with steel backbone chassis like the previous A108, starting in 1963.  The little 2-seater had a long and illustrious rally career, winning the World Rally Championship in 1973. The author captured the example below after the Tour de France Auto in 1974.  The car was never imported into the US, however...

The A110 became enough of a collector's trophy, though, that when Renault decided to produce a mid-engined GT car in 2016, then named it after the rear-engined A110 from the Sixties and Seventies. The new car is in the foreground below. 

Other detours and adventures occupied the years between 1977, when the original A110 finally ended production, and 2016.  In 1971 Alpine released the A310, still rear-engined but with the radiator in front, with styling by Trevor Fiore and six covered headlights marching across the sleek fiberglass nose, a clear reference to Alpine Renault's success in international rallying.  The A310 below was also photographed after the '74 Tour de France.  

While rear-engined Renaults were beginning to have rally success, Renault engineers were launching production cars with front-wheel drive. First was the R4, a competitor for Citroen's 2CV, in 1962.  By '65, though, they'd released the R16, a serious effort to redefine the mainstream sedan.  It featured a longitudinally-mounted aluminum inline 4 (from 1,470 to 1,647 cc) driving the front wheels, a hatchback configuration with folding rear seats, those 4 disc brakes, and a practical orientation not unlike the pitch Volvo used to attract US customers.  An unusual feature was torsion bar rear suspension design with non-aligned rear axles, which resulted in different wheelbases on each side of the car (104.3" right, 107.1" left).  The R16 was less successful in the US than in Canada, where it was popular enough to justify a Quebec assembly plant.

Renault's R5 was introduced in 1972 with similar front-drive and rear suspension, and by '75 was competing with the VW Rabbit / Golf and Honda Civic for US customers.  It was marketed in the US as Le Car, harking back to that late Fifties advertising campaign. 

The R5 / Le Car dramatized the divergent views of the engineers who saw front-wheel drive as a universal format, and those who wanted to promote Renault and Alpine Renault as rally winners.  In 1980, the rally crew got a mid-engined Turbo based on the R5 as a rally weapon.  The mid-mounted, turbocharged inline 4 of 1.4 or 1.5 liters sent power to the rear wheels through a 5-speed gearbox, and took the place of the rear seat in a body adapted from the front-drive R5.

Bodywork is credited to Marc Deschamps and Marcello Gandini of Bertone, along with the futuristic interior.   Sales greatly exceeded what was required for a "homologation special" over 5 years of production, with nearly five thousand cars sold.  A few "grey market" cars made it to the US...

Likewise, some V6 versions of Alpine's A310 came to the US through specialists willing and able to certify the cars.  These all had flared wheel wells and rally spoiler kits to go with the 2.7 liter PRV engine and 5-speed gearbox that might have made the lighweight GT an interesting alternative to Porsche's 911, had Renault taken an interest in selling it here.  The example below is from 1984, when production ended...

By then, however, Renault had taken a different route into the US market, focused on front-drive compact versions of the Renault 9 and 11, redesigned for the US market in a $90 million program with American Motors that gave Renault a 46% share in AMC. The resulting Alliance sedans and convertibles, and Encore hatchbacks, were sold in the 1983-'87 model years, but discontinued when Chrysler bought out Renault's share in AMC.  Still, the cars represented Renault's biggest sales success in the US market, with over 623,000 specimens sold.  American Motors was renamed Jeep-Eagle and merged into Chrysler in 1990...

From the '89 to '92 model years, AMC built and sold the Eagle Premier in the US.  A mid-size car by US standards, it was related to the Giugiaro-designed front-drive senior Renaults, and available with 2.5 liter inline four or Peugeot-Renault-Volvo 3.0 liter V6.  Pre-production prototypes had Renault badges, but these were replaced with Eagle badges.  The Bricklin lurking behind our example is a reminder of the difficulties of launching a new make of car, and the Jeep signs above it suggest that AMC's path to success may have been easier if it had invested as much effort into renewing the Jeep brand, in the face of growing demand for SUVs.  After all, it had a decade earlier produced AWD Eagle versions of its Hornet, and Audi was having some success with its Quattro line. When Chrysler bought out Renault's stake in AMC, it was because Chrysler management saw Jeep as the prize.  But that is a story for another day...

*Footnote:  We took a closer look at the Alpine Renault A310 and its A110 predecessor in "Forgotten Classic: Alpine Renault A310", posted here on January 9, 2021, and profiled Amédée Gordini's racing cars in "The Etceterini Files Part 6—Gordini: French Connection, Chicago Subplot", from March 27, 2016.

Errata:  When we posted this piece we noted that the Alpine A110 was based on the Renault R8 chassis.  Wrong; as we noted in our "Forgotten Classic Revival Follies Part 4" (posted here Dec. 27, 2023), the Alpines (including the predecessor A108 and the Brazilian Interlagos) had a steel backbone chassis. Think of something like a Lotus Elan, but turned around so the engine is at the wrong end...

Photo Credits:
Top, plus 5th, 7th and 8th from top:  Groupe Renault S.A.

2nd & 3rs:  Gogo Heinrich
4th, 6th, 9th & 10th::  the author

11th::  bringatrailer.com

12th & bottom::  Wikimedia

Forgotten Classics: Giugiaro's Taxicabs—A Checkered History

In the mid-Seventies, the Museum of Modern Art commissioned Giorgetto Giugiaro of Ital Design to design a prototype for a modern taxi. MOMA's home city was by then known for its clogged streets and familiar yellow Checker cabs.  Not surprisingly, Giugiaro came up with something completely different. With the cooperation of Alfa Romeo, he created a 5-passenger taxi in 1976 that measured 158" long, a whopping 46" shorter than the familiar Checker.  Power came from a fuel-efficient 1.3 liter boxer 4 cylinder driving the front wheels, with independent suspension front and rear. The Alfa shield grille shape is subtly (maybe too subtly) worked into the 5-mph bumper at the front.

Innovative features included wide, sliding passenger doors on both flanks, flat floors, and wheelchair storage space under the seats. Giugiaro's MOMA taxi offered striking space and fuel efficiency advantages over other cabs, especially the Checker. Sadly, it didn't attract enough interest from potential customers to put it into production...

Not discouraged by non-adoption of his Alfa-Romeo MOMA cab, Giugiaro proposed the Lancia Megagamma van above in 1978.  Front wheels were again powered by a boxer four, but this time by the 2.5 liter SOHC Gamma unit.  Driver's cabin and luggage space were more ample than in the MOMA taxi, as the Megagamma van was just under a foot longer at 169.7".  Fuel tank and spare tire were located below the flat floor.  Drag coefficient was surprisingly low for such a cubic form, at 0.34. Fiat managment showed a lack of vision by deciding not to produce this van.  Six years later, Chrysler engineers would confirm the soundness of Giugiaro's concept, when their own front-drive minivans helped revive their company's fortunes.

This wasn't the first time that Giugiaro had been involved in a taxi project.  Eight years before the MOMA project, he had begun a complete restyling of the Checker cab for Alejandro De Tomaso after the sports car builder had purchased Ghia. The Checker project was continued under Tom Tjaarda after Giugiaro left Ghia to start Ital Design. The resulting '68 Ghia Centurion as completed by Tjaarda, above, shared the clean flanks and glassy greenhouse of Giugiaro's previous 4-door project, the Iso S4 below, but none of the iso's sleek proportions.  The tall roof and too-vertical angles of the Centurion's windshield and backlight made for plenty of space, and also concealed the car's great length, as it was on the 129" wheelbase option offered by Checker. Though the Centurion was more modern-looking than Checker's standard design, the company apparently decided it didn't offer enough advantages to put into production. 

That standard Checker design had been largely unchanged from the A8 model below, which went into production in January 1956.  

A8 advantages over the previous A6 model shown rushing down a film noir street below included 30% more interior space and easily removable fenders, an important feature in an environment conducive to fender benders...

Despite the proposals from Ghia for a more modern-looking Checker cab, and from MOMA and Giugiaro for a taxicab revolution, Checker's basic design from the A8 stayed in production until 1982, receiving quad headlights in 1958, with Chevrolet inline sixes and small-block V8s supplanting the Continental L-head six in 1965.  It was such a familiar shape on American city streets that it was likely what you thought of when you thought "taxi."

It was a blocky and unrefined shape, but it was a friendly one, especially when one answered your hand signal for transport on a freezing New Year's Eve in New York.  In fact, it was such a friendly-looking car that this example has taken advantage of that blockiness and been modeled in Lego components at Legoland New York, delighting children of all ages...

Photo Credits:  

Top thru 3rd from top:  wikimedia.com

4th:  allcarindex.com

5th:  Iso Rivolta, featured on story-cars.com

6th:  Checker Car Club, on checkerworld.org

7th:  imcdb.org

8th & bottom:  Dr. Marcus Nashelsky

Springtime at Boulder Coffee and Classics

Springtime, rain-washed and cool, has unfolded with pleasant and unusual laziness this year in Boulder.  Plenty of rare cars have shown up at the Sunday Boulder Coffee and Classics events in recent years, but this 1938 Carlton-bodied Lea-Francis* at the April 28 show may be the rarest, because it's the only one bodied by Carlton.  It was in immaculate condition, and would have scored extra points if Coffee and Classics had a "cars you've never heard of, but probably want anyway" category...

Just what is a Lea-Francis, anyway?  It fits into the group of British specialist makes that thrived between World Wars 1 and 2, and was thinned out by bankruptcies and mergers after the second great war.  Think of Alvis and Lagonda, for example.  Unlike some of the other independent makes, Lea-Francis concentrated on small, sporting cars, and made its own engines, building 185 of the Hyper Sports model before being bankrupted by the Great Depression.  After a reorganization, the company announced a new model in 1937...

This had engines designed by Hugh Rose, an engineer who had designed a twin-cam engine for Riley.  For Lea-Francis, Rose designed a similar engine with twin cams on the sides of the engine block, and rocker-operated valves in hemisphercal combustion chambers. Nicknamed the "underhead cam" engine, in 12 hp form (that's taxable, not real hp) it had 1.5 liters displacement.  There was also a 14 hp at just under 1.8 liters.  Only 83 of the new "LeaFs" were built before WWII stopped car production in England.

This car, license plate FYW 622, appears to be the same car that was shown in pre-restored condition on an auction website, and featured in our blog post* on Lea-Francis.  It appears that the restoration crew has had an epic success with this car...

A Renault Turbo 2 showed up to confound and amaze.  The mid-engined 1.4 and 1.5 liter turbocharged rally cars were based upon the Renault R5 front drive 4-seaters and featured body design by Marc Deschamps and Marcello Gandini at Bertone.  The homologation specials, built as the Turbo from 1980-82, featured wild Bertone interiors with red and blue color schemes.  The "production" Turbo 2 built from '83-'86 had a tamer interior without the special Bertone seats and instruments.  These were real production cars, with over 1,300 of the Turbo, and over 1,800 of the Turbo 2 built.

The mid-engined Turbos sacrificed 2 rear seats for that engine placement, and predicted the obstructed engine access on modern mid-engined GTs like the Porsche Cayman...

The Oscar Mayer Weinermobile showed up to contest the crowd-pleasing style and rarity of those sports machines.  It's powered by a small block Chevy V8; acceleration figures were not quoted by the Oscar Mayer crew...

...but nobody else was offering hot dog samples, and that counted for something.

Alfa Romeo fans showed up at the April event in strength, with a silver GTV6, a rare (in the US) Type 916 front-drive roadster in yellow, and a Milano sedan tricked out for racing.  

This Lotus Evora showed up at the May 19 event.  Built from 2010-21 to contest the mid-engined GT category dominated in the US by the Porsche Cayman, the Evora was powered by 3,5 liter Toyota V6 engines available with supercharging.  Transmissions offered were 6-speeds, in manual or automatic form. 

This Triumph GT6 Series 3 was offered from late 1970 through the end of 1973, and was a sort of fastback version of the green Spitfire roadster parked just beyond it, with a 2-liter inline six replacing the Spitfire's four. Both cars shared the same Michelotti styling and all-independent suspension with swing axles at the rear.  

No Coffee and Classics would be complete without a Citroen, or some Ferraris.  Here a DS 21 is flanked by a red Testarossa flat-12 and a silver V6 Dino 246. 

This Alfa Romeo 4C mid-engined coupe, a lightweight competitor to the Porsche Cayman and Lotus Evora with 1.75 liter turbocharged 4-cylinder power, was offered in coupe form from 2013-19 and as a spider from 2015-20.  It's relatively rare in the US, but over 9.000 cars were built.

The Austin-Healey* 100-6 was built by BMC with 2.6 liter inline six from 1956-59, while its older brother, the 100-4 to the right, was built with 2.6 liter inline four from 1953-56.  Curvy, low-slung styling was by Gerry Coker.  

The 100-4 was the last Healey to have the fan-shaped grille; the racing 100S model featured disc brakes and an oval grille with vertical chrome bars in place of this fan shape.

The "Big Healeys" showed up in strength at the May event; this one flanks its little brother, an Austin Healey Sprite, nicknamed Bug Eye for obvious reasons, built from 1958-61.  Also a Gerry Coker design, it was planned for retractable headlights, but BMC cut the budget for those, giving their entry-level sports car plenty of character. A 948 cc inline four provided power; this car has been upgraded to 1,275 cc, as in some Mini Cooper rally cars.  The Porsche Turbo with Slant Nose option takes a different approach to design, with the somewhat anodyne sloping front (similar to 80s wedge designs like the Mazda RX-7) at odds with the curves and ellipses of the 911 body shell.  

The Big Healeys show off their tidy rear contours.  Rear ground clearance was so scant that the cars were famous for scraping exhausts on steep driveways...

This BMW 2800 CS appeared in spotless, original condition, including original alloy wheels.

The car had been upgraded, though, to a 3.5 liter inline six, and disc brakes from the later 3.0 CS replaced the rear drums.

This Triumph was one of a quartet of the British sports cars to show up at the May event.  A Spitfire, it's been modified with a vented hood with covered headlights in the style of the Spitfire Le Mans racers, and that hood covers a Honda VTEC 2 liter four making around 240 hp.  The builder replaced the Spitfire swing-axle rear with a fully-independent setup.  This car was very much in the fun spirit of the event.  For the schedule of Boulder Coffee and Classics event and an interview with organizer Mike Burroughs, you will want to visit fuelfed.wordpress.com. 

*Footnote:  

Our survey of Lea-Francis history appeared under the title "Forgotten Classic: Lea-Francis, the Underdog with the Underhead Cam Engine", on June 15, 2023.  We surveyed Healey history in "Forgotten Classic: Healey, Before and After Austin", on October 17, 2022.

Photo Credits:

All photos are by the author, except the 5th from top, which is from bonhams.com.