Shipping a car on it’s nose.

[Xander Wildeisen]

I was watching a video on vintage cars. And it showed a picture of cars being shipped on the nose. I have never seen that before. Was this a common method? We’re they shipped with out fluids?

[60FlatTop]

Ah, the old "Shipped High In Transport" method.

 

Fluids A La Carte.

[rocketraider]

Seems I remember that was one of many Vega "innovations". Supposedly could ship more cars for less money standing them on their nose on a railcar.

 

Along with the dissimilar metals engines, water-based paint and low quality body steel. Very innovative, yes.

[Phillip Cole]

The Chevy engineer who was in charge of the Vega Vert-A-Pac project sent me an article on it several years ago. If I can find it, I'll post it. He said the accountants messed up the Vega.

Edited July 23, 2022 by Phillip Cole (see edit history)

[rocketraider]

Wonder how many kept a job when all the warranty claims started coming in...

[Bryan G]

I suspect the Vega was the one and only model ever shipped this way. I recall reading a period magazine article about this and I seem to remember special consideration was made to the battery mounting or perhaps it was among the first to use a sealed no-maintenance version?

[Frank DuVal]

Well at least there should be no wheel bearing damage! 

 

Rambler had wheel bearing fretting damage form rail shipping incorrectly at some point.

 

If Vega had a large cooling system, most issues would not have surfaced so quick. This is one example of bean counters ruining the car. 

 

Porsche and Mercedes-Benz had similar aluminum technology in their engines and never had any issues. I talked with Reynolds Metal engineers back in the mid eighties about this issue. They too blamed the bean counters for the failures of the Vega. The biggest one being the head was not aluminum! I need an emoji of a dolt slap!

Edited July 24, 2022 by Frank DuVal (see edit history)

[John348]

18 minutes ago, Bryan G said:

I suspect the Vega was the one and only model ever shipped this way. I recall reading a period magazine article about this and I seem to remember special consideration was made to the battery mounting or perhaps it was among the first to use a sealed no-maintenance version?

 

They used this system until the crash bumper era 1975. There was an article in one of the old Cosworth Club magazines that I recall reading. Even the battery caps were toward one side of the battery so the acid would not leak out. When I sold my Cosworth the magazines went with the car. They were shipped with fluids 

Edited July 24, 2022 by John348 (see edit history)

[Bryan G]

My father once took delivery of a new El Camino; within miles of leaving the dealer he realized there was something wrong with the rear. Turns out it was badly bent; the only explanation they could come up with was that it was strapped down too tight during shipping.

[Studemax]

I remember seeing a GM film "Bright Star" about the Vega my sophomore year in Auto Information.... circa 1972? They showed how the cars were shipped via rail. 

 

Studebaker used to ship in rail cars, but stood on their rear bumpers.

[TAKerry]

Very interesting. I am pretty sure this has been discussed here before and that precautions were def. taken into account before they decided to ship them this way. I cant remember the details now though.

[Rusty_OToole]

Only the Vega was shipped this way. Supposed to save money as they could put more units on a freight car. Certain changes had to be made, like a baffle in the oil pan to stop the oil running out the front main seal and a special battery with the filler caps at the back. I don't know how it worked out but could not have been a success if they did not pursue it on later models.

[Paul Dobbin]

Just one more reason that the Vega failed.   My  brother bought one that had been the McDonals promo car.   The pin-stripe was all

Golden Arches.   As I remember, it was an awful car.  Everybody thought he won it.   Nobody would believe he actually bought it from

the winner.   We still tease him about it.

[Xander Wildeisen]

 

[John348]

29 minutes ago, Rusty_OToole said:

Only the Vega was shipped this way. Supposed to save money as they could put more units on a freight car. Certain changes had to be made, like a baffle in the oil pan to stop the oil running out the front main seal and a special battery with the filler caps at the back. I don't know how it worked out but could not have been a success if they did not pursue it on later models.

As posted earlier they could not use this shipping method with the rubber nose crash bumpers that started in 74

Edited July 24, 2022 by John348 (see edit history)

[rocketraider]

What's sad is the Vega could have been a very good little car. Several friends had them and I guess they were ok cars for a high schooler's first car, just no longevity.

 

Had they had good engines that didn't suck oil in 10k miles, decent paint that didn't fall off in the car wash, and steel that didn't start rusting on the assembly line, who knows what Vega could have become?

 

If the financial people had listened to the people who designed and engineered them... Is it just me, or was General Motors the worst for doing that? You sure hear about more blame for their fiascos being laid at the feet of their bean counters.

 

Bottom line, when the General built a cheap garbage vehicle, they did it world class. It unfortunately filtered into what were supposed to be their better cars, and is why there have not been and will not be any newer gm vehicles in my driveway.

[60FlatTop]

Well, you do get the extremes. My recently sold BMW got a bit more exclusive ride to the States.

[Bryan G]

If you haven't yet, read the sort-of autobiography of DeLorean, "On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors". He had nothing good to say about the car, which was developed not by Chevrolet but by corporate. 

 

Perhaps as proof that the car had promise, I was just reading some Consumer Reports tests from 1972 and they recommended the Vega, while ranking the Pinto at the bottom of the pack. Alas, the cars major issues just hadn't quite reared their heads.

[Frank DuVal]

The Vega was quite the performer in autocross. Way better than the Pinto. Maybe it was the skid pad tests that CR praised to get a good rating.

[Glen Andrews]

Interesting way to ship Vegas, but what was the cost and who paid for the special railroad cars and the framework. When the Vegas were unloaded at their destination did those rail cars go back empty, and what happened to all those RR cars and framework when the Vega fizzled out. Back in the late 70's and early 80's I had a few Vegas, and worked on them for other people that had them. I thought they were good little run around cars, relatively easy to work on, and had several design flaws already covered in this thread; one other sometimes aggravating thing was that the water pump was adjustable in order to take up the slack for the fan/alternator belt or was it the timing belt. I remember back then someone saying they'd rather have a bad cold than a Vega, you can get rid of a bad cold.

[Rusty_OToole]

A neighbor had a Vega when they were new, I drove it once and was favorably impressed. It was smooth, quiet, comfortable and easy to drive. Just what a typical Chevrolet customer who wanted a smaller, more economical car would like. None of the reliability issues were impossible to fix, they were the kind of things that never would have left the plant a few years earlier. But GM was going through a period of really rotten quality in the late sixties and seventies.

[HarryLime]

Has anyone here seen a Vega at a car show ?

[John348]

59 minutes ago, HarryLime said:

Has anyone here seen a Vega at a car show ?

Very rare to come by one stock, and when you do most are Cosworth's. They produced around 3,500 Cosworth's and they had a surprisingly high survivability rate.  There also many Vega's that were converted to V-8's and V-6's back in the day that are still around, that pop up at local shows from time to time. 

I sold my Cosworth about 3 years ago at Hershey as part of my downsizing of my collection. I attended a Cosworth Convention in 2017 and there were two stock Vega's in attendance. It was a blast to drive, very fast, it was impressive. 

[John348]

On 7/24/2022 at 10:34 PM, Bryan G said:

If you haven't yet, read the sort-of autobiography of DeLorean, "On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors". He had nothing good to say about the car, which was developed not by Chevrolet but by corporate. 

 

Perhaps as proof that the car had promise, I was just reading some Consumer Reports tests from 1972 and they recommended the Vega, while ranking the Pinto at the bottom of the pack. Alas, the cars major issues just hadn't quite reared their heads.

DeLorean was the guy behind the marriage with Cosworth and Chevrolet. Cosworth wanted to use the Chevrolet engine for F2 use.

Notice the black and gold pinstripe scheme as well as the gold wheels also used on The Trans Am's? Pontiac carryover?

 

Interesting read on the history of Cosworth and Chevrolet, originally it was going to be a beast! 12:1 compression Sunoco 260, production problems emission's testing, and then an 8:1 motor 

 

https://www.cosworthvega.com/cosworth-vega-history

Edited July 26, 2022 by John348 (see edit history)

[rocketraider]

23 hours ago, Frank DuVal said:

The Vega was quite the performer in autocross. Way better than the Pinto. Maybe it was the skid pad tests that CR praised to get a good rating.

 

19 minutes ago, John348 said:

Very rare to come by one stock, and when you do most are Cosworth's. They produced around 3,500 Cosworth's and they had a surprisingly high survivability rate...

I sold my Cosworth about 3 years ago at Hershey as part of my downsizing of my collection. I attended a Cosworth Convention in 2017. It was a blast to drive, very fast, it was impressive. 

Might have been why Cosworth worked magic on Vega. Granted the Cosworth engine changed the character of the car and may have increased reliability a bit.

 

But did you ever hear of a tuner company trying to do anything with a Pinto?

 

1 hour ago, HarryLime said:

Has anyone here seen a Vega at a car show ?

The only ones I've seen in past 30 years had been turned into drag cars.

 

A close friend had a school bus yellow 76 hatchback that, having the redesigned engine, served him well for almost nine years. He got some type of aftermarket camping tent package for it and we spent many weekends on the local lake just hanging out.

 

I think Vega was a victim of GM's Sixties arrogance. It unfortunately heralded the corporation's subsequent bad habit of sending out product that hadn't been thoroughly engineered and tested- with predictable results. They didn't learn a damn thing from the Vega debacle. Think the half-engineered Oldsmobile Diesel and the Cadillac V8-6-4. Things that, done correctly, could have cemented GM's reputation for innovation.

[Frank DuVal]

Well, Glen, you have to hand it to Oldsmobile's lower end on the 350, as it held up (with some modification) to the 22.5:1 compression ratio of the diesel! You hear of head gasket failures and injection pump failures (I've had my share), but the lower end was solid. I have 260 K miles on one with no bottom end work. I did put rings in it about 200K miles since I took the block out for something. Mains looked great.

[John348]

1 hour ago, rocketraider said:

 

I think Vega was a victim of GM's Sixties arrogance. It unfortunately heralded the corporation's subsequent bad habit of sending out product that hadn't been thoroughly engineered and tested- with predictable results. They didn't learn a damn thing from the Vega debacle. Think the half-engineered Oldsmobile Diesel and the Cadillac V8-6-4. Things that, done correctly, could have cemented GM's reputation for innovation.

Glenn,

You hit it on the head, there was a lot of changes put into production way too fast.

As far as a crappy car, that really could be said for every car made in that era, everything was pretty crappy. They were just the first and the biggest failures.  When was the last time anyone seen a Datsun, Toyota, Honda at a show from that era? The only vehicles that seemed to have survived are VW Beetles in any noticeable quantities. 

The Cosworth's survived because they were an expensive weekend toy, $500 less then a Corvette and $500 more then a Camaro, and pretty far from dependable they were GM's first attempt at EFI, so you can imagine how that went. 

Edited July 26, 2022 by John348 (see edit history)

[rocketraider]

I had forgot the Cosworth had that primitive EFI.

 

The Olds 350's bottom end was how Oldsmobile got saddled with developing the passenger car and light truck Diesel program. No other GM Division had anything as strong. Also telling that they kept the solid main webs in the Diesel blocks, when 77-later regular 350s got windowed webs to reduce weight. Those did however work fine with the laughably low compression ratios.

 

Some beastly 350s have been built using the DX 350 Diesel blocks.

 

It's a shame when the aftermarket has to correct and refine what the factory should have done right in the first place.

[mrspeedyt]

a year ago I sold a 1975 Chevy Monza town Coupe which is basically a Vega with a vinyl roof. three speed stick . clutch was worn out. But the original Vega engine ran remarkably well. The guy that has it now replaced the clutch and drives it around town! still wore its original factory paint… definitely a rarity to see on the street anymore.

[kgreen]

My brother had a Vega and solved the oil consumption problem by rigging a five gallon can of oil above and off to one side of the hood to serve as an IV. He got almost 60 miles to the gallon; of oil that is. 

[Buick35]

On 7/23/2022 at 5:20 PM, Xander Wildeisen said:

I was watching a video on vintage cars. And it showed a picture of cars being shipped on the nose. I have never seen that before. Was this a common method? We’re they shipped with out fluids?

Do they bury people that way? Just wondered.

[Xander Wildeisen]

With out fluids?

[8E45E]

On 7/24/2022 at 4:29 PM, rocketraider said:

If the financial people had listened to the people who designed and engineered them... Is it just me, or was General Motors the worst for doing that? You sure hear about more blame for their fiascos being laid at the feet of their bean counters.

John DeLorean devoted an entire chapter on the Vega in his 1979 book, On A Clear Day, You Can See General Motors.

 

Craig

[8E45E]

On 7/24/2022 at 8:34 PM, Bryan G said:

If you haven't yet, read the sort-of autobiography of DeLorean, "On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors". He had nothing good to say about the car, which was developed not by Chevrolet but by corporate. 

 

Perhaps as proof that the car had promise, I was just reading some Consumer Reports tests from 1972 and they recommended the Vega, while ranking the Pinto at the bottom of the pack. Alas, the cars major issues just hadn't quite reared their heads.

When the Vega was introduced in late 1970, I looked over one (like everyone else) at Edmonton Motors where they had some in their showroom.  Very first thing that caught my eye under the hood was the double row of bracing at the firewall.  JZD pointed that out in his book about how the front clip fell off within the first 20 minutes of the car being on the test track, and instead of going back to the drawing board and properly redesigning it, the 'higherups' told the body engineers to reinforce it, instead of starting over.  

 

Craig

[8E45E]

6 hours ago, John348 said:

Glenn,

You hit it on the head, there was a lot of changes put into production way too fast.

As far as a crappy car, that really could be said for every car made in that era, everything was pretty crappy. They were just the first and the biggest failures.  When was the last time anyone seen a Datsun, Toyota, Honda at a show from that era? The only vehicles that seemed to have survived are VW Beetles in any noticeable quantities. 

The 67-day strike in the summer of 1970 at GM didn't help matters, either.  

 

The answer why one no longer sees Datsuns or Hondas is because the engines & drivetrains in them were engineered and built well enough to keep them running through their entire lifecycle where the bodies and interiors wore out first, and they got scrapped.   They got totally 'used up' to the point they completely finished their earthly course on the upside of the asphalt.  In contrast, a Vega would often die before it hit the magic 100K mile mark and was still deemed worthy to repair as the rest of the components had some life still in them when the owner got a round tuit.  It was not uncommon to see a Vega or two languishing in a back yard as the 'round tuit' never came around.  Today, one still runs across faded out K-cars in backyards.

 

Craig

[SC38dls]

My wife liked the looks of the Vega . I’m not sure what she is looking at sometimes but she did marry me. Brand new from Cellozi Edelson (sp?) in Elmhurst Il. We lived in Wheaton about 15 miles away. It started making noises on the way home which is never good but especially in a new car. I checked the oil and it was down almost two qts. I filled it and drove it back to the dealer. Again checked the oil and again it was very low. They offered to put a new engine in it. I told them where they could put their engine. Got the keys to my trade in, cancelled the deal, pulled the plates and left. Never had a problem buying the car I thought we should have after that experience. 
dave s 

[TAKerry]

11 hours ago, John348 said:

DeLorean was the guy behind the marriage with Cosworth and Chevrolet. Cosworth wanted to use the Chevrolet engine for F2 use.

Notice the black and gold pinstripe scheme as well as the gold wheels also used on The Trans Am's? Pontiac carryover?

 

Interesting read on the history of Cosworth and Chevrolet, originally it was going to be a beast! 12:1 compression Sunoco 260, production problems emission's testing, and then an 8:1 motor 

 

https://www.cosworthvega.com/cosworth-vega-history

The black with gold striping trans am debuted in 1976 as the 50th anniversary 'Limited Edition'. The inspiration was the John Player Special race car livery. I would think most likely the same for the Vega as it predates the Pontiac version.

[John348]

2 hours ago, 8E45E said:

 

The answer why one no longer sees Datsuns or Hondas is because the engines & drivetrains in them were engineered and built well enough to keep them running through their entire lifecycle where the bodies and interiors wore out first, and they got scrapped. 

They were crappy as well, just not as crappy

[John348]

2 hours ago, Xander Wildeisen said:

With out fluids?

They were shipped with fluids, they were driven on and off the train car.

[Xander Wildeisen]

1 hour ago, John348 said:

They were shipped with fluids, they were driven on and off the train car.

Read the comment above mine.