1975 AMC Pacer X

March, 1975: Good times in Kenosha: From the New York Times:
"The American Motors Corporation announced today it would increase production of its new Pacer model by 32 per cent to 700 units a day because of stronger than expected demand."

You might say it was all downhill from there. AMC had a great year in 1974, and it looked like their huge investment in the new Pacer was paying off. Unfortunately, after a strong first year-and-a-half, Pacer sales took a dive along with everything else AMC was making. By that point the company had little money to invest in new platforms. The good news was that AMC had purchased Jeep in 1970. But the dream of a car company that would compete with Detroit's Big 3 was reduced to a flicker that finally burned out when Chrysler purchased the company in 1987.

The car on the left has the 'X' sport package. If you bought a Gremlin X, you could get a V-8 engine. In this video, Jeff Dunham refers to the Gremlin X as 'the poor man's Corvette', to which Jay Leno replies, "Well, maybe the homeless man's Corvette." The Pacer X didn't even have a V-8, although a few Pacers did get one late in the production run.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Concours d'Lemons: 1976 AMC Pacer

The Concours d'Lemons is a car show, "Celebrating the oddball, mundane and truly awful of the automotive world."

The Pacer was the last all-new car AMC ever built. It put a lot of money into the project, and although initial sales were strong, it seems everybody who thought it was cool bought one, then they couldn't sell any more. It also got a reputation as a not very well-built car.

So you may look at the Pacer and simply ask, "Why?!" Well, Americans were used to driving big cars, and there was a market in the 70s for small cars that were as wide as big cars and that drove the way big cars did. AMC had used this same idea for the Gremlin.

* This car is done up as a replica of the Mirth Mobile from Wayne's World.
* I've never seen a Pacer on the street in Washington, though I have seen a couple of Gremlins. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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