Battered but far from beaten, the Corvair boasted all-new styling and fully independent rear suspension for 1965. Here’s the pitch on the beautiful and controversial rear-engine Chevy.
The Chevy Corvair received all new sheet metal for 1965, designed by Ron Hill under the direction of Bill Mitchell, GM’s flamboyant Vice President of Styling. The bold new look was a smash hit with the pundits: David E. Davis Jr. of Car and Driver magazine called the latest Corvair “the most beautiful car to appear in this country since before World War II.” And underneath the new Italian-flavored skin was an improved chassis with a fully articulated independent rear suspension. Unlike the previous swing-axle setup that drew so much bitter criticism, the new rear suspension was above reproach.
But unfortunately, the fate of the Corvair was nearly sealed by that time. In April of 1965, an internal GM memo ordered all development frozen on the rear-engine Chevy except for government-mandated updates. Then in November came Ralph Nader’s paradigm-shifting book, Unsafe at Any Speed. From the high point of 235,000 in 1965, production of the second-generation Corvair slowed to a trickle, and barely 6,000 units were sold in 1969, the final model year.
Still, the Corvair is celebrated by enthusiasts today for its unique engineering and sporty character, just as it was back in the 1960s. In this original 1965 Chevrolet spot, the Corvair is compared to an agile and graceful cat—a most appropriate description, we think. Video follows.
There has been little doubt in my mind that the ’65-’69 Corvairs were worth saving, but ended as so many GM ideas have — perfect it and then drop it.
I had hear through my dad that there was going to be a rear engine air cooled competitor to the ever present V W coming out, he had even brought home a scale drawing of what the dash was going to look like before they had been publicly announced . I bought a 1960 “Plain Jane” coupe used which I really enjoyed a lot .Being newly married it was economical to drive and we went on trips with it .Only one time did I have any trouble and that was in the stifling heat driving through Georgia and the fuel pump was too weak to handle it and vapor locked. Oh ye, they had some faults in those early days but were addressed pretty quickly. Road oilers situation due to improper cap screws on the horizontal valve covers, hard turn weak suspension had both been taken care of after a fashion. Both of these situations could be tolerated. Dad bought a brand new four door in 1964 and it served him well .Publicity was the big factor that influenced a lot of would be buyers away I’m certain. Long live the gallant effort that G.M. had made in the market,not soon to be forgotten.
Actually once they got the problems fixed on the early ones, the Corvair was a good car. It just got poisoned by bad publicity and that was it. You can make the best car in the world, but if you can’t sell it, you’ve got to move onto something else….
Totally agree! Just think if that car had continued to be improved and had been around in 1973 when the gas crunch hit. They would not have been able to sell them quick enough!
Another interesting point, Edward. I often think of that myself; I wonder where the domestic brands would have been if they had stayed the course with the compacts. But then, the domestics were in the small car trade by then anyways. Unfortunately the bad publicity continued. And I think it was heavily exaggerated. I worked for a GM dealer in the 70s and 80s. We did a lot of warranty work but seldom over the targetted 2% of wholesale sales. I heard a Toyota rep slinging mud at the domestics about building such poor cars and I said that it was interesting to know that the local Toyota dealer was not selling quite as many new cars and pickups as the GM dealer up the street yet it employed just as many mechanics as the GM dealer. And every time I looked into their service department it was filled with broken Toyotas. Personally, I think that the negative publicity toward the domestic brands began with Nader’s book and the flames were fanned by a poorly informed media. The domestics were never able to fully recover….
The 65-69 Corvair should have been able to compete against the Mustang. Not everyone wanted a V8 and I’m sure a lot of straight-six Mustangs were sold. The traditional British and Italian sports cars had problems of their own and Corvair could have taken that market. I would guess that interior room was comparable.
Time after time GM has made the wrong decision. I think more than other companies. Their problems were rife long before they declared bankruptcy. The Vega was superior in every way to the Pinto but they rushed the engine and scrimped on rustproofing. With the exception of the Datsun 510, foreign cars were less than equal to the Pinto and Vega. I mentioned a few months ago how the Buick Wildcar could have slotted in next to the Corvette and killed the four-seat Thunderbird before it started.
GM has made good decisions as well, but I can’t think of another domestic company that made so many bad ones.
PS: Although the 65-69 Corvair was miles better than the earlier version, the oil seals still leaked and let fumes into the passenger compartment. That killed off most of the still-believers.
True, but GM had already solved the “O” ring leakage with an experimental engine built in 1963 that put an OHV head/valve assembly on top of each separate cylinder. Not only did this cure oil leaking, but that engine had much more torque and power than the production Turbo-Air 164 engine. Unfortunately as stated above, GM stopped further development on the Corvair. It had the potential of being a refined, powerful good-handling GT sedan, but GM “blew it.” Many owners, myself included, have upgraded our cars to modern vehicle handling, comfort and convenience standards.
I was unaware until fairly recently that the later Corvairs were IRS. It seemed a decent set up and was just like a Porsche, too much weight rearward but from what I have seen they handled ok until you got very spirited and then they spin, just like a Porsche! That according to the owner who has a 80s Porker.
GM should have taken Nader to task, or court re his mostly unsubstatiated clap trap. There was numerous Euro cars worse being sold in the US but they did not get canned.
More recently here in Oz our domestic cars are canned for being wrong and unreliable. Now they are not available a lot of people are going to find out a lot different, in fact already have with Focuses with dodgey trans, VWs that stop [and pollute!] Jeeps that are lemons, even Bimmers and Benzes at the lower end of the price scale that are quite poor.
And many of these imports have Takata air bags!
Hi Lee. Maybe it’s my imagination but it seems like it’s politically incorrect to penalize the imports, especially those across the Pacific. It seems that a recall on a domestic car gets more publicity than 9-11 but if it’s an import, the media sweeps it under the rug. I remember not too long ago when a faulty ignition switch got GM into a lot of trouble. It turned out that at least 7 (or was is nine? several of them anyways) other makes–mostly imports–used that exact same switch from the same supplier. If you listened to the media you’d think that GM was the ONLY one to blame. In the meantime somebody’s ‘Woo-P-Cooshin’ with the same ignition switch burns up in a parking lot due to an electrical short; it’s reported that it’s an ‘unexplained incident’ and investigators suspect arson (?!?).
The Corvair had independent suspension since its introduction in 1960. This image shows how the 1965 rear suspension was an improvement on the original’s VW like swing axle design. https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.corvaircorsa.com%2Ftech%2F64-65.jpg&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.corvaircorsa.com%2Fhandling02.html&docid=xOMtuIQGNF5YAM&tbnid=VqGyPobLCXFqJM%3A&vet=10ahUKEwirro6L5-rUAhVi3IMKHVn8ABcQMwgkKAEwAQ..i&w=300&h=442&hl=en&bih=630&biw=1360&q=%202nd%20generation%20corvair%20rear%20suspension&ved=0ahUKEwirro6L5-rUAhVi3IMKHVn8ABcQMwgkKAEwAQ&iact=mrc&uact=8#h=442&imgdii=VqGyPobLCXFqJM:&vet=10ahUKEwirro6L5-rUAhVi3IMKHVn8ABcQMwgkKAEwAQ..i&w=300
I saw an early one in bits decades ago and yes it was the dreaded swing axle. Corvairs rolled over like the early VW. Until recently I thought they all were
Which had swing axle until the 70s.
Judging by some of the comments a little history needs to be shown. Single jointed and double jointed are both IRS. I have seen a few of the proving ground test on Corvair Vs. Falcon Vs. Valiant and in the rollover test is was the Falcon to go over first. The Pontiac Tempest (1961-62) also had IRS swing axle, however the Tempest, VW and Porsche were equipped with 15″ wheels. The reason for the 15″ wheels in Pontiac’s case was to move the wheel tuck incidence much higher when pressed hard in a turn, and this is why early VW’s and Porsches were equipped with 16″ wheels in the beginning. The poor Corvair had 13″ wheels and the tendency to tuck came into effect much earlier in turns. Pontiac by 1963 had redesigned it’s IRS further with different trailing arm positioning. When Knudsen was promoted from Pontiac divisions General Manager and V.P. to Chevrolet in the late half of 1961, his one request was that he would only accept the new position of General Manager of Chevrolet if he were allowed to fix the Corvair. This is the reason for the double jointed Corvair IRS.
Porsche and VW were not alone with single joint IRS. Mercedes also had this set up in the sixties. Anyone here ever hear of one of those Mercedes rolling over like Corvair? It all comes down to spring rates, sway bars, wheel size and suspension travel in the form of wheel arc. Tighten swing axle spring rates up, limit it’s travel and control it’s sway and there are no problems as evident of Mercedes and Porsches racing success. Porsches Auto Union V-16 Grand Prix race cars capable of just over 200MPH from 1934-1939 had front and rear torsion bars and a IRS swing axle rear suspension. The suspension design went directly to VW and Porsche cars later.
The NHTSA results are remarkably simple when compared to Ralph Nader’s cataclysmic rhetoric. That’s how the truth usually is. Here is the verbatim conclusion.
The 1960-1963 Corvair understeers in the same manner as conventional passenger cars up to about 0.4g lateral acceleration, makes a transition from understeer, through neutral steer to oversteer in a range from about 0.4g to 0.5g lateral acceleration. This transition does not result in an abnormal potential for loss of control.
The limited accident data available indicates that the rollover rate of the 1960-1963 Corvair is comparable to other light domestic cars.
The 1960-1963 Corvair compared favorably with the other contemporary vehicles used in the NHTSA Input Response Tests.
The handling and stability performance of the 1960-1963 Corvair does not result in an abnormal potential for loss of control or rollover and is at least as good as the performance of some contemporary vehicles both foreign and domestic.