At first, Toronado was to be of similar size to the 1967 Chevrolet Camaro and Pontiac Firebird. If that was the case, the packaging efficiencies of front wheel drive would have made for a remarkably spacious small car. As it was, the "full size", front wheel drive Toronado, with its polarizing styling, was just another big car.
With its front wheel drive and styling reminiscent of the Cord 810, the 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado was one "far out" automobile. While a splendid engineering exercise, for there certainly was no need for a full size, front wheel drive car in the age of Aquarius, sales of Toronado were disappointing. Subsequent design updates through 1970, in an attempt to diminish much of the original car's controversial, avant garde styling did little to increase sales.
The primary benefit of front wheel drive, where the front wheels "pull" the car as opposed to it being "pushed" by the rear wheels, is superior traction; a result of putting the mass of the engine directly over the drive wheels. The basic front-wheel-drive layout provides sharp turning, and better weight distribution creates "positive handling characteristics" due to its low polar inertia and relatively favorable weight distribution.
The 1971 redesign turned the "psychedelic" original into a handsome, "Oldsmobile Eldorado". Toronado's similarities to the Cadillac Eldorado not surprising given that the Toronado and Eldorado shared much mechanically and structurally. Additionally, with Cadillac resale value being as excellent as it was in the late '60's and early '70's, Oldsmobile's Cadillac was quite fortuitous; sales of the 1971 Toronado were up nearly 15% compared to the 1970 model. Toronado being more than 10% less expensive than the Eldorado didn't hurt either.
Additionally, with the engine, transmission and drive axles together in front of the cowl, the interior of even the smallest front wheel drive vehicles are surprisingly spacious. Especially compared to similar sized rear wheel drive vehicles.
Climate change killed the dinosaurs, an iceberg killed the Titanic and the gas crisis' of the 1970's killed the (less than) 10 mpg, V-8 powered, American land yacht dinosaur. No sooner did Oldsmobile get the styling right on Toronado with its 1971 update, the 1973 OPEC Oil Embargo doubled the cost of gas. Seemingly overnight, Americans wanted Vegas and Mustang II's over cars like Toronado. As a result of the embargo, Toronado sales dropped by 50%.
While there had been several front wheel drive automobiles over the years prior to the introduction of the Oldsmobile Toronado in 1966, save for the Cord 810 of the mid 1930's, front wheel drive never caught on. The reasons for that are two fold. First, the cost; engineering and building a power train where the engine's torque output drives the front wheels is much more expensive (and complicated_ to manufacture than what is referred to as "The Panhard System", where the torque of the engine is transferred, via a propeller shaft, to a differential in the rear of the automobile. Second, need. Or lack of need, particularly in the United States. With vehicles as large as they once where, prior to the general downsizing of automobiles beginning in the late 1970's, there was little need for the increase in interior space that front wheel drive afforded.
Sales ebbed up slowly throughout the '70s from the days of the first energy crisis but Toronado sales lagged behind the Cadillac Eldorado and were ultimately dissapointing. Through the tasteful downsizing of 1979 and abortive 1986 "mini" Toronado, that ultimately, through subsequent revisions, resulted in the sort of car that Toronado should have been from the start, Oldsmobile kept Toronado alive through the end of 1992.
Small cars became popular as a result of the 1973 gas crisis, although most were rear wheel drive. It wasn't until 1978 that front wheel drive began becoming the "new normal" with, at first, those smaller automobiles benefiting greatly from the packaging efficiency and interior volume gains of front wheel drive. Throughout the 1980's, front wheel drive became available on mid size and eventually even "full size" automobiles.
Oldsmobile did not replace Toronado with another two door specialty car leaving GM with two (Eldorado and Riviera) instead of three models to compete in the very narrow two door, luxury market. The market for coupes, in general, was nothing like what it had been. The less competition the better too, particularly from makes and models within your own corporate family. Instead of a coupe, Oldsmobile, which by the early 1990's had problems far and above slow sales of Toronado, attempted to revitalize the entire division with the stylish and polarizing, Aurora.
The rest, as they say, literally, is history.
Toronado is a made up name.
it
Is it for sale
ReplyDeleteI love this car please tell me u want to sale it
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