British history is full of clever but ultimately completely pointless occasions when the wily English showed their middle fingers to those damned Germans, whether it was a game of football or European power games.
Vauxhall had its own skirmish at the British Motor Show in April 1978, when they took the curtain on a top-secret roadster concept. Vauxhall and German partner Opel had been owned by General Motors since the 1920s, but it wouldn’t be until the 1970s before GM started throwing them together to limit the number of models and save some money.
The Vauxhall Equus was a modern take on English roadsters
Perhaps it was because he was eager to assert his authority, but Vauxhall boss Bob Price thought it a good idea to see if his company could offer a slightly more modern take on cars like the Triumph Spitfire and MG Midget – popular cars, which were a bit coming to an end.
The team had used Vauxhall parts wherever possible, which immediately gave the Vauxhall Equus a production-ready impression. He stood on the undercarriage of the rather hideous Panther Lima. The fiberglass bodywork was indeed completely new and modern, but because the Lima itself was already based on the Vauxhall Magnum, a sedan from the mid-1970s that you can immediately forget, the Equus met the ‘use existing parts’ requirement and could therefore be put on the road quite easily.
The designer of the Vauxhall Equus
The Vauxhall Equus was designed by Wayne Cherry, an up-and-coming American talent who had become Head of Design at Vauxhall in 1975. He was at the start of what would become a glorious career at GM, moving through, say, the 1993 Corsa to shaping entire series of Cadillacs and Chevrolets.
The Equus used Vauxhall’s signature low nose, made popular by the 1973 Firenza Coupé; but the fact that it looked so slim overall was mainly because it had no tailgate (you’d have to squeeze luggage through the rear seats), nor a roof. The minimalist interior will look familiar to Vauxhall/Opel fans of the time – the doors and seats were from the Cavalier (known to us as the Opel Ascona), the air vents from the Chevette (Kadett) and the counters from the Royale (Senator ).
It wasn’t a viable idea
Although a popular sight at the Vauxhall stand, the Equus had already sidelined itself with its extravagant roof and trunk design (or rather lack thereof). Designing a folding roof alone would have required considerable investment. If you fell for the design of the wheels, you were in luck: they came back on the Astra/Kadett in 1984.
The Vauxhall Equus must have surprised the Germans, but they had the last laugh. It was the last concept car that Vauxhall ever presented. That is, until 25 years later, when they released the VX Lightning in 2003, a roadster concept based on a shared GM platform. It could have been a nice successor to the VX220 Roadster. Unfortunately: it didn’t work out for Vauxhall, while the Germans took it into production as the Opel GT. Was it still 1-1…
#amazing #Vauxhall #Equus #showrooms