Most Beautiful "Unknown" Cars: 1972-77 Opel Rekord D / Commodore B Were Two Gorgeous GM Cars

on this channel we often talk about beautiful designs of vehicles that were sold in the United States including some of the vehicles that you see here the 66 o tornado there in the foreground the Buick Riviera and the 67 El Dorado there increasingly in the background this Trio represents arguably the Pinnacle of General Motors design perhaps ever certainly in the 19 60s but there were a number of other vehicles that were produced overseas that were not sold in the US that really had an overall just beautiful design and we're going to talk about a couple of those Vehicles today more specifically the 1972 to 1977 opal record D and commodore B these were two vehicles that were sold by opal during that time period And for those who are around in the United States during the 70s you may recall that Buick dealers actually sold a number of opal Vehicles during that time period including the opal GT which by the way is an absolutely gorgeous car as well and the opal Manta among other vehicles from opal but two that never made it Stateside were the record D and commodore B and we're going to talk a little bit more about those two vehicles now because I think they're some of the most beautiful vehicles that General Motors ever produced and they're largely unknown at least State size so let's discuss them a little bit now the first thing to note is that the record D and commodore b along with other Opals of the time period were actually designed by a pretty famous American designer by the name of Chuck Jordan Chuck Jordan later Rose to become General Motors vice president of design in the late 80s through early 1990s but back at this time he was sent to Adam Opel agay to become the leader of their Design Studios this was during a period where General Motors was trying to purposefully rotate some Americans through opal design in part because general motor styling Vice President Bill Mitchell believed that they could help inject a little bit of flare into Opel which really was producing in the words of Bob Lutz boring cars for boring people the first American to go over to Opel as a styling leader was a man by the name of Clare McKean who had worked in General Motors design for many years in the United States McKean designed a number of beautiful Opals perhaps the best was the Diplomat Coupe that was produced from 1965 to 1967 in quite limited numbers and built by Carmen it also had a 327 Racing Engine underhood just an absolutely gorgeous vehicle but as you can tell it has some American flare associated with it well interestingly Clare McKean was actually actually not Bill Mitchell's First Choice to go over to opal a man by the name of Irv Riki was but at the time General Motors was just starting these expad assignments and the thought was that someone would be sent from the States to Germany and really live out the rest of their career there and that was just something that irer bicki wasn't willing to do and so he turned the job down by the time Clare McKean accepted it it was more of a rotational assignment and that's why Clare McKean was there for several years and then after Clare McKean Chuck Jordan became the design leader for Adam opal and when Jordan arrived he inherited a quite American styled opal record c as an example vehicle that displayed a number of styling traits that were very typical of the time especially for J Motors including that so-called Coke bottle shape where the body flares out around the rear wheels upward and outward you can see it here in this particular photo that again was a very American Trend that came into Vogue in the early to mid 1960s in this record SE was produced from around August of 1966 through the end of 1971 it's not an ugly car but let's see what Chuck Jordan developed with the design team take a look at this record D Coupe and you can see the styling has been significantly modernized and what was going on at the time in Europe in particular was that a number of beautiful designs with this so-called sheer look very sheer surfaces No Coke bottle shapes thin roofs big daylight opening or green houses were coming into Vogue during that time period And I would say one of the leading designers of the time in Europe was geeto juaro who designed a number of beautiful Vehicles during that time period including the Beautiful Day Tomaso Mangusta Tak look at it here was produced from 1967 to 1971 as well as the ESOP fedia just a gorgeous sedan Jato and others were really setting new styling Trends some beautiful Vehicles even the Fiat 130s were another greatl looking car and eventually this design language would even flow Stateside as Cadillac introduced the 76 sevil with a similar sheer look although with a bit more American form to it and the 1977 Caprice and Impala as well as the General Motors fullsize lineup would continue that so-called sheer look but over in Europe is where this look really started arguably birthed by designers like juato and Chuck Jordan really wanted to have Opel take part in some of the design Renaissance that was happening in Europe thus the record D and commodore b as you can see here the record D was just a beautiful car and the way to think about the record of the Commodore is that a commodor is kind of an uplevel record that had a six-cylinder engine in it as opposed to various four-cylinder engines whether gas or diesel in the record and the record was a very successful vehicle in terms of sales in its 5 and 1 half year production run 1.1 million of them were produced so these vehicles were found all over Germany and Europe and it's no surprise why and looking at it notice the styling though of the record D and how different it is from the record C no more coke bottle much thinner looking roof a bit more sheer overall surfaces a newly introduced Hoffmeister Kink there on the C pillar and homage to BMW styling and beautiful slight tumble home to the vehicle clean body sides somewhat fuselage looking in uh their overall form just just overall absolutely gorgeous vehicles and here's a picture of an opal Commodore B again produced from 1972 to 1977 similar to the record D but again just an absolutely gorgeous coupon here in the Commodore BS you got a bigger engine a six-cylinder either 2 and2 or 2.8 lers in this case as opposed to the record D that just had four cylinder engines ranging from about 1.7 L all the way up to a 2 L Diesel and there were different gas and Diesel variants that were available in the record D but the hot vehicle again was the Commodore b 2 and 1 12 to 2.8 L 6-cylinder engines that on the upper end there was actually a fuel injected 2.8 engine I think made around 160 horsepower so it was quite powerful it wasn't quite as powerful as the 3 l fuelies from BMW at the time but if you were going on the autobond you certainly had a very respectable autobond Cruiser now the other great design element about these vehicles was the Interiors which as you can see here were just super clean tasteful handsome had some interesting features for the time including an IP that wrapped into the door as you can see there at the corners of the IP and take a look at the beautiful gauges kind of your typical two round dial speedometer tachometer and you also have a full complement of gauges there oil pressure fuel engine temperature Etc so that you actually know what's happening with the engine I also love how the center console is beautifully integrated into the dashboard as opposed to just purely floating it gives the car just a seamless feel on the interior and you get a bit of a mercedesbenz four-spoke steering wheel there too here's a more holistic picture of the interior and you can see it from a bit further back again absolutely beautiful I do love one element that you can really see in this picture a bit better and that is that the speaker for the radio is disguised as part of the center console there I think it's just a great integration and it makes sense I guess you can hear the sound uh pretty well it's coming from the center of the vehicle now while I could expound to a greater degree on the design of the opal record and commodore B I think it's better to hear a firsthand account of how the design came into being and let's turn to an interview that I had with Bob blutz regarding this particular topic here Bob discusses his relationship with Chuck Jordan and ALS Al the design of the record D and commodore B including a variant of the Commodore that never made it through to production but which designers and Bob felt was absolutely gorgeous Bob served as opal's sales leader during this time before being hired Away by BMW where he would introduce a number of vehicles there including the first three series the original M cars and even introduce the BMW nomenclature let's listen in to Bob tell the story of the opal design for these vehicles you look at the portfolio everything from the GT in I think 196 that was another tough one and then and you have the the um asona the Manta the record D you know the the Chuck Jordan cars too yeah beautiful cars how did how did that design Evolution come about how did all right I've been discussing this one a lot lately with former GM designers But Chuck Jordan was a great designer but very American in his orientation you know he very much liked D's that were like this and half vinyl roofs capped at the end and vinyl roofs that didn't come over the edge but had a little Chrome bead before the drip Rail and he he he just loved that stuff and he came to opal and he says here's what's wrong with you guys you need a little Pizzaz and he started taking the cars and I said Chuck listen uh let me try to help you understand European design and he had been indoctrinated by Bill Mitchell who said there is no such thing as European design and American design there is good design and bad design period and American design as practiced by General Motors is good and what the European are doing is pure crap and I suppose seen through American eyes he was right but the Europeans weren't seeing it through American eyes they were seeing it through European eyes and a a more subdued cleaner less ornamented tighter uh execution spoke functionality and Engineering excellence and sent all kinds of sublim subliminal messages to the European customer that frankly you know the average American designer didn't understand so I wrote Chuck Jordan a long Treatise which I did all by hand and I included p i included pictures of a De Tomaso Mangusta and and EOP fidia and Etc all the Good georgo Ju stuff and then I did a lot of sketches of American roof line you know exaggerated flowing sea pillars and and then European roof line very very crisp an American dloo very tight High Belt Line thick Roof then European Belt Line tend to Sky down from the front door mirror and and then a very thin roof with a slight Arc to the top and a very thin roof I I sent it to him and I didn't hear anything for about four days and then he called me over to design he said close the door and I did and he said let me tell you something I got your 10-page thing and I read it and I internalized it and I'm telling you don't you ever try to teach me about design again is that understood because you're you're a marketing guy and I'm a professional designer and you don't know anything about my business is that clear I said yes Chuck it's clear he says having said that you make a lot of excellent points in there so he acquiesced a little bit then yeah yeah and then he said I I get it as far as that Italian design is concerned I'm going to go down I've already made the contact I'm going to go down and see juano I'm going to meet him I'm going to see what he's doing and the two of them became fast friends and then and then Chuck Jordan told me he says the next record Commodore I'm going to do it's I'm going to out juaro juaro so well they came out gorgeous not just on the outside but even the inside everything that car was near perfect that black IP that kind of wraps into the doors to it was fantastic it was a fantastic execution and the one that all the GM designers retired designers remember and I remember which we we were never able to sell because of the additional investment was the Commodore which had the six-cylinder engine which which fit under the hood but design and I wanted about 5 in more hood length and that commodore coupe with the additional 5 in Hood was to die for I mean it was fantastic it took it into another class and we kept throwing it to top management and to the finance guys and they said yeah it's nice but so what you know easy Bob the finance guys right but you got the Commodore a through right and eventually yeah well that was the Commodore a but it was the B that that had the nice body yeah and that was the one where we were going to we wanted to extend the front end also to pull it away from the record because other than Grill and trim they were really identical and uh we never sold that which was a shame but you know the commodor did all right and opal went from being the sloths of the autobond that the guys in mercedes-benz's and BMWs kept having to figuratively sweep out of the left lane uh suddenly became dominant if you had a Commodore gsse with the the 150 horsepower fuel injected six that was faster than well maybe a BMW the the six series and the the the uh the big ones the six the six cylinders 3 lit yeah 3 lit fuelies that had I think 200 horsepower they were slightly faster but other than that you were faster on the autobom than any BMW or Mercedes-Benz Sur so it it made Opals respectable and there you have it hope you enjoyed this design segment on the opal record D and commodor B if you did please drop a comment and be sure to like And subscribe thanks again and until next time take care

Channel: Rare Classic Cars & Automotive History

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Id: F7SbWfJ3fg0

Length: 16min 51sec (1011 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 22 2024