In the car world, keeping a car in production for too long often opens you up to scorn from the automotive press and the public alike. I’m sure you’ve seen a joke or two about the advanced age of still-in-production cars like the Nissan GT-R, Dodge Challenger, or Chevy Express. There does seem to be a point when keeping the same vehicle rolling down the assembly line becomes less of a bad thing and more of a curiosity. Some vehicles have been in production in other parts of the world for decades with only a few changes along the way.
Lewin’s fun article from this morning detailed the oldest cars still in production today. It appears the crown is split between the BAW BJ212 and the UAZ-452. If you count other vehicles, the Cessna 172 has been in production since 1956, with only a 10-year break between 1986 and 1996. The Royal Enfield Bullet 350 is a good example, “the longest-running motorcycle model in production anywhere in the world” as the firm calls it, noting says the motorcycle was manufactured essentially unchanged for over 54 years before its first major update in 2009. The Honda Super Cub is another model with a long history of production, but Honda was a little more regular with updates to the Super Cub than Royal Enfield was with the Bullet.
Some of these vehicles make fine used purchases. I’ve flown a couple of 50-year-old Cessna 172s and they were reliable aircraft. One of them definitely needed a new paintjob, but the aircraft always landed in well enough that I could have flown it the next day.
Before you consider importing that sweet Lada Niva, OCS-BN wins COTD for a second day in a row by offering a humorous story:
Talking about long-running models, we cannot leave out the infamous Lada Niva. It came out in 1977 and is still in production. The Niva is the only car I ever bought new. With virtually any other vehicle, buying a well kept, certified pre-owned example is the smarter choice. Not so with the Niva. See, these beauties already started to rust when chief designer Pjotr Prusows drew the first design sketches. Buying new, I was able to enjoy two years of its awesomeness before the rust (and many other problems) started to get critical. Yes, I lost a lot of money. I also lost some of my hearing, because of the incredible gear whine and the noise of the heater fan. The blower had just three settings: Off, MiG 29 and MiG 29 + afterburner. Good times.
Ok, I lost it at the MiG references!
In other news, Cadillac is committing to the idea of giving its EVs names with an “-iq” suffix. The lineup will now include the Optiq, Lyriq, Vistiq, Escalade IQ, and Celestiq. A lot of you cracked jokes about these names, and SW got me the hardest:
When I read the name, I immediately heard “Do not take Vistiq if you are allergic to Vistiq. Possible side effects of Vistiq include…”
Cadillac better be careful as they might get sued by big pharma for taking some of their nonsense names off the board.
If you’re curious, here’s Cadilliq’s explanation behind the new naming scheme:
The IQ naming strategy celebrates Cadillac introducing a different type of EV to the market — one that works in tandem with people’s daily lives and environments. The IQ designation is Cadillac’s EV nomenclature and first debuted on the LYRIQ.
So, there you go. Use that information as you will. Have a great evening!
Can’t wait to get my hands on a Coupe DeVilleiq. And win first prize, the ever popular Cadillac El Doradiq. Second prize as you all know is a set of steak knives. Third prize, “You’re fired!”
“Who am I? You came here in a Hyundai. I came here in an $80,000 BMW.”
Never gets old.
That Lada Niva is the spitting image of Groucho Marx. Not only in the face, but its penchant for smoking and the likelihood that it will make you look ridiculous over and over again.
A friend in Greece just bought a 2014 Lada Niva; so far he is only too happy with it. Of course, he has a regular car (and two motorbikes) too, so when his ears start ringing he has options.
I’m just disappointed that Cadillac didn’t take the opportunity to name Escaladiq, and use the “diq” ending for a model.
“Escaladiq” sounds vaguely Inuit, too, which would tie in to the Denali.
Yeah but you had two years of a great upper body workout, with the bus sized steering wheel you get the shoulders of a Leningrad dock worker
I am humbled.
Two in a row?
Thats like Master Commenter Level there!
Not me – OCS-BN has that distinction
I thought that the answer to “What car do you not want to buy used?” Is a Subaru WRX. Always a WRX, and even worse, an STI. Doesn’t matter is it looks untouched, showroom fresh and only driven by a little old lady on Sunday, you know it’s been thrashed.
(Looks out window at an 02)
Hey now!
🙂
my son went to look at a WRX, which was horrifyingly trashed, broken seat belt ?? at the back, etc etc. He said “this car speaks to me !” My wife had gone with him as I was at work, she said, “this car speaks to me too, it says – Flee ! you fool !”
By this time he’s bought 2 used WRXs, both have been surprisingly OK. First one was written off when a drunk HHR crashed into him, second 03 bugeye is going strong with a STI transmission.
I drove a used Lada Niva from ’85 – ’87 in Ecuador. My boss, the Project Director, bought it from his mistress. It was considered a good one since the engine had already blown and been replaced. Driving from Quito to Napo (Amazon), the strap holding the rear axel in place fell off. Dirt mountainous road where go on and off the gas made the rear end slide one way or the other. Anyway, Italian design with Russian quality but it usually got me where I was going!
The Niva was the only relative commercial success amongst in the first wave of former Eastern Bloc cars getting imported to my neck of the woods (Lada also sold the Samara here in Portugal, while Yugo sold the 45 and at least a couple Floridas, but that was basically it; Skoda would later come into our market with the Favorit/Forman, which obliterated the Niva’s sales figures, but they had the VW dealership/assistance network, which makes it feel like an unfair comparison).
One thing about rust-prone cars is how much longer they last in warmer climates. We don’t really have road salt around here, so old Nivas are still around in decent numbers. Certainly far from a unicorn sighting, spotting one of those in good condition on portuguese roads. And for all the bad rep Ladas had for being unreliable, the few Niva owners/former owners I know swear by its reliability-by-simplicity: they did break down, but apperently were super jerry-rigging-friendly. I’ve heard tales of roadside zip-tie and duct tape fixes becoming semi-permanent and staying on for months while parts weren’t available.
You must be far from the coast, because just the salt in the Mediteranean air in the coastal town in Algeria that I lived in for a bit was able to (and did) eat through a Lada 1600’s fenders in 18 months and through a matching pair of Fiat’s fenders in less than five years. It was like acid in the air. No road salt.
Well, I’m in Portugal and the coast is densely populated, but most population isn’t right on the coast, but rather inland enough that air salt no longer is a problem. To be fair, once you get to coastal towns, air salt will go though a Mercedes W123 almost as easily as it will go through a Niva.
In college (and probably right now) my friends and I would probably make the joke to each other, “We don’t have any Lyriqs on the lot, but I can show you Thisdiq in the shop.”
Honestly, I kinda like the “-iq” thing (not necessarily separate as the “Escalade IQ” but every other one).
As far as naming schemes go it’s still better than Infiniti, BMW, Lexus etc. naming schemes of just letters and numbers. Plus the names are nicer than at least half of Toyota’s offerings (past and present). Then again, I suppose that’s a low bar.
(Pickup trucks get a pass because they’re at least somewhat intuitive in that sense.)
I said the same thing on the article yesterday. The -iq names might be silly, but at least they are, in fact, names.
I’m convinced that ad people come up with names for pharmaceuticals by throwing a bunch of Scrabble tiles up in the air and seeing how they land.
Again? Madness! Congrats Mercedes, you just sold me an upgrade to Velour.
Kind regards to the Torchinsky Family. That letter through GoFundMe was a nice gesture.
Bring back the Brougham d’Elegance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9mccBDeqG0
Exactly!
I have driven a low mileage Niva made in 00’s and it felt like it was straight from the 70’s and abused to hell. It was horrible, the description of blower engine felt very familiar. And it was the smallest problem.
Okay, if Lyriq is pronounced LEER-ic, and Optiq is OP-tic, is Vistiq pronounced VIS-tic or vis-TIQUE?
Shoot, I was going with the “-ique” pronunciation for all of them in my head… shows you what I know!
I lived in Panama for some years in the early 1990’s. I wanted a car I didn’t care too much about since the tropical rain, the jungle roads, and car theft all make a good vehicle a bad idea. I became fixated on getting a Niva. You could buy one new for less than $10,000 U.S. and I thought a little VERY simple 4WD would be perfect. I also figured that since every other taxi was a Lada, parts wouldn’t be a problem. Besides, I rationalized that a crude and basic vehicle couldn’t break down because what was there to break? An engine with points, and a transmission with a clutch, right? How bad could it be?
Unfortunately (fortunately?) at the time my Spanish still wasn’t very good so I asked my Panamanian friends to help me buy one. They REFUSED.
Sounds like they were true friends.
And that is the new name for this part of GM. 😀
I spent too much time playing with software-defined radios. In that context, I and Q are the “in-phase” and “quadrature” channels for processing signals.
I wonder if similar concepts are used in motor controllers?
Oh it actually is. In motor control theory, there’s a system of characterizing the current flow doing work in the electromagnets and they’re graphed on a coordinate plane with an D (Direct, some times called I, for inline) axis and Q (Quadrature) axis.
I’ll bet nine M10x1.25 JIS flange-head 10.9 hex bolts this was part of the naming consideration.
No bet! It just feels like a nerdy inside joke that got passed off as modern techy weird.
Errr…I may have once replaced a nearly brand new Daihatsu Charade with an eight year old Lada Niva. It didn’t have much rust…
I just have to ask how that worked out for you
mind, having made many, many in hindsight questionable choices myself, I completely understand if you still don’t want to talk about it
If I’m honest… really well. Though it may not seem that way to a casual observer.
The rust was fixable and you could see what caused (poor rear window and door seals, no drains in the buckets formed by the rear wheel arch and rear body) it so further rust was avoidable.
Mechanically, it never let me down in three years I had it. I broke the suspension trying to improve it. Fitting OME shocks resulted in snapped lower front shock mounts. So we had to build new ones.
Most of the fails were in the little things like the drivers seat slide mechanism (broke, welded up) and the cable operated side windows (snapped cable, replaced with brass swaged stainless cable).
I did many road trips and camping excursions in that car but then I wanted to do bigger trips and found Land Rovers.
I ended up swapping the Lada and a Series 3 cab chassis (with a Rover engine in it) for a Series 3 Stage 1 utility with a stroked (was 3.5 litre, now 4.4 litre) V8, modified twin Strombergs, Genie headers and a 2.5″ exhaust.
Sounds like the kind of ownership experience that either drives you mad & broke—or expands your capabilities and ingenuity. I say this because I spent a fair amount of time yesterday separating an aluminum fan blade/hub from a steel shaft at work. They had been exposed on a roof for some 35 years, and it was the experience of many, many broken rusty bolts on decades of cheap beaters that allowed me to persistently & gently work them apart in order to reuse the NLA 3/8” hub*
excellent upgrade, to be sure!
*I remember casting the I Ching years ago & getting Perseverance Furthers which I now can wryly appreciate although 10yo hyperactive me hated
Respectfully, if you are able to use terms like “build new ones” and “broke, welded up” in a sentence related to car ownership as something trivial, you’ll probably also describe owning a rabbid pet lion as regular experience, and it never let you down – jumped you a few times but you wrestled it and beat the crap out of it every time.
The car simply was never given the chance to let you down 🙂
Oh it had every opportunity…
As for the rest, fixing simple cars isn’t that hard if one consistently follows the basic principles of diagnosis and problem solving… which IS hard.