22 amazing ’60s concept cars

Free your mind

It’s almost beyond imagining nowadays that any major motor show would take place without at least one concept car being on display.

Things weren’t always like this. There were concept cars before the Second World War, but not many. By the 1960s, they were becoming common, and in many cases they presented a vision of the distant future, even if that particular version of the future never actually happened.

Here are 22 concepts from that decade, listed in alphabetical order, which show what can happen when car designers really let rip.

1. Alfa Romeo Canguro

Many concept cars have been designed by independent companies rather than the manufacturers themselves.

This applied to the Canguro (the Italian word for ‘kangaroo’), which was created by Bertone in 1964 as a proposal for a roadgoing version of the Alfa Romeo Giulietta TZ sports racing car.

The Bertone variant arguably looked even better than the racer, but Alfa did not put it into production.

2. Alfa Romeo Carabo

Bertone revealed the Carabo in 1968, only four years after the Canguro, but it looks almost like a car from a different century.

While the Carabo was curvy, the Canguro followed the developing fashion of being made almost entirely of flat panels with sharp edges between them.

It also featured scissor doors, which would appear two years later on the production Lamborghini Countach.
 

3. AMC Amitron

Small electric cars designed to avoid the expense and pollution of oil-based fuels don’t surprise anyone today.

The American Motors Corporation, however, had one up and running back in 1967.

The Amitron was far too early for either the technology or the public support available today, and its tiny dimensions and pyramid-like shape might not have gone down well with buyers in the 1960s, but it shows that AMC had the imagination to think a long way ahead.

4. Autobianchi A112 Runabout

This Bertone-designed sports car of 1969 was an open-topped two-seater with a Fiat engine and gearbox mounted between the rear wheels.

If this description, and the appearance of the Runabout, remind you of something, there’s a reason for that.

The Runabout is widely regarded as being the inspiration for the production Fiat X1/9 (also by Bertone) which made its debut three years later, and to a limited extent the much more powerful Lancia Stratos.

5. Bizzarrini Manta

No relation to the slightly later Opel Manta, this car was based (according to Bizzarrini itself) on the chassis of the 5300 GT.

First displayed at the Turin motor show in 1968, it looked almost a decade newer than the facts insist.

One very special feature was that it had three seats mounted side-by-side. A similar layout was used in the McLaren F1 in the 1990s, though Bizzarrini did not get there first. Ferrari had done the same thing with the 365P Berlinetta Speciale in 1966.

6. Chevrolet Astro III

Chevrolet created a remarkable number of concept cars in the 1960s.

Three of them, all known as Astro, were produced at the rate of one a year from 1967 to 1969.

Astro III was the last and most dramatic of them. Exceptionally narrow, it looked at first glance as if it had only three wheels, though in fact the front two were simply mounted very close together.

The car was also powered by a gas turbine engine. Chevrolet wasn’t the only manufacturer to try this idea, but it never caught on in production cars.

7. Chevrolet Testudo

Based on the rear-engined Corvair launched three years before, the Testudo made its debut at the Geneva show in 1963.

It was designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro, who was working for Bertone at the time.

Along with a smooth, curvy shape very different from that of the standard Corvair, Giugiaro created a front-hinged canopy through which passengers could enter rather than through conventional doors.

The concept was badly damaged in an accident, but was restored in the 1990s.

8. Chevrolet Rondine

Chevrolet had very little to do with the Rondine other than shipping a Corvette chassis across the Atlantic to Pininfarina in 1963.

Tom Tjaarda created a new body which transformed the very American Corvette into something that looked thoroughly European.

Tjaarda then designed the Fiat 124 Spider. At the extreme rear, there’s a resemblance between this car and the Rondine, but shrinking the entire shape to fit a much smaller car proved impossible.

Pininfarina held on to the Rondine for many years, but it is now in private hands, having been sold at auction in 2008.
 

9. Chevrolet Monza GT

Like the Testudo, the 1962 Monza was based on the Chevrolet Corvair, but in this case the engine was relocated in front of the transaxle, giving it a mid- rather than rear-engined layout.

Designed in-house, the Monza bore some resemblance to the third-generation Corvette which would appear five years later, though that car did not have the concept’s front-hinged canopy.

The open-topped 1963 Monza SS looked similar to the Monza, and was still based on the Corvair, but this time the designers left the engine at the back.

10. Chrysler TurboFlite

In the 1950s, Chrysler embarked on a long and ultimately unsuccessful attempt to produce viable roadgoing cars with turbine engines.

The early prototypes were adaptations of conventional models, but in 1961 Chrysler revealed the TurboFlite concept, designed by Virgil Exner and built by Ghia.

Slightly resembling an aeroplane on wheels, the TurboFlite had a rear-hinged canopy which rose automatically when the doors were opened. There was also an airbrake, fitted to compensate for the fact that turbines have minimal engine braking.

The TurboFlite never made it to production, but the Chrysler Turbine Car did a couple of years later, though very few were built. Chrysler eventually abandoned turbines in the 1970s.
 

11. Citroën Projet C-60

For many years, Citroën had nothing in its range between the 2CV and its derivatives at one end of the scale and the much larger DS at the other.

The situation was finally resolved in 1970, when the GS went on sale. A full decade earlier, Citroën had shown it was on the case with the Projet C-60.

To very strange effect, this concept combined the designs of the company’s most beautiful production car and its ugliest. The shape was similar to that of the DS, but the reverse-angled rear window and the prominence of the headlights recalled the thoroughly eccentric Ami.

Wisely, Citroën abandoned this line of thought and began work on the less weird Projet F, which never came to anything either.

12. Dodge Flitewing

The 1961 Flitewing (described as such by Dodge, though other spellings have been used) was publicised not as a ‘dream car’ – the common term for American concepts at the time – but as an ‘IDEA car’.

Ideas were certainly in plentiful supply. For example, the side windows were opened and closed by electric motors rather than having to be cranked up or down. The enormous front grille rivalled anything being produced today by BMW and Lexus.

Inside, there were four leather-trimmed bucket seats, and many of the minor controls were mounted on the driver’s door – perhaps slightly too many, since the indicator switches were among them.

Designed in Detroit but built by Ghia in Italy, the Flitewing was a driveable concept, powered by a 6.3-litre V8 engine.

13. Ford Gyron

Designed by Alex Tremulis, who had previously been responsible for the attractive shape of the Tucker 48, the glassfibre-bodied Gyron had just two wheels.

Since the driver and passenger sat side by side, keeping the car upright would be a challenge. Tremulis intended to solve this by fitting gyroscopes.

However, according to the Henry Ford Museum, these were never fitted for cost reasons. Instead, it had two stabilisers – all that was really need for a car whose small electric motor gave it a maximum speed of 5mph.

The full-sized concept was destroyed in a fire in 1962, the year after it was built. A scale model sold for $40,000 at an auction half a century later.

14. Holden Hurricane

Described by its maker as a ‘research vehicle’, the 1969 Hurricane looked very much like a contemporary sports racing car, and had a mid-mounted 5.0-litre V8 engine to match.

Slightly lower than a Ford GT40 at just 39 inches, it featured some very modern pieces of design, including digital instruments and a rear-view camera which compensated for the fact that there were no windows behind the occupants’ heads.

The Hurricane was abandoned for several years, but went on display in completely restored form in October 2011.

15. Jaguar Pirana

The Pirana was unusual among concept cars in that it was commissioned by The Daily Telegraph newspaper.

Jaguar was persuaded to send the chassis and 4.2-litre straight-six engine of an E-type to Bertone, where the Pirana was designed and built in the five months leading up to the 1967 Earls Court Motor Show.

Jaguar did not take the idea any further, but the Pirana bore a striking resemblance to the Bertone-designed Lamborghini Espada, which went on sale in 1968.

16. Lamborghini Marzal

The most dramatic feature of the Marzal concept designed by Marcello Gandini was the fact that its gullwing doors were made almost entirely of glass.

Company founder Ferruccio Lamborghini reputedly objected to this, on the grounds that the legs of any female passengers would be visible to the public.

Created in 1967, the Marzal was based on an extended Miura chassis and had a rear-mounted 2.0-litre straight-six engine, essentially one half of Lamborghini’s 4.0-litre V12.

Only one full-sized example was built (and sold at auction in 2011), if you don’t count the great many miniature versions produced by model makers Dinky and Matchbox.

17. Mercer Cobra

The Mercer Cobra was one of several ‘revival’ designs by former Chrysler designer Virgil Exner published in the December 1963 issue of Esquire magazine, all of them suggesting modern versions of cars built by classic American marques.

Exner was commissioned to complete this particular project by the Copper Development Association.

The resulting machine was based on an AC Cobra chassis and powered by a 4.7-litre Ford V8 engine. Given who was paying for it, it’s not surprising that many of its parts were made of copper.

18. Pininfarina Berlina Aerodinamica

Although it looked nothing like it, the Aerodinamica was based on BMC’s resolutely foursquare Austin 1800 saloon.

The concept was designed to slip through the air rather than crash into it, as the Austin did.

Aerodynamic touches included a slim, curved nose, a fastback body shape and a Kamm tail.

The styling was possibly too adventurous for a production car of 1967, but not for Citroën’s GS and CX or the Rover SD1, all of which went on sale in the following decade bearing noticeable resemblances to the Aerodinamica.

19. Plymouth XNR

Virgil Exner designed the XNR (named after him in abbreviated fashion) very late in his career at Chrysler.

It was a suitably wild final fling. The semi-open two-seater had a partly asymmetric design, with a nose bulge and large tailfin on the left side to guide air round the driver. The passenger, if one was carried, sat several inches lower.

This 1960 car was strictly a concept. Ghia produced a slightly toned-down version called the Asimmetrica the following year and intended to put it into production, though only a tiny number seem to have been built.

20. Pontiac Banshee

Pontiac created several Banshee concepts over nearly a quarter of a century.

The first, codenamed XP-833, was developed in 1964. A two-seat convertible with swoopy lines similar to those of the Chevrolet Monza GT, it was intended to lead to a production model.

Politics within General Motors seem to have got in the way. Chevrolet was GM’s sports car brand, and Pontiac wasn’t.

The Banshee never got beyond the concept stage. The third-generation Corvette, launched in 1968, looked remarkably similar in many ways, though its wheelarch treatment was quite different.

21. Rover T4

Like Chrysler, Rover put a lot of effort into trying to develop a viable gas turbine car.

Its first effort was the JET1 of 1950, while the Rover-BRM racer competed at the Le Mans 24-hour race three times in the 1960s.

The last Rover turbine which might have been developed for road use was the T4. It first appeared in 1961 and looked very similar to the production P6, which went on sale two years later, though unlike that car the T4 had front-wheel drive.

22. Vauxhall XVR

The XVR displayed at the 1966 Geneva show was like no Vauxhall ever seen before.

The incredibly low sports car had a swooping metal body with gullwing doors. It was fitted with a small-capacity engine (which Vauxhall tried to hide from viewers by locking the bonnet), but this was later replaced by an early example of the larger Slant-4.

Two glassfibre-bodied non-runners were built later, and one of those (pictured) is the only surviving XVR.

The other was broken up, while the Geneva show car was savaged with an axe during a tour of Canada, and was deemed beyond repair when it returned to the UK.