Bricklin V-8 Trivia Questions of the Week:
1. What country was home to the Bricklin automobile’s corporate headquarters and manufacturing facilities? 2. On November 20, 1974, the United States Department of Justice filed its final anti-trust suit against what huge American company that would lead to its eventual breakup? 3. He was a Joker a smoker and a midnight toker. Who performed the 1974 hit song The Joker? 4. It was January 12, 1975... the second year of production for Bricklin and while Malcom was struggling to keep his enterprise afloat, the Pittsburgh Steelers defeated the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl IX. In what stadium did this event take place? 5. Four days later, January 16th would see the final episode of a NBC television series which had been running for eight years.The show’s plot was based around a former San Francisco Police Chief who was forced to retire after a sniper’s bullet paralysed him from the waist down, confining him to a wheelchair. What was the name of this popular TV series and who played the starring role? 6. This 1975 hit single contained the lyrics, "I’d like to see you, but then again; That doesn’t mean you mean that much to me". What was the name of the song, and what British group performed it? 7. Here’s a baseball question for my friend Jim Riganti. Born April 4th, 1975, this MLB third baseman began his professional career with the Philadelphia Phillies and would go on to play for the St. Louis Cardinals; and the Toronto Bluejays. The seven-time Gold Glove winner was traded to the Cincinnati Reds on July 31, 2009. Name this MLB champ. 8. Far from an April Fool’s joke, a new company was formed on April 1, 1976 by Steve Wozniak and a partner who’s name would give away the answer. What was the partner’s name and what company did they form?

The answers to this week’s trivia questions may be found at the end of this story.

Ask a hundred average people on the street, "What is a Bricklin" and you’d be lucky to get one person who could answer the question. (You know, I think I’m going to do just that... ask 100 people if they know what a ‘Bricklin’ is. Good idea. I’ll report back to you with the results in the coming weeks.) Ask one hundred Fin Man readers the same question, and you might get a figure in the lower double digits. (That’s because if you read this column, you have at least a mild interest in automobiles and a fundamental knowledge of the subject.) Why do so few people know anything about this sleek seventies sports car? Because, like Ford’s Edsel, the Bricklin SV-1 was a ‘flash in the pan’ of automotive history... its production surviving barely three model years.

Although the Bricklin had exotic lines, mechanically speaking it was fairly straight forward and uncomplicated. The Bricklin drive train relied on components out sourced to major auto makers, which was probably a good thing for the handful of consumers who chose Bricklin, making repair parts much easier to find then and now.
 
During its first year of production, the Bricklin was powered by a 360 cubic inch V-8 power plant provided courtesy of American Motors Corp (AMC). (That’s 5.9 liters for all you gen-Xers out there.) Nineteen seventy-five models were motivated by a 351 Windsor engine manufactured by Ford. A two-barrel carburetor fed the eight cylinders and output was rated at a modest 175 horsepower.
 
Bricklin was the brainchild of Malcom Bricklin, a Philadelphia-born, Jewish-American businessman who, after dropping out of college, went on to turn his father’s Florida-based building supply company into the once highly successful, franchised chain of Handyman Hardware stores. After making millions in that venture, Bricklin went into the automobile business, setting up sales organizations and franchise operations for a number of motor vehicles and gas powered scooters. He seemed to have a knack for getting involved with what would become legendary losers in automotive history. He was responsible for importing the Subaru 360, a car for which Consumer Reports would award the title "The Most Unsafe Car in America". He also brought us the infamous Yugo in 1985, a car which would quickly go on to receive the dubious distinction as one of the worst cars of all time. In terms of production, however, Yugo was far more successful than the Bricklin, racking up sales of nearly 160,000 units during its initial launch phase. That number was almost double Edsel’s total production for all three years. Unfortunately for Malcom Bricklin, the Yugo had such a bad reputation for quality that it would soon become known as the "No-Go" by many.
 
Okay, here’s a bit of instant automotive trivia gratification for you. Do you have any idea what the ‘SV-1’ model designation stood for? I didn’t think so. I’ll fix that for you right here... right now. You see Malcom Bricklin’s mission was to build a safe, high performance sports car for the American market. His entire marketing plan was designed around the safety factor so the ‘SV-1’ model name stood for ‘safety vehicle 1’. So, there you have it... and now you know. And, don’t forget– you read it right here in the Old Car Column!
 
Malcom built the Bricklin in five colors... and just so you didn’t forget what the Bricklin was all about, he named them ‘Safety Red’, Safety Green, ‘Safety Suntan’, ‘Safety White’ and ‘Safety Orange’.Not very creative, but it hammered the point across. You might wonder why Bricklin’s color choices were so limited. (Astute FIN MAN fan John Putz reminded me of this fact.) Because, unlike conventional automobiles which traveled through a paint booth on their way down the assembly line, Bricklin’s bright and sporty hues were impregnated into the car’s revolutionary bonded, acrylic-fiberglass body. Each additional color added a great deal of expense to the bottom line, so Bricklin the man, limited color choices to a handful of trendy sporting colors popular with the pony car segment of the marketplace. Bricklin’s plan was to eliminate the nasty paint chips which ordinary cars were subject to. When a shopping cart bounced off a Bricklin, any scratches could simply be buffed out without the need to apply paint. This scheme sounded good in principle, but the process of bonding acrylic to fiberglass was in its infancy and owners were plagued with warping and cracking of the body panels almost from the time they took delivery.

The two-toned theme, with it’s black lower body section was standard fare and came with all Bricklins.
 
And then there are those exotic ‘gull wing’ doors. Mercedes used them successfully for years in there sporty two-seaters, but they were manually operated. Malcom wanted to make it easier for the occasional soccer mom to get in and out, so he devised a hydraulically operated system that enabled the doors to be raised and lowered at the touch of a button. That idea also sounded good in theory. The problem was the doors, which weighed in at a hundred pounds each, were too heavy for the mechanical system which frequently failed, leaving passengers stranded inside the car!
To coin a phrase from a country western song I once heard, "if it weren’t for bad luck, Malcom Bricklin wouldn’t have any luck at all." Unfortunately for Malcom, the process of bonding acrylic plastic to fiberglass was still in it’s infancy and not yet perfected. But that wasn’t about to deter M.B. He trudged forward stubbornly with his plan and as a result, Bricklin owners soon found that their brand new sports car came with

Although the Edsel was the subject of much ridicule and countless jokes, when it comes to successful business ventures, Bricklin made the Edsel look like a blue-chip investment. While the two marques have little in common, save the fact that they both have four wheels and a front engine, rear drive platform, you’d be much more successful finding an Edsel on the market today than you would a Bricklin. In the three model years of production, Ford Motor Company produced a total of 92,213 Edsels, while Bricklin production for three model years totalled a scant 2,854... or almost exactly half of the number of six-passenger Edsel Villager station wagons for 1959.

Despite all the negatives, Bricklin has garnered a small but loyal number of devoted fans and owners. For more information and details, visit the Bricklin International Owners Club at www.bricklin.org.
Here’s a bit of bonus Bricklin trivia with a St. Louis connection, courtesy FIN MAN fan Mark Kohring of Ballwin, Missouri:
 
"Bruce, Time has faded my recollection of his last name, but a fellow named "George" designed and built the opening mechanisms for the gull wing doors on the Bricklin. He lived down in south St.Louis. He was a hippie type guy who was bone skinny and had long graying hair down his back. When it came to engineering, he sure knew his stuff. I knew him because he owned a ‘ 70 Hemi Cuda and we were huge motor heads back then. I remember him taking us for a ride after he had swapped 2.76 gears into the rear end. We went over to I-64 in Illinois (it was a new road back then). From about the 8 mile marker to the 11 marker it is flat and straight arrow. With that gear ratio, the big hemi’s torqueflite didn’t shift into third until 110 mph. We went on until he buried the 150 mph speedo. I’ll always remember that ride. It was one of only three times I saw 150+. The others were a ‘ 70 440-6 Superbird and a ‘ 71 GTX. Ah, the good ol’ days of open road and very few cops." (You said that Mark, not me!)
Thanks, Mark Kohring, Ballwin, MO."
 
If any of you readers out there have further information on "George", please e-mail be at mailto://the_fin_man@msn.com.
 
And, from the ‘what will they think of next’ department... would you believe you can now transform your perfectly good ‘93-’02 Chevy Camaro into a righteously-retro, ‘57 Chevy-like hot rod? Would I lie to you? EasyRods, the same (or is it ‘insane’) people who brought us the reportedly successful retro ‘49-’50 Ford front end kit for ‘89-’97 Thunderbirds and Cougars, has done themselves one better. Not a bunch known for leaving well enough alone, they have come up with a bolt-on, glue and screw together package that, according to them, can be assembled in ‘hours’. (Of course they don’t specify how many hours.) Take a peek, (which includes a video showing an actual build at a weekend car show) at www.easyrods.com.
 
P.S. A hearty FIN MAN thanks goes out to Bob Wendal and the others from the Buick Club who cleaned out the fire pit last Sunday so that we could cook our hot dogs over an open fire. I never shoulda torched that 52 inch Sony widescreen in the pit last year. It wasn’t very eco-responsible on my part, but after a few Bud Lights, stranger things do happen. Rush would have loved it... and it did help Dan Tuck find our place last year as he was heading over from South St. Louis. He just wasn’t sure if the glow in the nighttime sky and the acrid smoke was from our place or Granite City Steel’s operation!
 
You’d never know that the car show season was coming to an end by looking at next weekend’s calendar. A total of eight events are scheduled in the St. Louis area including Friday night cruises at Chuck-A-Burger in St. John; Soprano’s Pizza & Pasta in O’Fallon, MO and Culvers in Arnold. Saturday brings the monthly cruise at Culvers in Collinsville; The Outlaws Car Club cruise at Steak ‘n’ Shake in Sunset Hills; the Southern Illinois Street Machines Annual Halloween Car & Motorcycle Show in the K-Mart parking lot in Frankfort, Illinois and the Morningstar Church Car Show in O’Fallon, MO.
For details visit http://clubs.hemmings.com/clubsites/lakerscarclub/indexP.htm.
 
‘The FIN MAN’^TM is available for your group’s special occasions. In addition to his seminar schedule, he has been a guest speaker at group meetings including car clubs, engineering clubs and other professional associations. He has also acted as host or emcee at a number of special events including trivia parties, holiday parties, social and professional club events, benefits and fund raisers. During his appearances, he presents an overview of the collector car hobby plus a detailed look at American cars from the fifties and sixties. His program includes a fascinating Power Point presentation with images of collectible automobiles and various associated nostalgia and Americana. Guests also have the opportunity to play "FINS for FUN," the video game he produced in 1987 which inspired his nickname, in which players compete to identify the year, make and model of cars from tightly cropped photos of fins and taillights. Those who score the highest win auto-related prizes donated by supporting Fin Man sponsors. For more information, go to http://www.thefinman.com. We are currently accepting bookings for the remainder of calendar year 2009 and 2010.
 
The FIN MAN^TM is a member of the Society of Automotive Historians, the St. Louis Chapter of the Buick Club of America and the Lincoln and Continental Owners Club. Past club memberships include the Cadillac-LaSalle Club, the DeSoto Club, the Imperial Owners Club, the Monte Carlo Owners Club, the Vintage Thunderbird Club of America and the Edsel Club of America. He welcomes your questions, comments and suggestions regarding the column or old cars in general. You can e-mail The FIN MANtm at mailto://the_fin_man.com . Visit his web site at http://www.thefinman.com .
Thanks for reading the Old Car Column!
 
Bricklin V-8 Trivia Answers: 1. Malcom Bricklin set up shop in St. John, New Brunswick, Canada. 2. The U.S. Justice Department’s actions put an end to the monopoly on phone service long held by AT&T. 3. The Steve Miller Band. 4. Super Bowl IX deciding game was held in Tulane Stadium in New Orleans, Louisiana. 5. Raymond Burr played the starring role as former SF police chief Robert T. Ironside in the series Ironsides. 6. The lyrics are from the song, ‘I’m Not In Love" performed by 10cc. 7. The Cincinnati Reds player I am referring to is Scott Bruce (good name) Rolen. Was that too easy Jim? 8. Wozniak’s partner was the infamous Steve Jobs, and of course unless you’ve been living in a cave for the past thirty-three years, you’ll know the company they formed together was Apple.
All materials copyright 1998-2009, PH Enterprises, d/b/a The FIN MAN^TM.

Bruce Kunz - a.k.a. "The FIN MAN
thefinman.com

Others may talk about the golden age of American automobiles...
The FIN MAN lived it!