Earlier today, Jason wrote about how the first NHTSA crash test–performed on May 21, 1979–involved a 1979 Plymouth Champ. This Mitsubishi Mirage doing business in America as a Chrysler and as a Dodge Colt performed better than you’d expect. Sure, the kid isn’t going to make it to school and the front seat passenger found a new way to open the glovebox, but it’s not so bad! Searching the NHTSA database, the organization performed 139 crash tests in 1979. Since the Champ was the very first, the car technically had a silly distinction, pointed out by car comic and reader Sid Bridge: I mean, technically correct is the best kind of correct! If you’re curious, on the very next day, NHTSA tested a 1979 Mercury Bobcat, which came out of the other end looking like this: According to the report, the dummies came out of the other end more or less similar to the Champ’s dummies. Congratulations Sid Bridge on another one that got us laughing! Technically correct is also the only kind of correct. Regards, A joyless engineer. COCOTD Now go find a 1978 Mitsubishi Lancer/Plymouth Colt and drop a Chrysler 360 in it as god intended. I would suggest that the Fiat 128 is a better answer to your question, because it pioneered the front-engine/front-drive layout that has been used by every manufacturer since, it was made as a Fiat nameplate for 16 years, and it too was licensed around the world. In terms of sheer numbers produced, it may not beat the 124, but I think it was more impactful. I rear ended a courier van and bounced my noggin on the windshield. We fixed it, I paid to fix the van out of my pocket. The courier company let me do that in installments. First snowfall after I got my license (PNW, not a lot of snow there in the metros in those days) me doing happy donuts in a parking lot that day. Next day, things warmed up and I put the thing in a ditch almost taking out a row of mailboxes. Dad just so happens to check our mail as I’m walking home. “Where’s the car?” he says. The tow truck did more damage pulling it out of the ditch than I did putting it in there. I loved that car. Many life lessons there that inform my driving habits today. RIP Dad.
