Don't know about you guys, but to me it is so sad the number of advanced ideas that American car companies played with in the 50's 60's and 70's... and then just punted on because of cost, or the fact that they were a few years ahead of their time. There are so many stories of cool concepts like this one being 'mothballed'.
GM's expirments with alloy sleevless blocks... that started out crappy ala Vega, but later were pulled off by another company after GM bailed on the concept. GM played the Wankle, bailed on it... Mazda rode that wave and the rotary still has rabid followers. I know Chrysler designed a twin overhead cam 4 valve per cylinder V8 by the early 70's to keep their dominance of NASCAR style racing. When NASCAR (weenies) basically decided to dumbdown stock car racing to help with cost... the big 3 crapped all over their racing and design programs.:mad2: Pontiac's IRS rearend Tempest and OHC straight 6's... Even GM's electric car concept... Sure it wasn't ready for public consumption, but to totally walk away from it, when personally it's pretty obvious that one day there will be a solid nitch for electric vehicles, at least inner city. To just totally kill all those programs and all that potential progress... aaaauuuggghhhh!!!!! :doh:
So many forward looking designs that were given up on, setting our cars so far behind by the end of the 70's early 80's. Back when America was financially kicking the worlds butt and the big 3's profits were great, they toyed with so much...