Chevrolet Corvair

The story

Nothing about the Corvair behaves the way an American car of 1960 was supposed to. The flat-6 lives in the tail and is cooled by air, the trunk is up front, the floor is flat, and the unassisted steering is light enough to work with fingertips because so little weight sits over the front wheels. Ed Cole's team gave it independent suspension at every corner and even disguised the program inside Chevrolet as a Holden project to keep it alive. Then buyers ignored the economy pitch and bought 109,945 sporty Monza coupes in 1961 alone, a lesson Ford took straight to the Mustang.

The early swing-axle cars could snap into oversteer if tire pressures were wrong, and a front anti-roll bar cut before production did not help. Chevrolet kept improving it, and the 1965 redesign brought a fully independent rear and one of the cleanest shapes General Motors ever produced. By then Ralph Nader had opened his book with it, GM had been caught having him trailed, and federal safety standards arrived in the aftermath. Investigators later judged the early car no worse than its peers. The Corvair died in 1969 regardless.