Also on eBay, a no-reserve auction. Current bid is $7,600. Listing says it has a heavy-duty towing package too. https://www.ebay.com/itm/373039054077
This may be the first Checker wagon I have ever seen also. Can only imagine how big that thing is in person. Remember riding in Checker cabs in NYC back in the early 80s and they were huge inside. They also were everywhere and all looked identically beat up to my eye. Now wondering if "Taxi" reruns are on cable somewhere. Could use some laughs.
A girl I knew in college, her dad worked for Checker. She had a civilian version that she drove during college.
It looks as though it would be perfect for hauling a vintage Airstream trailer. Nearly as big as the trailer!
Boy from the side those things could have been ‘60’s generation Packards. I went to college as well with a guy from Farmington Hills. He had a Black civilian Checker with a black vinyl top. Never will forget that car.
They are interesting cars, they are not as big on the outside as they look in pictures, full size American wagons of the 60-70's are much larger. The back seat area is very large on them though, they were built for passenger comfort not driver comfort. Driving them is like driving an early 1950's car. But I have never driven one powered by a Chevy V8. Only a couple of I6 powered versions (both 4 door's non taxi models) one powered by a Continental Flat head I6, the other by a 250 Chevy I6. Bothe Automatic's. This one with the top of the line 327 Chevy should be more fun to drive, but the powerglide trans is a minus for me, never cared for them on a street car. They work well if you only drive around town at speeds under 50mph, but other than I think they sux. I like this car. As stated any Checker is rare, and wagons are very rare. They are an interesting Domestic not seen often. They also were engineered to be easy to maintain and repair. So cheap to keep running. Other than body and interior parts keeping this one going should be easy with the Chevy drivetrain. Bid to $8100 with less than 7 hours remaining, could be a very good deal. This one being a 67 model at least it will have some modern safety features such as dual master cylinder side impact door beams, & a collapsible steering column. And yeah they made them all the way up to 1982, they look very similure, but as they got newer less and less chrome was used. And 73 & later cars have the bigger painted bumpers.
They were put into production in the mid-Fifties. That's why they're dimensioned similar to other makes of that date
So What other make and model has held relatively the same design for 30 years. Jeep Wagoneer comes to mind with the same body different grill configurations. But I can’t think of anything else made in the 80’s that still looked like it was from the 50’s. Why don’t automakers do this? I feel like dodge reviving the lines of the challenger was a huge success. VW did the same with the beetle and it wasn’t bad. How great would some traditional wagon designs be?!
Safety aspects and fuel economy are the big consideration. A '50s chassis car *could* theoretically be engineered to be as safe as a modern car but it would cost a considerable amount and the "large brick" body makes it difficult to achieve the fuel economy numbers mandated these days. GM could have done something like this, but they obviously chose to not do so. Dodge and VW have definitely been having success with it. The other is that buyers want something "different" regularly. If your car looks "dated" it will turn off large quantities of buyers.
A big brick moving at urban traffic speeds isn't going to have any notable disadvantage over conventional vehicles used as taxis worth noting, in terms of aerodynamics. Applying such virtues to vehicles used by private owners, you're absolutely right. London has replaced their traditional fleet with modern cabs of which don't to much better, if at all, in a wind tunnel. Fares aren't going to be fussy, as to the outward appearance of what gets them to their destinations, anyway. Production change for achieving safety requirements would start with doing away with a full frame. That alone would require fleet order guarantees large enough for converting over to new tooling. Dodge could afford coming out with a Retro, only because their Challengers were already unibodies. Not that any part is guaranteed to interchange with the original. They're much bigger than Checker was. Therefore, they could afford sticking their necks out. The new Challenger is marketed in a higher profit segment, as it is. Therefore, less of a marketing risk. As for the new Beetle, it's basically a Golf with a rounder shell. If traditional consumers were to have today's minset, the original Beetle would not have lasted basically unchanged between 1938 and 1974. For my needs, an old Beetle would suffice. There are plenty of others who would like nothing more than to turn back the clock that way. But, not enough of them to make the effort profitable for any auto maker
