About the History of Cars in China
Yulon YLN701, Free China Review 1960/6, photo mobile01.com
Yulon (Yue Loong) Motor of Taiwan was founded in 1949. It started automobile manufacturing in 1953. In 1956 it made its first jeep. In 1960 the first motorcar, the YLN-701 (a licensed Datsun Bluebird 210) was introduced.
Continue reading “Yulon involved in the ‘Mainland’ China Car History.”
It is amazing to see how many small factories and workshops have developed cross-country vehicles in the 1950 and 1960s. I wrote already about them: “Jeeps made before the production of the BJ212.”
But it stopped not after the introduction of the BJ212. That was in 1966, at the beginning of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.
I will show you here some of the more exotic cross country vehicles made during and just after the Cultural Revolution.
Continue reading “Jeeps made after the production start of the Beijing BJ212.”
This is the history of the Dandong Auto Works.
The Andong Automobile Refit Works had the guts to make a copy of one of China’s most important cars: the Dongfeng CA71 made by the First Auto Works. It was chairman Mao Zedong himself who had ordered the design and production of the Dongfeng and Mao personally sat in the backseat of the first car on May 21, 1958.
When strolling along the Yangze River banks (Changjiang river) in Chongqing, 1980, Oliver Barnham met a Austrian Steyr-Puch Haflinger which appeared to be Chinese made!
We all know the Hongqi CA770, the Shanghai SH760 or the Beijing BJ212. The Tianjin TJ740 is a rather unknown product. Time to show this interesting car.
Our research is most often a success, this is a story of a failure. Till today I am unable to solve the problem I am going to describe here.
I showed you some time ago the products exhibition in 1959 of the Nanjing Auto Works. I wrote about the two cars present: a clear copy of the Russian GAZ M20 Pobeda and an American style sedan.
During the late 1970s Shanghai Auto Works worked in two directions: developing a successor for its SH760/SH760A saloon and filling in the gap between the Shanghai saloon and the Hongqi limousine.
We have seen already the bigger models (SH762/SH763) developed during the Cultural Revolution.
This story is about the Shanghai SH771, according my opinion a wonderful project which flirted with the Mercedes Benz W116 S-Klasse (1972-1980). Continue reading “The Chinese Mercedes S-Klasse”
The history of the factory with the proud name “Chengdu Auto Works” goes back to September 1970, when there is a small reel in Renmin Ribao (People’s Daily): “Chengdu 120 lorries are being made in Chengdu”. The Cultural Revolution is there, what that means for the automobile industry we have decribed before.
In the early years of the 21st century Chery is a rapidly growing company. Chery shows SUV, MPV, sedan, van, so many concepts of different models. Including a larger sedan, via Italy a picture comes to China and arrives at my desk. It is the Chery F11 concept, a slim car design done by Pininfarina.
The photo has been taken at the roof of the Pininfarina design studios, and somehow it escaped the secrecy. The car has a fancy German license plate and an unknown logo. There is nothing known about engine, details etc. I don’t even know if it has an engine, or that you can ride it.
At least four projects were undertaken by FAW (First Auto Works) to develop a small family car. Well, to be exactly it was either FAW itself or the Changchun Research Institute, which functioned as the research and development department of FAW.
Continue reading “Four attempts to make a Hongqi family car.”