About the History of Cars in China
Today in China Concept Cars: the Hongqi C601 sedan. In the early 2000s, Hongqi was looking for a new mid-size luxury sedan. To get there, they developed four concept cars under the C601 code name. These were:
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: The Story Of The Hongqi C601 Sedan”
Today in China China Concept Cars: three concepts based on the Hongqi HQ3 and Hongqi Shengshi sedan: a bulletproof extended limousine, an extended version, and an open-top inspection car.
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: The Hongqi HQ3/Shengshi Extended Limousines & Inspection Car”
After their life times efforts to make cars for the leaders, mr. Hua Fulin and two other FAW senior researchers and engineers decided to develop a real “people’s car”. The project was named “Sankoule”(literally “Three Mouths”) the name revers to the then standard Chinese family with two parents and one child.
When travelling in Xi’an in 1984 I noticed, in front of the fire station in the centre of the city, a strange car, registered 24-05900. Or truck? The front looked like a Hongqi, the wheels were as big as truck wheels. And the wheelbase was very short in regard to the length.
Many versions (like parade cars, smaller versions, lwb etc.) are based on the ‘da Hongqi’, the basic CA770 Red Flag limousine. They were made by the FAW factory itself or by local car refit shops.
I will show you here four different ‘station wagons’. Well, in fact they are a so-called ‘engineering vehicle’, an ambulance, station wagon and a hearse.
Continue reading “The Hongqi CA770 Station Wagons From China”
This is part 2 of the story of Thunder Sky and their experimental electric vehicles, part 1 can be found here. In my last article I introduced Thunder Sky and gave you an overview of their early history as well as details on their vehicles prior to 2007. In this article I will introduce you to the cars they made after 2007 and also go into detail on their interesting relationships with companies such as FAW, Krystal and MVP RV’s. I won’t go into detail on some of Thunder Sky’s other ventures but it would be an understatement to say that they’ve been involved in just about everything! Winston Chung has been recognized for his work by the United Nations and Thunder Sky donated 10 million dollars to University of California Riverside to establish a research center named ‘Winston Chung Global Energy Center’, produced LiYPO4 battery packs (using 1000AH battery cells) and also helped install the batteries in buildings. All very cool stuff but not really car related and so I won’t be covering it all in my article because it doesn’t really relate to vehicles. For more details please search on Thunder Sky’s website www.thundersky-winston.com.
In 1987, the Shenzhen sub-factory of First Auto Works (FAW) produced a single right-hand drive Hongqi CA770G called the CA770C. FAW had a desire to enter markets outside China and the CA770C was created to explore the possibilities of export to right-hand drive markets including neighbouring Hong Kong.
The CA7560 series was the last hurrah for the CA77x series of Hongqi limousines. The CA770 was produced between 1966 and 1981 and was succeeded in 1985 by the CA770G which was a lightly modernised CA770 equipped with a 5.7 liter V8 engine from Ford. The CA770G lasted until 1988 with only 25 examples being produced in those 3 years. Between 1991 and 1992 a possible variant called the CA770E was produced (unconfirmed). Then in 1992 the final iteration of the CA77x series was released – the CA7560. In this article I will discuss the CA7560 and its stretched variant – the CA7560LH.
This picture shows four Hongqi CA72, three Beijing CB4 and two Tianjin Heping 2-type, together on Tian’anmen square in Beijing in 1959 or 1960. It is a very interesting gathering of the three candidates for manufacturing state-limousines for the People’s Republic of China. The chances are already clear taking into account the number of cars present: 4 Hongqi, 3 Beijing and 2 Tianjin.
Yes, it was Hongqi that won. And Beijing and Tianjin were the losers. Recently new photos have been found of the limousines from Beijing , which we will present here.
Continue reading “The lost Beijing and Tianjin limousines of China.”
Thunder Sky is a major player in the development and production of LiYePO4 Rare Earth Lithium Ion batteries. Thunder Sky started experimenting with electric vehicles around the turn of the last century by converting existing petrol powered cars to electric power. This included, as you shall discover from this article, everything from the humble Geo Metro to über collectible Hongqis. Join me as I take you on a journey to discover one of the most ambitious, ingenious and downright insane (in a good way) companies we will ever discuss here on the pages of China Car History. A journey so long it has to be split across two articles. The first shall cover all their vehicles prior to 2007 and the second everything after. Please note that right up until the day of publishing we were uncovering more and more vehicles produced by Thunder Sky and likely may find more in the future so these articles will more than likely be updated.