About the History of Cars in China
In the late 1990’s and early 2000’s Geely manufactured two mini pickup trucks and one mini-mini van. All were based on the Geely Haoqing hatchback which in turn was based on the Tianjin Xiali hatchback which in another turn was based on the Daihatsu Charade.
Continue reading “A Daihatsu Charade But Different: The Geely Mini Pickup Trucks”
This is a 2010 Buick Lacrosse Hybrid. Back in 2010 Shanghai hosted the World Expo and in an effort to improve its taxi fleet a lot of money was spent by the taxi companies to buy new cars. They initially bought 3,650 Volkswagen Tourans and 350 Buick Lacrosse Hybrids to be put into service. I remember clearly reading articles about all sorts of New Energy Vehicles being brought into service before expo, including Super Capacitor buses! The Lacrosse Hybrids were part of this push for a “green” expo. Actually they should have said blue because they shut down a lot of factories in and around Shanghai during the Expo and we had endless amounts of lovely blue sky. Those were the days…
Continue reading “The Buick Lacrosse Hybrid Taxi, a short lived Expo dream”
A beautiful blue Jilin Jiangbei Meilu JJ7090 Opel Corsa B, Spotted in China in the far east of Beijing. The vehicle was in a remarkable good condition for its age. I met the owner and he said it was still running. He also told me there is at least one more Meilu JJ7090 in the capital, owned by a friend of him.
Continue reading “The Jilin Jiangbei Meilu JJ7090 Was A China-made Opel Corsa B”
This magnificent machine is an MG 7L. For those of you who don’t know, when MG Rover went bust Nanjing Auto and SAIC were in a heated battle to get the brands. Nanjing ended up getting the most and made cars based on the 75/ZT badged as MG’s and SAIC obtained enough from the sale to make Rover Roewe badged cars based on the same platform. So yes, at one point there were two different companies making essentially the same car just 300km apart. Eventually someone realized this was a bit silly and SAIC ended up buying Nanjing Auto in 2007.
Continue reading “The MG 7L, a Chinese take on a British classic”
A Hongqi CA7220 EL1 stetched limousine, seen in Beijing in 2012. It is based on the Hongqi CA7220 sedan which in turn was based on the C3 Audi 100. The latter was made in China by the FAW-Volkswagen joint venture from 1988 to 1999, alongside the more luxurious Audi 200.
FAW, or First Auto Works, is also the owner of the Hongqi (Red Flag) brand. Under a deal with Volkswagen the Chinese manufactured various Hongqi-branded sedans based on the Audi 100 and 200. Production started in 1996 and ended all the way up in 2005.
Continue reading “All The Hongqi Stretched Limousine Variants Based On The Audi 100/200”
This is a 2005 Nanjing NJ7150 Soyat, seen in an area of Wuxi with lots of smaller car dealers and repair shops. Interestingly this place is only a kilometer or two away from the factory where this very car was made 12 years ago! The NJ7150 was an updated version of the original NJ6400.
The NJ7150 was only made between 2004 and 2006 and is a very rare beast outside its native Wuxi, although I have seen one as far away as Taiyuan in Shanxi province. Nanjing Auto got the tooling for the Ibiza in a deal made in the late 1990’s and made cars using it beginning in 1999 with the NJ6400.
Continue reading “The Soyat NJ7150, a modernized SEAT Ibiza”
This is a First Auto Works (FAW) LuBao CA6440UA, also known as the Chinese made Austin Maestro van. A successor to the far rarer Etsong series of Maestro based cars, really just the same cars with different badging made between 2000 and 2003.
FAW took over operations in 2003 and this car appears to have been one of the first off the line under their ownership as the vin number reveals it is a 2003 built car! This particular car is in Wuxi.
Continue reading “The FAW CA6440UA is a Chinese Austin Maestro van”
This little red and white beauty is the Beijing Auto Works (BAW) Dongfanghong BJ760, a mid-size sedan launched in 1960 and manufactured until 1966. I met this BJ760 at the Beijing Classic Car Museum to the far north of the Chinese capital.
Continue reading “The Beijing Auto Works Dongfanghong BJ760 Is A Beautiful Chinese-Russian Sedan”
A very dusty Dadi Musso SUV, Spotted in China by serial spotted Navigator 84, thank you for the photos! The Dadi Musso was manufactured in China from 2001 until 2006 by a company called Chengdu Xin Dadi Auto, based in the great city of Chengdu in Sichuan Province.
This is the Beijing Auto T8, the only one in the world, seen on a factory parking low, with plants growing up over the wheels.
The T8 was a concept car for a new flagship model for the Beijing Auto brand. Sadly, it was never shown in public and it never made it to the market.
Continue reading “The Beijing Auto T8, A Chinese Limousine Based On The Chrysler 300C”