About the History of Cars in China
One of the intriguing projects is the Hongqi CA770 hearse, made in 1977.
It was the late Hongqi designer Lv Yanbin who made these drawings of a hearse, based on the Hongqi CA770 Station Wagon.
Th story was that the car was designed in 1977 to remove Mao’s body from the Mao Mausoleum when the Soviet Union was going to attack Beijing. The car would have been stored underneath the Mausoleum, in a part of the so-called Beijing Underground City.
The Jinggangshan (the two-door prototype) from Beijing and the Dongfeng CA71 from FAW (First Auto Works) were made in 1958. Both prototypes are still existing.
This is the car which is generally regarded as the first Dongfeng CA71, and by official sources, also the first Chinese car.
Before, the car was stored in the FAW Warehouse, later the car was exhibited in the FAW Cultural Pavilion. Now you can find the car at the Museum of the Communist Party.
Continue reading “Jinggangshan and Dongfeng. Which one where?”
I spent a lot of attention to the coach builders in the 1920s in Shanghai, the most important one of them and their motor show in 1921.
Though Shanghai was the most important of the cities in that era, there was also automotive activity in cities like Beijing and Tianjin. This time more about the Frazar company from Tianjin, it was reader Kate who told us that her grandfather worked there. A good reason to do some research.
One of strangest cars is the Jiefang CA6410, strange because it doesn’t fit in in the standard FAW Changchun and FAW Jilin program.
We thought it was a product of FAW Jilin, Tycho has written about it in 2012.
Hello again dear reader, today I decided to write about quite a peculiar car brand – it has been more forgotten in china, than in the west – Tanghua (唐华). Over the span of almost 15 years, they made series of very strange concept cars, the most famous of them would be the trio featured at 2008 Detroit car show.
Continue reading “Chinese Car Brands That Time Forgot: Tanghua”
In 2001 the Beijing Municipality Pinggu County Wangxinzhuang Town Economic Union Corporation was looking for a foreign partner, to produce cars. The choice was the Taiwanese version of the French Renault Express.
Continue reading “The Renault Express from Taiwan made on the Mainland.”
Thanks to our reader 3Star4WD and my dear friend Tycho I can tell you more about the five-seater small mpv Hyundai Matrix (not) made by Hawtai (Huatai).
Continue reading “More about the Hawtai SDH7150M-D/ SDH7160M B5 Meijia (美佳).”
Two times before, in 2018 and 2020, I showed you pictures of vehicles of which we wanted more information. Here are some new ‘questions’ about unknown Chinese cars. In 2018 I wrote: “But each answer leads to a new question. ” That is the fate of the researcher…
Continue reading “Questions, questions, questions (3) About Unknown Chinese Cars”
In my last article I promised you to write more about the Dutch Globe B.V. initiative.
It was a brave Dutchman, Peter de Koster, who bought about 6 BJ212s when making a sales trip to Beijing in 1987. He started a company named Globe B.V., established in Loon op Zand in the south of the Netherlands, where he was a local Chrysler, Jeep and Mercedes dealer. Later De Koster imported more BJ212s.
Continue reading “Globe B.V., European import of the Beijing BJ212 in the late 1980s.”
The first 4×4’s used in the People’s Republic China were of Russian origin. After the GAZ 67 followed the GAZ 69.
When it was time for a replacement, the Soviet Union and China worked together to design a successor; the Soviet Union got the UAZ 469, China the Beijing BJ212.
Continue reading “Export of the Beijing BJ212 in the 1970s and 1980s.”