Ah yes, the 1980 Chevy Citation. GM's first stab at compact transverse-mounted front-wheel-drive cars debuted on an all-new platform in April 1979. The Chevy Citation replaced the old rear-wheel-drive Nova in the line, and featured an all-new optional 2.8L V6 for motivation.
Sales were brisk in '80 (over 600k that year alone), but problems showed up early. The front subframe, which held the engine and transmission, had a bad habit of working itself loose. It was probably safer to drive with no rear wheels, as the commercial shows because if you breathed on the brake pedal, and the rear wheels would lock up, spinning you and your 30 bags of groceries out of control into a tree or through someone's hedges. And that new 2.8L V6 had a nasty habit of overheating and blowing head gaskets because whoever designed the cooling system forgot that coolant needs to pass through the engine in order to, you know, cool it. And so the Chevy Citation, along with its Pontiac Phoenix, Oldsmobile Omega, and Buick Skylark platform mates, became the most recalled car in history.
But in April 1979, none of that mattered. They had a "thoroughly contemporary driving machine" to replace the aging, oversized Nova. Play the above and savor the pre-catastrophe optimism.
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