I was born in 1975; and was pretty obsessed with cars from a young age, so I was 'noticing' car stuff in the early to mid-1980's.
I remember smaller, front-wheel drive vehicles showing up and looking very different from a lot of cars around at the time. My folks had a 1978 Malibu wagon, and a lot of our neighbours had similar large sedans and wagons. But some of them started to get cars that looked very different - Ford Escorts, Plymouth Reliants, Chevrolet Cavaliers, the new Tercel..etc..I remember the mall we shopped at had a contect where you could win a baby-blue Cavalier 4-door sedan. I thought it was a really neat-looking car, because it was SO different from what we usually saw.
Along with that, I remember when 'callouts' for your engine equipment were a huge deal...if you bought a 5-speed manual vehicle, it said '5-speed' on the trunk. Some cars with high-performance 4-cylinders would have door decals saying stuff like "DOHC" or "Twin Cam" or "16 valve"...heck, if you had a hot car, it had all of them! I also remember fuel injection being a big deal, if your car had it, it said 'FI' on the trunk.
I remember when the whole "lazer\Tron" grahics thing happened...when all car ads had that black background, and 'lazer light' effects on the car...or seats and instruments had that 'lazer graph' pattern to them. In the same vein, I remember early digital dash displays and controls. Good example of all this would be a 1986 Cavalier Z-24 with the pattern on the seats and the body cladding and a digital dash!
As for car ads, the ones that stand out for me are the GM ads for the Cavalier and Pontiac J-2000 from the 1980's..."Cavalier, Cavalier, because you drive like Cavalier...are you ready...ready for Chevy.."
So, what sort of automotive 'style' or 'tech' trends do you remember growing up?
I remember smaller, front-wheel drive vehicles showing up and looking very different from a lot of cars around at the time. My folks had a 1978 Malibu wagon, and a lot of our neighbours had similar large sedans and wagons. But some of them started to get cars that looked very different - Ford Escorts, Plymouth Reliants, Chevrolet Cavaliers, the new Tercel..etc..I remember the mall we shopped at had a contect where you could win a baby-blue Cavalier 4-door sedan. I thought it was a really neat-looking car, because it was SO different from what we usually saw.
Along with that, I remember when 'callouts' for your engine equipment were a huge deal...if you bought a 5-speed manual vehicle, it said '5-speed' on the trunk. Some cars with high-performance 4-cylinders would have door decals saying stuff like "DOHC" or "Twin Cam" or "16 valve"...heck, if you had a hot car, it had all of them! I also remember fuel injection being a big deal, if your car had it, it said 'FI' on the trunk.
I remember when the whole "lazer\Tron" grahics thing happened...when all car ads had that black background, and 'lazer light' effects on the car...or seats and instruments had that 'lazer graph' pattern to them. In the same vein, I remember early digital dash displays and controls. Good example of all this would be a 1986 Cavalier Z-24 with the pattern on the seats and the body cladding and a digital dash!
As for car ads, the ones that stand out for me are the GM ads for the Cavalier and Pontiac J-2000 from the 1980's..."Cavalier, Cavalier, because you drive like Cavalier...are you ready...ready for Chevy.."
So, what sort of automotive 'style' or 'tech' trends do you remember growing up?
