I'd prefer the lighted instrument panel instead of lights in the door panel. Dome lights and under dash lights are enough. Beautiful car just the same.
Yeah, but look what happens; You get the 1956-57 Continental Mark II, and the 1957-58 Cadallac Broughm. Wonderful luxury cars yes, and all exponetially better than any Rolls Royce ever produced, or on the road anywhere in the world at that time, but what did it do for the company or somebody not super rich?
GM spelled it "Gages" to save that one letter. That's worth the price of admission right there! Thanks Adam... you consistently manage to present information found nowhere else.
My 1998 Ford Explorer did the same. When the fuel tank’s sensor realized I was running low, it would throw a light that read “Check Gage” on the dash. I thought to myself “What kind of illiterates do they have designing the dashboard???”
Iconic automobile when they manufactured luxury without all the computer chips to make everything fail and surveillance. Your vehicles are true classics, most appreciative of your videos
In October '73 I had the pleasure (displeasure) of riding in the back seat of a '72 Newport for a couple of hours as we went around 'trick or treating' on Halloween night. The whole time that I was back there I could hear the gas sloshing around in the fuel tank. I guess removing the baffles from the tank was another way the Chrysler engineers cut costs on their cars!
Hey Mr. Bob Johnson! That sloshing sound is way better than the sudden BANG! sound of a Kia gas tank expanding under the back seat! Kia recall coming soon...
They cut cost on the tank baffles to provide dual premium mufflers with resonators for that quiet cabin. That means can really hear the induction when you floor that big block Mopar. Music to the gear heads ears.
Every time you show this car it takes my breath away - absolutely stunning in the black/gold combination! Like I said before - if I were to be buried in a car, this would be the one! 🤣I thought the mirror idea was brilliant myself - keep it simple less things to go wrong!
For me, ever since the Imperial lost its unique body after the 1966 model year, it just looked cheaper. I can remember a Car & Driver road test of the '69 and they said that "it smells like a Plymouth Fury". Your comment reminded me of that. Sad that their interior designers weren't stolen from either GM or Ford.
@@loveisall5520 I think that may have been Tom McCahill in Mechanix Illustrated. In the late 50's to mid 60's he loved Imperials and personally owned several. You can read a few of his reviews on the Online Imperial Club website.
Wow, they thought of everything back then. I’m glad I was born in the late 60s and grew up in the 70s. I remember riding in cars like these, and especially at night it was a treat, because of the ambient lighting. Cars of today just don’t have these special touches anymore. That interior is sublime. You feel safe in that huge land yacht. Love the old Imperials!
One of our fine RU-vid commentators, indeed one “MarinCipollina,” lets loose with a superfluous lesson in diction since RU-vid commentator “jeffsmith846”correctly expressed the quirkiness of automobile’s door control illumination. Whether through editing or otherwise, “smith” carries the meaning satisfactorily by calling the illumination method “bizarre.”
@@fairfaxcat1312 You're criticizing a comment for being superfluous, but in commenting on it you're being even more superfluous! Which makes my comment meta-superfluous.
Absolutely love that ‘72 Imperial! Same starter as my dad’s ‘71 Newport. Can’t imagine that removing the light in favor of a mirror was that much of a cost savings. But, I guess if you deal in volume, every $ makes a difference. Thanks, Adam! Your videos never get old!
“Extra care in engineering.. it makes a difference.” One of the ad slogans for Chrysler Corp. during this era. Awesome topic. Thanks for a great video here!!
On the subject of lighting, one egregious cost cutting move was Chrysler replacing their spiffy 1968 side marker lights with cheezy reflectors that looked like they came off someone's mailbox for 1969. FMVSS regulations allowed lights OR reflectors for 1968 and 1969, so it technically did pass muster, but it's always been the first thing I notice when approaching a '69 Mopar. I guess the Imperial did get the cool "shark gill" cornering lamp up front, which had an amber bulb for side marker function, but the crummy reflectors remained on the rear quarter. This fortunately changed for 1970, when FMVSS 108 required both illumination and reflectors on each side/corner.
I love it! We had a 1972 New Yorker, and the interior here (along with that delicious MoPar rumble which was a hallmark of the 440s) brought back some great memories.
You’re so good at coming up with interesting content. Every video after so many feels like you’ve got to be scraping the bottom of the barrel for topics. But no, each one feels good and fresh even with some recycled footage here and there. I sure appreciate your channel but appreciate your excellent stewardship of all those cars even more. It takes a lot of real passion and yours shows.
Bro, this imperial of yours is just fucking incredible aside from being massive and over the top and in every way, freaking beautiful man what a nice piece of machinery
I have a 1972 Chrysler Imperial brochure from a friend who visited a dealer back then. An impressive design with the hidden headlamps and sleek clean lines, also in black with a black vinyl roof. Styling was on par with GM in my opinion. Clever and smart interior design details as well.
I have a 69 Imperial and there is a lens with a bulb behind it on the door panel. With the relatively small number of Imperials sold, you've gotta wonder if it was worth it. Plus, they had to redesign the panel to remove the bezel.
My ‘70 LeBaron had light or lights in the door for this. Yet my ‘90 Mercury Sable was pitch black. No lights; no illumination of any kind on the door switches.
The windshield looks to be the same exact one that a 1973 Plymouth Satellite we used to drive used. The little mirror was a great idea. It may have been less troublesome later on than having additional wiring for a light for the switches. You truly have an amazing collection of vehicles!
Seems strange they cheaped out on that, since they had 4 special cigarette lighters for the imperial with special turned aluminum and chrome knobs. But then they used the same shift lever as a Plymouth
@@WiencouragerStrange isn’t it? They had some Imperial only doodads but parts-binned where they could. Chrysler had many up and down eras as did AMC, but AMC was too small to survive those down years on its own.
A great trip down memory lane for me. My dad sold Chryslers in the 60's & 70's. We had a '73 Town & Country station wagon that was a monster! 440 4 barrel engine with the towing package to pull our camper. I loved that thing! Oh, it had an 8-Track player too! 😉
Cost reduction runs rampant across all manufacturing. I worked at Nortel in one of their "CR Teams" . when they were making millions and the joke was, start pulling parts out till it quits working then put the last part back in. We actually quit painting their cell site equipment to save money.
Sadly, Nortel was an iconic Canadian company that was respected around the world. I guess the post Y2K obsession with stock price at the expense of product did it in.
I worked for Nortel for 16 years, installing and testing new fiber optic terminals all over the USA. We always stayed in hotels, had rental cars, and always taking airline flights every one or two weeks. I always wondered how could Nortel afford our travel expenses and still make a profit?
That mirror is genius. U get lighting without an additional bulb that needs to be changed. These 72’s have about the best line on a car ever. So long and the front grill is just epic
What a beautiful car. I always liked the sound of the Mopar starter on my several Plymouth Fury's I had as young man. As I grow older I often wish I'd have kept my last 71' 2 door.
Thank you Adam. Chrysler continued the illuminated ignition area well into the 1990s as I saw it on 90's Chrysler cars. That cost cutting was not just Chrysler either. They were just more obvious with it. You could see that with the Imperial and New Yorker for decades( 1970's and 1990's) The late 1970's Mercury Marquis/Grand Marquis and Town Car and LTD used the same instrumentation panel parts. GM was really doing this a lot. I recall so many cars that shared parts for decades and it was obvious. The W body Regal and Cutlass Supreme shared the same instrumentation panel in the 1990's . Those cars had different more loaded interiors, and by 1995 it was the same. The Oldsmobile Achieva and Buick Skylark did as well in the 1990's. There are parts that were carried over from other models to others. The Oldsmobile Eighty Eight Royale Brougham seats were used in Pontiac Parisienne Brougham before 1985 and for one year in Chevrolet Caprice Classic Brougham LS( a rare option in 1986 until a real Brougham LS was created in 1987). The 1990's B Bodies shared so many parts it was scary. You really could see the Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser shared parts with Buick Roadmaster and Chevrolet Caprice. The only thing unique to the Oldsmobile was the steering wheel, the wheels and grille and the seats. The 1970's Oldsmobile Ninety Eight, Eighty Eight and Toronado and Custom Cruiser 1971-1976 shared lots of parts. The same thing happened over at Buick with the LeSabre, Electra/Park Avenue and Riviera. It was a common practice. The other interesting thing is at the end Town Car and Grand Marquis were still doing it. Another obvious example was Ford Thunderbird and Mercury Cougar in the 1970's and 1980's and 1990's. The The Mark IV and Ford Thunderbird shared parts. That was obvious too. The Lincoln Versailles and Ford Granada and Mercury Monarch did too. The 1992-2011 Ford Crown Victoria and Grand Marquis really started sharing in 1997-1998 time frame. The Chrysler LH cars in the 1990's shared parts. They took the trunk lock cover off the Ninety Eight and Eighty Eight in 1993. They both had them in 1991-1992. By 1993, it was gone. My 1996 Ninety Eight does not have a trunk lock cover. GM took the trunk pull down feature out of some of its luxury cars too.
Thanks for a terrific review, Adam...extremely informative. Just imagine how this car would be if they had used construction materials up to the 1966 level of quality! That would be exceptional.
I have a 1972 Imperial. I never knew about that mirror. The car was my father's. I inherited it. He bought it new in 72. When the 73 came out with the bumper protectors, bumperettes was the name we were told, he ordered a pair and had them installed on his 72.
Imperial, a very good and very luxurious/prestige company by Chrysler, with my favorite models being the '59-'60, '61-'66, '67-'68, '69-'73, and '74-'75 (my most-most favorite being the '59-'60 and '61-'66). It is a real shame it only lasted 20 years (with the nameplate used again from 1981-1983 and then used as the Chrysler LeBaron from the 80s to the 90s). It was a luxury company that was even lesser used and liked than Oldsmobile, Buick, Cadillac, Mercury, Lincoln, and even Chrysler itself (especially the fact it was not as seen as much in movies as those car companies. The only movies I remember the 1970-1975 being a very used car was in "Mean Streets" (1973) and "Last Of The Red Hot Lovers" (1972) along with some popular cop series like Adam-12/Mannix and CHiPS). Still a lot better than most of the modern-day interior and uncomfortable and electronic-obsessed garbage of the cars of today. It makes me wonder, why didn't Lincoln and Imperial sell as well as Cadillac? Cadillac's sales for those cars were always in the 100,000s to 200,000s, but for Lincoln and Imperial, it was around five to ten times lower!
@@matthewpaanotorres7309 for me the 1960 Imperial 2 Door Hardtop is the best American car ever made it is the epitome of American style, wealth, and engineering, uniquely American no other country could even dream of building a car like that. 🇺🇸 🦅
I so love the Mopars from this time! My parents always had Pontiac Bonnevilles and then the Grand Ville. I was fortunate though to get a Fury III gold sedan with black vinyl roof for my high school driver's ed. This man's Imperial is so cool and such a great alternative to the ubiquitous Cadillacs. I'd have had a hard time in '72 (I was a senior in high school) trying to decide between this fine car and the Lincoln sedan.
GM spelled “employee” with only one “e” on the end for decades. Technically acceptable; someone calculated that it must of saved a barrel of ink a year!
That floodlight for the gauges is pretty spectacular in it's own right. Can see myself cruising dark highways a bit too fast with illuminated fake wood. Oh damn i just hit the end of the video, and that "dying dolphin" starter cracked me up!
These Imperials were beautifully understated American luxury vehicles. Seems like cost-cutting has always been with us to greater or lesser extents. Unfortunately few can afford items that are built to a standard and not a price point.
@@Art-is-crafta bulb a harness and socket cost maybe 35 cents, a shiny tiny disc and a screw probably 3 cents. Makes more sense if one sell in large quantities though, which these cars didn't.
@@Art-is-craft yes, agreed. It makes more sense if one sell 3 million units over 3-5 years, and save those amounts on a few more items. It does add up to millions saved if it's $1 per car then, but not on this car, as it's very low volume. Probably spent more money engineering that mirror than the savings removing the bulb.
.....meanwhile, at Mercedes Benz, the heater controls on my dad's 1971 220 had a fiber optic wire to distribute light over the control and the blower switch......think about that. This was1971- ......
I found it hilarious as a farmer how ford used some of the same parts on their agricultural tractors as on their cars. Like there was a digital clock module in the 88 ford 7610 and in the 88 fiesta. when the gear knob split due to age on the tractor, i screwed a fiesta knob on it, perfect fit.
Please please please do a segment on the one year only oddly placed courtesy lights on the 1977 Cadillac Fleetwood. I LOVED these and they were a one year only feature on one model only. They were placed on the door panels just above the arm rests. Oddly enough the car also had regular door courtesy lights placed below the arm rest as well.
Hey! Adam! Thank you for another Highland Park Hummingbird! Every time I hear that sound then the engine start it means another fun ride in a MOPAR! I would say though that your Imperial was sitting way longer than a week due to the long crank cycle. Thanks for all your thoroughly detailed explanations. Love the mirror solution. Its great the Chrysler solution was just a small hidden mirror with no smoke.
One thing they messed up on was not giving the Imperial a different dash! If money wasn't there for a unique dash they should've at least tweaked it enough to give it a different look - like what Ford did with the dash of the MK III that shared the dash with the T-Bird! As it was, you didn't know if you were behind the wheel of an Imperial or a Newport!!
The haunting glow of those Park lamps are unmistakable. Also, the performance of the reflective mirror, if cleaned, improves dramatically. Thanks for the cool content! 📺🚘✨
I believe this lighting of the master switch panel started in 1967 for Imperial. On page 17 of the owner's manual for that year, it mentions the "Driver arm rest light". It describes it as adding light to the master switch panel on the door as well as lighting the headlight switch area. The bulb tucked in under and back a bit from the interior door handle, as I recall. I think I prefer the subtle reflected light on the chromed switches over the direct lighting from a bulb.
New information that I will keep on hand for future Mopar-head driven conversations. Of course I can't remember my own phone number, but this will be with me always. Thank you for another great video!
Sad to say that the remnants of Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep seem to be swirling towards the drain under the reign of Carlos Tavares. A man who is the master of cheap.
I implement similar cost saving routines when feeding the family, instead of those expensive dinners with lots of fancy ingredients, like veggies, i serve a 1 ingredient meal, like beans or hot ketchup and then put a reusable picture from a cooking magazine in front of each plate to look at. Works great!
Want to talk about costing out? My wife's 2005 Buick Century has no dome light! Only car I've EVER seen without one at all. It only has those tiny map lights on the bottom of the rearview mirror and 2 above the rear seat grab handles. They're so small, they're useless. Don't even cast a shadow. My son and I ordered LED bulbs online to replace them which are easily ten times brighter. They're fantastic and still not excessively bright.
I was looking at a Plymouth Duster the other day and noticed the “hard top” styling but the rear windows do not roll down. Lots of room for the window to roll down but they do not. My theory is that Chrysler was planning to make them roll down but at some point scrapped the idea for cost cutting. I would love to convert one to roll down windows with period correct parts from other Mopars but the Dusters are so expensive now it’s hard to justify cutting one up.
I learned to drive in a '73 Newport...basically the same as this monster but even cheaper interior etc. Long, you say? Yup, we called it "The Boat" because Dad's car was 6" longer than his fishing boat. The best part of the design was the loooong straight fender top lines...made parking much easier because you actually had a clue where the ends of the thing were.
What a stunning ride. The front end is elegant to this day, it was futuristic for the 1970's. I think your carb needs a tune up kit. The float bowl or the accelerator pump are not giving it the gas to start fast.
I think the cornering lights were genius. Shame that many cars today don’t have them. I know that some have them built into the floodlights, but it is helpful at night in my BMW that they go on when you turn.
Thank you for covering one of my favorite parts about this era of Chryslers. I loved how they could light up the entire dash with only a few lights, and apparently they also could do the drivers door as well! I can't get over that these were the longest non-limousine production cars made. I would have thought that would have gone to a Cadillac but here it is. Thanks again, and your car is in beautiful shape.
That "floodlight lighting" looks like the real cheap move. Ten years earlier they had beautiful electroluminescent ("panelescent") instrument panels. This is like shining a flashlight on the dash. They could have individually lit the instruments with bulbs as was done with most other cars (including our 66 and 74 Coronets). I suppose the upside is it should be a lot easier to change the bulbs.
Interesting, but you got one thing wrong. Chrysler did not receive one single penny in that "bail out". In fact, the bail out cost the US Treasury exactly ZERO dollars. The US Government backed the loans from the banks, becoming Guarantor for the loans. A fancy way of saying the government co-signed the loan agreements. In the event, Chrysler was able to repay the loans before they were due without Government assistance. There were significant if almost invisible changes between 72 and 73 Imperials. The front bumper was moved out about an inch as well as having the large overriders. The rear bumper was also made slightly more proud of the surrounding body with another pair of the overriders. It is also interesting that the Fuselage Era Chrysler and Imperial models shared the body structure. Greenhouse and doors were identical. The difference in length was in the front clip ahead of the firewall. 73 was meant to be the final year of Imperial. A drawing of the waterfall grill proposed for New Yorker became the start of a new Imperial. There was no time to design and engineer the longer clip and subframe, so the 74/75 Imperial were the first to share a wheelbase with Chrysler branded cars since the 1961 model year.
I ADORE that car, absolutely love ALL OF IT ... the first time i was _assaulted_ by the sound the headlight doors make when they close would make me hit the deck and throw in a couple "Hail Marys" just in case 😂
The mirror is genius! I also think it's more than cost savings, because if the light was anywhere on the arm rest or door panel, it would also be subjected to rain and snow, if/when the driver's window was down, which would inevitably lead to the 'inconvenience' of the light not working at all. My old '68 Valiant two door wouldn't let you lock the car unless the doors were fully closed. That meant that you either had to be inside the vehicle with the keys, then depress the locking knob on the door; or outside the vehicle to lock the door with the keys in hand. Brilliant!
(At time 5:26), I find the driver’s door window switches interesting, in that the left (vent, front, and rear) switches are slightly staggered rearward compared to the location of the corresponding right switches. This had to be done on purpose, but can’t guess why. (Perhaps the switches might feel aligned due to the angle of the driver’s arm and hand reaching toward the switches?). It seems like on other vehicles the switches are perfectly aligned, side by side. Any thoughts/guesses? As always, thank you for another awesome, insightful, and interesting video!
I believe this is the most beautiful Imperial ever made. The 72 and 73 were styling masterpieces. If Chrysler would have promoted this car, it would have sold better. It also came with Sure Stop, an antilock breaking system. Yet, they never promoted this feature either.
I had a 66 and then later a 71. I noticed at the time that the 71 cut corners in other ways too. Interior materials went down with lots and lots of plastic.
Had 71’ Dodge Polara CHP sedan. Dashboards are close but the Polara had a square Speedo to 140. Always thought it was interesting the way Chrysler never backlit their dashes even on the top of line cars.
Adam, you are the king of interesting, arcane malaise-era automotive knowledge. Your videos are almost ridiculously awesome for guys like me who love 70s and 80s American iron. And since I am not well off enough to purchase one of these beauties, your videos really allow me to experience the cars. I'm super envious of your auto collection but also happy that you are highlighting knowledge about these very special cars. Dude, rock on!
My 1969 and 1993 Chrysler New Yorkers were both the most comfortable and smoothest riding cars I’ve ever owned. It’s just so sad that the Chrysler nameplate today consists of just one model and will probably fade away in the coming years.
At least they still had lighting. Toyota doesn't think you need to see those controls. 2008 Camry was the first car I ever had with electric windows and locks that had no lights on them. Makes it a bit awkward to unlock the door for someone you're picking up at night.
Pretty sure the *driver's* window button says *AUTO* on it... that word should be illuminated - alone. That's how it was with my 2001 Camry. Other than that, you're right. The other power window switches aren't illuminated, neither is the central locking switch.
It's true, every Mopar V8 from the 1960's-80's has the exact same starter sound, my family had many of them. ChryCo had to save a bundle using that same starter for decades...
Beautiful car! Excellent video as always. Great presentational style. The seats are magnificent on those cars. The headlamp doors sound like wheelie bins falling over! Worth buying one just for that feature alone!! Keep up the good work 👍
The Imperial was a beautiful car ruined by the overly stiff "Torsion-Air" suspension. I owned a 1969 Imperial once. It was fully loaded and had pillows on the sail panels too. The torsion bars weren't bad up front but, I was not too fond of the leaf springs in the rear. The car was great though on the highway when driven over 80 MPH, and at 110 MPH, I liked it better than Cadillac and Lincoln.
