Great cars of . . . Ireland!
Since it's St. Patrick's Day, we have a perfect excuse to run a picture of the most Irish of all possible Irish cars, a lovely green DMC-12.
Ah, faith and begorrah (whatever the heck a "begorrah" is), sure as you're born 'tis more to the story of Irish car lust than green DeLoreans. Follow me to the end of the rainbow and we'll take a look. (I promise to lose the phony accent.)
American businessman William K Curtis founded the Shamrock Motor Car Company in the middle 1950s, with the objective of building a large fiberglass-bodied luxury convertible for the U.S. market. The resulting Shamrock was a pastiche of late-50s styling themes: a little bit Ford/Edsel/Mercury in its general squarishness, a dash of '55 Packard in the forward-canted headlights, some Rambler in the grille, a touch of '57 Chevy with the tail fins, the mandatory wraparound windshield--and, unfortunately, a whole lot of ugly. It's not so much 1950s styling as it is an unintentional parody of 1950s styling. The front quarters are particularly clunky, with their oddly-shaped wheel wells and misplaced character lines.
Styling wasn't the Shamrock's only problem. Though rather hefty of curb weight considering its fiberglass construction, the Shamrock was powered by a dinky 55 HP Austin four-cylinder--an engine that had trouble enough overcoming the inertia of the much-lighter Austin A55 it was originally designed for.
William Curtis had dreams of cranking out 10,000 Shamrocks a year from his factory in Castleblayney, County Monaghan, but only eight of the ungainly and underpowered beasts were assembled before the company went bust in 1959. Four Shamrocks survive, one in Seattle and the other three in Ireland, all kept carefully hidden lest they frighten the horses.
The Thompson Motor Company of Wexford did a much better job with its offering, the TMC Costin. Named after its designer, Frank Costin, it was an interesting little hand-built roadster with butterfly doors, intended to compete with the likes of the Lotus/Caterham Seven. 39 Costins were assembled between 1983 and 1987, and they enjoyed some success in racing. After TMC went bankrupt, the Costin chassis design was sold to Panoz Auto Development Company of Georgia, which built another 220 or so cars between 1992 and 1997 with V-8 engines and different bodywork.
Ireland also has a very rich and active car culture. If you're interested in old school wheels, the Irish Veteran & Vintage Car Club is the place to go. Their website has what looks to be a comprehensive calendar of car shows, meets, "runs," and rallies throughout the country--and there are quite a few of them, even now in the "off season." The IVVCC's biggest event is the International Gordon Bennett Rally Ireland, a three-day combination rally and recreational driving tour, every June.
Another website, Juicebox, chronicles the Irish tuner car community. Up until I started writing this post, I would have never imagined that there would be Hondas and Toyotas with dropped suspensions, color-keyed rims, cold-air intakes, body kits, and chipped ECMs rolling on the streets of Dublin and Cork, but, well, there are apparently quite a few of them. I'd encourage you to click through to Juicebox's feature articles and photo galleries. There's some lovely work on display there.
In my brief excursion through Irish car culture, I was most impressed by the musclecar enthusiasts, of which there are a surprising number. American Muscle Cars Ireland is an organized club for Irish owners of big old Yankee iron. They've gone to the trouble of acquiring real American cars with gofaster-equipped V-8s, and they get together for meets, track days, and occasional "runs" on the public streets.
I'll leave you with a video of some AMCI members getting together for a run on St. Patrick's Day 2008. It's a mix of vehicles that would be at home at any Wednesday night cruise-in in Ohio: Camaros, Mustangs, Chargers, Road Runners, Trans Ams with "flaming chicken" hood decals, a C3 'Vette. (I'm not sure how the triple-white Eldosaurus sneaked in, but no one seems to mind it tagging along.) The accents may be different, and they may be driving on the other side of the road from us, but these are definitely our kind of people.
We here at Car Lust wish our friends in Ireland's car community a happy St. Patrick's Day. On your next run, may the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be at your back, and may the Gardai leave their radar guns switched off. Éirinn go Brách!
--Cookie O'Dog's Owner
The green DeLorean at the top of the post comes from Photobucket user dmc12jz. The photo of the ill-fated Shamrock is from Wikipedia. The TMC Costin photo is from carpictures.com. The tastefully-modded Honda "hatchi" was spotted at the 2009 Kilkenny Tuner Show by Juicebox's roving reporter.
Anthony Cagle on March 17, 2011 at 02:49 PM
Everybody should be sure to click through to the old DeLorean Car Lust post. It's an excellent writeup of one of the most Lustworthy cars of modern times.
That Car Guy (Chuck) on March 18, 2011 at 07:19 AM
I have some online friends in Ireland. They will appreciate this post.
Thanks Cookie!
Chris on March 19, 2011 at 05:53 AM
I just love the Delorean, we have seen so many classic cars coming back for example, the Dodge Charger and Challenger, the Mini, Mustang and lots more. So why doesn't somebody make a new version of the Delorean and this time put a decent engine in the thing.
MattC on March 19, 2011 at 03:42 PM
@Chris:
I agree , but you can now buy a better than new DMC from a company in Texas. The "new" DMC motors bought all the remaining NOS parts from the original Delorean plant, plus they do complete rebuilds and upgrade. They have proper performance options to really wake up that PRV engine. It is actually a lot of fun perfusing their website and doing an imaginary build.
Bryce on March 20, 2011 at 09:31 PM
Classic cars making a comeback are ok. the mini was iconic Mustang so so Charger had some class Camaro etc all had something going for them. De lorean had no such cachet it was crap it was gutless and it was appalinly badly built and despite its looks couldnt outrun anything Bury it deep
Adrian on March 22, 2011 at 06:12 AM
Delorean is really a British car as Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom.
That Car Guy on March 22, 2011 at 08:00 AM
So, as a British car, it rusts, leaks, and the electricals don't work?
Chris Meirose on March 22, 2011 at 02:55 PM
Chuck - if you time it right though, a bolt of electricity can really get one of them moving!
That Car Guy on March 22, 2011 at 06:46 PM
Yes... I hope there's a clock tower around when you need one LOL!
Chris Hafner on April 13, 2011 at 11:52 AM
This is fascinating stuff, Cookie - I never knew that Ireland had a car-building history beyond the DMC. A few quick notes:
- There's something jarring about seeing a painted DeLorean, but my goodness, this one looks good.
- I'm not too surprised that Ireland has a vibrant muscle car club. Old domestic iron is quite popular in Europe - in fact, while I was buying my Gran Torino wagon, I found several of the same vintage in Europe, one even pictured on incredibly narrow streets near old-worlde buildings. Quite jarring.
Alastair Ward on April 23, 2011 at 01:19 PM
"From 1972 through 1983, Toyota assembled Corollas and Starlets in Ireland", living in Northern Ireland (which is, really, another world altogether from the Republic of Ireland) the two things that always struck me as odd on holidays to Sligo and then Cork were the very creamy milk (homogenised, we didn't really go in for that up North for a while) and the number of Starlets on the roads. In fact, NCF branded milk cartons had a regular competition to win a Starlet for some time if I remember correctly.
The other difference was, and this may have been more to do with average incomes in the 80s, cars of a much, much older age could be seen on the roads down South than up North. I was told by my parents it was because the Roads Service in Northern Ireland put rock salt on the roads and their counterparts cross border didn't put salt in their grit. It seems unlikely, but its what I was told.
You can still see a difference in some of the Japanese cars that cross the border. European Fords and GMs have all become as one, with the sole difference between Irish Opels and N. Irish Vauxhalls being the badge. But the Irish seem to pick up what I assume are a lot of grey imports. Or models that are right hand drive, but for a market other than the UK. I've never seen wide headlight Integras or odd Civic saloons with a NI registration, but plenty crossing the border with ROI registrations.
@That Car Guy, the Albert Clock tower, the other side of Belfast, would have sufficed. I'm sure I could pick up 88 mph down the Ormeau Road and past the High Courts, then go back in time before I have to hit the brakes and swerve right towards the Royal Mail building. A remake of Back to the Future is surely on the cards for my wee country!