Gran Turismo On Detroit Wheels

In the categories of automobile, from the racing kart buzzing around a one-eighth-mile course to the 170-mph Grand Prix machine, the gran turismo car is probably the most interesting to the most people. The phrase gran turismo, which is to say fast touring, is a link with the storied giants that roamed the world's roads in the first three decades of the century: the Phantom I Rolls-Royce, the SJ Duesenberg, the 8A Isotta-Fraschini, the 540K Mercedes-Benz and the rest. A gran turismo motor car is a special thing: not as fast as a race car, not as Spartan as a real sports car, but faster than the ordinary passenger car, nimbler and safer. A gran turismo car might be called a sophisticated sedan or a sophisticated hard top coupe. The American industry has not often produced one.

For example, the Chrysler 300H has been one of the few American gran turismo automobiles in current production, but at 219 inches over-all it is bigger than some modern enthusiasts like, and at $5,800 it is too expensive for many. A handier size is 170 to 180 inches; if a car is small and light it doesn't need the 405 maximum horsepower the Chrysler offers. The Chevrolet Corvair is a 188-inch car, and some months ago this and other interesting Corvair characteristics began to intrigue the inventive automotive mind of John Fitch. Fitch, one of the first of the postwar U.S. road-race drivers, and for years, as a member of the Cunningham and Mercedes-Benz teams, one of the best, had driven most high-performance automobiles on the world market and thought he knew what ought to go into a gran turismo car. The first result of his thinking in the matter is now on the road, having appeared without a trace of the usual preliminary rumor. As these pictures show, it is intriguing.

Chevrolet had made a start in the right direction by producing a hot version of the standard Corvair, the Monza, named after the Italian racing circuit. The Monza is a two-door coupe carrying a 102-horsepower engine instead of the standard 80 to 84 of the four-door sedan, and with various other optional extras available. Using as a base the factory Monza, a strikingly good-looking car, Fitch worked the engine up to 130 horsepower with a mild degree of tune, a Paxton supercharger, a dual-pipe exhaust system and so on. He has since replaced the supercharger with a four-carburetor manifold as less complicated but equally potent. The carburetors are stock Corvair. With 130 horsepower the Corvair engine can take Fitch's car, which he calls the Monza " Sprint," from 0 to 60 miles an hour in 12 seconds, comparable to the 0-60 times of a good Porsche Super 90 GT and better than the Volvo P-1800. The Sprint's top speed rating of 115 miles an hour also betters the Volvo's 105 and equals that of the Porsche. Fitch intends to sell the car through dealers, at $2,995, and it is in the light of this price that the Sprint's performance figures are most impressive: the Porsche costs $5,500 and the Volvo $3,795.

To balance handling with performance, springs and shock absorbers heavier than standard are used, and 2� of negative camber are enforced at the rear wheels. The steering is modified to be faster, or quicker, and because of the light front-end loading of the Corvair chassis, no additional effort is noticeable. The car is not intended for racing, but its tractability and safety in high-speed road use have certainly been increased, and its appearance in gran turismo races or rallyes would be no surprise.

There are certain bits and accessories that traditionally belong on a gran turismo car, and the Monza Sprint has most of them: a four-speed, all-synchromesh manual transmission; an alloy-spoked steering wheel with a finger-grooved rim of exotic woods; bucket seats and safety belts; a tachometer; a grab rail to help passengers to cope with centrifugal force in corners; a spotlight that is mounted conveniently on the inside of the windshield. Not traditional but useful and present is a compass.

The Sprint is distinguished by uniform paintwork and upholstery: white body with a double metallic blue stripe of modest width, black vinyl upholstery. It mounts extra lights and a chromed steel mesh stone-guard to protect them. The metal hardtop is tautly covered with a shiny, nylonlike fabric to simulate a fold-down convertible roof, and the rear-window area has been reduced in the same way. Since the Monza, as delivered to Fitch, has the optional padded dash, backup lights, windshield washer and radio, the end product, the Sprint, may reasonably be said to be well equipped.

The car is rewarding to drive, and pleasant. Its rate of acceleration is in my view nearly right for this kind of automobile in everyday use: 14 seconds 0 to 60 is slow by today's standards, and a car that will do 10 seconds can be too quick for some drivers. Twelve is adequate, and will meet most needs. A top speed of 115 miles an hour means that 90 or 95, which is all that most people will ever find use for, can be brought up quickly and maintained for reasonable distances without harmfully stressing the machinery.

It is a comfortable automobile, too. The engine has not been so awesomely set up as to be hard to start on a cold morning or a hot afternoon; the exhaust noise is louder than standard but not irritating, and it does not, as with many cars of more pretension and less performance, produce the blatting on the overrun that so offends police officers. The firmness of the springing did not annoy me in the least; by European standards it is not really firm, and I hold with those theorists, among them the Rolls-Royce designers, who maintain that short rapid movements are less fatiguing to the body than long slow ones. The handling seemed happy at any speeds to which I cared to take the car; it was in neutral balance nearly all of the time, the wheels securely tied to wet roads or dry. It was fun to see the puzzlement of standard Corvair drivers as they were passed—the Sprint is so obviously a Corvair, and yet its appearance is so obviously a little different, its way of going a lot different. It is, in the timeworn but meaningful phrase, a desirable property, and I should think John Fitch would not be long in installing in further Monza Sprints the 250-odd four-carburetor manifolds he has ordered made up.