Bricklin SV-1

The American Dream from Canada: but it became a nightmare

Economical and safe. It doesn't often go hand in hand with a supercar. No, not even in the Bricklin SV-1. Besides, it wasn't particularly pleasing to the eye. A core value in the super class… Surprisingly enough, the intended success did not materialize. Exactly one of the main reasons why the established supercar manufacturers are so exclusive. And stay. Because if it was that easy to build a supercar and be successful with it, everyone would.

At least Malcolm Bricklin made his own valiant effort in the early XNUMXs. The rather unevenly successful American entrepreneur had quite a bit of capital behind him after his career as a car importer ended prematurely. His company, Subaru of America, shipped, you don't say, Subaru's small type 360 ​​to the immense American car market. That went very well at first, until the mini car was labeled as extremely unsafe and the crash-phobic American public ignored the Japanese ball from now on. It was indeed no match for the native mastodons on the crumple front. Subaru then bought Bricklin out with shares, the perfect opportunity for him to realize another childhood dream. Because he already had sideburns, a noisy outfit and sunglasses.

Laughed at Motown

A supercar with his name on it, that was his next dream. The American Dream. But then in Canada. In Detroit, Bricklin was laughed at when he unveiled his plans for his supercar. Impossible design and totally impossible to build, the technicians judged Motown about his prototype, "The Gray Ghost". Bricklin's attempt to persuade skeptics to have Ford's own designer Herb Grasse refine the design of the Bricklin SV-1 also failed. A thing of nothing, the mustache Detroiters persisted. Bricklin dripped off with their jeering laughter. But they were not the last to laugh. At least for the time being ...

In New Brunswick, Canada, Bricklin finds support in the form of Richard Hatfield, the provincial premier. He wants to put this ailing region on the map and sees Bricklin's plastic brainchild as the ideal project to achieve that. A Canadian supercar. Wow. The first six million dollars has already been released, even before the feasibility study has been completed. Oh detail. But also well before the Bricklin SV-1 is even remotely ready for production. Here comes trouble.

Super safe, but not a supercar

To a large extent even. The factories in Minto and Saint John are not running for a meter. But empty. Every ten weeks at least. New Brunswick's liberal social security system makes it possible to receive 42 weeks of benefits after ten weeks of work if unemployment has arisen. A good plan, according to many workers in this new factory, and so Bricklin can look for new employees every ten weeks. As a rule, this is no guarantee of quality. It therefore suffers considerably, also because the design itself was not exactly flawless. But the intentions were good.

Bricklin's vision for the Bricklin SV-1 was a super-safe supercar. That pursuit of safety succeeded reasonably well, but at the expense of weight. The intended super sports car became so heavy due to all the safety features that it was at the expense of the most important feature: supercar handling. Despite the gull-wing doors. Or maybe because of: heavy and almost continuously bent and broken by the opening mechanism. Bummer. The Windsor 5,7 liter V8 also didn't help that. The thing was too bulky and rude to be able to cope with this level. And then nobody had looked at the finish.

Yet unique

For example, the tailgate of the Bricklin SV-1 had no drainage. No idea where the rainwater went. No one had thought of that. And the acrylic polyester from which the body was constructed was difficult to glue and kept cracking and breaking. The idea was good: just like a bathtub, the plastic was not sprayed in color, but already poured in color, so that any scratches could easily be polished out again. But a bathtub encounters little torsion, curbs, thresholds, roundabouts or other bathtubs. If that was the case with the Bricklin SV-1 and damage occurred, then customers and dealers discovered to make matters worse that there was actually no method whatsoever to repair that damage to the body. The Bricklin SV-1 once again proved unique: the first disposable supercar was a fact.

The American dream was now about to shatter. In fact, much earlier, but then everything and everyone was blamed for the lack of success, except Bricklin and Hatfield. At least they thought so themselves. Tens of millions of dollars had already been pumped in by the province of New Brunswick and Hatfield privately, but it only resulted in more losses. It was a flop, Bricklin went bankrupt. In 1974 and 1975, only a small 3000 units were built and delivered to extremely brave customers, who, tearing, breaking and leaking, kept up the appearance of a supercar. They deserved better. And Malcolm nothing at all.

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