The game-changers of each decade.

David09

If you could nominate one car from each decade that was different to others and set new benchmarks in styling, engineering and was influential on others, what would they be?

Here's my choices, and I've done my best to avoid any personal biases.

60's : Renault 16.

First mainstream 5 door hatchback. Modern styling that still looked fresh 20 years later.

70's : Fiat ritmo.

A controversial choice. It was revolutionary in terms of styling and was one of the first cars to be built entirely by robots. It should have been good, but was a disaster in terms of quality control. It was a lesson in manufacturing quality to all others.

80's : Peugeot 205.

It set the pace for small cars that despite being cheap could be well built and excellent to drive. The gti was iconic.

90's : Ford focus.

Demonstrated how a mundane family car could have pin sharp handling and excellent driving dynamics that blew all others out of the water. Styling wise, the original still looks fresh 16 years later.

00's : vw Passat.

Not much can be said about the car itself, in that everything about it was run-of-the-mill in terms of styling and engineering, but the pd engine under the bonnet was a game changer in that it proliferated diesel power and proved that economical could also be reasonably powerful with little trade off for comfort.


Those are my nominations. What are yours??!

W123-80's

80’s : E30 & 190E
The first of the mid sized exec saloons. Created a whole new market in terms of marque motoring and owing a prestige brand.

bazz26

David09 wrote: »

00's : vw Passat.

Not much can be said about the car itself, in that everything about it was run-of-the-mill in terms of styling and engineering, but the pd engine under the bonnet was a game changer in that it proliferated diesel power and proved that economical could also be reasonably powerful with little trade off for comfort.


Those are my nominations. What are yours??!

Not sure I'd agree that PD was ground breaking. The original TDI introduced in the early 1990s were pretty ground breaking for diesel at the time but most of the competition were moving over to Fiat's designed Common Rail injection system by the early 2000s while VW pursued Pumpe Duse. VW eventually moved to CR later on too.

wonski

Fiat Bravo (1995-2001) would be my candidate.

Right in the middle of the decade, but it was a cracking looking car in the 90's.

The Passat doesn't fit he bill, if you aked me.

visual

Renault Laguna 2001

First with 5 star NCAP and at time rated one of the safest cars on the road.

Joe 90

60s:
BMW 2002, Lotus Elan and Jaguar XJ6.

2002, the first real sports saloon.
XJ6, probably the first big saloon that had good road behavior.
Elan, one of the best small sports cars ever.

70s::
Porsche Carrera RS Lightweight. The reason that Porsche still make lots of money from the 911.

Golf GTi.

Porsche 944.

80s:
Cosworth Sierra. Last desirable Ford.:)

90s:
Elise.

mister gullible

Alfasud

visual

Joe 90 wrote: »

60s:
BMW 2002, Lotus Elan and Jaguar XJ6.

2002, the first real sports saloon.
XJ6, probably the first big saloon that had good road behavior.
Elan, one of the best small sports cars ever.

70s::
Porsche Carrera RS Lightweight. The reason that Porsche still make lots of money from the 911.

Golf GTi.

Porsche 944.

80s:
Cosworth Sierra. Last desirable Ford.:)

90s:
Elise.

Golf GTI and the 205 GTI where game changers

to a lesser extent Renault 5 turbo

These set the stage for cool fast hatchbacks

visual

80s

audi quattro took the rally world by storm

Joe 90

visual wrote: »

Golf GTI and the 205 GTI where game changers

to a lesser extent Renault 5 turbo

These set the stage for cool fast hatchbacks

Not to forget the Renault Turbo.


This ones a Turbo 2.

Zcott

And no mention of the Renault Espace?

visual

Zcott wrote: »

And no mention of the Renault Espace?

There you go.. 1984 First Espace

wasn't a great success for Renault at launch but it set the bench mark for people carriers

Moneymaker

For Ireland, surely the Toyota Corolla in the 80s and 90s set a standard in reliability and build quality that every other car is compared to.

Buzz Killington the third

Fiat Multipla changed the game because it literally made EVERYTHING else on the road look good!

ba_barabus

W123-80's wrote: »

80’s : E30 & 190E
The first of the mid sized exec saloons.

You're forgetting the Triumph Dolomite SPRINT of the 70's was the car which created this class.

90's, while a controversial choice I'd like to nominate the Rav4 for creating the softroader class now popularised by the CashCow and Juke.
Going back:

30's Citroen Traction Avant - Contains many features still considered modern

50's Citroen DS - Still modern in many ways

60's - Toyota Corolla - The beginning of reliale, cheap family motoring and the rise of the Japanese

70's - Golf GTI - The first hot hatch, everyday fun and useable transport

80's - W124 - Over-engineering at its finest.

90's - Rav4 as above

00's - Veyron - A technical tour de force

10's - Tesla - The acceptable electric car and revolutionary in every way the company is run.

visual

1960 was the decade of the Morris Mini-Minor or Austin Min or Leyland Mini or simply just called Mini

starting production in 1959 and ending in 2000

I had the more common 850 as my first car and dreamed of 1000cc or better still the cooper with its big 1275 cc engine.

W123-80's

ba_barabus wrote: »

You're forgetting the Triumph Dolomite SPRINT of the 70's was the car which created this class.

Perhaps, but the E30 & the 190 took this market on and defined it.

ba_barabus

W123-80's wrote: »

Perhaps, but the E30 & the 190 took this market on and defined it.

Agreed. BL always snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

ikarie

Peugeot 104 zs twin carb 1978-79

This was the game changer along with the golf mk1 long before any 205

Henry Ford III

Porsche 911, Mini, Golf GTI, Ford Focus.

BMJD

1990s:



Affordable, reliable, low-cost and very fast.

ianobrien

My votes are

50's Citroen DS. Its got features that are only making mainstream models now (cornering headlights)

60's Mini and E-Type. Mini for packaging four adults into a small footprint. The E-Type for showing that supercar killers needn't cost the earth, and also look better than Ferrari's

70's Golf GTi. Class defining.

80's Audi Ur quattro. Inventing the cross country killer. First to show turbos and 4wd can work rather eeffectively. Honerable mention for the Renault Espace

90's Ford Focus. For ever killing the bland hatchback (even though the current one isn't the best I reckon)

00's I'm struggling massively. Maybe the Prius for showing a hybrid works in the real world.

10's Tesla

JohnBoy26

The focus is the most overrated "game changer" out there imo. Yes it handles well but it's as bland as anything to look at and isn't as fantastic as it's made out to be to drive either. it's nothing special at all imo.

It's also not as reliable or as well built as it is made out to be either. Now I'm not saying it's bad but these do suffer from many small niggles and the odd bigger problem as well.

The British press bigged this car up massively when it came out in 1998 and made a big deal of it's rear suspension. One such show was top gear and Jeremy clarkson. He compared it's suspension to the rest of the family hatchbacks making it seem like the focus was the only car with independent rear suspension and that the other "ordinary" family hatchbacks only had a beam suspension, yet it's only the megane and Astra he was using as a comparison.

What about Japanese cars in that segment. At the time nearly all of them had independent rear suspension with the prime example being the civic with it's highly sophisticated double wishbone suspension.

colm_mcm

To be fair, control blade suspension was very clever from a packaging and refinement point of view.

JohnBoy26

colm_mcm wrote: »

To be fair, control blade suspension was very clever from a packaging and refinement point of view.

I never thought that it was as good as it was made out to be tbh.

It offers good handling but ride quality like any car( that's setup for handling) is nothing special as a result.

colm_mcm

You can tell a car is right when everyone copies it. Like it or not pretty much every rival (including honda) followed the lead of the focus in terms of size, width Vs height etc.

Keep in mind what was out there in 1998. Alfa 146, Fiat Brava, Rover 400 type Civic, 97-02 Corolla, Mazda 323, Nissan Almera etc.

You have the styling, which 16 years on is accepted but was quite controversial at the time, and the triangles all over the dashboard vs the stuff everyone else was doing.

I'm not a massive Focus fan and think they drop the ball every time they do a new one - but for its time it was revolutionary. Not in one big way, but in lots of little ways that we now expect cars to be like.

(Of course, not everyone wants revolution, and that's fair enough too)

quadrifoglio verde

colm_mcm wrote: »

You can tell a car is right when everyone copies it. Like it or not pretty much every rival (including honda) followed the lead of the focus in terms of size, width Vs height etc.

Keep in mind what was out there in 1998. Alfa 146, Fiat Brava, Rover 400 type Civic, 97-02 Corolla, Mazda 323, Nissan Almera etc.

You have the styling, which 16 years on is accepted but was quite controversial at the time, and the triangles all over the dashboard vs the stuff everyone else was doing.

I'm not a massive Focus fan and think they drop the ball every time they do a new one - but for its time it was revolutionary. Not in one big way, but in lots of little ways that we now expect cars to be like.

(Of course, not everyone wants revolution, and that's fair enough too)

You also had the alfa 156, of which ones in good condition still look great on the road. I can see there being less than a hundred of the phase 1s left on the road in three years time.

bazz26

I think the other big thing with the Focus at the time was that it was the complete opposite in every possible way to the piece of $hit model Escort which it replaced. The MkI Focus was stylish (in a controversial way at the time), well built and handled superbly for it's class. It did to be fair shake up the segment at the time.

JohnBoy26

colm_mcm wrote: »

You can tell a car is right when everyone copies it. Like it or not pretty much every rival (including honda) followed the lead of the focus in terms of size, width Vs height etc.

Keep in mind what was out there in 1998. Alfa 146, Fiat Brava, Rover 400 type Civic, 97-02 Corolla, Mazda 323, Nissan Almera etc.

You have the styling, which 16 years on is accepted but was quite controversial at the time, and the triangles all over the dashboard vs the stuff everyone else was doing.

I'm not a massive Focus fan and think they drop the ball every time they do a new one - but for its time it was revolutionary. Not in one big way, but in lots of little ways that we now expect cars to be like.

(Of course, not everyone wants revolution, and that's fair enough too)

I never found the styling that revalutionary. It's got sharp headlight but other than that it's a tall slab sided piece of bland imo. The saloon is just pure ugly. Tbh I can't see where Honda copied them, or with which car?. The only carmaker I seen copying the focus was vw with the rear suspension in the mk5, mk6.

colm_mcm

JohnBoy26 wrote: »

I never found the styling that revalutionary. It's got sharp headlight but other than that it's a tall slab sided piece of bland imo. The saloon is just pure ugly. Tbh I can't see where Honda copied them, or with which car?. The only carmaker I seen copying the focus was vw with the rear suspension in the mk5, mk6.

Compare a 90s civic to an 06+ civic.
I'm not just talking about suspension. Look at height, shape etc.

JohnBoy26

bazz26 wrote: »

I think the other big thing with the Focus at the time was that it was the complete opposite in every possible way to the piece of $hit model Escort which it replaced. The MkI Focus was stylish (in a controversial way at the time), well built and handled superbly for it's class. It did to be fair shake up the segment at the time.

I think you hit the nail on the Head with your point on the escort. That car was so poor however that anything would be an improvement over it. The focus was a massive improvement over it and for a ford at the time it was a decent effort. The build quality isn't all its cracked up to be however and the car still suffers from some of fords old failings.

bazz26

I always found the MkI Focus to be well built, panel fit was very good and interior was solid enough. Still plenty of 98-00 Focus on the road with high miles on them too.

JohnBoy26

bazz26 wrote: »

I always found the MkI Focus to be well built, panel fit was very good and interior was solid enough. Still plenty of 98-00 Focus on the road with high miles on them too.

Lots of niggles on them and some bigger faults too, they also rust, well some more so than others. They are capable of high miles though.

PurvesGrundy

Gen 1 Volvo S60 of 2000/2001. A coupe styled saloon four years before the Merc CLS:

colm_mcm

That's just a saloon though? Its nice alright

PurvesGrundy

colm_mcm wrote: »

That's just a saloon though? Its nice alright

Never claimed to be anything else, but had a slight hint to the four door coupe concept none the less, at a time when three box design was order of the day.

visual

PurvesGrundy wrote: »

Never claimed to be anything else, but had a slight hint to the four door coupe concept none the less, at a time when three box design was order of the day.

Bigger hit of 4 door saloon

Why was it a game changer ?

PurvesGrundy

visual wrote: »

Bigger hit of 4 door saloon

Why was it a game changer ?

Its spaceball gearknob?

DakarVert

Biggest game changer in the 1960s?

The Ford Transit.

tossy

There is nothing coupe like about the S60.

Red Kev

Going back decades every country has had a car that has changed that particular country, a cheap runabout that made motoring affordable to the masses, like the Model T, 2CV, Mini, Fiat 500, Beetle etc.

More recently for me it's these:

Land Rover; from Kinshasa to Kinnegad, the first widely available off roader, honourable mention to it's cousin the Range Rover, the first luxury off roader/SUV.



Renault 4, cheap affordable motoring, very spacious for it's class, first mass produced hatchback, as good in the city as in the country, and it had a good van version as well.

Audi 100 C3. Aerodynamic shape was groundbreaking, the car was designed for being as fuuel efficient as possible, something that is probably the most important consideration in a car today, as was the 4WD system, making both acceptable on a mass produced car for the first time.

It's estate was the first "lifestyle" estate where space was sacrificed for looks and it was one of the first mass produced turbo cars in this category as well. Procon ten was a forrunner of airbags and in many ways safer.




Mazda MX-5. Re-introduced the small open top sports car.




Renault Scenic. A small affordable MPV for the masses, not the first, but the first very successful one, every car manufacturer has one in their line up today. I owned one for a while and they are an excellent car for the job they are designed to do.



Toyota Prius. Mass produced hybrid, often mocked but copied by almost every major manufacturer and........

Nissan Leaf, first fully electric car from a major manufacturer, if it's a gamechanger remains to be seen.

Frankie Lee

For the 90's it has to be the LS400


Introduced new standards for everything in its class and was a phenomenal success in terms of sales.

dr.fuzzenstein

I don't know why people list, sports cars, sports models or special editions, they did not affect 99% of car buyers. The cars that I think turned the automotive industry on it's head, changed it and broke new ground are very different to what you're thinking.

00's (of the 1900's) Ford Model T
(can't think of anything inbetween and not trawling the net for hours to find out)
50's VW Beetle (from 1938, but only took off in the 50's due to unspecified reasons I cannot mention)
60's-Mini (1959, but the essential 60's car)
70's-Golf
I don't know why people list the GTI, only a tiny amount of people actually had one and it came out later on. it took the family hatchback to new levels.
80's-hard to say, the Japanese where taking over by then..., but the Renault Espace sticks out to me, since it introduced a whole new class of cars.

ofcork

The Lexus ls was up against THE standard setter which was the s class.

Frankie Lee

ofcork wrote: »

The Lexus ls was up against THE standard setter which was the s class.

And blew it out of the water in every aspect of performance and annihilated it when it came to sales in the US. It also set new standards in production and assembly. Hence why it was a gamechanger as Mercedes were operating in a comfort zone for a long time before that.

Voodoomelon

The Scenic was a definitely a game changer when it launched. Having so much interior space, headroom and cargo capacity, without a massive overall footprint and three individual rear seats meant it sold exceptionally well. It was also quite stylish compared to the boxy offerings of it's time.

EDIT: Ah, mentioned above.

JohnBoy26

The Nissan qashqai was a game changer, it introduced us to the crossover we know today, and a concept copied by many other manufacturer s since.

PurvesGrundy

tossy wrote: »

There is nothing coupe like about the S60.

Well either you don't see it or the designers failed, as it was the C70 coupe that was reported to have influenced the shape. I accept you might argue the coupe styling reference is vague, but to say it has none is a fabrication. Would anyone be aware the Merc CLS had a coupe influence if no one was told?

visual

JohnBoy26 wrote: »

The Nissan qashqai was a game changer, it introduced us to the crossover we know today, and a concept copied by many other manufacturer s since.

The market was already saturated with crossovers M5 springs to mind and lots of soft off roaders that where so soft they had difficulty marketing as SUV or MPV

Jimmy Bottles

JohnBoy26 wrote: »

The focus is the most overrated "game changer" out there imo. Yes it handles well but it's as bland as anything to look at and isn't as fantastic as it's made out to be to drive either. it's nothing special at all imo.

In terms of car styling, the Mk 1 Focus was the game changer. Everything pre Focus looks fuddy duddy and ever car ever since owes part of its styling to that Focus.

Just look at the Astra or Corolla from 98 or 99. They look last century compared to the Focus which IMO to this day still looks good.

Frankie Lee

The first generation Punto was more influential from a design point of view. Hard to believe these are 21 years old now.