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Think of station wagons and your
thoughts immediately go to the practicalities of motoring. How big
the is cargo area? How much can it tow? How large is the engine?
For years the wagon was the ultimate
family vehicle. In recent times the practical wagon has undergone a
metamorphosis and many are called
`sportwagons.'
Estate's like Audi's RS 4 Avant and
for that matter the classy looking Holden Commodore wagon. But, for
mine this 1957 Buick Caballero takes the cake in the wagon stakes.
Where it differs from most wagons is it
is pillarless – that is to say there's no B-pillar. In most cars
the B-pillar undertakes an important role of strengthening torsional
rigidity. It also locks in the front door and is used to hinge the
rear door, also adding to body strength. At times it has also been
known to hinge the front door, commonly known as a suicide door.
The concept of a pillarless wagon came
from the concept of a pillarless coupe, of which there were plenty of
examples. Australia actually had it's own version when Holden
produced the first Monaro in 1968. But we were late on the scene.
The idea of having a pillarless hardtop
wagon was to take the hardtop coupe concept to other market segments.
After all, if a coupe could be airy and stylish, why not a wagon?
General Motors did not invent to
pillarless coupe, but they probably led the way in mass-production of
the hardtop coupe in the late 1940s. So it was a matter of time
before they took the concept further.
Buick in the 1950 was almost, but not
quite, as adventurous in design as Studebaker and Chrysler.
These cars rarely found their way to
Australia as we were still in our 48-215 (FX) and FJ Holden phase
along with VW Beetle, Vauxhall, Morris and Ford Prefect, Consul, and
Zephyr. Our V8 cars were primarily Ford Customline and Mainline utes.
Buick produced two pillarless wagons in 1957-58, the Special Riviera
Estate and the Century Caballero. They were pretty much identical
with the pillared counterpart.
The most apparent difference between
the two wagons is the use of Buick's `portholes' along the front
mudguard – the Caballero having four portholes as it carried the
Century moniker and all Century badged vehicles have four instead of
the usual three portholes.
We found this stunning example of a
Century Cabellero at a Buick display in the Gold Coast Hinterland.
Cars like this are simply not made anymore. Nor are they ever likely
to be. As it was the Caballero was short lived. The concept of a
pillarless wagon failed to excite the American motoring public, when
there was so much else on offer ... not the least Buick's own
impressive stable along with notables such as Chevrolet's 1957
convertible and pillarless hardtop coupe and impressive four door
sedan.
Buick was not the only maker to venture
into hardtop pillarless wagons. Oldsmobile, Mercury and even the
small volume American Motors took the plunge. Caballero had what the
Americans call a `greenhouse' rear end. With a large, slightly curved
rear window meeting long side windows that extended to the back
doors, it created a greenhouse effect. We don't think there was
window tinting back then, so it would have got pretty warm in summer.
Still, with front and rear windows down, it would not have taken long
to get the breezes flowing in the big Buick.
One of the problems with pillarless
cars is dust and noise intrusion as the windows butt against each
other, rather than sliding into a window housing. Just a tad more
than 10,000 Caballeros were built and they took ages to move out from
dealerships. These days they are highly sought-after collector cars,
and it's not hard to see why. They are more exclusive than the
convertible or hardtop, which still rate higher on the desirability
meter. The Century Caballero was powered by a 300 bhp 364 cubic inch
V8 hooked up to either a three speed manual of two speed Dynaflow
auto transmission. It had a top speed of 110 mp/h and would shoot
from 0-100 km/h in a respectable 10.5 seconds.
To us through, the Caballero is all
about appearance. And on that count we'd rate it as a 10/10 as wagons
go.
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