Vert-A-Pac Train Cars Kept Chevy Vegas Affordable
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Once upon a time, a specially-fitted railcar. Known as Vert-A-Pac, the railcar was designed to maximize the amount of vehicles being transported, and GM made at least one vehicle that was specifically made for this kind of duty: the Chevy Vega.
In order to keep the price at a rock bottom level, these Chevys were designed to fit on railcars that could carry twice as many Vegas than usual, for a total of 30. In order to fit all 30 cars, each rail car had 30 doors, 15 on each side, that folded down so that a Vega could be secured inside in a vertical, nose-down fashion. Then a forklift would come along and lift the door (and car) into place.
Since the cars were stored with the nose down and shipped with all of their necessary fluids, certain aspects of the vehicles were designed specifically for this type of shipping process, including an oil baffle in the engine, a special anti-gravity (just kidding) battery, and even a repositioned windshield washer reservoir. Pretty cool, and — if nothing else — interesting… no?
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what held them in place tho?
This makes it sound as if all Vegas were shipped this way. Not so. In fact, cars that were slated to be Vert-A-Pak’ed had special option packages that added the special baffles, reservoirs, and so on needed for vertical transport.
I didn’t know that! What with GM making trains I suppose it was easier to design one to fit the other so to speak. Wonder how many cars they could sqeeze in nowadays if they so wished.
Jon, GM made locomotives, not freight cars, so…no, it wasn’t easier to design one to fit the other.
Working it out on a average size car (say a Volt), I still think they’d only fit 30 cars on one carrage.
And we all know what a rousing success the Vega was! ~ LOL. If
I were GM I’d take everything they did with Vega and just do the
opposite –
So perhaps they should Vaccume-seal Sparks and just pack ’em
in six packs to be unwrapped at home? Hey – ya gotta give ’em
credit for tryin’ I suppose, but this really makes no sense.
Can you imagine this being a trend – and suddenly we’d have
uber hydraulic garage door openers that we just clamped the
family Sonic to and just hauled her up outta the way! Oops! –
there goes that bowling ball I had in back through the windshield!
Oh, damn – my wife didn’t take that latte out of the cupholder –
SPLAT! – and gee, the engine, full of liquids – just isn’t firing up
well on those cold mornings – I wonder why…..
Anyway, leave it to GM back in those days to cut costs any old
way they could – I had a friend with a Vega and it seriously was
a death trap with the worst engine ever invented by man.
Nobody can blame GM for trying to make money, it’s cut throat & every little makes a difference. GM is in the business to make desirable cars, be they 4,6,8 cylinder, Diesels, Trucks or whatever & to make a profit doing it & whatever else brings home the cash. GM is not a charity that can afford to loose money & needs profitable cars & products to keep the money rolling in for future improvements & new models.
I remember these as a kid and am shocked with all the web sites jumping on this story and people not knowing.
I do not have the exact time frame but while GM did do this they did not do it to all Vegas and did not do it long. We live near the plant and most were shipped on normal rail cars most of the time. I can still remember seeing them on the open rail cars at the time. The sight of these rail cars were not as common as the story makes it out here.
Ad for the Vega they were not as bad as many like to think. In high school old Vegas were the winter beater of choice. While they rusted and burned oil they would run forever. Most of us would save used oil from Auto Shop class and use it to pour in.
If they had better rust protection and steel sleeves in the engine the out come would have been very different.
To be honest the first gen was a very stylish car vs. the Pinto and Gremlin and nearly all imports.
I owned two. Both bought used. They were the sharpest, affordable coupes available. I also drove my first one in the winter and it went over the snow while others got stuck. Great vehicle. Was about 5 years old and looked and ran great. Hey, it was even a hatchback with all that rear end noise.
The 2nd one I bought my last year in college in ’81. I believe it was a 72. The front suspension upper A arm supports were rusted away and the wheels would move in and out at the top but it was all I could afford. However once I got my job I bought a new loaded 82 Z28.
I had a 1975 Vega Kammback Wagon in metallic copper (like a new shiny penny), and I paid less than $4,000 for it. It only had one problem: the electric fuel pump that failed once. I sold it in 1985 to a racer who crashed his 1972 Camaro and needed a body to move the parts. He bought my Vega Wagon for $500, replaced the 2.3 L I4 with a small V8, replaced the transmission and the rear end, and won several races after that, so my Vega had a second life.
I have a book with the original story on the Chevy Vega (its production was promoted by John deLorean) and it covers the Vert-a-Pack shipping method. But I don’t believe my Vega was shipped that way.
BTW, GM did design a Wankel-powered Vega for 1974 and made prototypes, but stopped production due to leaky seals and emission problems with the engine (licensed from Curtiss-Wright, not Mazda!). Read it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_Rotary_Combustion_Engine
So the Chevy Vega is the only American vehicle that had I4, V6, V8 and rotary engines.
Thinking about it I may have read about this train thing somewhere before, it obviously didn’t make money for GM and was quickly dropped.
These were shipped from Lordstown,Ohio to California and out West ,These cars sold for between 500 & 1,000 Dollars so not huge profit margins in the early 70’s, talked to a guy Ron from Berlin Center,Ohio that used to load them just the other day !!!
That’s what I ment we have GM locomotives in UK not sure in great detail as to what they are other than class 59 & 66.
That’s the like fleet number, I’m no train enthusiast so I’m sure Wikipedia can help for anybody that is or has a passing interest.
Very interesting…
My first car was a ’73 Vega GT. I called it “McLaren” orange. It was a nice little car for about 6 months. I had to replace 2 water pumps, an alternator, 3 valve springs, and the head. It rusted through in all the places familiar to Vega owners. Is this car is the reason GM thinks people won’t buy hatchbacks?
Wow, and you got one of the good ones! The horrific quality of this car is what gave Datsun and Toyota a foot in the door to the US market. GM has not learned the lesson about poor quality to this day.
Makes me remember all those vega V/8 swaps we used to do and wish i had a new black vega wagon now, cool.
Now you are making me think of a cosworth vega with an LS3.
wasn’t the cosworth some special DOHC 4 cylinder ?
It was built for my 75 and 76. Aluminum 2L dohc 16v fuel injected stainless steel headers. 110 horsepower 107 lbs ft of torque. At the time it was advertised as ” ONE VEGA FOR THE PRICE OF TWO”
Were the Monza/Starfire related to this vehicle at all…
Yes they were and the Pontiac Sunbird and Astra, Buick Skyhawk.
Whoa, blast from the past! Look at all those hatchbacks. They had sedans and wagons, too. What was the overhead cam version , black with gold stripes? They all drove like go-karts.
,
Just remembered, Cosworth!
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