Weirdest Vintage Cars Ever Existed

No automaker designs anything, especially for the mass market, with the intention of calling it "weird", but such cars do exist. Designed as a radical new idea or simply as a means to stand out from the crowd, here are the cars we'd call weird if we saw them rolling down the street.

While some of them were truly destructive, others are just weird because they don't fit our current automotive tastes. We show them to you and you decide: were they weird three, four or five decades ago?

Izetta Isetta

What happens when a refrigerator company designs a car? They make it small and put a big door on one side. Here, in a nutshell, is the story of the Isetta. It may sound funny, but the Isetta excels in one area: fuel economy.

The Isetta was the first car to reach 94 mpg in '1955. If you don't mind a highly unsafe (and illegal) car, you can use it to get to work when fuel prices are skyrocketing.

Ford Gyron

Even before Chevy had this ridiculous idea to make a three-wheeler possible, Ford tried to make one with only two wheels. How did this thing stay balanced, you ask? To do this, he used a gyroscope.

Ford, however, quickly realized that it was actually inefficient to support a 300-pound curb weight spinning at hundreds of revolutions per minute, even if there was no global energy crisis.

Amphicar

While flying cars are still the future, floating cars are a thing of the past. Remembered as the most famous non-military amphibious vehicle in history, the Amphicar was produced from 1961 to 1967.

It had a set of propellers at the rear, and the front wheels acted as the main rudder functions, allowing the machine to propel itself through the water at seven knots.

Alfa Romeo Disco Steering wheel

Today, aerodynamics is one of the main considerations when designing any dedicated racing car, but back in the 1950s, engineers relied more on brute force and precise control.

Then Alfa Romeo was far ahead of its time, at least by decades. They came up with the most aerodynamically “slippery” design possible without wind tunnel testing. It looks weird but does the job.

Chevrolet El Camino

Coupes and pickups are on the opposite spectrum of vehicles, but in the 1960s Chevy got away with creating a hybrid of the two.

Do you need a 300 hp V8? He is! Want to transport lumber for home improvement? El Camino will do it! Still looking sick at this age.

Dymaxion

Despite the fact that today this "thing" is called a car, the creator Buckminster Fuller refused to call it such. This vehicle had to be capable of carrying a dozen passengers, as well as be able to travel by land, air and water.

The idea attracted the likes of Amelia Earhart, Henry Ford, and Isamu Noguchi, but the technology of the 1930s was not enough to realize these ambitious goals. The project finally failed when one of the prototypes was involved in a high-profile accident at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933.

Oscar-Mayer Wienermobile

Leave the form aside, the very name of this thing is enough to sue in this age. Although it looks absurd, Wienermobile has the guts.

Equipped with a 6.0-litre V8 engine, this is not only a show car, it can move at a decent speed with great agility.

Chevrolet Astro III

This demonic love child between a Batmobile and a jet was a product of a time when airplanes were just becoming something special, and researchers discovered this trendy new science called aerodynamics.

Designed to be as aerodynamically efficient as possible, this two-seat road jet had one wheel less than what is normally expected of a car, which ironically prevented it from reaching any speed that could exploit that aerodynamic efficiency.

Citroen DS

The Citroën DS was one of two models produced by the Citroën car company over the years. This was an era when there was an understanding of the concept of aerodynamics, but no methods had yet been developed to determine the most efficient shape.

The optimal solution was to make the car as smooth as possible. And the innovators did it, no matter how strange the product looked…

General Motors Firebird III

If ever there was a car that was more like a plane than a car, this must be it. The third version of the Firebird had a gas turbine engine, wings and tail, air brakes, and a fighter-mounted joystick to control.

Despite the fact that this car could run on anything from jet fuel to cologne, difficulties with gas turbine engines eventually forced Ford to abandon the project.

Stutz Weightman Special № 26

If you claim to be a manufacturer of high-end sports and luxury cars and you commit such atrocities, you are bound to fail sooner or later. Such was the fate of the Stutz Motor Company, its founder.

What looks like four tires bolted to a drum was one of their finest racing cars...think of what the rest would look like.

Bond's mistake

The Bond Bug was designed by Tom Karen of Ogle Design for the Reliant Motor Company, which produced it between 1970 and 1974. This 2-seat, 3-wheeler was designed as a cheap way to get around for the masses, but it never really caught on.

This is because when you remove a wheel from a car's established formula, the result is inherently unstable and not very safe to drive.

General Motors Le Saber

It was 1951, the world was still recovering from the war and General Motors came up with this abomination of the car. Named after the F-86 Le Saber fighter, this car was to revolutionize the post-war automobile industry.

However, using design advice from aviation proved not to be the best approach to building the "car of the future".

Fiat 600 Multipla

When a normal car crashes into something, a crumple zone is created that collapses before the impact can harm you. However, in the 600 Multipla, the crumple zone is your own knee.

In addition to its extremely strange appearance, this thing was completely unsafe and inconvenient, and even by the standards of that time, it lacked security equipment.

trojan

Who could tell that its creators would create one of the most prestigious automotive brands of all time: McLaren?

The huge hood of the Trojan might make you think that there is an engine under it. However, the unreliable 4-cylinder 2-stroke engine was actually placed under the seats. It also had solid rubber tires, a welded front diff, and a host of other atrocities that are unthinkable these days.

Chrysler Turbine Car

It might look like any other 1960s car, but that's only until you look under the hood. This car was equipped with a gas turbine engine, but the same as commercial aircraft.

Chrysler made 200 of these cars as an experiment and donated them to selected families for real-world testing. They soon realized that sitting on a literal jet engine for a 100-mile trip was not very comfortable, and they soon canceled the project. Nine out of 200 turbine cars still exist today, five of which are steerable.

Subaru Brat

After the El Camino gained its reputation as a classic, Subaru tried to replicate the same coupe-pickup formula. The result of this quest was Brother.

However, it doesn't have a big droning American V8 under the hood and never got the same status as the El Camino.

You can 92

Saab is actually an acronym that translates to Swedish Airplane Company Limited... if that's not obvious from the car's teardrop shape.

Even though it was not a very beautiful car, there was an aerodynamic advantage in performance and handling that led to this car being one of Saab's most successful cars until the 1980s.

Lotus Europe

Europa was very unusual when it came out in 1966, although it doesn't look special today. It was also rather unique in that it had a mid-engined layout.

It was originally produced with a Renault 16 engine, which was later replaced by its own Lotus Twin Cam engine borrowed from Ford Kent.

Rolls Royce Twenty

Can you imagine what the life of a peasant would be like when the elite walked around in such things? Looking aside, it had 20 horsepower, three forward gears, and NO FRONT BRAKES.

It was the 1920s and cars were just becoming something special, so we can't be too harsh on the criticism.

Horch 853 A

If you think the term "convertible" applies to sexy cars like the Maybach S600, think again. This is also classified as one. Horch 853 A was one of the most impressive cars of its time.

With an inline-eight engine and 4-speed manual transmission, it must have been a pleasure to drive in its best years, but by today's standards, it's an ugly, slow, and unsafe car.

DMC DeLorean

This thing still looks sick in 2022, imagine walking to prom in one of these in the 1980s. The stainless steel panels, straight lines and wedge shape of this car made it too modern for its time.

9,000 of them were produced before financial and legal problems led to the closure of the DeLorean Motor Company in 1982. The car was immortalized in the sci-fi thriller Back to the Future. Yes, it was strange - but cool!

Red cord convertible

This car is the spiritual ancestor of the Plymouth Prowler. You can either love him to the point that you're selling your house to get him, or you're disgusted even looking at him.

The Red Cord came with hidden headlights, a supercharged V8 engine, chrome wheels and all the great stuff BUT it was front wheel drive.

Mercedes Benz 300 SL

The SL or Super Light is one of the most sought after cars of all time and I know I'm going to get a lot of hate for including this classic on this list.

But if you forget for a second that this is an expensive 300 SL, you'll agree that it's actually quite an odd design. I mean swing doors just don't fit a '50s Mercedes!

Leith Helica

Part of the reason life expectancy was 50 in the 1920s was because these things were allowed. It was designed by the French biplane designer Marcel Leya with the idea that the transmission and clutch were unnecessary complications.

Powered by an 18-horsepower 1000cc Harley Davidson Twin, this front amputee death machine was not the safest car to travel. And by the way, I don't know why it's considered a car at all.