Is it a mussel car, or a GT. I think much more a GT. Have options on engines and the gear box, even have them put in in the US.
Have the Jensen Interceptor be a big seller in the USA.
- Thread starter Fuzzy Dunlop
- Start date
The primary problem with the Jensen Interceptor was price and production capacity, the latter a problem that could be worked around but the former is a little tricky. Big Chrysler V8s and automatic transmissions aren't hard to get or expensive, but everything else in the car gets a little more pricey, particularly if you maintain Jensen's production methods.
A more realistic ask for the Interceptor would probably be becoming one of the best GT cars of the decade in the world, and that is entirely doable, though as everyone says the British electrics are going to be an issue and so is fuel efficiency. Perhaps it using a smaller Chrysler V8 tuned up for more power to improve girl efficiency and having high-quality electrical components for better reliability would fix those. Aim for making and selling ~3000 a year instead of ~300 and you'll be off to a good start.
A more realistic ask for the Interceptor would probably be becoming one of the best GT cars of the decade in the world, and that is entirely doable, though as everyone says the British electrics are going to be an issue and so is fuel efficiency. Perhaps it using a smaller Chrysler V8 tuned up for more power to improve girl efficiency and having high-quality electrical components for better reliability would fix those. Aim for making and selling ~3000 a year instead of ~300 and you'll be off to a good start.
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To try and tie those together...
Chrysler bought the Rootes Group at around the time that Jensen introduced the Interceptor. What if it bought Jensen Motors Limited in the middle of the 1960s too?
Chrysler then builds the whole car in the USA as the Chrysler Interceptor for sale in North America instead of @AdA's suggestion that the Company import Jensen built bodies. Meanwhile, one of the Rootes factories could have built Interceptors for sale in the rest of the World.
NB: The following suggestion is not 100% serious...
Linwood and Ryton mass produce Interceptors instead of the Imp, Arrow and Avenger. The method in that madness was that Rootes could only produce about 300,000 units a year which wasn't close to the then minimum efficient scale of 1 million units and it decided to take the firm up market instead of creating Chrysler Europe by merging Rootes with Barreiros and SIMCA.
Scotland's 1978 World Cup Squad would have driven Jensen Interceptors instead of Hillman Avengers in that television commercial.
Spain had very high tariffs on imported cars so it's very likely that Barrieros would build Interceptors too, possibly instead of the Dodge Dart and Dodge 3700.
IOTL Michel Tanguy (Jacques Santi) drove a Renault Alpine and Ford Capri in Les chevaliers du ciel. ITTL he might have driven a SIMCA built Interceptor instead. Which, I think @groundhogday666 will appreciate, if nobody else does.
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From Autocar magazine
The car will be a four-seat GT, like the original version. It will be based on an all-new aluminium chassis and handcrafted aluminium body. After the Interceptor has been revealed to the public in late 2012, deliveries to customers will begin in 2014.
@NOMISYRRUC You got a bunch of good ideas there, though if you have the Interceptor made in America and as a premium product I'd recommend the use of a variety of Chrysler engines, starting at the smaller 340-cubic-inch V8 and moving all the way up to the mighty Chrysler 426 Hemi, and offer New Process Gear manual transmissions to go behind the massive engines as well as the TorqueFlite automatics. The goal would be rivalling the Chevrolet Corvette, which is an ambitious but doable benchmark. Owing to the price of the car, the Grand Touring car ambitions and the styling, I think I'd still call it a Jensen Interceptor in North America, but bought from and serviced by Chrysler dealers, same as the DeTomaso Pantera was. For the European markets I'd keep the 440 as an optional engine choice but go with the 340 as the base engine as the 440 or Hemi would be too fuel thirsty for European fuel prices, but both sides get the same transmission choices and all cars are equipped with the anti-lock-equipped disc brakes from the Jensen FF. European cars would get a Jensen-tuned version of the 340 in later years, using dual four-barrel carburetors (fuel injection is probably too costly at this point) while the 440 would be available as well.
American cars would need the higher specifications - air conditioning and sunroofs would be wise to fit on most cars, and power steering is a must particularly on big-block cars - but if built well it would very much a fighting chance against its opposition of the time.
American cars would need the higher specifications - air conditioning and sunroofs would be wise to fit on most cars, and power steering is a must particularly on big-block cars - but if built well it would very much a fighting chance against its opposition of the time.
That's a much better reply than I expected.
According to Wikipaedia Chrysler had been making cars in Australia since the 1950s in the 1960s took over Rootes Australia as part of its purchase of the Rootes Group. Do you think that Interceptors built in the former Rootes Australia factory would do well enough to save it from closure in 1972?
I highly doubt it. The Interceptor is too pricey to be a big seller in a market the size of Australia. If you want to save the Chrysler plants in Australia the task would be the same one Leyland would be doing in the late 1960s and early 1970s, creating Australian-market cars that can break the Holden / Ford duopoly that dominated much of the Australian market at the time. You may be able to have Jensen Interceptors made there in small quantities if they have the production equipment (or perhaps from complete knockdown kits) but if you want to save Chrysler Australia you need to break the duopoly, which is challenging but possible.
The Interceptor's big play would be North America. Anywhere you can sell smaller numbers of Grand Touring cars will contribute of course, but making the car sell in much bigger numbers would likely mean sales success in the United States. Priced competitively with the Corvette and other GT cars of the time - especially the BMW 3.0 CS, Jaguar E-Type and Citroen SM - you've got a real shot at success.
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That makes more sense to me than OTL. Having a Jensen with a Chrysler V8 made (makes) very little sense to me. (No more than a 351 Ford in a Pantera.)
Effectively as a captive import, OTOH, does. It need not have Jensen-built bodies, just Chrysler Britain &/or U.S. (whoever signs off) use the Touring design & not f*ck with it to make it "more American".
I also agree with the proposal to go with a smaller V8; the 440 was a brute & an enormous gas-guzzler. (The joke for 440-powered police interceptors was, they could pass anything on the highway but a gas station.
) Go with a tuned 340, IMO; that could be turned back into the Darts, Dusters, & Valiants, & even PI Aspen/Volaré, especially as the Oil Shock happens.I agree with a lot of this, except the Hemi & 440. I'm seeing the Jensen as more GT than muscle car, so straight-line acceleration with the 426 or 440, & the heavy weight over the front axle, is detrimental. So is fuel cost. IMO, use the Interceptor to show what the 'vette could be, & put pressure on Chevy (GM) to improve the handling. (I don't see the C2 persisting, much as I like that idea.) The C3 had a rep for being a bit crude, compared to a European sports car; this might make the C3 more refined (& actually might help sales in Europe).
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I kid you not that a Leyland Interceptor made in Australia could IMO be viable if they got in early enough before the Oil Shock, simply just didn't do the P76 and like, had the rest of their production capacity geared to licensed non-anglo-designed tractors or something./waits to get smacked down by other Oz members.
Otherwise the simple answer to the Jensen Interceptor Question is European management, which is another thing entirely. How British was the Ford Cortina Mk3? is a good starting point.
Fuzzy Dunlop
Banned
Just watched 'Jay Leno's Garage' and he mentioned that point . . . "If only they built it in the states?"
Didn't know they sold the Interceptor in the US, Sinatra and Jack Nicholson were owners in the 70's.