1970s Sports and Grand Tourers

The Seventies is an interesting era for the car especially the more expensive kind which I tend to feature in this blog. The sixities where a golden age for the Grand Tourer, opening with the Jaguar E Type and closing with the Ferrari Daytona, but the Seventies brought numerous changes for these types of cars not always for the better. Tougher Safety  requirements brought changes in requirements for car styling (usually not for the better), and the oil crises which blighted much of the seventies drove away many customers and drove manufacturers to the brink and beyond of bankruptcy.

The other key change which had started in the sixties but really took hold in the seventies was the mid engine. Ferrari finally put the 12 cylinder horse behind the cart  in a bid to catch up with the trend setting Miura of the sixties, Maserati and upstart De Tomaso followed suit.

So the criteria for the list; all of the cars in this list were launched in the Seventies and also in my opinion were at their zenith in seventies too. Many cars notably the Porsche 928 and 6 series BMW were launched in the late 1970's but were not developed into their definitive models well into the 1980's.

So without further ado here is my list of favourite Seventies Sports and Grand Tourers starting with possibly a surprise choice from the horror story that was British Leyland.

10. Triumph Stag.

Launched in 1970 the Stag was BL's attempt to produce a rival to the Mercedes SL.  Powered by an all new V8 engine and boasting stylish Italian styling by Michelotti that featured a rollover bar arrangement to avoid the possible (but never implemented) ban on full convertibles in the US. The trouble was the new V8 lacked development and suffered from a numerous issues usually surrounding overheating. This was doubly annoying as BL already had a perfectly good V8 from sister company Rover that would have provided the perfect powerplant for this GT. Perhaps the Stag doesn't really deserve a place on this list but it also happens to the first ever convertible I rode in with the top down and that is why it is here.

9. Plymouth Barracuda

An American Muscle car in amongst all this European Exotica surely some mistake. Well I must admit the American Muscle cars of the late sixties and early seventies do hold some weird fascination, probably as a result of all the car chases movies they have featured in. My favourite is the Plymouth Barracuda particularly in a vivid shade of purple. The Barracuda has a slghtly neater design than it's sister E body car the Dodge Challenger, in fact the latest Dodge Challenger is said to ape the style of the Cuda more than the original challenger. Living in the UK I can never see myself buying one but if I ever moved to the States.....

8 Lamborghini Countach LP400 Periscopica

No list of seventies sports and Grand touring cars would be complete without the mention of the Countach. While often associated with the wings and spoilers excess of the eighties as shown in the photo at the top of the blog, I prefer the cleaner early cars with the so called periscopica rood with the slot for the rear view mirror.  Rather like the Miura that preceded it the interior is very cramped and I cannot fit in comfortably enough to actually drive it any appreciable distance.

7. Mercedes SL / SLC (R107)

1971 saw the arrival of the longest running Mercedes of all the R107 series SL. A star of television shows Hart to Hart and Dallas, the SL became the default convertible choice throughout the seventies and eighties. Going with my criteria there is is strong argument to say the 500SL (larger engined 560SL in the States) are the ones to have, but in the late seventies Mercedes decided to make the longer and slightly less attractive 450SLC into a rally car. To do this a lighter and more powerful homologation 450SLC 5.0 (sometimes known as a 500SLC) was prepared and as a result one of the coolest but most incongruous rally cars of all time was born. Check out the You Tube video of one of these beasts in historic rally action today.

6. De Tomaso Pantera

Initially the joint effort of the De Tomaso and Ford to give Lincoln Mercury dealers a Luxury sports car to out do the Corvette. The car used the same European Style mixed with American muscle of many of the Etceterinis this time featuring a mid mounted Ford 351 V8. The car suffered from lack of development and poor build quality (Elvis Presley famously shot his when it wouldn't start), Ford lost interest after a few years and a fuel crisis leaving De Tomaso to go it alone. Like the Countach the Pantera sprouted wings and increasingly wide wheel arches to accomodate forever wider wheels,  so early examples are the best .

5. Porsche 911 Turbo (930)

I thought long and hard about including the 911 Turbo as it is really a development of the sixties 911 rather than a separate model. However the car that brought Turbo charging to the supercar world can't be ignored. Packing 260bhp the Turbo was amongst the fastest cars of its day which seems strange today as that's about the same power as a basic Boxster today. The Boxster is probably 100 times easier to drive to as the spiky power delivery of the turbo would easily catch the unwary giving the car it's scary reputation.

4. Ferrari 512 Berlinetta Boxer

Beautiful, exotic the Boxer was Ferrari's first attempt at a mid engined 12cylinder supercar. The Boxer is slightly erroneously named as the the flat 12 engine does not feature a so called boxer firing sequence. and is in reality a 180 degree V12. The flat 12 engine also created some packaging issues as Ferrari ended up fitting the engine above the gearbox resulting in a relatively high centre of gravity and tricky on the limit handling (but then a supercar was never meant to be easy to drive). The 2nd Generation 512BB is reckoned to be the best as the engine is more flexible than the peaky 365BB and more powerful than the later injected cars. Many people wonder why the Boxer is relatively undervalued compared to the Daytona, but I always contend that it  is the F40 that keeps the values of Boxers down. While the Daytona is an almost practical touring car the Boxer is much more of a Sunday morning blast machine, and for that the newer F40 delivers a bigger hit of adrenalin.

3 Citroen SM

The French have a long history in luxury Grand Routiers from the likes of Delage, Delahaye and Facel Vega. Arguably the last of these was the Citroen SM. A very atypical Grand Tourer, the SM featured a Maserati V6 Engine (also seen in the Merak), front wheel drive and a flowing aerodynamic body which looked like nothing else on the market (or anything since for that matter). Fiendishly complicated the SM utilised the full spectrum of the Citroen's hydraulics which ensured it also drove like no other car .  The picture is of the super rare Chapron Opera version. one of only eight made .

2. Maserati Bora

Along with the SM the brief ownership of Maserati by Citroen spawned two Maserati Supercars, the aforementioned Merak and the rather lovely Bora.  Powered by the familiar 4.7 (and 4.9) litre Maserati V8, the Bora was a softer and more usable supercar than the hardcore Boxer and Countach. It is probably the only larger engined mid engined supercar of this era that you might actually want to go touring in


The Bora also has a special place in my life as a silver example with a large Maserati Trident on the bonnet, was one of my first and favourite Matchbox cars when I was a child. One day maybe the real version.

1. Ferrari 308

The 308 was a game changer for Ferrari. The first cheaper (although not exactly cheap) model designed to appeal to a wider audience and be badged as a Ferrari.  It also went on to be build in larger numbers than any Ferrari that went before it.  Easily my favourite car of the seventies the problem for this was which particular version to choose. While generally unloved when new the 308GT4 2+2 was panned when new for its slightly frumpy Bertone styling. In actual fact the GT4's styling has aged well but as this list is about cars that were their definitive model in the seventies and the best and most desirable 308 has to be the early  glass fibre bodied GTB. As well as the beautiful Fioravanti (for Pininfarina) designed body the early GTB's featured a dry sump engine (retain on later european steel bodied GTB's)  sucking fuel t hrough 4 Weber carburettors. The GTB also has something of a connoisseurs appeal over the more populous GTS targa topped cars. I have recently looked at a slightly later steel bodied GTB although I couldn;'t quite conclude the deal.  Maybe one day in the future.