China’s Automotive Development from start to now

[UsmanAnsari]

This is the first part of a six part series that will take you on a journey through the six decades of Chinese automotive history in modern China. People think of China’s automotive history as starting in the late 90′s or early 00′s, in fact China has had cars for pretty much the same length of time as the USA. The first car to be imported in China was a German built Duryen model, and was brought to China in 1886 to please the Empress Dowager, although the car had to be modified to fit the cultural habits of the day before it was fit for an Empress. Even more scary is the fact that man selected to be her driver had no driving experience, it is a little wonder that the Empress did not die on its maiden trip, thankfully she lived to die from acute arsenic poisoning a few years later.

The 50′s

Dongfeng Liberation CA10

In the 1950′s China was going through a mini economic boom after multiple wars had destroyed infrastructure across the land, there was a demand for trucks but most of the trucks in China at the time came from their Superpower backs, the Soviets, and also the Americans who supplied the Nationalist party but they had to leave their trucks behind when they fled to Taiwan. The first Chinese truck, the Liberation (Jiefang) CA10, came down the production line on 13th July 1956 and was branded as a Dongfeng, although at that time Dongfeng was merely a brand that First Automobile Works owned, Dongfeng as know it was originally Second Auto Works.

The truck became the Chinese work horse throughout the 50′s and 60′s, certain variants can still be seen running around China’s neighbor, North Korea.

Jin Gang Shan



Jin Gang Shan

Jin Gang Shan maybe an area of Beijing, but it was also the first sedan that Beijing Auto Works produced. It came down the production line on 20th June in 1958 at Beijing’s first automotive products plant, and as soon as it was produced Beijing Auto Works changed their name to BAW.

The Jin Gang Shan sedan was reportedly based on the original VW Beetle in a bid to make it usable within Beijing’s then narrow Hu Tong’s and to get rid of the popular three wheeled motorbikes that were popular at the time. The Jin Gang Shan was powered by a 1.2L 4 cylinder engine, and also rear wheel drive. There are no reports of Hu Tong Drifting at the time, although a great name for a movie was born.

Dongfeng-CA71



Dongfeng CA71 Sedan

The Dongfeng CA71 was arguably China’s first luxury sedan and easily the rarest due FAW only producing 30 of the units. The engine was quite unusual in displacement, a 1.9L unit was used. The reasons for a small production run are not entirely clear, but it is probably due to the Great Leap Forward being in full swing and not wanting to be a waster of steel at a time when Mao was trying to boost China’s output to match the UK’s, FAW were probably not in the mood to waste materials on a luxury sedan.

Shanghai Auto’s Phoenix



SAIC's Phoenix

The Phoenix was the first car to come out of Shanghai Automotive Decoration factory, which we now know as the modern day automotive monster of SAIC. The first production cars came down on 28th September 1958 and owed its exterior styling to the American Plymouth Savoy, the engine was a 4 cylinder unit that Shanghai Auto copied from the Soviet Union’s Gaz M20 Victory engine.

Bureau leaders were able to drive the Volga M21 in China during the late 50′s, but with some help from Ford the M21 was put into production in China. Thanks to its relatively high chassis, stable suspension system and powerful engine the M21 became a popular car in China. In 1958 Shou Qi bought the rights to the M21 model. The Chinese government purchased 500 Volga’s in 1958 from the Soviet Union for use as VIP cars, but the use of these models was limited to bureau chiefs and higher.

Red Flag born:

HongQi CA72 - Chinese Luxury

In 1959, Chairman Mao was rather unimpressed with all of the Russian cars riding Chinese roads, and ordered FAW to get started on a Chinese luxury car for use by bureau leaders and VIP’s, the result was the first Hong Qi (Red Flag) model which was known as the CA72 and was used solely by the Communist Party’s Central Committee, only 202 of these particular models were put into production, and very few remain to this day.

source: Culture | China’s Automotive Development from start to now | China Car Times

[UsmanAnsari]

In our previous article we focused on the 1950′s of Chinese automotive, whilst other countries were quickly building their own national cars such as the original Mini and original Beetle, the Chinese government was focused on getting its people mobile on two wheels and peddle power. The 50′s saw small scale production of vehicles for government users, but the 60′s saw a slight increase in the number of cars produced and also the introduction of the game changing BJ212 Jeep.

Shanghai SH760

Shanghai SH760

In the 50′s the original SAIC Phoenix model was produced, but by the 60′s the Phoenix brand was killed off and became the Shanghai brand instead. The Shanghai SH760 was produced in February 1964 and had a production figure of 5000 units per year, engine power was a 2.2 six cylinder engine, more impressive was the production run – the SH760 was produced until November 1991 and only went out of production because VW introduced the Santana sedan into China, perhaps if VW never introduced the Santana then the SH760 would still be in production.

Jiefang CA140

Jiefang CA140

Another truck, and an update of the Dongfeng CA10 from the 50′s. In 1964 FAW produced the CA140 concept car and was the first time that China had independently developed its own pick up truck that wasn’t based on Soviet tech.

Hong Qi 770

HongQi 770

The Hong Qi 770 was special for several reasons, the biggest being its three rows of seats for bureau leaders and VIP’s. The 770 measured in at 5.6 meters long and had a monsterous 5.6L V8 engine under the hood and also a hydraulic automatic gearbox, the 770 was introduced in 1966 and was mostly used by the foreign office and central committee leaders.

Beijing BJ212

Beijing BJ212- the people's hero

The Beijing BJ212 SUV was China’s first self developed SUV and became a great work horse within China and within China’s sphere of Communist influence. The BJ series of light jeeps is worthy of a post of its own, but we’re going to try and summarise this one in a single post. During the 50′s, China had no way to develop its own SUV’s and relied on American Willy’s Jeeps that were left overs from the Second World War and also Soviet offerings in the form of the Gaz69 which formed the basis for the BJ212.

During the 60′s, the relationship between the two Communist giants of China and the Soviet Union took a turn for the worse with small border wars and pointless skirmishes over river islands sparking out between the two nations. The Chinese government decided it was no longer proper to use the Gaz 69 jeeps and the World War Two Willy’s jeeps were rather tired by this point, the Chinese central committee declared that Beijing Auto should focus on building a light weight SUV to fill the army’s demand. By 1st January 1961 the Department of Defense okay’d Beijing Auto’s plans for the BJ210, by June 1961 the first prototype had been produced but due to the army not being entirely happy with what they were being offered, two rounds of big changes were instigated.

At the time, BAW were expanding all the time but demand for the BJ212 within China was insatiable, other factories around China were brought online, production of the BJ212 ran from the 70′s to the 90′s, the 212 later developed into the more modern 2020, which ultimately became the Gladiator which is still on sale today.

During the 60′s, the Hong Qi sedans were for central committee members, the Shanghai branded sedans were for county level cadres, but what would mid level leaders ride around in? At the time, plans were afoot for a mid level sedan but during to political issues at the time sedans were thought of as a leftist’s capitalists cars, also a major problem was that production of sedans was limited at the time, so the BJ212 became the perfect vehicle for the mid level leader, it became so good in fact that Chairman Mao used a cabriolet version to inspect the troops in August 1966.

On 30th January 1988, Beijing Auto had a party to celebrate the 500,000th BJ212 coming down the line.

The political turmoil of the 1960′s severely limited automotive development where automakers were afraid to launch new cars or over produce vehicles for fear of being criticized for being capitalist roadsters or other trivial issues that ended up becoming life and death situations at the hands of the Red Guard, who ultimately were in control of the country during the mid 60′s to the early 70′s when the Cultural Revolution was in full swing. Stay tuned for our third part on the 70′s, which should be online later this week.

Culture | The Chinese car industry in the 60′s | China Car Times