This car almost has a 1940s movie starlet glamour photo look to it. The photos are a bit hazy and fuzzy, but the starlet – in this case, the Alpine White 1977 AMC Hornet D/L sedan under that weird effect – is looking fine overall. The seller has this Hornet sedan listed here on eBay in Orange, California, there is no reserve, and the bid is at $3,500 so far.
This isn’t a car that causes sleepless nights or marital strife, as in arguing your point as to why you just have to own this car. Although I’m guessing there are many people who would love to own it, four doors or not, six-cylinder or not, automatic transmission or not. AMC made the Hornet from 1969 for the 1970 model year until the end of 1977, and after that, the fancier but similar Concord took over.
That right rear door looks a little off, and I don’t know if it’s just open a bit (they did take the back seat photo from that side), or if it has something to do with this car being sold by a towing and salvage company. I’m not speculating, just stating a fact. Another fact is that the seller mentions that portions of this car have had some exterior paintwork over its lifetime. Here’s what the trunk compartment looks like, with some white overspray on the cracking gasket. Here’s a 1977 AMC brochure. The Hornet shows up on pages 6 and 7.
The very cool plaid “Veracruz Fabric” seats look good, or what we can see of them. The washed-out photos are a bummer, but there are a few close-up photos, and it looks really nice inside. The back seat looks good, or what we can see of it. It was a vertical photo for some reason, but the plaid seat fabric looks like new. This fabric was available on the D/L trim Hornet, shown on page 11 of that brochure.
The 1940s glamour engine photo shows a 258-cu.in. OHV inline-six, which looks nicer than I expected. It would have been rated at 109 horsepower and 194 lb-ft of torque from the factory, at least for California cars, which I’m assuming this is. Power is sent through a Chrysler-sourced TorqueFlite three-speed column-shifted automatic to the rear wheels, and they say it runs great, and it has factory power steering and air conditioning. It’s funny, although with gas being so expensive, not ha-ha funny, that this small car that most of us think of as an economy car gets fewer MPG than your new pickup. Of course, this car isn’t going to sell for $65,000 either, so there’s that. Speaking of that, how much would you pay for this Hornet?
Question for the AMC crowd – can a 258 be ‘woken up’ like the Chrysler Leaning Tower of Power can?
My only foray (Javelin SST) had a 343 and it was a decent small block.
Like any internal combustion engine, more air in and more exhaust out. The Jeep crowd have been hopping up these engines for years.
https://cliffordperformance.net/store/ols/categories/jeep-25840
Never have I ever thought of using “Glamorous” & “1977 Hornet”
in the same sentence.
That is funny!
It is interesting though, and probably the only one with those options. The hyundai excel of its time.
To Fahrv: Not sure why anyone would want to modify an AMC 6 cylinder, I don’t recall anyone that’s done so. It was just fine the way it was. I remember, Milwaukee had these white 4 door Hornets for their municipal use. Visiting city nurses, street crew bosses, trash collection foremen, all used white 4 door Hornets, with one big difference. They never had A/C. Not mentioned, the Hornet was the most successful AMC car, with Gremlin, Eagles, Concord and Sportabout, it sold more cars than any other AMC. Close to 1.3 million cars for all Hornet based makes, and that kept bread on the tables for thousands of Wisconsonites. They were great cars.