Imagine my surprise when I disassembled the tailgate on my new 84 Custom Cruiser to fix the power window and discovered that this one is plastic!! OK maybe not plastic exactly but some sort of resin-injected, fiber reinforced material (RIM, or something similar). My surprise is that I have two other B-body wagon tailgates, one on the 86 Caprice and one I got from a wrecking yard and both are metal. I'm aware of Oldsmobile's experiments with alternate body materials, like aluminum hoods on the diesel cars, but I was not aware of the plastic body panels. The cool thing about this is that it really is lighter than the metal one and the dual-action tailgate hinge, which ALWAYS sags on the metal tailgates, is actually in great shape on this 195,000 mile car. Learned something new yesterday.

 

That is a very interesting piece of info. I would have never guessed. And everyone thought those plastic fenders on the Saturn were a first......

 

Had an 84 CC as well and yep the tailgate was fiberglass...noticed it when a spot started to splinter a bit...

 

Actually, I'm going to say Fiero, followed by the original "dustbuster" minivans like the first gen Silhouette. And of course, the fourth-gen F-body cars had plastic front fenders.

 

I remember hearing that MOPAR broke ground when they started using composite material on the tops of their Jeeps. I guess this would have been in the mid 80s on the CJ7s. I think I read an article about it in an Automotive Engineering magazine.

 

Actually, the best story I ever heard about "plastic" cars was about the original Corvette. Apparently no one had told the electrical types that fiberglass was an insulator, so the wire harnesses for the prototype cars was built assuming the body would act as ground as it does in a metal car. Needless to say, nothing in the electrical system worked.

 

Interesting info indeed, especially since it was good enough that you didn't detect it just from handling/opening/closing the tailgate.

Wasn't it like 1972 when GM pioneered some kind of a plastic/rubber/foam mix for the nose of it's GTOs? Just read an article about that, where it was saying this was groundbreaking because the nose section of the car could take a hit and within 24 hours return to it's original shape. As the body color was mixed into the plastic/rubber/foam stuff repainting wasn't an issue, nor was getting the paint to stick to the material, which had been an issue with plastics in the past. Hmmm, think it was in CarCraft or possibly HotRod magazine. Hafta go dig that out and see.

 

It is interesting that you mention that Paul. I remember seeing a 1969 Pontiac Bonneville with the composite nose you mentioned. Perhaps it was an earlier design because the paint on the car was great except for on the nose where it had all peeled off. Like you mentioned, I guess it was difficult to get the paint to stick to the composite material.

 

Actually, what I DID detect is that I didn't need to slam the tailgate to get it to close properly, the way I do on my 86 with the metal tailgate. Clearly the lighter plastic part doesn't cause the hinge to wear and sag.