You Just Might Need This 4×4 Pacer In Your Life


You Just Might Need This 4×4 Pacer In Your Life

The American Motors’ Pacer will, for better or worse, be one of the best-remembered cars in the company’s checkered past. Ungainly and overweight, it was the byproduct of a lot of things gone wrong, not least of which was the general direction of automotive design in the mid-to-late 1970s. Nevertheless, aside from Wayne’s World fans and derriere enthusiasts, few people would ever think a Pacer is cool. Except maybe this one on eBay, which has been converted into a 4×4 with GM axles and the four-speed transmission and transfer case from an International Scout!

4x4pacer_interior2

There are some cosmetic and mechanical issues by the seller’s own admission, but how can argue with the American flags embroidered in the seats and on the front-hinged hood? And why shouldn’t a car built in Kenosha by AMERICAN Motors then converted to a 4×4 wear American flags? This is one of the most patriotic cars in the world and that’s no joke.

4x4pacer_engine

The one engine bay photo is tough to decipher, but I think this might actually be a V8-powered Pacer with the 304 cubic-inch V8 instead of the standard six-cylinder options AMC had. Fun engine aside: The Pacer was originally designed around a lightweight Wankel rotary powerplant. As AMC had limited engineering resources to start a clean sheet engine design, they licensed a General Motors rotary engine design that was, shortly before Pacer production started, dropped entirely by GM. Left without an engine for the Pacer, AMC instead gave it the hefty straight-sixes and 304 V8 that bloated the Pacer to more than 3,000 pounds.

4x4pacer_rear2

Anyway, back to the matter at hand: The seller states that “Lots of things need redone,” but the car is complete and the interior is very clean for a 1976 example. So what say you? The right kind of Pacer or some kind of weird sacrilege on a collectable oddball?

Find this Pacer 4×4 on eBay right here.


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2 thoughts on “You Just Might Need This 4×4 Pacer In Your Life

  1. Chevy Hatin' Mad Geordie

    Why didn’t AMC build on of these?

    But it would have been eclipsed by a rotary Pacer especially one that had been turbocharged and doubled up to provide a 4-rotor unit!

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