1986 AMC Eagle - Off-Road in a Vintage 4WD Wagon | AutoMoments

It was a different time Ronald Reagan was in the White House the A team was on TV a small company in Kenosha Wisconsin was building one of the most American cars ever made, fasten your seatbelts because we are going back in time. I apologize in advance. for muscle car owners, but this is the most American car after all, you can't compete with a name like American Motors Eagle, it's patriotic, it's tough and it's four wheel drive, just like GI Joe, it's a true American hero of late. 1970s AMC hit a rough patch financially and lacked the money to design some much-needed new cars.

Roy Lund, a clever engineer in the company's Jeep division, had tested the possibility of adding four-wheel drive to his existing cars. This economic proposal would give AMC a new product that GM Ford and Chrysler did not offer, management demonstrated their proposal and

eagle

s began flying from the American Motors factory in Wisconsin for the 1980 model year. The pickup truck was the body style Most popular in this

1986

model, it matches the rest of its family with quad headlights. and AMC's signature egg-crate grille and chrome door handles With several inches of lift over the AMC Concord on which it's based, the Eagle has a strong, aggressive stance that exaggerates its size rather than spending precious funds on redesign the body.

American Motors used plastic widened fenders to fill gaps caused by the increase in ride height unlike the exterior, the interior clearly shows compact car routes, adults will find rear seat room adequate , but the ungenerous space up front is satisfactory, although the windscreen seems oddly closed compared to modern cab-forward designs. There's something comforting about old cars with richly colored plush carpets, although the red seems to clash with a wood trim to prove its off-

road

cred. We took this truck up the side of a small mountain. AMC's ego is not a Jeep it doesn't have. It has a low-speed transfer case and doesn't have the kind of ground clearance that a Wrangler or Cherokee would have, but there hasn't been a single obstacle today that it couldn't tackle every puddle, every rock, every slushy mud.

Neglected area we've been through, this brave little car has conquered it, even though it was far from the Baja 1000. I was very impressed. The biggest bumps made the vehicle shake like a bowl of Jell-O, but not once did it get stuck, the Eagles' skill comes through. In cars, the select transmission system is transferred through a viscous coupling that consists of a set of plates surrounded by silicone fluid. When a wheel loses traction and begins to rotate, the difference in speed causes the silicone to resist, which which forces all the plates to rotate together, therefore instead of sending power down the path of least resistance the viscous coupling forces the front and rear to cooperate with the capabilities of an SUV, but the drivability of an Eagles car gave owners the best of both worlds we came down the mountain and hosed down the Eagle before crashing The streets here select Drive continued to impress, we've been driving all day with four wheel drive engaged and There's been no hammering, banging, squeaking, squawking, all that and look, that's how easy it is, I just took us out. a four wheel drive right there, no locking hubs, no shifting, none of that kind of nonsense, really the Eagle is a fantastic vehicle for that reason alone, the viscous coupling allows you to use the system on dry pavement without damage the car, which honestly is where most people drove these engines to power all of this is AMC's seven main bearing inline six-cylinder engine with its 4.2-liter carbureted engine that produces a meager 112 horsepower of strength.

This engine came standard in

1986

, although several previous years offered a four-cylinder for those who wanted even less power. Mated to a Chrysler-sourced three-speed automatic transmission, the Eagle will take you almost anywhere, but it won't hurt you. Every hero has his Achilles heel and the Eagle was his age. Its performance was sufficient when the car debuted in 1980, but as the horsepower and fuel economy of other cars began to climb, the Eagle looked decidedly dated next to the V6 'Sand fuel-injected four-speed automatic. like the Detroit in Japan, plus its basic styling came from the 1978 Concorde, which came from the 1970 Hornet, which even AMC's talented design staff couldn't hide while everyone and their mother flocked to buy a Ford Taurus.

It seems ironic that a car with the world's most advanced four-wheel drive system would have such an outdated body and drivetrain, but as Ken Burns likes to remind us heroes. They're always full of contradictions, but the AMC Eagle isn't a person, it's a car, and the buying public is relentless, adding to the Eagles' growing list of contradictions. its transfer case comes from England. This car was actually built in Canada. Major upgrades could have saved the Eagle, but American Motors' finances were tight and resources were directed toward other products. Finally, in 1987, Chrysler purchased American Motors Corporation and production of the Eagle continued only long enough to exhaust the remaining parts inventory, which was not a heroic end in 1980.

Roy Lund presented a white paper to the Society of Automotive Engineers , where he said it was evident that many consumers coming from the two-wheel drive segments were purchasing four-wheel drive vehicles for the safety they offered for on-

road

driving, although the only vehicles available were off-road accented ones. road use, this out-of-context purchase, particularly in large volumes, raised the question of whether there was a need for a new type of vehicle. This line of reasoning, along with the need for more fuel-efficient vehicles, led to the Eagle replacing the exhaust. CRV or Crosstrek and you realize it predicted the future 35 years ago for two decades.

Americans gobbled up the Tahoe and Grand Cherokee explorers only to discover that most of us don't need a hardcore off-roader, all we want is a car with a little extra ground clearance and all-wheel drive as the crossover craze grows utilitarians, we've seen a resurgence of familiar ideas down to plastic fender styles, maybe AMC was really onto something, in the end the Society of Automotive Engineers gave an award to Roy Lund. Because of his work, all heroes leave a legacy. Many cars outsold the Eagle, but few have survived. I'm impressed with how he blazed a trail both figuratively and literally.

In fact, he is a true American hero. We would like to thank Ronnie Schreiber from cars. in-depth communication for providing some of the images and information used in this video, if you have a cool car you would like to see in a video, send us an email and don't forget to visit our blog and follow us on Facebook. oh you