Consumer Reports is considered a trusted resource regardless if you’re looking for the best dishwasher or for a good car for your family. Because of this, it’s a pretty big deal when Consumer Reports publishes a negative review, and in 1978, the magazine caused a bit of a headache for Chrysler. That year, Motor Trend nominated the Dodge Omni its Car Of The Year, but Consumer Reports was unwilling to accept it, and spent an entire article explaining why the Omni and its Plymouth Horizon sibling weren’t just undeserving of Motor Trend‘s award, but were actually “Not Acceptable.”
The automotive media wields more power than you might think. One negative article by a large enough publication can trigger alarms within an organization. Part of why manufacturers care so much about this coverage is that sometimes, all it takes is for one negative review from a major publication to ruin a model’s reputation. Sometimes, it doesn’t even matter if other publications wrote glowing reviews.
Perhaps the most infamous occurrence of this is when Consumer Reports, the magazine of Consumers Union of U.S., tested the 1988 Suzuki Samurai. As CNN reported in 1997, Suzuki accused the magazine of rigging its test results, which suggested that the Suzuki Samurai “rolls over too easily.” To keep it short, Suzuki sued Consumers Union, and the pair settled in 2004. Ultimately, Suzuki was vindicated somewhat as it was found out that the Samurai was no more rollover-prone than other SUVs. However, the damage was done, as Samurai sales plummeted by 70 percent after the article.
Another time when a car caught some heat after a Consumer Reports test was after the magazine published a review of the Dodge Omni that called into question why Motor Trend had nominated the small car as its Car Of The Year for 1978.
A New Era
This story takes us back to the 1970s, when dramatic downsizing was in vogue. Ford built the Pinto, Chevrolet built the Vega, and AMC had its Gremlin. As Hemmings writes, Chrysler was supposed to create its own domestic compact to battle its rivals, and started Project R-429 in 1969 to facilitate it. That car was due to arrive in 1971.
However, as the New York Times noted, the Chrysler subcompact never came. Part of the blame, the NYT reported, was on Chrysler President Lynn Townsend, who dismissed subcompacts. As the story reports, Townsend believed that one of the biggest threats against full-size cars was taxes on low fuel economy, but Townsend didn’t expect the full impact of those to hit until about 1980. In Townsend’s eyes, Chrysler had plenty of time to figure out just how many subcompacts it wanted to sell.
At the time, Chrysler had amassed a massive empire. It was under Townsend’s control that Chrysler spread far and wide, from one of my previous stories on Chrysler history:
In 1958, Chrysler decided to make its mark on the international stage by purchasing a 15 percent stake in French company Simca from Ford. In 1963, Chrysler put more money in, acquiring a total of 63 percent of Simca by buying shares from Fiat. That same year, Chrysler also took 35 percent of Spanish bus, truck, and car manufacturer Barreiros.
Chrysler’s buying spree included the purchase of Greece’s Farco in 1963 and an attempted purchase of an interest in Britain’s Leyland Motors in 1962. Chrysler didn’t get Leyland, but it did score a 30 percent share in Rootes Group (Hillman, Talbot, Sunbeam, and others) in 1964. By 1967, Chrysler’s European division was in full motion as the company purchased the remaining shares of Rootes. Farco, then renamed Chrysler Hellas S.A., ended production, but two years later Chrysler would take control of Barreiros.
In 1970, Rootes was renamed Chrysler UK Limited with Simca becoming Chrysler France. During the existence of Chrysler UK, storied British names such as Hillman, Humber, Singer, and Sunbeam saw their badges phased out and their vehicles called Chryslers. Between vehicles that were long in the tooth and general brand confusion, Chrysler’s European operations struggled to stay viable. In 1978, Chrysler decided to pull the plug, selling off the European division to Peugeot. Now under Peugeot control, some cars that were once branded as Chryslers, Hillmans, and Simcas were renamed to Talbot, a brand that at that time was dead.
As Chrysler figured out its plans for a domestic subcompact, it sold captive imports as a stopgap measure. These vehicles included the Dodge Colt, Hillman Avenger, and Plymouth Cricket, which were all rebadged versions of cars sold overseas. If you were wondering why Chrysler failed to make a domestic subcompact, Townsend made an interesting statement to Forbes in 1973:
“The subcompacts are just too small. The American people won’t climb into them. They have to give up too much in creature comfort. I think even a compact’s a little small. I would think that probably the most popular car size you’ll see 15 years from now will be like our intermediates today.”
Chrysler’s “World Car”
The Omni was a product of collaboration between Chrysler here in America and Chrysler in Europe. Chrysler enthusiast site Allpar has an article sourced from people involved in the making of the Omni. In that story, Allpar notes that in 1975, Chrysler Europe implemented a modernization program, which included the creation of three new platforms to create new models that could cover two-thirds of the European car market.
Chrysler, which had sent executives to Europe in 1974 to find a small car for America, was initially interested in the C6 platform, which would underpin the likes of the Chrysler Alpine and Simca 1308. Ultimately, Townsend rejected this vehicle, even though it would later win Europe’s Car of the Year award in 1976. Townsend would retire from Chrysler in 1975, and Chrysler moved forward with its plans to have a small car for America.
This time, America had set its sights on the C2 platform, which had been in development in 1974. The first sketches of the C2 labeled it as a short-wheelbase version of the award-winning C6. Clay models were made later that year, and development went full speed ahead on the car meant to replace the Hillman Avenger and the Simca 1100. Apparently, when the Americans saw the C2 in the clay, they had decided it was the car destined to win in the American small car market. The C2 became Chrysler’s “World Car.”
What’s fascinating about the C2’s development is that while the cars would be similar in appearance, the American version and the European version were actually very different.
Marc Honore, Director of Product Planning, gave this statement to Allpar:
It turned out that the C2 was a “World Car” in only sheet metal appearance. Unique USA powertrain, crash test, lighting, and bumper requirements changed many aspects of the European-designed vehicle. Then, European management, under the influence of a Sales/Manufacturing lobby, insisted on retaining the Simca 1100 torsion bar front suspension on the basis that this would save a bundle of investment money (an attractive argument in Detroit at the time) and assure for the new C2 the reputation of the Simca 1100 for comfort and surefootedness.
While this decision saved investment money, it also added a significant piece-cost and weight penalty to the C2, as well as some loss of front leg room because the torsion bar suspension required a higher floor pan than the originally planned McPherson strut suspension, which was retained in the American design. The relative heaviness and cost of the torsion bar setup was to penalize the European C2 throughout its life. I always felt that this was a bad decision.
Other sources of diversification arose from differing requirements for light switches, column controls, steering wheel, seat and door panel designs. The European and American cars looked similar but by the time we were through, I doubt if we had many common parts!
According to Motor Trend, Chrysler purchased 79 Volkswagen Rabbits for the design team to use and get ideas from. After all, the Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon would be Chrysler’s answer to the popular Rabbit.
The significant differences between the teams in America and Europe, from differences in paperwork to measuring systems, meant that the teams spent a lot of time hashing out many different details. The teams even had to figure out a part number scheme since France, the United Kingdom, and America all had different ways of doing part numbers.
The Crowd Goes Wild
The C2 platform would go on sale in the 1978 model year. Over in Europe, the team had done it again, and the Chrysler Horizon scored the Car of the Year award in 1978 in Europe. Over in America, the Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon, despite being very different under the skin, also impressed the American automotive press. Here’s what Car and Driver said:
The prototype cars we have driven did not offer a satisfactory basis for final ride judgments, but they did demonstrate exactly what Chrysler engineers are after. Extra-long wheel travel (6.6 inches in front, 7.7 inches in back, compared to 6.1 and 7.9 inches respectively in a Rabbit) is this car’s claim to fame, even though such an attribute is rare in American cars. The long travel theory of suspension design allows soft spring rates for absorbing little bumps, with less likelihood of bottoming out over big bumps. Body roll is managed by front and rear anti-sway bars. This is a typically European approach, but while VW or Fiat would finish the job with tight damping, Chrysler has chosen very low shock-absorber control. This lessens the influence of small bumps on comfort but also makes the car slow to settle after wavy pavement. On fast steering maneuvers, the Omni and Horizon react in a lazy fashion—they’re still zigging when you’re ready to zag. The idea here is not to make former VW owners feel at home, but rather former big-car owners, who might be ready for more efficient transportation.
They will be asked to bear few sacrifices. The options sheet is fat with goodies new to this size car. In spite of the engineers’ best recommendations, power steering is at the top of the extra-cost list. It’s not at all necessary from a functional standpoint, but the marketing types had no desire to cold turkey their power-assist addicts.
Inside, there has been no skimping—no exposed heaters, no bare metal panels, no rubber floor mats—and this should tell you the Omni and Horizon start out at import-deluxe levels of trim. How far you take them in the luxo-garnish-molding direction is limited primarily by your imagination. You can pick from two upgrades of interior and exterior trim, outside woodgrain, or even premium outside woodgrain. Vinyl bucket seats are standard, but you may choose from five other vinyl, or cloth and vinyl combinations in two different backrest designs. Cut-pile carpeting is standard with all interiors.
The Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon originally sported a 75 HP 1.7-liter four-cylinder engine sourced from Volkswagen with modifications from Chrysler. The American version of this engine has a longer stroke and slightly more displacement, plus a different intake manifold. The Omni also sports a Holley two-barrel carburetor as opposed to the Bosch fuel injection found in the VW equivalent of the engine.
The Omni also used a Volkswagen four-speed manual transaxle or a Chrysler three-speed automatic. Reportedly, the Volkswagen guts came because Chrysler initially didn’t have the capacity to build hundreds of thousands of engines for the Omni and Horizon. Chrysler would change this later on as these cars gained Chrysler K four-cylinder engines and a Chrysler manual. In terms of suspension, the Omni would sport trailing arms in the rear and MacPherson struts up front.
Motor Trend loved the Omni so much that the publication nominated the Omni as its 1978 Car Of The Year. Here was the magazine’s rationale:
Chrysler Corporation’s Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon were judged by the Motor Trend staff to be the outstanding passenger cars for 1978. The package-the first American-built production passenger car to use a transverse engine and front-wheel-drive-is powered by a Chrysler-engineered lean-burn version of a well-proven 4-cylinder powerplant that not only meets the established emission and fuel-economy requirements, but also preforms and handles on a par with imported counterparts. Simple and straightforward, the design is practical but far from austere, and available options include deluxe decor, air conditioning and automatic transmission- creature comforts and luxury accessories that the American car buyer desires in today’s motor vehicles.
The Omni and Horizon, while identical to each other in dimensions, powerplant and suspension system, will be featured as individual automobiles, representing the Dodge and Plymouth Divisions, respectively. They are fun cars to drive, have excellent rear passenger legroom and headroom, are quiet and have a sports-car feel that will satisfy the enthusiast and bring no complaints from those who like comfort.
Downsizing on a grand scale while preserving the required interior passenger and luggage space is the name of the game for passenger cars from this day forth, and the Omni/Horizon effectively meets this criteria. It is one of the new generation of cars that other American makers are going to be forced to imitate in view of energy conservation programs and air pollution standards. The launching of the Omni/Horizon is a great step forward in the production of cars of the future, for the future is now, and Chrysler has met its challenge with the Omni/Horizon. We congratulate them for a job well done.
The platform would go on to underpin the Omni 024 and Dodge Charger coupes, the Dodge Rampage and Plymouth Scamp utes, plus the spicy Omni GLH and Omni GLH-S hot hatches. The 1986 Shelby Omni GLH-S would still be a relatively quick car today with its 175 HP and 6.5 second sprint to 60 mph.
Consumer Reports Disagrees
Not everything went smoothly, however. Consumer Reports tested the Omni in 1978, and unlike the car buff mags, it wasn’t nearly as complimentary.
In the July 1978 issue of Consumer Reports, the magazine came out swinging. The issue’s cover notes that the Omni was awarded as Car Of The Year, but puts a question mark at the end before following it up with “Not Acceptable” in all caps. The article itself pulled no punches. Even though the article was a shootout between four hatches, the title of the article was “Chrysler’s Big Mistake” with a subheadline of “The Dodge Omni/Plymouth Horizon is judged Not Acceptable.”
This is honestly amazing because, again, this is supposed to be a shootout of the Omni versus the Chevy Chevette, Toyota Corona, and Datsun 510. But the article is centered around the Omni, or specifically, how much the magazine thought the Omni and Horizon sucked. Here’s the opening salvo:
Chrysler Corp.’s new subcompact—the Dodge Omni and identical Plymouth Horizon—is the most unfortunate car of the year. From the outside, it looks very much like the high-rated VW Rabbit, the Ford Fiesta, the Honda Accord, and the other boxy, relatively roomy subcompacts whose design it copies. Like many recent subcompacts, it has front-wheel drive, an arrangement that can be advantageous when well-designed. It has a peppy little engine made by Volkswagen. And its price looks good compared with the inflated prices of imported cars.
However, the Omni/ Horizon gave evidence of poor design. Because it behaved in an unstable manner in the handling tests described in the box on the facing page, our auto testers judged it Not Acceptable. Our test results confirm that a prudent buyer should approach any new model line with caution. Since it went into production, late last fall, the Omni/ Horizon has been recalled repeatedly to check for safety-related defects unrelated to the unstable handling revealed in our tests. Presumably, the problems for which the car has been recalled can be fixed. But the handling problems we found may be much more difficult for Chrysler to solve.
The story continues by talking about how the publication got three Omnis, and of the trio, two of them were riddled with defects. The article then takes a swipe at Motor Trend:
The many failings we discovered in the Omni/ Horizon make us wonder how Motor Trend, a magazine for auto buffs, decided to pick that model for its “Car of the Year” award—a selection made before a single Omni or Horizon had been sold by a dealer. News of the award ran in Motor Trend’s February issue, cheek-by-jowl with paid advertising from Champion spark plugs and General Tire congratulating Chrysler for its achievement and, in Champion’s case, congratulating itself for selling parts to Chrysler. Chrysler has since spent a pretty penny publicizing the award and, incidentally, publicizing Motor Trend. (“Nobody can buy this award,” says Robert E. Brown, Motor Trend’s publisher. Brown describes the “Car of the Year” award as a “good healthy promotion.” )
Most years, the commercial back-scratching that sometimes passes for journalism, even for product-testing, can be ignored; it’s just a drop in the ocean of flackery. But sometimes, as this year, those who take such flackery seriously risk paying with more than their dollars.
Perhaps one could understand—if not justify—such an award if the design of the Omni/ Horizon had broken new ground. But Chrysler has merely followed what has become the standard subcompact recipe. That recipe has worked very nicely for the Rabbit, the Fiesta, the Accord, and other models.
The comparison then kicks off. To the Dodge Omni’s credit, it scored 30.9 mpg, besting everything in the comparison. Second place was the Chevette with 30 mpg. The main Omni test car also had power steering, which none of the other three cars in the comparison had. But things basically immediately fall apart for the Omni on the same page, in a blocked section that says “The Tests That The Omni/Horizon Flunked.” In this area, Consumer Reports explains that in 1974, it adopted a test where the publication’s drivers would pilot a vehicle at 50 mph on a track and then tug the vehicle’s steering wheel abruptly while leaving their foot on the throttle. The tester will then let go of the steering wheel and see how much drama ensues. The article said that, at that time, most cars would usually straighten out by themselves with limited swinging, and that the cars often returned to close to being on course.
The Test
So, naturally, the magazine tried the same test with the Omni. Here’s how that went:
When we performed that maneuver with our Omni and our two Horizons, the results were unsettling—and often frightening. After we released the wheel in each of those three cars, the car veered from side to side; sometimes each swing was wider and more violent than the one before. The technical term for such behavior is “oscillatory instability.” The driver had to grab the wheel quickly and firmly and make skillful steering corrections to bring the car under control. Power steering made the instability worse. We check-tested a car with heavyduty suspension; it did no better than our three Cars.
Motorists do not perform such maneuvers in normal driving (and we urge you not to try it out of curiosity). But the way a car behaves in this “free control stability test” can point to problems in the car’s basic design. No car on which we’ve performed this test has behaved as poorly as the Omni/Horizon. (Otherwise, normal driving wasn’t unusual.)
That first indication of instability was confirmed during our handling tests at the track. In an avoidance-maneuver test, we run the car along a path that includes an abrupt swerve—like the swerve one might make to avoid a child darting from the sidewalk—and an equally abrupt swerve back to the original lane. The path is outlined with rubber cones. We run each car through the course many times, gradually increasing speed until the car can no longer go through the course without knocking over an} cones. After the final swerve in that test, the Omni/Horizon cars would veer from side to side in much the same way as they did in our free-control test. Such behavior made the cars hard to control. In our other track tests, the cars tended to swing out their rear ends sharply when we cornered hard. If the driver of an Omni or a Horizon should have to make an abrupt evasive maneuver at expressway speeds, we believe, keeping the car under control could require more driving skill and experience in high-speed emergency maneuvers than one can reasonably expect of nonprofessional drivers. We have therefore rated the Omni/Horizon Not Acceptable.
The paragraphs I quoted above became a huge headache for Chrysler. It became such a big deal that national news publications like Time Magazine covered it. Front-wheel-drive economy cars were still somewhat novel in America, and reports of these cars potentially being hazardous were news.
Time talked about the test that I noted above, and then included the bit from the now-infamous test that a typical driver might not be skilled enough to handle the Omni in an emergency. Worse was the fact that the 1978 Dodge Omni test was the first time Consumer Reports had declared a car “Not Acceptable” since its test of the AMC Ambassador in 1968.
Chrysler was quick to respond to the test. It gathered a gaggle of journalists and took them to its proving ground in Chelsea, Michigan, where Chrysler replicated the conditions of the Consumer Reports test, and the car did not lose control. Likewise, Chrysler said it had not received any complaints about such behavior, and according to Time, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration hadn’t received any complaints, either. Initially, Time says, NHTSA couldn’t even figure out how Chrysler and Consumer Reports got vastly different results doing the same tests.
The car buff mags responded by pointing out that the Consumer Reports test didn’t accurately reflect real-world conditions.
The Omni Perserveres
A year after the test, Chrysler added a steering damper to the Omni and Horizon, which reportedly satisfied Consumer Reports‘ safety complaints. The model would go on to sell over 2.5 million units over a production run that lasted 12 years. As for Consumer Reports, the next time it would rate a vehicle as “Not Acceptable” was the Suzuki Samurai, which kicked off that whole scandal.
This whole debacle goes to show the power that some publications can have. One bad test can result in a huge headache for every party involved, from the publication and the automaker to even the person buying the vehicle. In the years since, Consumer Reports has grown to be an even bigger testing powerhouse, one that many consumers trust to deliver unbiased, comprehensive testing of new vehicles. Of course, the magazine also still tests more than 10,000 other products, too. Notably, the outlet still buys the vehicles that it tests, which many dedicated car publications can’t do.
The Dodge Omni and the Plymouth Horizon are largely forgotten by most people now, but Mopar enthusiasts keep the passion alive. Occasionally, even publications will write a story about Chrysler’s world car. But if you were a car buyer in 1978, there was a good chance that, maybe, you bought a different car because there was some hot debate over whether the car was as good as the car-buff magazines said it was.
Top graphic images: Chrysler; Ebay
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