Cars of yesteryears....

This time I am writing about cars of yesteryears.

Of course these cars were sold in Malaysia and perhaps you can still some of them running today like there is no tomorrow..

This is my tribute to those days...

These cars are particularly from the 70's right up to the late 80's (a tribute to Uncle Lee :) )

These cars were there when I was born and they will be forever etched in my memory.

No, I never owned them myself except some Protons but that were later Protons.

My father and my uncles may have owned some of them.

Some of you who might still remember them, I am sure many have fond memories with them.

Cars do bring us back memories especially when we were young.

Not to mention that they were affordable too in those days.

Here goes the cars of those bygone era:


Ford Escort Mark I ( a very successful rally car) circa 1973




Ford Escort Mark II 1978




Datsun 120Y 1973(lovingly known as Datsun Buah Kana because of the rear lights)




Datsun 120Y 1977


Datsun 120Y 1980




Opel Kadett 1977




Fiat 127 1979



Fiat 131 Mirafiori 1979




Toyota Corrolla KE10 1966



Toyota Corrolla KE20 1971




Toyota Corrolla KE30 1974




Toyota Corrolla KE70 1980




Toyota Corrolla AE80 1984, the AE80 is known as Corrolla LE (the first front wheel drive Corolla)




Mini Clubman/Cooper/Classic/Minor/Morris 1958-1970s



Volvo 240/244 1975




Honda Civic 1st gen (also known as Civic telur) 1976




Honda Civic 2nd gen 1982



Honda Civic 3rd gen 1985




Honda Civic 4th gen 1990



Alfa Romeo Alfasud 1977




Fiat 132 1978



Peugeot 204 1974




Peugeot 404 1974



Citroen GS Pallas 1975




Skoda 120 1979



Proton Saga 1st gen- out very own legend in the making.1985



Datsun 160J SSS (sports car) 1977



Datsun 160J SSS (sports car) 1974





Datsun Bluebird 1.8SSS (sports saloon) 1981



Daihatsu Charade G10 1979



Mercedes Benz W123 1979



Alfa Romeo Giulia Super 1973




Mazda 323 1981



Honda Accord 1st gen 1977



Honda Accord 2nd gen 1984



Nissan Sunny 1983




Lastly, any car write-up will not be complete without this legend. In the beginning it was the car nobody wanted but in the end became an automotive icon the world over.

That is the VW Beetle 1970 model...




This car is a legend and almost everybody we know had one or still has one!!


I may have missed other cars but due to the time constraints I apologize for not being able to feature them.

To all these cars, may I say thank you...for the memories...

Another loss for Malaysians..A man who followed his dreams and made it!

Yesterday I heard the sad news of the sudden death of (the late) Tan Sri SM Nasimuddin , the founder and chairman of NAZA group in LA.

He was fighting a late stage lung cancer. He was 53.
I have been reading about his NAZA empire and even though I didn't know this man, I have a deep respect and great admiration of him.

I once had a dream like him i.e to have my own car by my own name when I was young.
Reason being I saw most car companies in the world were founded by men who love their machines.

Here's a few example:
(Note:the year at the end is the year they started rolling their first car model, the company might be started earlier)

Mercedes Benz- Karl Benz, Germany 1886

Peugeot- Armand Peugeot (brothers), France 1889

Ford- Henry Ford , USA, 1903

Honda- Soichiro Honda , Japan, 1948

Renault-Louis Renault ,France 1898

Citroen- Andre Citroen, France 1919

Ferrari - Enzo Ferrari, Italy, 1929

Porsche (now part of VW AG)- Ferdinand Porsche,Germany 1931

Toyota- Kiichiro Toyoda (son of Sakichi Toyoda) ,Japan, 1937

Datsun (later Nissan) -The DAT family (Den Kenjiro, Aoyama Rokuro,Takeuchi Meitaro),Japan, 1931

Suzuki- Michio Suzuki ,Japan 1937

Opel -Adam Opel ,Germany 1906 (Opel is now part of GM such as Vauxhall in the UK, Holden in Australia ,Isuzu in Japan , Chevrolet in the US etc)

Audi (before VW AG) - August Horch,Germany 1901

Maserati - Maserati brothers ( Carlo Maserati, Bindo Maserati and Alfiery Maserati),Italy 1926

Mazda - Ahura Matsuda ,Japan, 1960


Well, I could go on and on but I need to mention these great car lovers who made cars out of their passion but never put their name on:

Volvo - Assar Gabrielsson and Gustav Larson, Sweden, 1927

Skoda (before VW AG bought it)- Vaclav Laurin and Vaclav Klement , Czech Republic , 1894


I said then if other ccountries could produce cars, why not Malaysia :).

This was the question Volvo creators asked more than 80 years ago in Sweden hence they produced Volvo. I am sure everybody knows what is Volvo.

Talking about Volvo, let me tell you something about Volvo:

Life better lived together is their latest TV commercial. They are known for their safety features.
The reason they made it to be safe because there is a sad story behind it.

Volvo was originally started after Assar Gabrielsson's wife died in an auto accident, he then vowed to produce the safest cars possible .

The rest was history. I will write a special topic about Volvo when I have time.


But fate had me going another way. So this man had followed his dream and he died doing what he loved most.

But as the saying says, only the good ones die young. Which is sadly quite true. I can name a few: Tan Sri P.Ramlee, Tan Sri Yahya Ahamd ( DRB founder).

I really envy him. He started his business at the age of 21 back in 1974.
He saved RM80,000 (quite a large sum that time I suppose) and went to Japan to buy 10 Japanese used cars.

He imported those cars to Malaysia with his AP and sold all of them. He made his first million ringgit a year later. RM1 million in 1975!!!

This man was accused as being one of the AP kings, but he actually worked hard for it and used the system to eventually provided jobs to more than 4,000 Malaysians and I must stress that he hired both bumi and non-bumi.

To me he was a true businessman and his love for cars had made him rich (damn, this was what I wanted to do!) and proved that anyone can become successful provided one works really hard.

For his contributions to South Korea (Kia Motor Corporation), Nasimuddin received the country's Industrial Service Medal.

Anyway, condolence to his family and I hope we will always remember this man for what he did and most of all he followed his dream....

A great man!


RIP Tan Sri...