We Test America's Most Economical Car

A Tom McCahill Report (r)
This Report Prepared by Tom McCahill & Brooks Brender

That's quite a claim -- America's most economical car. Especially on a car that's no longer being made.

Well, it's not our claim. It isn't even Datsun's. The Environmental Protection Agency in mid-1973 named the Japanese-made Datsun 1200 the most economical car sold in this country, based on their gasoline mileage test.

We wanted to find out what the car was all about, which is why we chose this now-defunct model. The 1200 has been replaced by the similar but restyled B210.

The EPA tests we're talking about give 1973 figures. While we were writing this, the '74 test data came in and revealed what happened to the Honda Civic, a bubble-size rig with a tobacco-tin engine we tested some months ago. The Civic, not tested by the EPA in '73, is the new champ at 29.1 mpg and Datun's B210 came in at 24.9. All the EPA figures were way under ours and also those of Motor Trned, which got 32.5 on the 1973 Datsun 1200.

We rented our test car, a 1971 model, from Mr. & Mrs. William Bennett, friends of Brooks Brender who live up the street in Ormond Beach. In the ages I've been testing cars for MI this is the first time we've chosen a car that's no longer being made and one of the few times we've grabbed one from a private owner.

This won't be a meaningless excercise because you might be interested in buying one second-hand.

Anyway, before testing the car we spent some money on it since it had been used quite a bit -- 27,000-plus mi. worth. So we changed the oil and oil filter, replaced the plugs and points and gave it a standard dealer tune-up. Keep in mind that the car is three years old and has been used by people not particularly automotive-minded.

Since our Datsun 1200 is a '71 the de-smoggery is less stringent than that on a '72 or '73. Thus all our performance figures may well be better than they would be for a '72 or '73 model in both fuel economy and acceleration times.

We made some runs on the Daytona Internation Speedway before we got to the real reason for this test -- gauging mileage -- so we'll give you the speed figures later.

We drove the little Datsun from Daytona to St. Augustine and back -- a total of 106 mi. -- on some second-grade roads. At an average speed of 48-plus mpd, the rig from the Land of the Rising Sun got 35.3 mpg, making the round trip on exactly 3 gallons of gas. What I'm really saying is that this Datsun 1200 is the gas-savingest car we've driven in many a moon.

Incidently, the EPA's tests were run a little differently from ours. They ran their cars 7 mi. from a cold start, keeping driving conditions -- ambient temperatures, altitude, road and traffic conditions -- the same for all. They tested some 386 cars, sometimes duplicating models for the sake of testing a manual and automatic, say, or different-size engines. Interestingly, of the three best mpg ratings achieved, the Datsun 1200 with a 71.5-cu.-in. engine, 2-barrel carburetor and 4-speed manual transmission scored best with 28.7 mpg and the same model with 3-speed automatic transmission ranked third (27.0 mpg). Even those numbers are impressive. (By the way, the Toyota Corolla-l 71-cu.-in., 2-barrel with 4-speed manual trans came in second, getting 27.1 mi. to EPA's gallon.)

But now on to the fun part of our test. Speedway runs proved the roadability of the 1200 to be good, the weavability excellent. In spite of the car's light weight (a mere 1,609 lbs), it rode pretty well. Blindfolded, you couldn't mistake it for a Rolls-Royce but it should still last a good few years. (This one lasted three already!) The four-cylinder engine seemed more than adequate for power. The 1200 handled beautifully on the high banked turns.

Timed 0-to-60 runs averaged 19.8 seconds. Zero to 100 ... well, we never made it, topping out at a shade over 90 mph. Time for the 1/4-mi. from a standstill was 21.6 seconds.

The sewing-machine engine displaces 71.5 cu. in. The wheelbase was 90.6 in. and overall length was 152. We rode with small 600x12 tires and if they weren't on the car I would have used them for dunking in my coffee.