Techzle has been in existence for 30 years, which is why we look back every week on this week’s edition in 1990. Techzle 45 will be in the shops from today, but what was exactly 30 years ago in number 45?
News
Actually, there is only one piece of news that immediately arouses interest when we open Techzle 45 from 1990 again. Lada announced that a new open version of the Samara was coming. The Samara was sold quite well here, yet it is a car that we can imagine that it has fallen quite deep in the memory. The regular Samara Cabriolet might say something, but this Taiga has to come a long way. With its extra ‘sporty’ bumper work, special headlights and a fabric hood behind the steel roof, it was a special almost landaulet-like appearance. Did you remember him?
There was bigger news a little further on in issue 45 of 1990. The 11-year-old Mercedes-Benz S-Class W126 at that time was about to pass the baton to a brand new generation. That it would be a considerable step forward became clear when our spy photographer took photos of an almost uncamouflaged specimen. With a whole series of photos we took a lot of action and as a result the Netherlands took its first look at the S-class, which was later jokingly baptized ‘Cathedral’ here.
Tests
One of the tests in this issue was the comparison test between the Honda CRX and the Toyota MR2. Two lovely Japanese sports coupés that many Dutch people were able to charm. The CRX certainly caught on here. The MR2 was just a bit more eccentric, also on a technical level, but at the time made the most impression in terms of performance. At the same time, it was clearly more cunning than the CRX; suddenly upset was quickly lurking, we concluded. Neither would appear in large numbers on Dutch roads, because they were enthusiast’s cars. The MR2 remained modest in terms of sales numbers, but the CRX became quite a popular appearance.
The CRX and MR2 were new as enthusiast cars, but that was not the case for these two other cars that competed against each other in a comparison test. The Rover 825 and Alfa Romeo 164 (especially the latter) reached that status much later. Which means; above all, you have to be an enthusiast to keep one on the road. Neither was the best in the history of the automotive industry. In any case, it was not the engine; the great common denominator of these two cars. The turbo diesel from VM Motori is not necessarily known as bad. Although both engines were basically identical, the test editor noted quite different characters. In the Rover, the 2.5-liter turbo diesel had a relatively short power bandwidth, while the block in the Alfa Romeo continued to drag more linearly into the high revs. In the Alfa was also less strumming to hear.
Reports
Just like today, not everyone was necessarily interested in new cars in 1990. We were happy to show that you could also make a good impression on the used car market. For those who did not need it all so flashy, but reliable, there was plenty of choice. For example, you could go for the well-known Opel Ascona, the ‘inconspicuous’ Peugeot 505, or the ‘high-quality business car’ Ford Scorpio. Although there are more types among them that are now adored by some enthusiasts, we still spoke of ‘used cars without a real image’.
Although at the beginning of this century it sometimes seemed as if the guilder prices were 1 to 1 transferred to prices in euros and we thus lost a lot of purchasing power, it must be said that the guilder prices of some top sedans in 1990 were also firm. At the time, cars such as the Citroën XM, Mercedes E-class and Alfa Romeo 164 fell into the ‘above 150,000 guilders’ category. For that money you naturally wanted a car that was perfectly put together. We found out whether the cars made a neat impression. All cars were found to be at the level of their price in terms of quality, but the Alfa Romeo 164 stood out in a positive way, due to the fact that in terms of ease of use and finish it showed nothing of the previous lesser reputation of the brand. The Volvo 780 was – if it disappointed at all – then rather a bit disappointing.
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A good sound system seemed more important in the 90s than it is now. It was also worth a lot of money in the car for some. Good sound, you liked to spend money on that. Ideally you wanted to listen to a bit of varied music and that was more complicated 30 years ago than it is now. For 1,500 guilders, however, you got a CD changer for 10 CDs and a radio cassette player from Sony. If only they knew then that this would eventually become completely normal from the factory.