You have to love car companies. Marketing geniuses will tout the superior advantages their cars offer, often referring to the technology incorporated as “ground breaking” or “innovative”. One such “recent” innovation has been the CVT – continuously variable transmission – that offers peak power and improved fuel efficiency. The only problem is that it is in no way recent; take today’s 1969 DAF 55 Coupe, for example. Launched in 1967 from a Dutch company otherwise known for producing trucks, the DAF 55 took their boxer-engined 44 and replaced the lump with a Renault-sourced 1.1 inline-4. But more interesting was the “Variomatic” CVT transmission – but surely, you say, it wouldn’t have worked back then. Well, it did, and like the NSU TT I wrote up Monday the DAF 55 enjoyed some time as a gentleman’s race car, even winning the 1968 Alpine Rally and having custom 4-wheel drive versions made. Sound neat? Yeah, it was! DAF was later swallowed by Volvo, but for a time these microcars were the realization of what would happen if you combined styling from all the various European nations into one car. Seriously, there are hints of British, French, German and Italian cars all wrapped up here in one neat little package. Today, there’s a stunningly nice example available on Ebay:
