How Small? Isetta Did the Job

Having recently sampled the diminutive Scion iQ (coming soon to your Toyota dealer), I thought about how small a car could be. The smart car (they prefer the initial lowercase "s") is smaller than the iQ--but going back a bit, how about the Isetta? Made by BMW (originally by ISO Spa) in the lean years after WWII, the tiny bubble car is about a cute as it gets and served the needs of the times for extremely economical transportation.

The miniscule Isetta has only one door--and it opens in the front. The steering column comes with it! You can park it nose-in to the curb and step right out onto the sidewalk. Its 13-horsepower engine is adequate for moving it down the road at up to 53 mph.

I actually rode in one back in the late 1950's and it was fun--what I can remember of it.

More than 161,000 were made, and you can still see one today--especially if you visit a microcar event.

Beloved, Neglected Metropolitan

I have loved Nash Metropolitans since I was a kid. They were cute, kid-sized cars that were zipping around my neighborhood in M&M colors. Our family had a Nash Ambassador sedan as a family car so I'm sure I saw them in the dealership while it was being serviced, and said, out loud, "That's my size car!"

I always wanted one, and my 1956 green and white coupe, which I found on Craigslist, looked nice when I found it. But it turned out to have serious wiring issues, so it didn't get driven a lot. It's neither safe nor legal to drive without brake lights and turn signals. So it has spent most of the last several years in my garage.

When I was about 10, I wrote a song:

It's the cutest car in the world,

In the world, in the world.

It's the cutest car in the world,
In the world, in the world.

A teeny, teeny Metropolitan

The cutest little car in the world.

A teeny teeny Metropolitan,

The cutest little cutest little car in the world!

It's the cutest car in the world,

In the world, in the world.

Not bad for 10, huh?

I hate to do it, but I need to find my little car a new home. I wanted to make it nice and drive it around, but I have learned two things. First: Little cars that are not sports cars that are 50 years old are not really much fun to drive. Fun to be seen in, to look at, to spot in traffic, but that's about it. Second: I don't like working on cars.

So, if anyone wants to finish putting in the new wiring harness, my little baby could be an easy and rewarding project. And the rest of it is pretty sound.