New Wheels

One sleek item in the Sixth International Automobile Show, which opened in Manhattan's Coliseum last week, was turned back by its original purchaser because it gave him cold feet. A politician had ordered the grey, four-passenger Fiat 2300 coupe as last year's Christmas present to his wife, then canceled the order when he remembered the number of voters in Detroit.

Water While It Rolls. But for those not so politically sensitive, there were plenty of other foreign models, as well as the "1962 1/2" models from Detroit. Sports cars, once a European specialty, are sprouting in the American lines. Oldsmobile's is a coupe called Jetfire, with bucket seats in front and a turbosupercharged high-compression engine capable of delivering 215 horses (price: $3,039). Stude-baker's new Avanti (TIME, April 13) is a rakish restyling from inside out designed to narrow still further the gap between the family sedan and the gran turismo.

Ford's showpieces are a one-of-a-kind sports version of its Falcon compact, the Challenger I, with a tuned 244-cu.-in. engine and special suspension designed to cruise at 120 m.p.h., and the Cougar 406, with gull-wing doors and a top speed of 160 m.p.h. Chevrolet's sports compact is a 150-h.p. version of the Corvair known as the Monza Spyder, and there are two special show models of the Corvette--the Shark and the Kelly.

The most ogled foreign entry was Jaguar's clean-lined, air-scooped Mark X, with its monocoque construction (lightening and tightening the body by eliminating a chassis frame) and its road-hugging independent suspension front and rear. Cruising speed for this fancy feline is a cool 120 m.p.h. But gadgetry is not a U.S. monopoly: Mark X's includes twin tables with mirrors that fold out into the rear seat, and an air-conditioning system that can deliver different measures of hot and cold to each passenger. The big new Facel Vega II from France has an instrument panel designed to turn anyone with $9,800 to spend into a Mitty-style jet pilot--8 dials. 10 toggle switches. And Rolls Royce. unable to improve on perfection, is offering such titillations as a built-in refrigerator to go with the built-in bar and a water supply built into a front door.

$500 a Quart. Under the hood, the news is turbines. The Chrysler Corp.'s superbly smooth version of this engine, which runs on any inflammable fluid (the publicity department likes to take a car for a $500 spin on a quart of Arpege). is the engineering department's answer to slumping sales. Chrysler is using it in the Dodge Turbo Dart and Plymouth Turbo Fury. Britain's entry: the Rover T4, which was exhibited next to Rover's first turbine, the Jet I, demonstrated twelve years ago. All in all, the show was a record breaker: 450 entries and the largest collection of new models (51) ever to be unveiled at the same time.

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