Pop Up Headlights

[Hertz]

Me and Fatha Hertz were out in the A610 the other day and were admiring the pop up headlights. We then discussed which car was the last to wear them due to Euro safety laws no doubt   I said Mazda MX5 in about 1998, he said MR2 in about 2000. A quick google shows it was 2004! Anyone hazard a guess or want to share their favourite?

 

Here is mine

 

[John F]

Suzuki GSX750SE Katana

 

[NorfolkNWeigh]

Funnily enough I saw a BMW 850 today and thought how good it looked with the lights up,I thought it may have been one of the last, wrong!

I had to google it and was surprised that I didn't think of it .

 

Anyway here's a an 8 series looking shifty

[eddyramrod]

I'd never had a car with pop-ups until we went to Cyprus...

...and then two came along at once!

[vulgalour]

Gene Winfield's Reactor is one of my favourite applications of pop out headlights and worthy of a mention here, I think...

 

 

... but one of my all time favourites from the factory is the Opel GT because they don't pop up in the conventional way.

 

[CortinaDave]

Love pop-up headlights. Apparently the EU banned them because of the risk to pedestrians. Have to say I've never seen written on any obituary "sadly died after being impaled on a pop up headlight" but there you go.

 

 

I had a few Ford Probes back in 2007-8, this was my fave. Owned by the owners club tech guru so he'd spent a fortune on it and it was brilliant. LPG too. Obviously I got rid of the wanky numberplate.

 

 

It lasted a few years after my ownership too, but sadly last time I saw it was on an online forum where the owner ( a few after me) had decided to cover it in huge dragon decals and it looked awful. He posted later that it had acquired some electrical fault that he couldn't trace so he weighed it in AFAIK. shame!

[drum]

I had a 480ES until I wrote it off while on my honeymoon in France. Always thought it looked a bit silly with the lights up.

[Sloth in a bowl]

I'm guessing it was one of these, though I'm not sure exactly what they looked like in 2004.

 

[jmsguzzi]

Was the last one the Corvette C5?

[richardmorris]

 I am biased, but this is mine...

[garethj]

I'll nominate my favourite car with rotating headlights, the Panther Solo

 

The super-tough Dodge Charger for it's headlights that rotate about the other axis

 

And the beautiful Cord 810 with pop-ups

 

And from our end of the market, the GInetta

[cort16]

I think some Ferraro Daytonas came without popup headlamps and they look shit.

 

I love em I've had a Volvo 480, tr7 and a silvia mainly because of the lights .

 

Lights go up, lights go down, lights go up, lights go down repeat 1000

[richardmorris]

I'll nominate my favourite car with rotating headlights, the Panther Solo

 

 

 

With Citroën BX door mirrors (says he with the anorak).

[cort16]

I think the Honda NSx had them up until the late 90s as did the Ferrari 456 which I think went on until early to mid 2000s

[Lacquer Peel]

I think the Honda NSX is the last car with pop up headlights. 

 

I accidentally cut up a Mk2 Toyota MR2 earlier in the year, I couldn't see the low-slung MR2 over the undergrowth at the junction - he flashed his lights, but I was gone by the time they popped up. Are they all quite slow to react?

[phil_lihp]

BMW 8 Series is a good call, they're a stunning design and the popups are the icing on the cake.  One of the only 'premium' cars I'd like to try.

 

As this is Autoshite, I feel I need to make the case for something a little more down-to-earth:

 

 

Not a bad looker either.

 

Edit:  The last one?  Well as of 2006 you could still hand Cizeta £650,000 to build you a V16T although the last one actually built was in 1995.  It's also the ugliest car ever seen when the lights are up, due to a unique design characteristic.

 

 

There's a definite element of deep sea trench creature about it.  Apparently designed by the chap who penned the Countach.

[ProgRocker]

One of my favourites, the 1980s Honda Integra:

 

I really wanted my dad to buy one of these. He always insisted that his cars were at least 4 door. This was a perfect combo between sportiness with the pop up headlights and practicality. Just like the Mazda 323F.

 

Edit: phil_lihp beat me to it!

Edited November 14, 2013 by ProgRocker

[eddyramrod]

I had one of these, and loved it; I'd have another tonight.  Here's one with the lights closed...

...and open...

The covers flip down.  The lights don't move.  I would put it away at night without turning off the lights, so that after I took the key out the covers would rise up, as if the car was closing its eyes for the night.  (The lights would then turn themselves off; I didn't suffer innumerable flat batteries!)

[ProgRocker]

As previously discussed, wasn't the last car to be sold with pop up headlamps the Ferrari 456? This fact may have been mentioned on Top Gear by Jeremy Clarkson a few years back.

 

My favourite car in my youth was the Posche 928S with the unusual exposed pop up headlamps, I think copied from the Lamborghini Miura (?).

[Barry Cade]

???

 

[Sloth in a bowl]

From wiki 'The Lotus Esprit (es-pree) is a sports car that was built by Lotus in the United Kingdom between 1976 and 2004'

 

So the Esprit with pop up headlights was made till 2004.

 

[jmsguzzi]

[richardmorris]

From wiki 'The Lotus Esprit (es-pree) is a sports car that was built by Lotus in the United Kingdom between 1976 and 2004'

 

So the Esprit with pop up headlights was made till 2004.

 

Beats the 456 by one year.

[Partridge]

Hey lets give this Accord pop up head lamps! Ahh fuck it, this'll do.

 

[Spiny Norman]

Quite rare to see a pic of one of these with its lights up.

 

[jmsguzzi]

Always preferred the Lagonda without the popups despite pop up headlights making almost any car better. 

[Sigmund Fraud]

 

Based on a Gandini-penned prototype... Full shitter points to anyone who can identify the above car !

[Partridge]

Whaaaaat? I never even knew the Lagondas did that.

[UmBongo]

I always laugh when I pop the lights on my Silvia because from the cabin it looks like the bonnet has sprouted two giant, extraneous lumps of steel...

[Partridge]

You has Silvia??