Independent thinking: Achtung!

The Hornet With A German Accent

By Pat Foster

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April 6, 2026This month, I’d like to shine the spotlight on Borgward automobiles. Remember them? Although the defunct German prestige automaker’s cars are a rare sight nowadays, I’ll bet many of you are at least a little familiar with them. In the 1950s and ’60s, Borgward produced sporty coupes and sedans with unique styling and good performance. Borgward’s expressive Isabella coupe especially seems, to me, created to celebrate the joy of driving a truly chic automobile.

The company came into being in 1929 when German businessman Carl Borgward merged his small but successful Goliath-Werke Borgward & Co., builder of popular little three-wheel delivery vehicles, with struggling automaker Hansa-Lloyd AG. Borgward expanded Hansa’s product line with larger, more desirable cars. In 1937, Borgward introduced the Hansa-Borgward 2000, a stylish upper-medium priced car. Two years later the name was shortened to Borgward 2000 and with a larger engine it soon became the Borgward 2300. But with a destructive war underway Borgward was told to convert his factory to build trucks for the German Army.

World War II left Germany in ruins but Borgward managed to establish three auto companies: Goliath, Borgward and Lloyd. They were set up as separate firms so each would qualify for larger allocations of steel and other rationed materials than a single entity would. Seeming to know what the public wanted, Borgward’s companies became very successful. The introduction of the stunning Isabella in 1954 was Borgward’s high point, sparking sales and substantial growth.
Then 1958’s Eisenhower Recession forced Borgward’s American dealers to cancel 9,000 orders, leaving the firm with a glut of unsold cars. Mechanical problems with the new Lloyd Arebella followed, forcing a recall and causing a sharp drop in sales that strained finances to the breaking point. By 1961, Borgward was bust. Production equipment was shipped to Mexico where a trickle of new Isabellas were produced from 1967 to 1970.

But, like America’s Avanti, Borgward remained an object of great affection for enthusiasts, whose hopes of an eventual resurrection brightened and dimmed over the years. A bizarre attempt to reintroduce the brand came in 1977, when a booth displaying a two-door hatchback coupe badged as the new “Borgward Isabella 2.3 Coupe” appeared at the Frankfurt Motor Show. The strange thing was that the “new” Borgward was essentially a repowered AMC Hornet hatchback.

I know.

The man behind the wacky revival was Peter Mueller-Buchhof, European distributor of Daihatsu four-wheel-drive vehicles and gray-market Jeeps. He’d acquired 200 new Borgward 2.3-liter engines in Mexico and was busy converting new Hornets bought from AMC dealers in Switzerland, Austria and Belgium. The Hornet engines were replaced with the new Borgward mills, resulting in a car both lighter and faster. To instill some flavor of the original, a Borgward diamond badge was added to the Hornet grille, plus thin bodyside tape stripes mimicking the curves of the classic Isabella. It still looked like a Hornet.

Quoted prices were $11,700 for a two-door, $10,900 for a four-door—a big step up from Hornet’s roughly $3,500 base price. For comparison, a new Corvette cost $8,748, a Coupe de Ville $9,800. Not surprisingly, the revived Borgward soon disappeared. How many were built remains a mystery.

 

What was that other AMC car called...not a gremlin.....not a pacer.....the back tapered down to the back bumper......
kind of a nipped off Hornet....

AHA AMC Spirit..... The AMX was the V-8 high performance version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwqIzk-dwaU

The AMC Spirit...Terrific car!