Mystery Car – CG1200S

The mystery car for the last issue was seen parked – as they do there – on a corner in Nice. I shot it and walked over for a closer look but apart from feeling it had a fibreglass body couldn’t find anything to help identify it. It was up to a friend in England to do that for me and when he did, I was a little surprised to learn of its links to a brand once sold here.

Before letting the cat out of the bag, it is actually a CG1200S, built in France between 1965 and 1968 and I was right about its fibreglass body.

They were built by French coachbuilder Chappe et Gessalin who were founded in 1932 and did contract work for various car manufacturers over the years, including Delahaye, Talbot, Deutsch-Bonnet, Panhard along with race car bodywork for independent constructors.

In 1955 they began making bodywork for the new Renault engined Alpines, continuing with this until the early 1960s when Alpine’s own company RDL took over production of most of their range.

So in 1964 Chappe et Gessalin began planning to become an automobile manufacturer in their own right. The new venture would be known as Automobiles CG and while they already had the in-house skills to do the styling and mechanical design as well as produce the bodywork and chassis, they needed to source engines, transmissions, suspension parts and brakes.

With Renault committed to Alpine and with Peugeot and Citroën declining to participate, Automobiles CG turned to the Simca company and their pool of production mechanical components.

The design of the first CG model began in 1965, and the car debuted at the 1966 Salon de l’Auto in Paris. It was a small rear-engined fiberglass bodied convertible that used Simca 1000 components.

The car received positive reviews for its appearance and the high level of fit and finish, and several variations of the original 1000 were produced over its three-year lifespan.

The 1000 Spider was replaced by the CG 1200S in 1968, with the bigger engine delivering double the power of the original 1000, and it was offered as a coupé or a convertible, although only 33 soft-tops were built. By upgrading to the engine from the Simca 1200 S coupé, CG was finally able to offer a sports car with performance comparable to the Alpine A110.

In 1972 the CG1300 entered production, their third and final version. In all 405 Simca based CGs were produced.

Ross McGowan

Source : “The Bayside Vehicle Restorers Club Inc. Magazine”