1974-1979 Opel Bitter CD – Greater than the Sum of It’s Parts

Late model Opel Bitter CD

I’ve always regarded the late ’60s to mid ’70s as a kind of golden age for sleek grand touring cars. When asked about machines from this era, names like Ghibli, Grifo and Dino are just a few of the names that come to mind. Much of that golden era of design came from the design houses of Italy, but there were also some notable small scale producers who like Germany’s Bitter Cars did their part in contributing to the GT car boom of the ’70s.

Bitter was a tiny company that went from selling accessories to building it’s own exotic. Like the Lamborghini origin story, Erich Bitter was a race car driver and importer of Italian sports cars who was dissapointed with the reliability of his Italian products. So he set out to build his own car.

Bitter’s German engineering heritage meant that like Audi or BMW, it’s cars were tough and built for the long haul. Unlike a typical Audi or Mercedes, Bitter cars had a bit of Italian flair about them. The company’s first car was actually born from a Opel. Opel teased buyers with a futuristic concept that never quite manifested in it’s car line. For Opel, it’s stunning Opel Coupe Diplomat (CD) concept car at the 1969 Frankfurt Auto Show would get another lease on life with someone else.

1968 Opel Diplomat CD concept car

For whatever reasons, Opel never committed to bringing the CD to market. Sensing that it was too good a thing to let go, Bob Lutz, then head of Opel commissioned Pietro Frua, one of Italy’s small coachbuilders to develop a prototype that they saw as an experiment. This is when Erich Bitter worked out a deal to start a new company that would build the CD.

After design modifications from Bitter and Fura, Bitter’s company took the Opel concept and made it into a sleek low volume luxury GT. Final production would be done by Baur in Stuttgart Germany. Interestingly, Opel still had a lot of input in the development of the car hence the name sometimes used name Opel Bitter CD.

Opel Bitter CD

When the final product was ready for 1973’s Frankfurt Motor Show, it did not resemble the original Opel show car from 1969 save for the overall profile. Compared to similar cars like the Iso Grifo, the Bitter CD was just as beautiful, and nearly as powerful despite it’s humble Opel Diplomat donor chassis. It was said that the CD was quite the star of the show, getting 176 orders wealthy showgoers. Bitter had hoped to produce as many as 200 units a year at about 54,000 DM or about $34,000 USD. That was a lot considering that a more powerful Maserati Ghibli or Ferrari Daytona could be had in the low 20s. Due to the oil crisis and inflation, only 395 units were made by the end of production in 1979.

The Bitter CD’s striking profile was similar to the Iso Grifo in that it had a long hood with a roofline that tapered smoothly into the rear. With the CD, the proportions were slightly longer than the Grifo with a longer more elegant roof line due to an emphasis on more room. Another car that inspired the CD’s design was De Tomaso Mangusta with it’s muscular bulging fender flares. On the CD they are not so exaggerated, but protrude just enough to suggest the power under the hood.

Speaking of the bonnet the CD borrows from a tradition of many small volume sports car producers who mate European design with American muscle. In the case of the CD, it was a Chevrolet 327 V8 with an overhead valve design, similar to what was in some Corvettes, Camaros and Chevelles. In the CD the 327 made 227 hp that was sent through 3 speed automatic to the rear wheels. With disc brakes all around and a independent rear suspension, the CD was well equipped advanced at the time. The interior approach to modernism was one of blocky volumes, not unlike what would become mainstream in American cars in the ’80s.

1978 Opel Bitter CD Interior

Despite it’s clean exotic looks, the CD was a 2+2 hatchback design, making it as practical as it was beautiful. Speaking of hatchbacks, the hatch was one of the largest glass hatches of it’s day and likely made the CD an oven in sunny climates. With such small production numbers, it was as rare as any handbuilt Italian sports car. The front could easily be mistaken for the Ferrari 400i, while the rear has shades of more practical cars like the Camaro or even the Ford Pinto with it’s big glass hatch. Any pedestrian traits in back were erased by the sight of the quad piped dual exhaust system.

In the proper grand touring tradition, the CD was tuned for all day comfort with just enough roadholding performance to remind the driver that the CD was also a serious curve carver. Even the back seats were separate body hugging buckets incase evasive maneuvers were necessary – all in the comfort of factory air conditioning of course.

1979 Opel Bitter CD with custom wheels

The lack or excessive ornamentation on the CD may have been one of the reasons the design looked fresh up to the end of production. Conceivable it could gone beyond 1979, but Opel ended production of the Diplomat sedan effectively killing the source for new Bitter CD chassis donors. That of course would lead to the CD’s successor the handsome (but squarish) SC based on the Opel Monza. While only the front of the CD resembled the Ferrari 365/400 GT, the SC would look like a splitting image from almost any angle.

Mid ’70s Opel Bitter CD