{"id":83155,"date":"2025-08-12T09:10:12","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T13:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=83155"},"modified":"2025-08-12T09:10:12","modified_gmt":"2025-08-12T13:10:12","slug":"bmw-rare-look-isetta-pickup-prototype","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=83155","title":{"rendered":"BMW Gives A Rare Look At The Isetta Pick-up"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you\u2019re a BMW buff, and you probably are, given the website you\u2019re visiting, you know the story of the Isetta. Times were tough in the mid-1950s when the company was on the verge of bankruptcy. Motorcycle sales were falling, while cars like the 503 and 507 were costly to produce. The solution? Sell a vehicle that could turn a profit, ideally one that wouldn\u2019t cost much to engineer.<\/p>\n<p>At the 1954 Turin Car Show, BMW stopped by Iso Rivolta\u2019s booth and stumbled upon the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bmwblog.com\/2022\/07\/09\/bmw-isetta-started-first-time-40-years\/\">Isetta<\/a>, a quirky city car with a front door flanked by headlights. BMW bought the licensing rights to build and sell the car from the Italian maker of refrigerators and microcars. That\u2019s how the BMW-badged Isetta Motocoup\u00e9 was born, and not long after, it became a commercial success. In its first year, some 10,000 units were sold.<\/p>\n<p>Between 1955 and 1962, BMW moved 161,728 examples of the so-called bubble car. Several versions were offered over the years, including models with a retractable roof for the German market. For export, the Isetta Motocoup\u00e9 came with a fixed roof and retractable side windows. The UK also got a three-wheeler version with a single rear wheel, and there was even a Cabriolet. To our surprise, there was also this, the Pick-up.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"instagram-media\" data-instgrm-captioned=\"\" data-instgrm-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/DNOA69BOAWu\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading\" data-instgrm-version=\"14\" readability=\"0\"\/>\n<p>BMW Classic has shared rare vintage images of the Isetta Pick-up, a tiny trucklet with a storage tray mounted at the back. Although we\u2019re looking at a prototype, the diminutive truck was actually sold to customers. Buyers had the option to order either a closed or open loading platform, which had a maximum payload capacity of 250 kilograms (551 pounds). Not even Munich knows how many were made, only confirming it was even rarer than the Cabriolet. The open-top model with a fabric roof had a production run of fewer than 70 units.<\/p>\n<p>The Isetta Pick-up was available with 250-cc and 300-cc engines. Like the Cabriolet, the Pick-up was only manufactured between 1956 and 1957. The single-cylinder engine produced just 12 hp in the Isetta 250 and a mighty 13 hp in the Isetta 300. Flat out, the little truck that could had a maximum speed of 85 km\/h (53 mph).<\/p>\n<p>So there you have it. BMW <em>technically<\/em> sold a pickup long before those <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bmwblog.com\/2023\/12\/12\/bmw-built-three-pickups\/\">rad M3 and X7 concepts<\/a> came along, none of which were even available to customers anyway.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you\u2019re a BMW buff, and you probably are, given the website you\u2019re visiting, you know the story of the Isetta. Times were tough in the mid-1950s when the company was on the verge of bankruptcy. Motorcycle sales were falling, while cars like the 503 and 507 were costly to produce. The solution? Sell a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":83156,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-industry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=83155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/83156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=83155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=83155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=83155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}