Shanghai Auto Museum (photos)

I recently went to the Shanghai Auto Museum, and I have a few photos to share here :)

First of all, the way the museum is laid out is really cool. On the 1st to 3rd floor, each floor has a big exhibition area, and there are big ramps curved around the edge of the building, to get between the floors. These ramps have cars parked along them. Seeing these ramps, I imagined how they must have had to drive and/or drag all these cars up these ramps when setting up the museum.

When you walk in on the 1st floor, the first exhibit you see is this one, about the history of vehicles, dating back to ancient times. These are just scale models in this section, but the rest of the cars in the museum are real.

Model of the Wright brothers' airplane (1903)

Model of the C919. "C919 is China's first large jet civil aircraft with independent intellectual property rights." (2015)

Model of China's Shenzhou spaceship. "The Chinese nation realized its first manned space flight." (2003)

Then you get into the actual car exhibits.

1913 Ford Model T

Each car had a sign on the ground in front of it, which said the year and model. The signs were in both Chinese and English, and the English was actually decent, which is nice.

1975 Beijing BJ 212

1935 Auburn 851 SC

1955 Cadillac El Dorado

I'm sure that, for people who actually know things about classic cars, this is all very impressive. In my case, however, I'm walking around looking at these cars, thinking, "Ah, yeah Cadillac is a brand that people say is fancy, and 1955 was a long time ago, therefore I suppose this car here is very amazing."

Also, wow all the cars were so shiny and clean! They must have spent a long time repainting all of them.

1995 Mitsubishi Lancer Evo III

This car had parts cut away so you can see how it's built inside.

I learned that the Chinese word for differential gears is 差速器

1957 Volkswagen Beetle

This is really cool- this is a car whose parts have all been separated and are hanging from the ceiling, like an exploded 3D model.

1993 Williams FW15C

1960 BMW Isetta 300. This is such a tiny little car, with 3 wheels, and the front of the car is the door.

1928 Bentley 4 1/2 Liter

1906 Stanley Steamer Ex

1902 Peugeot Type 39

1890 Road Coach (France)

The 4th floor of the museum had a cafe and a kids' play area. A HUGE kids' play area. My son loved it and wanted to spend the entire day there.

It had the normal things you see in kids' play areas in Shanghai- ball pit, little cars for the kids to scoot around on, dress-up clothes (a lot of little firefighters and traffic police running around in there), a kitchen full of plastic food, etc- but also had a very strong car theme. Like, the ball pit aesthetic was something like the inside of an engine. And there were little racetracks with toy cars on them.

Overall, a very cool museum. (My only complaint is that it was all the way out in Jiading, but if you're not familiar with Shanghai's geography, that won't mean anything to you.) My son loved the play area, and I was impressed by all the old cars, even though I don't really know anything about old cars.

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Related:

The Shanghai Natural History Museum (has got me thinking about evolution)

"Jurassic World" Exhibition (Shanghai, China) 

Starting Point of the Great Wall (Qinhuangdao, China) 

Sheshan, Shanghai [Photos]

YK (Japanese BBQ Restaurant in Shanghai)

Lingshan Buddha (Wuxi, China)

Shanghai Disneyland