Wow that’s weird. Ford is so gay friendly that they actually became a target for a boycott by the American Family Association.
I don’t believe that. Sure, a lot of companies try that shit, but they don’t last. I bought my first TV in 1989. I was in the military, in Germany, and it was a small multi-system (worked in every country in the world) color thing.
I’ve moved it all around the world, and all across the States, many times. It’s still my most reliable TV. Beautiful, crisp picture and color, even to this day. It’s a Sony.
I bought all my stereo equipment from Sony two years later when I got back to the States and I still have and use it today and it all still works exactly as advertised.
I’m brand loyal to Sony. Maybe they suck now, I don’t know. But when I go to buy my next thing, and there’s a Sony available, I’m probably going Sony until they piss me off. If they do piss me off, I’m gone. It’s my money, I’ll spend it where I feel good about it.
My car (Malibu) has pedals which move, just for this reason. However, I’m 5’2" and I’ve never had this problem.
levdrakon, I think we are talking about two different things. You’re saying that planned obsolesces means that the engine was designed to die at a certain time, and I say planned obsolesces means that something was designed to be obsolete in a planned amount of time. Take for example iPod. The iPod is designed to be old even when it’s brand new. In other words, Apple has better iPods in the pipeline, even while it’s releasing its old model.
Having worked in the drug industry I can assure you that nearly every drug on the market currently, has a better version already made. This is the planned obsolesces drug companies use so that when their patent runs out they can renew it, with a “New and Improved!” version.
Why do you have the idea that American auto companies have your version of planned obsolesces?
That info has never trickled down to my awareness. Nor, I think, has it trickled down to most of the buyers’ awareness. Thanks for sharing it.
No. iPods aren’t designed to break after a year, forcing you to buy a new one. They just keep coming out with models that make you want to buy a new one. My perception of the American car industry is that they did design their cars to break down after four to five years.
There’s always a new, better model of something that’s designed to make you want to buy the new model.
Because they all started falling apart after four or five years, and we got pissed off when we found out that’s what they intended?
But you see, what you’re talking about is “functional obsolescence” not “planned obsolescence”. Why do you think that the American auto companies employed this method. And when? There was a definite problem with cars in the late 70s early 80s but that was because poor engineering not functional obsolescence.
92 was the first model year, and they did have a lot of bugs to be worked out. My first one was a '93, and it was much better.
They changed the interior around '96 or '97, so the one I have now has a lot more head room, and is a lot roomier. The styling on the first models was nice - the teenage kid next door even thought my car was cool. The later ones have very generic styling, I agree. Looks like every other car of the era.
Saturn made an effort to do things a reasonable way, not the GM way. GM at the time had two keys - one for the door and one for the ignition. Saturn had one. They put the radio over the climate control because you use the radio more often. I like the window controls in the middle myself - I have an easier time working them with my right hand, and the passenger can play with them also. They work the natural way for me.
They never made a lot of money (if ever) and became just a GM division. In '93 the dealer seemed to be really into the Saturn Way, by '97 they seemed to be going through the motions. (Different dealer, though.) While I’m not bored with my car at all after 9 years, I’d go test drive new Saturn when I need a new car, but I doubt I’d buy one.
The cars that made Japan’s image were all JUNK. It’s just that America-haters at
Consumer Reports and shameless payola whores at the commercial car mags kept repeating the mantra of" Japanese worker is industrious and hard-working.
American worker is sloppy, lazy, and spoiled and deserves to fail." until a significant number of car buyers began to believe it.
A couple of years ago, I had two 1987-model cars–one a “piece-of-GM-crap” Pontiac 6000, the other a “virtuous” Nissan Sentra. I was given the Nissan Sentra by a co-worker who couldn’t sell it for as little as $500.
The Nissan looked outwardly nicer-- the paint was in better shape, no VISIBLE rust–but unlike the 6000, which had bubbles of surface rust on the doors, but no rust-throughs–the Nissan had no useable trunk due to wheelwell and trunk-floor rustouts.
The Pontiac had fuel injection. The Nissan had an ugly carburetor with several vacuum do-dads attached.
The carb had no choke. The starting method was “pump and pray” followed by “floor it (to clear the flooding) and curse”. If you pumped once too many, you flooded. Once too little produced start, stumble, die. Pump once more after start, stumble, die and you were flooded again.
The diaphragms of the vacuum do-dads started deteriorating and I found that they weren’t sold separately; you had to buy an entire new carb.
The starting method on the Pontiac; turn the key and it started.
Don’t tell me how crummy GM is supposed to be. Turn the damn computer off every now and then, get out in the real world and stop basing your decisions on Internet propaganda pumped out by the shills of Japan, Inc.
But there are those of us in America whose car requirements are a lot closer to what Europeans look for than what the American car industry caters to.
I live near a major city and use my car almost exclusively for commuting. I don’t do intercity driving- if I want to go to a city more than 100 miles away or so, I fly there instead of driving if possible. I don’t have kids or carpool. I very rarely use my car to haul large quantities of stuff (the last time I did was in 2003, when I moved, and for that I rented a minivan).
I want a small car (easy to park in small spaces, and I don’t need the interior room for lots of passengers or cargo). It needs to be powerful enough to do 80 on the freeway, but it doesn’t need to be able to tow anything or haul a lot of cargo, and I don’t need a high-powered car for some psychological need to prove something. It must not have random stuff go wrong with it very often- I need it to get to work, and I’m not mechanically inclined, so I can’t fix it myself, and repairs can be expensive. I want good gas mileage- even if gas is cheap, why should I pay more than I have to for it?
The Big Three just don’t seem to be trying very hard to sell cars to people like me.
Hear, hear, Anne Neville. I want the same as you do, but I have kids to boot.
In 1984, Bruce Catton’s book Michigan: A History was published. The author had died several years earlier. Catton was a Pulitzer Prize winner who had emerged from an unlikely small rural town in the lower peninsula to become the most recognized Civil War historian of his time. Yet throughout his life, his home state and its enigmatic history held a deep fascination for him.
In Michigan: A History Catton describes the timeline of the stae as a series of economic waves: Huge and tremendous success followed by abject failure. Even before the economic crash of the 1980’s, Catton seemed to hint that the auto industry’s boom was destined to come plunging down.
A quick synopsis: The first Europeans to populate the state came for the fur trade. To a trapper’s eyes, Michigan was a paradise where the supply of animals and high quality furs seemed endless. Yet end it did - the high prices commanded by fur traders led a rush of frontiersmen to the territory. Soon overtrapping and poor land management depleted the environment. Those remaining found themselves in poverty.
Within a few years the lumber industry took over the territory. The quality of wood grown in the peninsulas was superior to that found most anywhere. Michigan lumber was shipped all the way to the East coast, and from there to Europe. Most buildings constructed in the United States in the first half of the 1800’s were built from Michigan lumber. There is little exaggeration in the statement that the entire state was cleat cut from one end to the other. It is very hard to find an old growth tree anywhere in the state (even the trees in the ‘wilderness areas’ are actually second growth.) This is the land of Paul Bunyan and the tall tales of lumber men. Yet the lumber industry in Michigan crashed and the state was reduced to abject poverty again.
That changed when Copper was found in the upper peninsula. The copper boom crashed and was replaced by the iron boom. The iron ran out and farming became the big industry in the state. Settlement of the West ruined Michigan’s dominance in farming. Then the auto industry took over.
With it’s iron production and auto industry, Michigan was known as the “Arsenal of Democracy”. It transformed itself into a war machine in both World War I and II, churning out enough arms and vehicles to supply the armies of half the world. This was the brightest time in the State’s history. But to Catton observed this as being simply another of the series of waves the state had undergone.
Each economic wave, from the first trappers all the way through to the iron and farm industries had made the same assumption: that their industry was permanent. The supply endless. The economy inexhaustible. While the state has always been blessed with good luck, shortsightedness has always been its downfall and its curse. To quote Catton: “The idea that abundance was inexhaustible–that fatal Michigan word–dominated thinking about the state from its earliest days.”
One of my best friends teaches at Michigan State University. He and I discovered Catton a few years back. Ever since, we’ve watched the economy of Michigan through this lens and found it disturbingly illuminating. When an announcement such as Ford’s layoffs becomes public we will look at each other and nod. We say one word. I’ve sent him emails consisting of only this word, and he’s left messages on my machine which consist of this one word.
“Inexhaustible”
Sorry for the long post. It seemed relevant. Well, it did to me, anyway.
I think that is a sad indication of the current state of US car manufacturers. Rather than being the innovators and market leaders they are now quite happy to lease technology from their competitors.
That’s basically the same thing that the US consumer electronics industry (eg TV set makers) experienced 20 years ago. Are there any US companies that are still selling their own TV sets? I think Zenith and Magnavox are now owned by Philips.
I’m sure that you have probably already looked into it, but have you considered the Ford Freestyle? I know it’s not exactly a small vehicle (it offers seating for 7), and the mileage on the AWD is not great (19/24), but it seems to be a very versatile car with excellent safety ratings (I believe it was co-designed with Volvo). For these reasons, I myself am considering purchasing a Freestyle later this year…
Planned Obsolescence: EVERY engineered product is designed with a lifespan in mind. This is nothing peculiar to the American auto industry, or for that matter the auto industry at all.
When I pick a switch out of a catalog, I’ll find one that has a mean time between failures that matches the product it’s going in to. ANYTHING can be made to last longer, if you’re willing to spend more money, add weight, or have other tradeoffs. We could increase the lifespan of every computer by simply putting more powerful cooling systems in them. But this would make them heavier, more expensive, and perhaps noisier. Somewhere during the design of your computer, an engineer had to look at the cooling issue and decide how much was ‘enough’.
So ‘planned obsolescence’ is not a negative term, and nothing that should be criticised, UNLESS the engineers made poor choices and picked components that fail earlier than they should. That’s not an issue of planned obsolescence, it’s just bad engineering.
One of the areas where domestic automakers screwed up was in perceived quality, as opposed to actual quality. For cost reasons, they built their tooling in such a way as to haave bigger panel gaps, and they chose switches and interior materials that, while functional, have a ‘cheap’ feel to them. This hurt the perception of quality for the vehicle, even if its actual reliability was as good as the competition.
But they’ve learned their lesson. The new generation of domestic cars have tight tolerances, excellent-feeling switchgear, and better tactile sensations in the cabin. The panel gaps are tighter, the bodies more rigid (eliminating squeaks and rattles, among other things), etc.
Not only that, but the modern auto-industry is so inter-related that it’s not even all that accurate to talk about ‘domestic’ vs foreign cars. The Ford Fusion is built on a Mazda 6 chassis, and uses the same engine as the Mazda 6. We have a Saab 92x, which is a car from a Swedish auto company, which is owned by GM, but which is actually a car built on a Japanese assembly line (it’s a Subaru WRX). Our other ‘domestic’ car is a Ford Escape, which is built on the same assembly line as the Mazda Tribute, and is virtually identical to it.
You can look at almost any new car out of Detroit and see the same thing. There’s a new 6-speed automatic transmission that is a joint effort between several domestic auto makers, BMW, and others. The same tranny will be used in numerous cars from numerous countries. The Pontiac Vibe is the same car as the Toyota Matrix. Some domestic cars are unique, but share ‘global’ powertrains.
IMO, the smartest thing for a car buyer to do now is to buy domestic, but only when these insane rebate and pricing deals come along. You’re buying a world-class car at a huge discount because the domestics are trying to build back market share. Take our 92-X, for example. I have no love for Saab, but we wanted a WRX. In Canada, the WRX is $35,495. The 92x is upgraded somewhat to make it a ‘Saab’. It has a moonroof, automatic climate controls, aluminum suspension bits, upgraded soundproofing and interior materials, etc. As a result, it listed for about $40,000 in Canada. But with GM’s incentives and rebates at the end of last year, we saved almost $9,000 off of retail, and got a superior car to a WRX for $4,000 less than the Subaru model. It was a great deal.
Another irony of ‘Domestic’ cars which tends to be lost on the ‘buy American’ crowd is that domestic does not necessarily mean American-made. A Ford Fusion is built in Mexico, while a ‘foreign’ Honda Accord is built in the U.S. You simply can’t tell where a car is made any more simply by looking at the home country of the company selling it.
Forget foreign/domestic. Just buy the best vehicle for your usage, for the best price you can find.
At the risk of hijacking the thread, we may be caught in a terminology difference. I have always heard ‘handling’ used in the ‘mountain goat’ sense, as in “Ferrari handles better than Rolls-Royce” or whatever. I wasn’t aware that it was a relative thing.
But since a bigger engine weighs more and needs more power to accelerate it, and needs a bigger heavier body to fit it into which also needs more power, surely there is more than fuel and air to consider? Ceteris paribus, I would have thought that generally it would be more efficient to get a given amount of power from the smallest lightest engine available? Anyhow, this is probably another bit of confusion caused by the fact that over here ‘tuning’ is generally meant to mean ‘sqeezing as much performance as possible out of something’ which mean I had a bit of dissonance about Omniscient’s comment - to me something tuned to the outer edge of the envelope means a car like this rather than anything US-built (when I was kid we all wanted one of these - 224bhp 2.0 liter from the factory, 350bhp when modified, 500+bhp in race trim).
Back on topic
It wouldn’t surprise me if GM and Ford build several cars that exactly match your requirements but only sell them in Europe, which seems a tad foolish given that all their competitors sell ‘global’ cars in the US as well as US-specific models.
Zenith - since we are in anecdote-exchanging territory, an American colleague of mine always used to regale us with the story of his mother’s Chevrolet which broke down and had to be towed. The garage told her 'if it was a Toyota we could fix it by tomorrow since we have all the parts, but we’ll have to get the Chevvy part in from Detroit - it’ll take 3 days". This was in Maryland IIRC - his family were strictly US-only up to that point but haven’t bought another ‘American’ car since. Jaguars, Mercedes, and the odd yacht, mainly. Whether it was the product, the dealerships, the marketing or just mismanagement is debatable, but Detroit screwed the pooch big-time, and fantasizing that it was all the fault of foreign-paid agitators in the media won’t change that.
“Assmebled” does not mean "made"Just as an FYI, it is require by law that cars sold in the US have a sticker on them showing the content of the car is American/Canadian. My Chevy is 90%, while my friend’s American assembled Toyota is 60%, and the Mexican assembled PT Cruise is 70%.
I don’t get why this would cause them not to buy an ‘American’ (extremely stupid quote marks) car. So the garage stocked Toyota parts, and not GM. It’s not like she went to the dealership. Most garages which cater to Toyota owners carry the parts because it would be dumb not to. But your friend’s parents aren’t very bright anyway if they bought a POS Jag (a Ford BTW).
Criminy, I wish I’d seen this thread earlier, now I think my nice long post will probably not attract any attention, but here goes:
I just bought a new car, a 2006 Chevy Impala, after dumping my Isuzu Rodeo, which I despised. The Rodeo was a compromise vehicle, I initially bought a Trooper, but it had major alignment problems, engine trouble, and a variety of issue that made me go back to the dealer and ask for soemthing else. At the time, what I could afford was the Rodeo, so that’s what I got.
I test drove a LOT of cars. For the most part, excepting Kia and Saturn (My wife owned a Kia and we’ll never own another, I had a Saturn and thought it was junk), if there is a car on the market in the $25,000 or less range, I test drove it.
While driving I took notes on the parts of the car that I cared about, my main concern being room for my legs. I’m 6’2", but have very long legs. I always feel cramped in a car, because my knees seem to be in my chest. Add to that arthritis in the knees, and driving can be very uncomfortable. Here’s the gist:
Anerican cars, in general, felt less “finished” than thier foreign counterparts. I think a lot of American manufacturers have done a decent job with exterior styling, but if you sit in a $25,000 U.S. car versus an $18,000 foreign car, you’ll feel like the foreign car is much more finsihed and rugged inside. At least I did.
The foreign makers, however, have a long way to go as far as interior room is concerned. For example, the “smaller” Pontiac Grand prix had more leg, elbow, shoulder, and hip room than the Mazda6, the Camry, and a host of other competitors.
American cars ingeneral had a smoother, more comfortable ride, with the exception of the Chrysler 300, which sounded like a chainsaw starting every time I accelerated. On the flip side, most of the Japanese makers has much quieter rides.
But the largest difference between the two (aside form gas mileage) came down to pricing and options. Foreign cars manufacturers have got this down to a science. Aside from Mazda, I found that all of the foreign dealers were able to offer me just about any combination of options that I wanted - - whether they were listed in the brochure or not. Many admitted that the car might have to be ordered “my way”, but were willing to do it.
On the other hand, American manufacturers are in love with “packages” and not one of them was willing to break a package or make any modifications to it. In fact, Dodge lost a sale over this, sending me to the Chevy guys instead (the “package” they wanted me to buy versus the one feature I wanted was a difference of nearly $7000, which made no sense to me at all).
I think that this is telling, and that the Japanese manufacturers have probably captured the marketing idea that choice sells. Chevy is picking up on this (the Impala and other models have as many as 6 different trim levels), but the other guys are not. So in general, if a consumer wants what they want and nothing else, they’re better off with Toyota, Mazda, etc. If they’re willing to compromise on features, and perhaps pay for some they don’t want, then they can go with a U.S. car. In the end, I chose the Impala because it was almost as roomy as the Dodge Charger, but thousands less than the package Dodge wanted me to pay for.
I’d be happy to post my notes on any of the cars I drove. I still have them.
On a side note, if I’d had my checkbook the day I drove the Pontiac Grand Prix I’d own one. It wasn’t roomy enough for me, but that’s a FUN car to drive.
[QUOTE=slaphead]
But since a bigger engine weighs more and needs more power to accelerate it, and needs a bigger heavier body to fit it into which also needs more power, surely there is more than fuel and air to consider? Ceteris paribus, I would have thought that generally it would be more efficient to get a given amount of power from the smallest lightest engine available? Anyhow, this is probably another bit of confusion caused by the fact that over here ‘tuning’ is generally meant to mean ‘sqeezing as much performance as possible out of something’ which mean I had a bit of dissonance about Omniscient’s comment - to me something tuned to the outer edge of the envelope means a car like this rather than anything US-built (when I was kid we all wanted one of these - 224bhp 2.0 liter from the factory, 350bhp when modified, 500+bhp in race trim).
[quote]
You’re wandering off into anecdotal territory and some of your base assumptions are off. A competitive car does three things: accelerate, corner and brake. All of these require a certain power to weight ratio. You can make a given car perform better by changing either side of that ratio.
A bigger engine * does not* automatically imply a heavier engine. An Iron block, iron head inline six (say, in a Nissan 280z as that’s the specific motor I know about at the moment) is only about 75 lbs lighter than an Aluminum Block, Aluminum Head LS7. The V8 makes a third to twice the hp, gets a third better gas mileage for that 75 lb increase in weight, and can perform under much harsher conditions for longer.
The Cosworth mentioned in your URL has limitations pressed upon it by the shell wrapped around the motor. You CAN’T physically put a Ford Modular V8 in the space presented. You CAN put a 5 liter pushrod ford motor in there. When you do so, you must also change springs, brakes, and tires to make an all around better racecar. And when you make a small, peaky, motor make 500 hp, you RUIN it for the street. (Note that drivability in traffic hasn’t entered our conversation yet.)
It also very much depends on the kind of racing you’re doing. I can pick a course that’ll have a WRX beating the pants of Chevy’s C6R, and I can pick another course that’ll have the C6R blowing the WRX into the weeds.
Yes, quoting peak horsepower number are meaningless. One must display the horsepower and torque along with the power curve for both, along with engine speeds.
For example, the over exhaulted Honda S2000 flaunted it’s 230 HP rating from a tiny 2.0 litre engine. Oooh…ahhhh! Over 100 HP per litre!!! It drove like an anemic sewing machine, and if you had a full tank of gas/petrol you might as well just stick the tachometer at 7,000 rpms because that is the revs needed to get the power up.
230hp in a 2-seat convertible: Then why did it take 5.5 to 6 seconds to get this baby to 60mph? Because 230 was the peak horsepower, made up near 9,000 rpms. Well, zippity frigging doo dah, a tiny car with 230 HP should be hitting something closer to sub 5 runs.
It was 230 horsepower, with a shallow power band and no usable torque.