According to those renowned postmodern philosophers the Barenaked Ladies, “everything old is new again.” The maxim certainly applies to the automotive industry. Those of us who put ourselves in Moto-PR harm’s way are constantly bombarded by joyous claims of new and improved technology and the latest justgottahavit features: self-parking cars, adaptive cruise control, heated/cooled cup holders, etc. The truth is, many of the technological advancements we lust after are recycled ideas from days gone by. They may be “improved” but they definitely aren’t “new.”
As manufactures try to squeeze every inch per gallon out of engines that lower their CAFE ratings, variable displacement powerplants (a.k.a. “Displacement on Demand”) are the next big thing. Shutting down half the cylinders turns a powerful V8 into the world’s bulkiest four-cylinder, but saves enough fuel to salve the customer’s conscience and convince them that they’re doing something positive for the environment/America’s energy independence.
Back in ‘77, Ford developed an ill-fated version of their 300-cubic-inch truck engine that shut off three cylinders in cruising mode. In the early ‘80’s, GM’s infamous V-8-6-4 engine made it to market. Unfortunately, engine control technology wasn’t mature enough to handle the task efficiently and the idea died an ignominious death (along with the Cadillac models powered by GM’s variable displacement engine). Now that computer technology has caught up with the concept, we have engines that adapt to changing conditions faster than a White House press secretary.
GM was the first to offer another technological marvel infesting today’s high-priced luxobarges: menu-driven video screen control panels. Whether it’s called iDrive, COMAND, MMI or just plain aggravating, they’re all riffs on the Electronic Control Center (ECC) installed in Buick’s Reatta and Riviera in the late 80’s. The ECC touch screen adjusted the radio and climate control functions and accessed diagnostics for the vehicle's various electronic systems. It was universally reviled by the automotive press, and for good reason: drivers found it confusing and complicated. Of course, today’s mouse-driven multi-media controllers boast high-resolution full-color screens and… greater complexity.
The starter button is a slightly more useful addition to today’s high-priced cars. This hot new feature dates back to the early days of the last century, when Cadillac first introduced the self-starter. For years, the ignition key was used only to close the ignition circuit. To start the car, you turned on the ignition then pushed or stepped on the starter button. On some really fancy cars, it was combined with the accelerator; flooring the pedal would both set the choke and start the car. Today, financially flush carpal tunnel sufferers can rejoice. With an RFI-enabled key fob tucked in your pocket or purse, you just push the button and go.
And then there’s the treehuggers' dream date: the electric car. The way its boosters promote the technology, you’d think they invented electricity. But any pistonhead worth his gas card knows that electric cars pre-date the gasoline-powered car. An electric vehicle was the first to break the 100 kilometers per hour barrier in 1899, reaching the blinding speed of 105.88 kph (65.79 mph). Most production electric cars were limited to a more civil 20 mph and marketed as town cars to upper-class customers and women drivers, thanks to their clean, quiet and genteel operation.
By the 1930’s, the electric car industry had all but disappeared. It’s a good thing we’ve progressed so far in the intervening 70 years or so. Today, there are only a few things standing between us and freeways filled with silent running electric cars: finding a way to create an affordable, safe machine that can travel a distance comparable to a conventionally-powered car that can be recharged quickly and conveniently for the same price as it would cost for a tank of gas. Which is, of course, the same set of problems that killed the concept last time.
Some ideas come and go, then come and go again. In 2003, GMC touted their Envoy XUV’s “first ever” retractable roof (a roof section that slides back and forth to facilitate tall cargo). Forty years earlier Studebaker offered the Wagonaire, a station wagon with a retractable roof. Envoy owners retracted the XUV's top with the flick of a switch, while the Studebaker’s lid was a clever manual design. But both systems had one thing in common: an alarming propensity to leak. At least GMC had enough sense to abandon the idea after two model years; Studebaker hung in for four.
Who knows what the next “new” idea will be or who will have it? Whatever it is, it’s probably been done before. Which is just as well. The only thing worse than an old idea made new is a new idea made bad.
(feel free to delete this post)
“Le plus ca change le plus ca reste le meme” is a *horrendous* french translation. “The more things change the more they stay the same” does not translate literally well at all.
“Plus Ça Change, Plus Les Choses Sont Les Mêmes” would be correct (literally, “more it changes, more things are the same”. Although french don’t capitalize each word in titles, that’s forgiveable.
Hate to be nitpicky, but I know about the literary standard of this site.
I love the article by the way, I think it’s not just the auto industry where people seem to believe a revolution is under way. Somehow a lot of people think everything is different in this day and age thanks to fabulous technology… which is not, we’re all still human and complex machines and systems can fail, no less now than 30, 40 years ago. Things are indeed the more the same than ever.
Ca suffit?
Remember Chrysler’s Pushbutton Automatic transmission from 1956 ? I bet BMW takes another shot at that one.
Wonderful article, Frank. We forget to put things in historical perspective, even if history consistently repeats itself. I didn’t know about the Ford 4.9L getting DoD research! That was one helluva motor…
People always say that overhead cam motors are the most advanced engine design, making the most power, efficiency, etc. Not only has the latest GM small-block V8 shot holes in that theory (30+mpg in a torque-rich 400hp Corvette? How many wins at LeMans now?) the original OHV design dates back to Kettering’s 1949 V8.
The first OHC motor was in the 1930s, maybe the 1920s. So next time someone says pushrods are old tech, remind them its actually one of the most modern engine designs we got.
Back in 1999 or 2000, when Nissan introduced their crew-cab mini truck, the press release information made it sound like they just stumbled onto the idea and were presenting it fresh to the world – as if domestic makers haven’t been making crew-cab trucks since the 50’s, or as if crew-cab mini-trucks haven’t been in every market except North America since the 1980s! It was just bizzarre.
I mean, I understand that ads want to hype the product as the “hot new thing”, but why all the puffery? If the idea is good, then it’s good. It’s not like people are going to say “gee, I would have liked that [fill in the blank name of new product] if it had actually been new on the market, but now that I find out it’s a new version of an old idea, I don’t like it any more.” Does anybody really think like that? Or are advertising writers just so lazy that they don’t bother to find out whether some “new” product is, in fact, a new idea?
Maybe they’re just so solipsistic that they think anything that is “new” to them must therefore be “new” to everyone else?
If my memory serves me correctly, the first OHC engine was a Peugeot back in 1914. And it was not only OHC, it wasfour cylinder DOHC, and four valves per cylinder. Oh yeah, it redlined at something like 6000rpm. And it put an end to those 15 liter dinosaurs on the racing circuts.
Syle
Deranged Few M/C
Frank, I’m going to have to challenge your reference to a Ford 300 DOD engine. I’m pretty familiar with that engine and I have never heard of it. Are you talking about a production engine? Ford did a lot of research with PROCO, a stratified charge engine in the 70’s, but it was not DOD. Sorry to nitpick.
Pauln, they called it a “dual displacement” engine. No, it never made it to production due to rudimentary computer controls, low power-to-weight ratios, and difficulties in controlling vibration when the engine switched to half power. See:
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/automotivetech/428b3bcc2eb84010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
Martin says:
Or are advertising writers just so lazy that they don’t bother to find out whether some “new†product is, in fact, a new idea?
Please Mr. Albright…let’s not be disingenuous! Any advertising exec or staffer tasked to sell a product who even casually mentioned the possibility that the aforementioned product might not be the newest, hottest, most innovative item ever dreamed up by the cleverest of the R&D whizzbangers would be dragged out back and shot, and their carcass left to rot on the pavement of Madison Avenue as a reminder to other advertising writers.
The advertisers mantra (repeat after me):
It’s NEW
It’s HOT
It’s LIKE NOTHING EVER DONE BEFORE
It’s GOING TO MAKE YOU SEXIER
It’s SOMETHING YOU NEED TO BUY RIGHT NOW
(all other considerations are secondary, and therefore, irrelevant)
Martin, I feel what you’re saying and know where you’re coming from. But let’s not expect Madison Avenue to act with common sense.
Excellent article, Mr. Williams.
This article was lots of fun. And lets remember that the first car (at least the first one I know of), the 1769 Cugnot Fardier a Vapeur, came long before cars became commercial products. And the idea goes back at least to Da Vinci.
sykerocker: that Peugeot is the earliest OHC design I’ve heard of. Thank you for enlightening me.
My Great-Grandmother, who lived until I was in college, drove a Baker Electric before WW I.
Cool article. I’m a young guy, so most of this stuff is new to me. Always amazing to see how far and how little we have actually progressed.
Let’s not forget another never-before-thought-of revolutionary idea introduced with the GM Trail Blazer and Envoy…that crazy straight six engine! Who knew you could actually line those things up in a row?!
All I want to come back: Kick-on brights.
Thank you.
A few more recycled ideas:
The swiveling headlight first appeared on the 1948 Tucker, then it was picked up in the late 60s by Citroen for the DS. Now swiveling headlights are almost de rigueur on any luxo-brand.
In 1900 Ferdinand Porsche modified electric cars by adding a gasoline engine that generated electric power used by motors at each wheel. The resulting hybrid-power, four-wheel-drive automobile was produced until 1906.
Hatchback cars had their heyday in America in the 1970s and are making a comeback today (but usually called something else by the marketing mavens). In 1949, the Kaiser Traveler sedan featured a rear hatch and a fold-down, rear-seat backrest. It was the first car that attempted to combine the style of a sedan with the utility of a station wagon.
Steering wheel-mounted transmission controls were one of the many things that added to the strangeness of the Edsel. They mounted the pushbuttons for the automatic transmission in the hub of the steering wheel — an idea that died even before the Edsel did. However, steering wheel-mounted transmission controls have reappeared in recent years, in the form of paddles or buttons on the spokes.
And so it goes…
Johnny Canada:
Actually, Chrysler’s “Torque Flight” push button automatic lasted several years and was responsible, in large part, for the Dodge Hemi’s reign of supremacy in the quarter mile in the early to mid 60’s. Pushing buttons proved faster than yanking a shifter.
Very, very interesting editorial.
Sajeev, there is more to mileage efficiency than simply horsepower. Gearing, weight and aerodynamic efficiency play huge roles as well.
Last Summer I was in Cleveland and visited the Crawford auto museum. I do not recall the name of it, but one of the early 20th century vehicles was a hybrid. It used an internal combustion engine to generate electricity to turn electric motors on the axles.
I’m not sure the Tucker was the first auto to have a headlight turn with the steering wheel. I thought I saw somewhere a car from the teens or twenties with the same feature, though I do not remember the details.
If you ever visit Cleveland, be sure to visit the museum. They have some really nice, rare vehicles there. I also love the Lane Motor Museum in Nashville, TN. Great place run by true pistonheads.
Tuckers did have six tailpipes.
That needs to “come back.”
NeonCat,
Porsche modified cars by the Lohner Company in Vienna. Also, in the 19-teens, the Woods Motor Vehicle Company in Chicago, marketed a design where an electric motor powered the car up to 15 m.p.h., then a gasoline engine kicked in to propel the vehicle to its top speed (about 35 m.p.h). Don’t know how much synergy it had, but it certainly was a hybrid!
Tucker is credited with being the first to incorporate a swiveling headlight (one headlamp mounded in the center of the car) into the design of the car. Previously there had been kits you could install to link your headlamps to the tie rod and make them pivot as you turned the wheel. These were designed for cars that had free-standing headlamps (like the Model T).
Thanks for the tips on the museums. I’ll check them out if I find myself near those cities with some free time.
If the recycled feature’s preveious incarnation is fairly recent, those marketing mavens often use new names to make us think its REALLY NEW!!! Hence, instead of “station wagon,” they say “crossover vehicle.” PuLEEZE!
Frank Williams: fascinating about the early 20th century Porsche hybrid. Do you know why they stopped makng them? Weight? ??
David, from what I understand, in 1906 Emil Jellinek bought the patent for the Lohner-Porsche system and hired Porsche away from Lohne to work for the Austro-Daimler company. While they worked on some gas/electric models, they focused most of their attention on gasoline automobiles. I don’t know about the weight; specifications on the car are kind of sketchy.
Mervich:
That’s right. It may have even included the 413 Max Wedge cars.
“Torque Flight”, what a great name for a transmission!
Johnny C,
I seem to recall that it was Torque Flite or even Torqueflite on cars such as the Valiant RV-1 and SV-1 – you can see the “Torqueflite” chrome badging – in Australia.
Unfortunately, the system evolved into the lever and “PRNDL” quadrant. I think the push-buttom system had four buttons, P,R,D, and N.
About time for a come-back!
Good article. Frank, I’ve got an idea to realize more quickly the treehuggers’ dream of electric cars. Build all the electric cars now. Take the engines out of all the obsolete gas-powered cars, mount them on the electric cars, fill ’em up with gas and use them to charge the electric cars’ batteries while they’re driving. Brilliant, no?
Or to put it another way, where do those electic car advocates think the electricity to run the cars is coming from? Coal, baby.
This is a nice piece, Frank. As a kid, I always loved that Wagonaire with the sliding top. Last time I saw one, was in 1988, at a collector car auction and despite the propensity for leaks, I wish I’d bought it.
Here’s another way-back to the future comparo. Today, Toyota and its partner Aisin, are working to best Mercedes with an 8-speed automatic transmission.
But way back in 1907 – almost 100 years ago – Alanson Brush’s car bearing his surname had a variable speed clutch that gave 8 forward speeds and reverse; at high speed – well, about 30 to 40 mph in those days – it became a friction clutch.
Brush was a key design-engineer on the first Cadillac engine. Addititonally, the Brush automobile just mentioned, was the first production automobile to use coil springs and shock absorbers. How cool is that?
For what it is worth, the designer on the Wagonaire, was I recall, Brook Stevens, who also did the freshening up of what had become the Studebaker Hawk by 1962. Mr. Stevens was also responsible for the Excalibur, which was to have been a Studebaker concept car at the 1964 NY Auto Show, and to have set upon a Lark chassis. But then, when Studebaker left South Bend Indiana to try surviving as an auto company in Canada – they lasted only two more years – Brook Stevens put the car into the show himself and became a car maker himself. (He ended up using a modified Studebaker chassis with a Chevrolet V8 and then cobbled together a chassis from GM components.)
Ah yes, the Excalibur…the inspiration for the “neo-classic” look of the 1970s, which spawned the plethora of “personal luxury cars.” How well I remember it: the sweeping lines molded into the side of the car to invoke the feel of separate fenders of the 1920s, the opera windows, opera lamps, landau roofs, and the best – the two-headlight systems that attempted to make the front of the car look like a pre-WWII beauty. In the early 1980s, Lincoln released a four-door Mark VI with the functioning headlights hidden behind doors that had FAKE headlights attached to them!
Brooks (plural) Stevens was a great designer, but somehow his later designs were not among his best…although they inspired many trends in the automobile’s “dark days” of the 1970s.
Terry,
My bad. I changed Frank’s copy and assumed the manual part of the retracting process was a “hand crank.”
Copy amended.
I think it was a 55 BUICK that had the gas pedal/starter.If you got the ROADMASTER it came with a WONDER BAR radio and a DYNO FLOW automatic.Hey you didn`t hafta to shift gears,or tune your radio Ahh the golden age of motoring.
Mikey,
I don’t know when they first installed it, but Buick had the gas pedal/starter as late as 1959 that I know of. In the late 80s I found a couple of little old ladies who were selling their ’59 Invicta sedan and they had to tell me how to start it (they thought it was amusing I didn’t know how). Yeah, I’m still kicking myself for not buying it.
As I recall, some of the cars (or maybe all of them?) with the Wonder Bar radio came with a button on the floor so you could operate it with your foot.
# Jonny Lieberman:
September 15th, 2006 at 3:11 pm
All I want to come back: Kick-on brights.
Thank you.
My dad was driving a new car back for the dealership in Ohio (from oklahoma) that had been abandoned for a little over three months in a parking lot. He was doing 70 mph down a two lane stretch of blacktop, kicked on the brights, and the headlights cut out completely, no moon, no streetlights. When he finally dropped off the car back at the dealership, he told them “Yeah, you really need to fix that.”