When a chain smoker develops lung cancer after thirty years of habitual self-annihilation, their ill-health should come as no surprise to either the smoker or a casual observer. Likewise, The Big 2.5’s current tailspin is the direct result of bad habits stretching back some fifty years. Like a pack-a-day puffer, the Detroit automakers “felt just fine” for several decades. Eventually, inevitably, their dirty little habits caught up with them.
In the 1950’s, The Big Three rode America’s post-war economic boom to unprecedented profits. Their seemingly unstoppable success crowded out the domestic competition (Hudson, Nash, Packard, Studebaker). The Detroit capos reigned supreme, addicted to the high profits generated by a one-size fits-all strategy. So they cranked out nothing but full-size cars and trucks, counted the cash, paid off the unions, sat back and enjoyed the view. After all, why do anything different when the sun’s shining and hay’s being made?
The annual model change summoned forth more fins, chrome and horsepower– while hiding undersized drum brakes, marshmallow handling, numb steering and declining efficiency. While there were moments of brilliance amid the glitz and glamour, The Big Three decided Americans were suckers for sheer size and superficial flash.
Despite the eternal sunshine of Detroit’s spotless minds, European import cars started trickling into the domestic arena. By the late 50’s, the trickle had become a torrent. Corner car lots sold every conceivable (if obscure) European make: two-stroke DKWs, two-cylinder Lloyds, Renault Dauphines, Hillman Minx, Austins, Simcas, Peugeots, Citroens, VWs, Mercedes, Borgwards, etc. The Big Three launched their first counterattack in 1960.
Enter the Falcon, Corvair, Valiant and later, Chevy II. They were mostly seven-eighths scale full-size cars; vehicles that shared as many components with their bigger brothers as possible. The end result had certain relative merits, but import-style steering feel, handling and efficiency were not amongst them.
The new compacts sold well enough. Sales of “exotic” imports imploded in 1960– and no wonder. By then, most of the fragile machines were either dead or falling by the roadside. VW and Mercedes were a notable exception, importing robust cars within a proper dealer network. But the rest of them weird ferrin jobs couldn’t withstand American-style driving abuse—long distances and minimal maintenance. The lack of parts and service from fly-by-night dealers didn’t help.
The Big Three misread the tea leaves– they saw their compacts’ success and the collapse of import sales as complete vindication.
In Detroit’s mid-sixties’ euphoria, the domestics failed to notice that VW’s reputation and sales continued to grow. Soon, they were closing in on half a million sales per year. In fact, The Big Three’s compacts were stealing sales from the compact Rambler American and Studebaker Lark and their own land yachts– not the sturdy little German cars.
Anyway, the U.S. market was expanding so rapidly that the domestic compacts’ failure to stem the import tide was lost on their creators. Falling back on old habits, they put their compacts on a super-size V8 Juice diet.
By the late 60’s, Fort Detroit once again became aware of the foreign invaders. There were termites in the walls– VW bugs– and the sound of their collective chewing could not be ignored. At the same time, Toyota and Nissan put their heads over the parapet.
GM and Ford responded with a salvo of four cylinder compacts: the 1971 Chevy Vega and Ford Pinto. We’ll dispense with all the old jokes. Let’s just say that one nadir attracted another. Never mind the Pinto’s exploding gas tanks and the Vega’s self-destructing engines (aluminum block with cast iron head?), the terrible 2+2-some were packaging efficiency anti-matter.
At least the Vega handled well. Customers looking for a shrunken Camaro with a suicidal, gutless tractor engine, a three-speed stick (or two-speed Power-Glide) and interiors with all the ambience of a Rubbermaid storage bin loved it. Chrysler’s solution– The Plymouth Cricket (the imported English Hillman)– was no better, and a lot worse.
Meanwhile, Nissan had a hit with its Datsun 510, the “poor man’s BMW.” The Japanese import boasted a lusty OHC four, slick transmission, independent rear suspension and a practical but good-looking body. Toyota’s Corona was a little more boring (the company DNA?) but sturdy and fully equipped.
Never mind. The Big Three entered the 1970’s brimming with confidence. Their all-new ‘71 big cars were the pinnacle (and blow-out) of the American car’s evolution– from the 1200lb Model T to 5000+lb big-block barges longer than a Suburban.
Detroit firmly believed that the cute-as-a-bug Vega and um, inexpensive Pinto would finally show those nasty, cheap, tinny little imports what for. Once again, the big boys in and around Detroit convinced themselves that they had dealt with a problem that would eventually go away, just like the last time.
Cigars were passed. Kool-Aid drunk. A reckoning was on its way.
Paul, you really nailed it with this article. I’m about the same age as you and remember all of the above quite well (except I lived in the hinterlands — Pittsburgh, PA — and never saw most of the weird pre-1960 imports you mention).
It is truly amazing how the then-Big 3 couldn’t resist the urge to supersize all of their offerings. The original, “intermediate” Chevy Chevelle of 1964 morphed into a huge land yacht in 9 short model years, only “small” in comparison to the humongous Chevy Impala of the same era. The Impala, of course, was dwarfed by the luxury cars of its day — Cadillac, Lincoln Continental, and Imperial — all pushing the 5000-pound mark as you stated.
I remember also the ridicule directed at AMC for not having a “standard-size” car in the mid-60s because their Classics and Ambassadors fell short of the magic 200 inches in overall length.
Great reminder, Paul. And, let’s not forget the Gremlin (“Let’s just hack off the back end of our compact and call it an import-beater!”).
35-40 years ago, arrogance was pervasive, and the Big Three were betting that Americans would Buy American, despite design, reliability, quality and customer service that didn’t measure up to even those then-mediocre imports.
If they’re finally emerging from slumber now, why are we still being bombarded with “America’s truck/car/CUV” ads?
Here’s a preview of the next chapter of the Deathwatch: the Cassandras are saying that Saudi Arabia’s oil production dropped 8% in 2006 and that was NOT voluntary.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2325
oops, didn’t close HTML tag correctly.
BAck in the early/mid 60’s, my father stareted buying VW Beetles. He was a salesman with 4 kids in parochial schools, and needed a dead-reliable car to keep groceries on the table. He became a True Believer, to the extent that all his kids drove Beetles when they got thier licenses.
Slow, poor heating, but great in the Pennsylvania snow, impeccable build quality and incredible reliability. VW made its’ bones on the back of a 40 year old design. They steadily improved it every year, and built a cult-like fan base.
When he finally made some money and could afford to buy a bigger car, he drove Fords. ’68 Galaxie, ’70 Galaxie, ’73 LTD (a nice barge), then the killer: ’76 Mercury Monarch.
He switched to The General when his local Ford/LM dealer wouldn’t give him good service. After a ’78 Sedan DeVille (I still love that monster), he went through a series of very bad cars. Buick Electra, Buick X-Car. When that debacle was over, he made another bad choice: 1983 Chrysler New Yorker. A few Olds 98’s later, his last one ending with a blown tranny at 35K and a blown engine at 75K.
My mother now has a ’92 Camry bought after his death when we traded the 98 and the New Yorker for one decent car. That Camry now has 47K miles and has NEVER had the first problem.
Ask how many of his kids drive an American car?
You describe things right on the mark, Paul! That Detroit f..ed up in the sixties, in the seventies, in the eighties, too, is — in a way – water under the bridge. But, how they have been able completely and totally erase the experiences from these eras from their corporate minds, is – well – mind-blowing. Think back to 1973, there were gas lines, you could drive only every second day based on the last digit on your number plate, there were conversion sets to turn your low-compression, low-powered V8 into a V4 (that probably could not turn itself over)!! How is it possible to drink so much Kool-Aid that all this is forgotten, and you are betting the farm that 5,000 or 6,000 or even 7,000 pound heavy machinery is a sensible form of transportation? Beats me, and the consequnces are rearing their ugly heads even as we speak.
Interesting comment about the VWs, Zarba, my dad bought a chain of Beetles in the same time period. Our relatives warned of our early demise in a nasty crash when that rear engine sent us into a terminal tail spin.
I always pointed out that they were supposed to float real good if we drove into a river.
I have to agree with everything you’ve said here, Paul, and in fact I’m red-faced to admit that I tried very very hard to “keep the home fires burning” by continually talking up, and spending good hard earned money, on “domestic” cars over a span of about 25 years, with a 7 year gap of living in the UK where I didn’t feel it was necessary to hobble myself with British built stuff. (Why should I have? The Brits didn’t, by and large, and I wasn’t even British). That may have put the seed into my mind about trying “other than Detroit” stuff once I moved back to the states, but it still took quite a long time and a string of very poor dealers (and even worse, “Detroit brand” cars) to get me to try a Hyundai in 2002.
We still have the Hyundai, and a 2005 Prius. I’ll never go back to “Detroit brands” again.
I should have learned my lesson in 1973-4-5. I distinctly recall trying to talk my dad into a new 1971 VW Beetle (since I knew that the car being bought that year would be my mom’s for about 3 years and then I’d “inherit” it). He bought a 1968 Pontiac and wow, was that ever an absolute piece….. yep, General Messup put NYLON cam gears on the crankshaft and of course, the cam chain wore through it so while I had it, it stopped running and left me absolutely stranded (with my parents out of town) in the countryside.
“The annual model change summoned forth more fins, chrome and horsepower– while hiding undersized drum brakes, marshmallow handling, numb steering and declining efficiency. While there were moments of brilliance amid the glitz and glamour, The Big Three decided Americans were suckers for sheer size and superficial flash.”
Now that everyone has pretty much nailed the basics as far as the underpinnings go, I think it’s high time to return to the “superficial flash” you deride, insomuch as building everyday vehicles that can still draw admiring glances and be appreciated as a rolling piece of art instead of a very expensive washing machine.
The magic year is 1973 (CR’s car of the year was the Galaxie 4 door), the year that Detroit died. Finding out virtually overnight that their money making lines were obsolete, the management literally did not know what to do, and compounded with the disaster of the UAW production lines (remember the old adage: Never buy a car built on a Friday or Monday), the 70’s was the decade that American consumers really discovered other brands. Nader/GM killed the only decent small car Detroit ever built, the Corvair (the ’64-68 cars were wondrous to drive), and since then Detroit has been terrified of doing anything challenging in terms of engineering. See your accompanying editorial on the Focus to judge how little Det. has learned over the last 30+ years.
Yep, I lived though all that; how I’ll never know.
First new’un was a stick shift V8 black Ford ’57 hardtop.
Becoming mature and married found me in a new ’60 Corvair. Worked better when I discovered steel core fan belts.
Success bit me in the rear so I got a new ’63 Thunderbird.
The new ’68 Corvette that I got to celebrate my divorce was a piece of manure.
Second marriage found me in a new ’70 Toyota Corolla station wagon. ¡ Neat car !
Toyotas, Fiats, Audis and a BMW then reigned supreme for me til I sold the last car I owned in ’97 and exported my to date non-car owning self to Central America, where I still am today.
Thanks for the accurate history lesson.
Allen McDonald, El Galloviejo®
Having owned so many different vehicles, foreign and domestic, through the years (Ford, Mercury, Honda, VW, Nissan, Isuzu, Subaru, Mazda, Volvo, Mitsubishi) I feel pretty well qualified to weigh in on the relatives merits/deficiencies of foreign vs. domestic products. And it’s not much of a contest, really. Although I enjoyed the driving dynamics of my Taurus MT5, it went through a hideous number of head gaskets (all at rather inopportune times and places) and was replaced by an Accord at my first opportunity. While the Accord was nice, it never did much for my soul.
Domestic automakers will never be worth exploring when I need a new ride because the twin evils of bloated healthcare costs and short-term management objectives will never allow them to build anything but the most compromised machinery. Yes, the Japanese build competent, albeit vanilla, offerings and the Europeans build desirable but cantankerous machines. Neither have nailed the formula, unless you have $50 large to drop on a true luxury ride. But at least the foreigners offer passably compromised vehicles. Nothing that Detroit has spawned of late has a whole lot going for it and will certainly not grace this driver’s garage.
Oh wow, a deathwatch for a whole City! Yikes and yowie.
But y’know, ya gotta do what ya gotta do. And Paul, your opening paragraph says it all. It’s especially poignant how you relate Detroit to a smoker, and expose the similarity of “suicide by self-annilation” between the two.
I may have to print this one off for sharing.
Originally Posted by starlightmica:
“Here’s a preview of the next chapter of the Deathwatch: the Cassandras are saying that Saudi Arabia’s oil production dropped 8% in 2006 and that was NOT voluntary.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2325 ”
Everybody and anybody who loves cars NEEDS to read this link. That site (theoildrum) can come across as a bunch of doomsdayers sometimes, but this particular story is well worth your time.
I’ve been following energy (not just oil) issues closely for over a decade and that story is solid. Anybody who believes that the author of that link is wrong needs to come up with a better explanation, backed up by solid evidence. I HOPE he’s wrong, but I can’t make any kind of convincing argument that this is the case.
starlightmica wrote: “Here’s a preview of the next chapter of the Deathwatch: the Cassandras are saying that Saudi Arabia’s oil production dropped 8% in 2006 and that was NOT voluntary.”
I read an interesting article a couple years ago that said that most oilfields decline in production rate by 8% to 10% each year.
It’s the normal rate of decline, and it’s due to the physics of how oil moves through substrate via capillary action and gravity.
Normally it’s not a big deal, because an oilfield will have what they call “extra capacity”. But older oilfields may no longer have that extra (unpumped) capacity, hence the decline in output, which can actually be measured. This appears to be the case for Saudi, as the charts in Starlight’s link show.
This is not new, however. Saudi Arabia has known about this for years. They, in an attempt to increase production, pump seawater into the substrate…supposedly underneath the oil, so that the oil will rise and be pumped easier and/or faster. It’s not an uncommon practice either, and in fact, that’s the technique we use to draw oil out of the caverns that are part of the Strategic Oil Reserve (SPR) several locations in the states around the Gulf of Mexico.
But you can’t rush the process! The article went on to say that there is a possibility that Saudi may be pumping too much seawater too quickly into the ground and that there’s a risk of causing a mixture of oil and seawater and/or causing a problem with the substrate; a problem that cannot be fixed with existing technology.
The upshot of the article was that it’s possible to cause damage to the extent that an oilfield is rendered partly or completely unusable.
And the problem could manifest itself rather suddenly, over the course of just a few months.
That’s not a lot of lead-time.
If I recall correctly, the US currently gets most of its imported oil from Canada and Mexico; about 60%. Next is Saudi, followed closely by Venesuela and then by other OPEC nations.
Oil in the Midlle East is “cleaner” than oil coming from other parts of the world. That means it costs less to refine it and make it ready for use in home heating systems, power plants, and our cars, trains, and ships.
If our #3 importer suddenly says they can only produce 75%…or 50% of what they could before, that will most certainly mean that it’ll cost more for everything that depends on oil, not only because there’ll be less available for purchase in the market, but also because what’s being sold will have to be “cleaned up” more.
There’s no putting a nice spin on this one, fellas. It’s going to put an enormous upward pressure on the prices of everything that is made with or transported by the use of oil.
And that’s EVERYTHING. Food, and the cost to get it to market. Fertilizer. Wastewater treatment and freshwater production. Plastics. Plane tickets. Train tickets. Sports teams travelling to other cities to compete. Refrigeration, air conditioning, and anything else that uses electricity. Cars. Tires. Roads. Computers. Anything and everything for sale in a store.
I don’t know if Starlight intended for his comment to turn into a discussion about Peak Oil, but he opened the door, so there it is.
How’s that to cheer y’all up on a Monday? :)
If you need background information about Saudi Arabia’s oil production, Matthew Simmons has a bunch of PDF presentations on his web site, or read his book, Twilight In The Desert.
http://www.simmonsco-intl.com/research.aspx?Type=msspeeches
What does this all mean? Well, peak oil just might have happened in 2005, but we won’t know for sure for a few more years. Saudi Arabia has long been the world’s leading supplier of oil and felt to have excess capacity that could cover for output deficits from other countries, but this may no longer be the case. An inelastic oil supply is more vulnerable to price gouging, and oil shales and sands are natural sources that are expensive to extract and produced on a much smaller scale than “traditional” oil. Renewable fuel sources won’t be available to replace gasoline in mass quantities for at least a few years, which may mean some expensive motoring in between.
Many other components in the automotive construction process, i.e. transporting raw goods, manufacture of plastics, would be adversely affected by rising oil prices. Not to mention how sensitive oil prices are – check out Fark.com’s headlines – it won’t take much to send them into the stratosphere.
And let’s not forget that this will impact the 2.5 more than other automakers, given where the bulk of their profits are from.
My mom’s Vega wagon (’76 model if I recall correctly) had a five speed manual! And the engine wasn’t aluminum any more.
And that car couldn’t get out of it’s own way.
I hope this discussion of politics and peak oil, amongst others, does not have to be edited out. The auto industry is intensely political and subject to innumerable outside forces. Discussion, even just speculation, of these issues is plenty relevant to problems in Detroit. Any number of which could be the beam(s) that let go to set off a collapse.
It’s very negative to think like this, but vigilance is what keeps us prepared right?
Sorry about threadjacking – I look forwards to part 2 of the Deathwatch Prequel Trilogy where we can all reminisce about the favorite car from my childhood, the Mustang II.
To Kablamo and Starlight:
I think this IS an important issue, and yes, I do believe that it will impact the 2.5 (I’m so tired of their BS, I’m not even going to bother lying and saying the word “big” anymore).
But yes, it could be the “final beam” as Kablamo says…or maybe the straw that breaks that “camel’s” back? :wrysmile:
And also when examining issues of import (no pun intended…okay, a small pun intended…) to the domestics, we have to address issues that may impact all industries and all people.
Oil is arguably the single most important life-giving substance on the planet. With it we can purify water, get rid of waste, make food, medicine, shelter, clothing, tools, and machines.
Without it, we can still do a lot of those things, but we’ll have to turn to making them out of wood or soft metals. And we’ll have a helluva harder time getting those goods to the people who need them.
I’ve been pondering this lately: If Peak Oil has already occurred or will soon occur, is it possible that someday in our lifetimes or our kids’ lifetimes that automobiles will only be driven by the very rich?
If that is a real possibility, then it would stand to reason that it doesn’t even matter what the 2.5 do from here out. They’re like that frog in the pot where the heat’s being gradually turned up. They might as well just sit back and enjoy the jaccuzzi.
Yes, it can be depressing, this subject. But I too, prefer to get it out in the open.
I’m also sensitive to the whole hijacking thing, so at this point, I’m going to step back and let this thread get back on topic. :redface:
ZoomZoom:
Off Topic: that’s what’s happened to horses in the States. Hay & blacksmith are not available in my neck of the woods.
It’s sad how slow Detroit has been to “get it”. Even after all these years, they’re still clueless. Going back to the Beetle related comments, my parents had something similar happen. My dad never had any specific brand loyalty, he pretty much just bought what was the best value (in his mind). The last time he bought the best value, it was a 1987 Chevy Celebrity. That thing was the biggest POS I’ve had the displeasure of driving. I didn’t drive it very often, but it was given to my brother. Needless to say, my brother would never buy a GM product after having to replace the transmission in it. Since the Celebrity, my parents have owned a 1994 Accord that they just sold in 2005, and now they own a fully loaded 2006 Jetta. My brother and I are VW freaks, but if the time comes, I’d buy a Honda without a second thought. No big 2.5 vehicles will likely ever be owned by myself, my dad, or my brother. Someone needs to tell the big 2.5 the rule of holes.
No, it was not a conspiracy.
When you build a small car, the margins are very low as compared to a behemoth. In other words, your manufacturing inefficiencies which can be hidden when selling a large whale become QUITE APPARENT when you build a small car. With those inefficiencies, they would have to charge way above and beyond what a comparable small car would cost coming from an efficient automaker.
So, it was the same old song and dance 30 years ago as today: “We can’t build a small car…and Sell it for a PROFIT”.
(Of course, they will tell you its due to yet ANOTHER conspiracy…that being currency manipulation, etc.)
Surprisingly enough, Nissan is the most efficient automaker in NA at 18.93 man hours:
http://money.cnn.com/2006/06/01/news/companies/plant_productivity/index.htm
That efficiency contributes directly to the bottom line…assuming you are building a product that sells.
The gap between the 2.5 and the Japanese has closed quite considerably. That gap was much Much larger in previous years. So while you have to commend the 2.5 for their efforts, you can see it still wasn’t enough to save the plants discussed in the article.
Efficiency doesn’t mean much if you are building the most efficient Gremlin, so to speak.
I just happen to have handy the February 1972 issue of Motor Trend. Check out these letters from readers:
“The foreign cars that are invading this country are the best thing that has happened to driving since the wheel. Toyota, Datsun, Saab, Renault, Ferrari (upper class) and of course Volkswagen were all designed with economy, performance, style, and dependability in mind.
“Owners of the huge, ridiculously built cars here in America buy these cars mostly for their gadgets and size. They do not stop to consider the fact that every time they start these monsters they produce more than twice the pollution than the little foreign cars and run on gallons per mile rather than mpg.
“The little cars made in foreign countries are built to be driven by people who love to drive such as myself. These cars are comfortable, are are very stylish. They are economical, run on pennies, hold pints of water (excluding VW) and very little oil. Cars built in America such as Ford, Chevy, Plymouth, Dodge, etc., are built to drive people. People who buy these cars buy them for luxury and do not know how to [i]drive[/i].”
Now for the opposing point of view:
“I knew before reading the article comparing T-Bird, Riviera and Jaguar (December) what the evaluation would say. Same old jazz, The American cars don’t give you the ‘feel of the road,’ they are sprung ‘too soft,’ mediocre design, etc., etc. The [i]American people[/i] in general much prefer the design of American cars over the antiquated looking Jaguars (sedans), Mercedes etc. They [i]prefer[/i] a softer ride to the “MG” type ride of the European cars. And as for handling differences, Hogwash!!! I’d gladly bet a week’s pay I can stay with any Jag or Mercedes [i]sedan[/i] on any road course available with my ’70 T-Bird. The [i]minute[/i], subtle differences between a Jag or T-Bird handling would go unnoticed by 99% of the average drivers. When a person in this country shells out 6-7,000 clams for wheels he generally wants a beautiful looking, smooth riding, quick automobile like the ‘Bird or Riviera. If he wants an auto that may beat him at Le Mans by 6 seconds but looks like a fancy Checker sedan (Mercedes) or a Hudson revival (Jaguar) this is what he buys.
“So lets knock off the insignificant nitpicking on American automobiles and evaluate through the eyes of the average American buyer not the average European Grand Prix driver.”
My take: Change a few specifics and these letters could have been written yesterday. Both of these people were, to some extent, full of crap.
Oh, this was also the Car Of The Year issue. The ’72 COTY was…the Citroën SM.
People obviously bought them in numbers large enough for Toyota to set up x-number of plants here on our shores, right?
I don’t see much of a difference today as 30 years ago (maybe others will disagree)..yes, you have the asses out there who insist on driving an F-350 8 miles to work and back…and you have people who drive something much more sensible.
Believe it or not, if you weren’t around then…you aren’t missing much. What you see today with trucks….just replace with your favorite huge-ass car(LTD anyone?). That’s why GM and Ford are still pushing large vehicles….they only know one thing: SuperSize Me.
One other thing to consider..and I do believe this is very Key to our discussion:
The “Imports” were always an “outside” country bringing their product to the US.
The US *NEVER* exported a damn thing, aside from an occasional Suburban to an Arab country.
As a kid, I always wondered: How can a country the size of Kentucky or Tennessee (Japan) be No 1 in the WORLD in electronics??? How in the HELL can they take on the US, with so MUCH more in the way of resources??? It was mind boggling.
And now today, that very same tiny county is kicking royal ass in the auto industry.
How???
Because they were export oriented…it was part of their mindset.
GM and Ford always looked at the US market as their “home turf”…they never even bothered to lift their head to see what was important to those “other” people.
Why? Because that takes effort!
GM and Ford…well, you can see what their laziness has bred: contempt and disgust for their products.
Good editorial. Cant wait for pt2.
While I agree with the article as a whole I also blame the american consumer. those excessive cars of the 50’s were what the average person WANTED. Just like like the recent SUV boom. the market had alternatives in the late 50’s with both Studebakers & Ramblers as the most obvious examples. But people wanted the biggest chromiest cars offered, so Detroit was only following its customers for a long time.
Cliff:
Something you don’t mention about the Corvair is that the ones built BEFORE ’64 were NOT wondrous to drive if one was an average American not used to its setup. GM has always had a policy of “We’ll get it right later on”. Ergo the swing axle, because they wanted to keep it under budget. It’s handling quirks would have been easily solved by a transverse leaf spring, but that would have cost ALMOST $1 PER CAR!!!! So by the time the ’64 came out, the Corvair was a lost cause.
FF to the ’70’s and the Chevy Vega with the amazing melting engine. My sister bought one, and it stayed so hot she had to run the AC all year round just to keep the cabin habitable. Aluminum engines have their advantages, but they HAVE to be kept cool! GM nickel-and-dimed the cooling system so by the time they gave the later models a decent cooling system, the car was dead.
Now the ’80’s. The Pontiac Fiero was sneaked past the GM brass as a ‘commuter car” so as not to break the rule that The Corvette would be GM’s only sports car. Its Iron Lump of an engine wouldn’t fit, so they maed the oil pan smaller, so the car always ran one or two quarts low. Again, by the time GM had a proper engine ready, the Fiero was toast.
Then there’s the service. I had a sweet handling ’72 Opel that the Buick dealers who sold it to me (new) would barely touch itwhen service time came. I had a ’69 VW bug that was nearly indestructible. A ’76 Honda Accord that never saw the inside of a shop. A ’95 Ford Contour that was a fine ride, but I could only take it to the dealer on days my assigned mechanic was on duty. I now own a ’00 Pontiac Bonneville whose trans died at 35,000 miles! This was after the rear window dropped down into the door and wouldn’t come up – while I was on vacation!
I expect to replace the Bonnie this fall – but with what? The Aura, ’08 Malibu and G8 look good, but can I trust there hasn’t been a corner cut somewhere that might strand me again in the middle of nowhere?
I haven’t seen the ’08 Accord, but it looks better every day.
My old man was a GM freak until I started working at a Toyota dealership. He’d cruise by to see me at work and stick his head in all sorts of things. At the time we shared a 1980 Chevy LUV and it was bulletproof. He was intrigued when we found out it was really an Isuzu. It got replaced when it got tired with a used 89 Toy V6 5 speed pickup (oh, the hoonery) and that got replaced with a 93 when the first one got rear-ended (the first family car to be written off that wasn’t my fault?). That got sold to my cousin when dad fell in love with a 3.4 litre Tacoma which was much more suited to pull his small fifth wheel. Jonesing for a bit more power, he stepped up to a 4.7 litre 2001 Tundra a few years ago.
As a semi-retired mechanic, he still gets to see a fair variety of “domestic” stuff. He knows he pays a bit of money initially for his Toyotas, but for every American brand he cuts his knuckles on, he knows that they are just gouging their customers on the back-end.
The old man has no desire to buy another truck ever again, but if, God forbid, something happens to his Tundra, he will be certainly be looking for another one. The only time and money he’s spent on his Toys outside of regular servicing were for performance upgrades. A HUGE change from all his Chevys.
There are likely few readers of this site who do much more servicing than changing their own oil, but if you start rooting around a little deeper under the skin, you’ll find that there is a reason American brands are cheap to buy and hold little value. Since the dawn of time, The Japanese have cared about thier reputations and their customers (maybe Mitsubishi aside) while the 2.5 only cared about next quarter’s profit.
When you see quality in vehicle after vehicle, generation after generation it’s going to tough to switch to a different brand, especially after the different brand has repeatedly screwed you without lube. Neidermeyer has written so eloquently about what my dad and many others have long known about the car industry.
The sad part for GM was they had a dynamite German small car in the early 70s. The Opel Manta. Unfortunately it was sold by Buick dealers who didn’t know what to do with it. And the US-side arrogance refused to acknowledge the superior engineering of the Opel. I raced a Manta back then against the “poor man’s BMW” and the real BMW in SCCA and did quite well.
Rastus:
The main thing that the japanese focused on was quality. Nissan (or Datsun as was) approached BMC – makers of unreliable cars in the uk – to export their know-how on how to make cars. Remember in 1948 just after WW2 the UK made more cars than the US. Mind you look where our industry is now.
Part of the deal with Datsun was that they would make BMC cars in Japan using increasingly local parts. Each new part had to be approved by BMC as being of a high enough quality before it could be used. Because of some memories of WW2 and the ill treatment of prisoners by the Japanese sometimes the BMC people would be very picky over quality – parts clearly superior to the ones made in the UK would be rejected as not good enough.
The result was that the Japanese ended up with the same cars and parts produced to a much higher quality. Not only that they took that rigorous approach imposed on them and applied it again and again. So when their “copy” products – motorbikes, electronics, cars – came back to the States and Europe they worked straight away and just carried on working.
So actually Len Lord is to blame :)
‘Morning to ya :)
Yes, I agree completely re. quality. Totally.
The point I’m trying to make is this: If you are going to build a product…and in turn ship it half-way across the world, you …by very nature…have to ask the question “What do THEY WANT…and how can WE fulfill that need?”.
In other words, if you’re going to take on McDonald’s…you’d BETTER have a better burger…in theory or in reality.
Well, the Japanese made it a reality.
The domestics never asked that question of “other” markets…and over the years they stopped asking that question re. their OWN market.
In stead of asking what to they want, they were asking the question: “What can I SELL them to my own benefit”?
Quite a difference if you ask me.
And sure as you mentioned, quality was an integral part of it…when most American iron was ready for the scrap heap at 100K miles.
Hell, GM and Ford ..it can be said they built their entire fortunes on built in obsolescence. Well, if you’re poor old tired GM rots away at 100K miles…come on down, we have yet Another one to sell ya!
I still remember of those early Japanese cars…the folklore at the time was that “you can’t REBUILD one of those thin-walled 4-cylinder cars like you can an American V-8”.
Well…surprise of all surprises….you won’t NEED to :D
Pretty cool by my book (and wallet).
sorry for the grammar mistakes…I’m only on my first cuppa :)
Hey, I had a 74 Pontiac Astre. (BTW, it had a 4 speed manual transmission. ) I drove it for 120K miles but was tinkering with it almost every weekend, and slapped a whole bunch of bondo and sheet metal on the body about about 30K miles. Top speed (really, I tried it) was 107mph, even though it took awhile to get there. Hindsight asks, “what could I had been thinking?”. If anything had happened, I wouldn’t be around to reflect upon it today.
I thought it would be the worst car I had ever owned, but I was wrong. My 1999 Buick Century is.
FYI: VW Beetle sales peaked at just under 400K in 1968.
I thought the peak year for VW in the US was 1970, with over 500,000 sales. However, you may be right in that the Beetle sales peaked a couple years before.
According to my sources, VW’s best year was 1970 with 498,000 units sold. I did say that VW sales “were closing in on a half million”; even if they didn’t make it.
The real nightmare is looking at VW sales in the early 70’s, by about 74 or so, they were down in the low 200k level. Ouch!
Thanks Paul, I thought 1970 was the best year for VW. That big drop by 1974 reflects the Beetle’s growing obsolescence, the market failure of the VW 411, and the rise of Toyota, Datsun, and the fledgling Honda.
Rastus:
I would agree, but their opening was quality. Their stuff worked, was well serviced and kept on working.
I also doubt Mr Hitler really had 50s and 60s Americans looking for an alternative car in mind when he initiated the Kdf-wagen project.
Now they have the US market covered they spend time with US customers and the US gets their own “Japanese” car range, its worth the investment. VW doesn’t do this as the return on investment is probably not worth it now as opposed to a couple of decades ago.
At the same time, Toyota and Nissan put their heads over the parapet.
GM and Ford responded with a salvo of four cylinder compacts: the 1971 Chevy Vega and Ford Pinto. We’ll dispense with all the old jokes. Let’s just say that one nadir attracted another.
Well put THAT.
Ralph may be a lunatic now, but he had a point back in the day…
This post strikes me as cliche mongering.
The ’55 – ’57 Chevy only weighed 3300lbs – that’s what a Camry weighs now – and Chevy had a sterling reputation for build quality and stellar resale value that lasted throughout the ’60’s.
I think the problem with this post is it conflates three different decades and tries tying them all together and tars them with the same broad brush strokes.
KingElvis: The ’77 Impala sedan weighed 3564 lbs. Close enough (“within 200 lbs”)?