This is where people lose credibility. "Oh yeah? Well explain a 200hp 8.2L V8" as if that's some hard evidence of bad engineering.Really? Cause I have an '80s SL that would beg to differ. There was nothing with any power anywhere in the world during that era.And that whole period in the '70s and '80s when you were forced to make 7 litre V8s produce 200hp – it's hard to imagine that happening anywhere else on the planet.
British take on American cars
Re: British take on American cars
Re: British take on American cars
Similar kind of thing as we've seen before, though I like the credit of building things in a simpler manner rather than needlessly complicate.
There are a hundred reasons why there is a DNA split between US and European cars. Our cities were, by and large, built with cars in mind. European cities, by and large, were not. So we built wider roads with plenty of parking to accomodate large cars and plenty of them (in hindsight, from an urban planning perspective, a huge mistake most of the time, but we did it). We have much wider stretches of the country where you can travel between cities, making long-distance comfort more important. And of course our decision to subsidize oil production and avoid gas taxes, simultaneously making our gas much cheaper and making our roads crappier. Bigger engines, bigger cars, softer suspensions.
I really feel your appreciation of simplicity. The Corvette, while not simple really, has managed to come at the problem of building a sports car with a really different playbook than the Europeans, a playbook based predominantly on mechanical packaging (pushrod engines for compact motors, transverse leaf springs), and damned if that hasn't produced a brilliant car. (that even seats tall people and has a buttload of luggage space!) Then I look at all these GM pickup trucks, and I get into work on those and so many times I'm pleasantly surprised at some little engineering detail that is so simple and yet so effective. Think of that story of "the americans built a pen to write in zero G and the russians used a pencil", and a lot of the time that looks like European car building thinking vs. American. Not to say that's always true, and I love me plenty of European cars, but the Americans can be pretty good at getting the job done simply and effectively and the Europeans can really make things overcomplicated.
Re: British take on American cars
So back to that 70s and 80s argument.
European cars (sold in Europe) didn't have to keep up with what the US was doing in terms of emissions, and they reserved V8s for really expensive and fancy stuff.
European cars (sold in Europe) didn't have to keep up with what the US was doing in terms of emissions, and they reserved V8s for really expensive and fancy stuff.
1) You can't compare engine outputs between American engines of the 70s and 80s, full of stringent emissions controls, and European engines of the same era with no emissions controls. 2) Because of the considerable power reduction from early emissions control technology, American manufacturers focused more on producing low-end torque which helps efficiency and masks (kind of) the power deficit in the driving conditions of the day (i. e. 55mph speed-limit), hence big engines with lots of torque down low and low power ratings. Everybody seems to forget the BMW eta engines of the mid 80s which produced all of 121hp out of their 2.7 liters of displacement, by using this same concept. 3) The European market associates big V8 engines with expensive, high-end cars, but in the US of the 70s and 80s a V8 was just a regular engine option for regular cars. For this reason, European V8s of that era had more technological content than US V8s, so they did have some power advantage, but not as much if you look only at US-spec engines. When you compare smaller engines, the differences almost disappear, like early-mid-80s Audi 2.2 liter 5-cyl producing 100hp and Chrysler's 2.2 4-cyl of the same era producing 96-99 hp.
Re: British take on American cars
This, too.
When I was in Zurich, Switzerland this year, we saw a ton of supercars. Frankly, it got boring real fast after the 20th Lambo passed us in one hour. What really caught everyone's eye was a newer midnight blue Shelby GT500, with what appeared to be a straight pipe. It was screaming loud, and suddenly everyone wasn't staring at the supercars anymore. After going through Switzerland, Germany, Austria, and France; that was the only mustang I saw. In a land of supercars, the rarer car was a somewhat common American muscle car; and it turned all the heads.
Re: British take on American cars
Aside from them really liking the Z-28, I was very surprised to see this:
I am ok with the cold hard truth at the end of this very huge compliment. 10 years ago, nobody would say that the US car industry was making anything that anybody really wanted (sure you can come up with a couple over $60,000 cars, maybe). This quote, along with other comments shows a real 180 in people's perspective of the American car companies. (Just don't tell GM because when they get a big head they get complacent and suck for about 30 to 40 years lol)That is my current viewpoint. I think the US car industry is replete with fun and dynamism and, at the enthusiast level, making cars people desperately want to own. But it wasn't always that way
Re: British take on American cars
10 years ago you could get a 400hp CTS-V for about $50k fully loaded. But that wasn't a true luxury vehicle. For reference, the 2003 M5 was $70k, 40% more.
Even Bob Lutz said the interior WAS expensive, but it just didn't look it. They hadn't figured out interiors yet.
Even Bob Lutz said the interior WAS expensive, but it just didn't look it. They hadn't figured out interiors yet.