At least they don't have live axles, cart springs and lever arm shockers.
And given that I beat all the Austin-Healeys, about half the Ferraris and several Lotus Elises at Shelsley Walsh a few weeks ago, TVR's ain't so bad.
The VSCC declared there was a watershed in 1930. Anything made after that date was homogenised pap. (Actually sports cars became affordable to the middle class and not the preserve of the upper so very expensive exclusive "thoroughbred cars" were allowed in the VSCC.)
I feel there was watershed around 1990 when more impact testing was introduced. By the end of the 80's designers had been reasonably successful in hiding the 1980 big black rubber federal impact bumpers by making them part of the car's styling and body coloured (also helped by weaker standards). But what they have had to do cope with ped and side impact can never be hid. The current safety laws mandate that the front be tall and blunt, that requires the bonnet, scuttle and waistline are raised. Only way to avoid making a WWII pill box with slit windows (VW Corrado, 51.8" high with waistline of 55.7" MKII Golf) is to make the whole car taller.
Side impact demands added width and high sides - glass just breaks. So the waistline went up yet again. The added width doesn't add space for passengers inside the car, what was a void is now twice as thick and foam filled.
Cars like Ford Mondeo have gone from a "normal" 1,372 mm (54.0 in) high in 1992 to 1,500 mm (59.1 in) in 2007. They have managed to claw back
25mm/1" with the 2012 model, 1,476 mm (58.1 in). Width has gone from 1,747 mm (68.8 in) to 1,852 mm (72.9 in). The extra width does go some way to hide the height by keeping in proportion (1992 78.5%, 2012 79.5%) but if one ever turns up at a "classic" car show then it's overgrown proportions will be clear to see.VW Golf started at a near "normal" 54.9" in 1974, now mkVII is 57.2" mkVI was 58.2".
Only one way to hide that growth, make it longer 4,481 mm (176.4 in) now up to 4,869 mm (191.7 in). A lot of that extra length is to cope with newer frontal and offset impact laws.
So you have to decide. Style or safety?
What a bunch of tedious old farts they must be.
Also, 1991 was the year that catalytic converters were made compulsory for all new petrol engined cars. This is likely to be a problem in years hence when cars so fitted become a low mileage collectors item and it doesn't get used often enough to keep the cat in good condition.
I haven't measured one, but something like the Rover P5 (3-litre) or P5B (3.5-litre) might meet the measurement requirements if a replica classic design is to be made.
Jim
ITYM were. Assuming only 20 years old then, they'd be well over 100 now.
Well, that's nonsense. For example, I would never claim that *no* car made today could end up as a classic, in such a sweeping statement. Although, I believe that *most* cars now are ugly.
[snip lots of stuff about dimensions and impact safety]It has never been beyond the wit of man to create something beautiful given *any* set of restrictions.
However, there are certain wide-spread features in cars that will, at least in my eyes, always seem either ugly or unnecessarily over-designed and many of those features are not necessitated by all the demands of 'elf 'n safety. For example, the triangular wrap-around headlamps (with integral indicators, etc) that are all-pervasive, as compared to the simple, clean lines of round forward-facing lenses.
Even Rolls Royce have ruined their designs by making "slitty-eyed" rectangular headlamps that seem to look too small in relation to the rest of the "face". I can't believe that they felt they had to do away with twin round lamps. Bentley have kept them (although I think their recent designs aren't that refined in other respects).
And looking at the propensity to exaggerate the "aggressive" look (which human beings with their anthropomorphic tendencies can read very easily into the shapes of the faces of many cars today) - there are many anthropomorphic features in classic cars too, such as the "frog-eye" Austin-Healeys, but these more often tend to have a warm, whimsical or even "cute" look to them, or a more refined "stately" look in the larger cars such RR. All of these are a far cry from the downright aggressive features of some modern cars, both large and small. Or the stupid and rather unfortunately "lamprey" look of a Ford Scorpio!
Whether or not you are forced to have a rather taller front to the car than you would like owing to safety regulations, does not dictate the need for aggressive features as opposed to softer and more refined features, or indeed any other styling. It's simply a conscious decision of the designers and nothing more.
It's *always* possible to have "style" within any constraints.
There will be some decades of design that everyone hopes to forget whilst other decades may linger with fondness for hundreds of years.
Time will tell if I'm right or wrong about the future view of this decade's cars.
Michael
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