US v European car technology

I am not sure that a sonic boom at 50 000+ feet is such a big deal. If Boeing had launched its SST you can be pretty sure there would have been no overflight ban.

The actual cruising speed was about Mach 2 - 2.2 (c. 1350 mph)

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling

You could almost bet your mother against it.

Huw

Clarkson is a journalist, not an actor. He got into motor journalism quite early in his career and hasn't looked back. He does know quite a bit about driving but doesn't seem to like to talk about it much, preferring to talk about things like his donkeys or yak herding. He is very very opinionated and vents much anger on his pet hates of cyclists, caravans, bus lanes and the environment. He has the annoying habit of dismissing extremely practical cars as being boring. Driving, a la Jeremy, is all about fun. He drives an SL (500 I think) and gave back his GT40 to Ford because getting woken up at 4am by an oversensitive alarm wasn't much fun. Most of his viewers/readers probably thought it was hilarious.

His articles are, however, quite entertaining and some are available online, including the one that was quoted at the start of this thread.

I'm sorry, can you name any innocent people killed under R. Reagan? From what I've learned in a rather long lifetime is that no one is innocent, especially those idiots in the middle east.

I don't think I would since American gripes get heard a lot more than you might imagine. Anyway, all they'd have to do is pop a few sonic booms over some senator's hometown and it'd stop overnight, especially if it was that idiot T. Kennedy's. Hey, he even joined in the prohibition of the installation of wind turbine generators in the Long Island Sound because he didn't want the view destroyed. I'm sure if someone wanted to grow corn next door to his summer palace there to convert into biodiesel he'd show his true environmentalist qualities. What a phony clown....I'm refering to his red bulbous nose of course.

That seems a bit cynical.

How did you get to interview the Great Communicator?

Did he communicate greatly?

A Mazda MX-5 or a Honda S2000 is a sports car. The Mustang is a sporty 2-door sedan. And as far as luxobarges are concerned, does the Mustang not share the platform of the Jag-you-are S-type (or is it the X-type)? So maybe one's expectations should be reduced accordingly.

Speaking of which, I note that the term "platform" has replaced "chassis" ever since unibody construction became all the rage. But what is a "platform," exactly? Isn't it just a more glam- orous term for the floorpan, i.e., the foundation upon which the rest of the car is built? Sounds like a chassis to me. Should it really matter that it's made of sheetmetal rather than box girders, if it fulfills the same function?

And why do the car magazines, or at least the American ones, call torsion bars "twist beams" nowadays? What's up with that? Is it because in this postliterate age, nobody knows what "torsion" means anymore? Much like the way venereal diseases are called "*sexually transmitted* diseases" now because hardly anybody is educated enough to know that Venus was the goddess of love, and to make the appropriate connection to the old in-out? Maybe we should go back to the old terms (and stop that silliness of using the term "archi- tecture" in an automotive context while we're at it).

Grumble.

Geoff

Loosely, the S type, which is a family saloon but with a properly tuned rear end, not the live rear beam axle for goodness' sake.

They are talking down to their readers. However you cannot underestimate the intelligence of the typical reader so maybe they are correct.

Huw

Is it

Huw responds:

Yeah, protectionism is unknown in Europe... We all know that Europeans are devoid of sin, original or otherwise, and that the United States Of America is the root of all evil, right?

Actually it was environmentalism, which was, and is, international in scope. There was fearmongering from the bunnyhuggers about the ozone layer and sonic booms. I remember. I was there.

The "protectionism" explanation also makes no sense when one recalls that U.S. airlines were free to order the Concorde. Several did, in fact, but ended up cancelling their orders largely as a result of the prohib- ition against supersonic flight over the continental U.S.

Other countries had no obligation to ape the American environmentalist legislation. Environmentalism then, like now, was a phenomenon that pervaded the industrial West. "Post hoc ergo propter hoc," don'tcha- know.

That they *should* endure? Says who? In what book of eternal TRVTHs is _that_ bit o'wisdom written, pray tell?

Real human beings with real families to support, and who contribute real money to their local tax bases, work for those companies, Ronnie Ruthless. It makes sense to do everything possible to try and save them.

So was Lockheed in 1971, and Chrysler a decade later. Both survived to prosper.

I detect a persistent note of anti-Americanism in your posts. You might pause to humbly reflect on the fact that were in not for America, you and your countrymen would be speaking German now.

Geoff

May I add? A 4-door car with a low roofline (e.g. CLS-class) is *not* a coupé. For that matter, just because a car has only two doors doesn't make it a coupé; 2-door cars with back seats once were called "2+2" precisely because they were not coupés.

--/

I particularly didn't say that. You are being overly deffensive by trying to be offensive. Do you have a guilty concience?

The evironmental excuse was used as protectionism. If it was an American plane or there was a credible American competition then the environmental arguement would have been swamped by deffensive political arguement.

At that time they were easily dismissed.

They are trading while insolvent. Their protection is effectively a distortion of trade and competition, both domestic and international. It is a ditortion of the Capitalist system which should not be tolerated, especially by the many Americans who attack so loudly any 'liberal' tendencies.

Either you are a socialist interventionaist or you are a fraud. Not you personally that is, but you as a Nation.

Yet Americans in general think of Europeans as the protectionists and the socialist supporters of industry. I am saying that you are just as guilty of subsidising your industry and agriculture, more so in fact, while trying to justify it as something else entirely.

Again you appear deffensive. This is not the case at all. I am however for honesty and the down-to-earth realisation of what is what and how things are. There are very many peoples who are indeed anti-American in this world and it would do the average American and the Country as a whole, a bit of good to try to understand why that should be. Hint, it is NOT envy.

You

That is one good reason for a start. Not the act, but your words. I will certainly not be humbled by America and it is this kind of remark that makes people want to spit in your collective eye. Remember that empires never last long.

Have a nice day :-)

Huw

Not so!

If it were not for Japan they would be speaking German!

Thank the Japanese for bombing Pearl when it was almost 1942.

The new Mustang has a live axle because the original Mustang did. According to what I've read in the car magazines, it works quite well, with little or no axle tramp. The upcoming Cobra version will have IRS for those who want it.

Meanwhile, Ford believes that the standard car will have a strong "retro" appeal, being updated sufficiently to appeal to potential buyers while not putting off the staunch Mustang traditionalists. Since Ford is in business to make money, not to commit corporate suicide by producing things that nobody would want, I'm inclined to believe that they know what they're doing in this respect.

My, what a dark view of the world you seem to have. Everything and everyone is interpreted in the worst possible way.

A magazine's talking down to its readers doesn't strike me as a very sane business plan. A more likely explanation is that "twist beam" began as a sort of car-guy hipster logo, caught on and became mainsteam, and that "platform" was originally used for marketing reasons, in order to distinguish between unibody and body-on-frame construction. But that's just speculation; I'd be receptive to other theories.

Geoff

Not at all. You brought this subject up and I agree with you and present a possible answer as to why it should be.

I just think they are dumbing down. Just like Ford are doing with their cars. In America, apparently dumbing down sells. In Europe sohistication and design and performance sells better. Ford tried dumbing down with the last Escort and it nearly killed them off. The later Focus and Mondeo cars are genuinely good cars and have rescued their reputation in a market full of excellent cars. That does not stop the BMW 3 from outselling the Mondeo in recent times.

Huw

: Yeah, protectionism is unknown in Europe... We all know that : Europeans are devoid of sin, original or otherwise, and that : the United States Of America is the root of all evil, right?

I didn't say you said that; I implied that you implied it. You used the phrase "U.S. protectionism in action" in a world-weary "here we go again"/"We're on to the bastards, ain't we?" sort of tone, which implied that protectionism was unique to, or at least characteristic of, the U.S. Why else would you have written "U.S." instead of "government protectionism" or just "protectionism?"

How do you know what I'm trying to be, Sigmund Fraud?

No. Why should I? I've never practiced protectionism in my life. You?

You seem to have rather a fixation on the concept of defensiveness.

The Boeing SST project was cancelled in early 1971 due to environ- mentalist resistance. The prohibition against supersonic flight over the continental U.S. would've affected the Boeing SST as it eventually did the Concorde, so it's silly to insist that the legislation was enacted as protectionism to work against the Concorde.

: Other countries had no obligation to ape the American environmentalist : legislation. Environmentalism then, like now, was a phenomenon that : pervaded the industrial West. "Post hoc ergo propter hoc," don'tcha- : know.

Sure. That's why we got the Clean Air Act in 1970 (and the Clean Water Act in 1977) and why the first U.S. automotive emissions standards came into effect in 1971, getting serious two years later. The environmental- ist movement was a force to be reckoned with even in the very early '70s. Again, I know: I was there.

: That they *should* endure? Says who? In what book of eternal TRVTHs : is _that_ bit o'wisdom written, pray tell?

You said that already.

Where is it written that "distortions" to the capitalist system should not be tolerated? What exactly constitutes such a distorion, anyway? Taxes? Any form or degree of government regulation? What? If you're not too busy conferring with the Gnome Of Zurich, Adam Smith, let's get down to brass tacks here.

But wait, there's more! Aren't whether, and which, "distortions" are tolerated a matter of national discretion? Or is there some capitalist analogue to _Das Kapital_ that I've not heard about, which lays these things out in proverbial stone?

One of the first lessons I learned as a young, earnest university student was expressed in a colloquial idiom by a political science professor of mine. He said "There ain't no absolutes." He returned to that saying for emphasis again and again. And you know something? Even after all these years, I still believe he was correct. (He was a bit of a leftist, too, as professors are wont to be. Make of that what you will.)

: Real human beings with real families to support, and who contribute : real money to their local tax bases, work for those companies, Ronnie : Ruthless. It makes sense to do everything possible to try and save : them.

"There ain't no absolutes," my earnest young friend.

Refraining from trying to keep large corporations afloat when it'd be in the national interest to keep them afloat, on the basis of adhering to some fundamentalist interpretation of capitalism, would be a matter of cutting off our metaphorical nose to spite our national face. Aren't you lefties the ones who are supposedly so good at "fact- based" argument?

: So was Lockheed in 1971, and Chrysler a decade later. Both survived : to prosper.

The flaw in that statement is in your careless use of the cliche "just as guilty." Practically every country has subsidies, tariffs, and the like. That isn't protectionism; it's real-world economics.

The difference, or *a* difference, between Europe and the U.S. is that in the U.S., while there's such a thing as protection from creditors during reorganization under various bankruptcy laws, and sometimes gov- ernment loan guarantees as there were with Lockheed and Chrysler, the operating expenses of healthy companies and industries aren't subsidized by the government as a matter of course.

You really seem to have it in for the United States. Did an American steal your girlfriend or something? Capitalism can be a good thing, as many of your countrymen discovered when Margaret Thatcher pulled down all those statues of Lenin and introduced the concept of "take- home pay."

: I detect a persistent note of anti-Americanism in your posts.

Pointing out some characteristic in another is defensive? Wow. It's a shame that mental gymnastics aren't an Olympic event, 'cause you'd be a gold medalist for sure.

I'd say that on the contrary, I'm putting *you* on the defensive, having maneuvered you into the position of explaining and justifying your motives. Whoops! I bet you'd thought you'd hit a home run, right up until the time the second baseman caught it...

Who said anything about envy? Until you did, I mean? Do you have a guilty conscience?

: You might pause to humbly reflect on the fact that were in not : for America, you and your countrymen would be speaking German now.

Hey, my mother loves me. (So does yours, as a matter of fact...)

Oh? And to think that all this time I figured it was envy (oops) and petty resentment that did it. It seems to me that we're doing something right, considering the fact that much of the rest of the world is damned near breaking down our door to get in. Up to and including crossing 90 miles of shark-infested water on innertubes, trudging across the trackless Sonoran desert in the summer heat, and the like. Or do you think they're just coming over to hang out with Cindy Sheehan and chant "Hey hey, ho ho, George Dubya Bush has got to go"?

"Being The Hyperpower(tm) means never having to say we're sorry."

How did I know you were going to trot that old chestnut out eventually? Maybe someday, if you work at it and try real, real hard, you'll start thinking original thoughts instead of parroting the leftist garbage that was put into your head by Marxist university professors?

Come back after you get a few years on you, kid, and then we'll talk. In the meantime, do try and stay out from underfoot, mmmkay? Your betters across the Great Undrinkable have a world to run, and we frown on unnecessary distractions.

Geoff

Elswhere I clearly said

"Yes but I have a feeling that some Americans are under the impression that they live in a whiter than white free market economy. This is patently not so and the USA is damned clever in protecting its industry to the detriment of other countries. I just focused on the air industry because it was brought up and because it is topical. One can look at steel which leads to the subsidised production of cars if you like or any number of other industries. They are not unique in this of course but they have no moral high ground to stand on."

You 'imply' but exclude me the same privilege?

There you go, defending what are effectively left wing tools and policies while calling others 'lefties'. It seems that I am somewhat further to the right than you. LOL

You can play word games if you like but the casual observer will not be fooled.

Yes, you do come across as the stereotypical arrogant loud bastard who boasts that 'mine is bigger/better than yours'.

And blow you up it seems. Go figure.

Up to and

It is a fact proven by history. It is also a fact that the more bellicose in those empires really did think that their prosperity would last forever. Your stratification of society was shown up in stark contrast during the recent bad weather in New Orleans and perhaps your empire will start to crumble from the inside as much as from without.

Your condescension does you no favours.

Huw

In America, it started with the Media all fighting to get a chunk of the biggest market by playing to the lowest common denominator.

Whoa. We can sit here and laugh at the general stupidity of the average American who has succumbed to the mind rotting drivel force fed to him by an immoral and corrupt media machine but perhaps we would do better to stop, look and take stock of the situation.

Our weather presenters don't show pressure charts anymore. BBC's horizon program now does fancy graphics instead of science. We run like lemmings to buy the cheapest, then spend hours whining and moaning at the lack of quality or the poor service. I could go on, but it seems fairly obvious to me that we are on the very same road as the yanks. It's just that they found it first and got a head start.

We are at a slight variance here because I think today's European cars are better designed and better built than ever before. There is even a commendable amount of design innovation and product differentiation making a comeback. Yes we want cheaper cars but the success of the premium brands at the expense of mass builders and the reaction of innovative quality products from the mass shows that quality and innovation has the upper hand over price.

Huw

Mercedes might be a 'premium' brand in some countries but you're not suggesting it is anything other than a "mass builder"? One million Merc-branded cars p.a....

Same for BMW, e.g.

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling