The Honda PCX / Forza / ADV150 / SH Forums

Swung in for a photo op as I passed this local classics car lot.
They sell lots of T-Birds, Corvettes - including the early ones - , some Italian jobs - and every now & then a really cool & interesting car - a restored VW beetle!





And in my coffee village, this Falcon cabrio parked nearby



Had a nice sit & a cup of Joe, swapping lies with the regulars, then headed home. Mid 50's at sunrise - leaving the mesh a bit wanting.



The "Bavarian beer garden" behind me, is attached to the ancient Trail Tavern. (was a stage coach stop long ago - oldest building in town) We stopped eating there 2 yrs ago - for health reasons. Under new management these days - with an all German menu.


Fish

No pics of the Beetle?

That was my first car - a 1972 Super Beetle. Great, but had issues, pertaining to a rear-end accident and a broken engine block from it. And the replacement engine out of a boneyard was a POS. So it went away.

When I had my '72 Super Beetle I had to rebuild it from top to bottom, but I did, and my youngest daughter loved riding in it, just like her oldest sister did in 1971 when she was that young and I had a 67 Beetle. I have had three Beetles and have enjoyed all of them. I even love the new ones, and if they didn't have so many electrical problems I would have one now.

Mel46 wrote:When I had my '72 Super Beetle I had to rebuild it from top to bottom, but I did, and my youngest daughter loved riding in it, just like her oldest sister did in 1971 when she was that young and I had a 67 Beetle. I have had three Beetles and have enjoyed all of them. I even love the new ones, and if they didn't have so many electrical problems I would have one now.

My fantasy, and it will probably remain such, is to go to Mexico - and buy one of their last Beetles. They closed the Puebla line in 2003; and it's legal to import a non-compliant motor vehicle 25 years old or more. So, a 1993 Beetle down there could be brought in.

There were improvements, primarily fuel injection and some safety mods. Gas heaters were standard too, IIRC. I don't know about the quality of steel used back then in Puebla - I remember in the 1970s, VW of America imported Mexican VW parts for dealers to sell. Mexican mufflers lasted a year, no more.

But it would be fun to try.

Ah. . .the days when you knew right away what car it was just by it's design. Today it's hard to tell. With all the rounded edges they all look very similar.

Cars had style then. . .maybe not as safe as the ones today but definitely had style.

Keep the Beetle Ill take the T Bird.

The T Bird was a great car until it became too big. It took Ford quite awhile to realize that you buy a sporty looking car because it is sporty looking, not because you want a family T-Bird. The same went for the Mustang. The 1971 Mustang was a truck with no rear view. I had multiple Mustangs and that particular year sucked the worst.

Owned only Honda bikes in the 60's....and swore when I got home from the games in sunny S.E. Asia the only sensible auto would be a VW. Couldn't afford poorly built American cars. Waste of my hard earned $ to buy American.
The VWs were as good as my Honda bikes...never regretted the decision.
America learned its lesson - builds good stuff now.Too many new Mexican VWs running around now with one headlight and 1 tail light.
Fisher

Mel46 wrote:The T Bird was a great car until it became too big. It took Ford quite awhile to realize that you buy a sporty looking car because it is sporty looking, not because you want a family T-Bird. The same went for the Mustang. The 1971 Mustang was a truck with no rear view. I had multiple Mustangs and that particular year sucked the worst.

Mission creep. The original T was a great car - and frankly more sporting than the Corvette of the same era.

But, dealers reported too many people looked at them and said, "Can't do it. No back seat."

Meantime, Robert MacNamara, later to be the brains behind Johnson's Splendid Little War...he hated the T. It had its own production lines. The body was made by (IIRC) Briggs, for Ford. He wanted Ford to make ONE car, and he wanted it to be like the Falcon. An appliance.

Putting the Squarebird (the name Ford fans have for the first Big Bird) on a modified Ford chassis, saved money. Platform-sharing, or Badge-engineering...whichever term you like.

Now it was a four-seater, and the novelty sold them for a few years. Later the dripping bling brought a new buyer - the same buyers who would go for the Grand Prix or Monte Carlo. That market, too, would be exhausted; and by this time, Lido Iacocca, lover of big, big cars, was in control. So the Bird grew bigger...until it didn't appeal to anyone, except Mark III buyers.

Badge-engineering the Torino into a downsized Bird saved it for a few years, but that was just novelty, again. By this time, the memories of the original T-Bird were fading.

So...in trying to satisfy potential buyers who gave a flippant reason not to buy a Thunderbird...they lost sight of the original market.

That would be the story for all 3 of the major U.S. automakers. They couldn't even see the writing on the wall when their quality went done to nothing. Who wants to buy a car and finish building it themselves?? I went into one showroom and when I opened the car door the kickplate fell out. What?? On a new car?

A bit of arrogance I think as well in the big 3.

Look how Ford tried to screw Bob Kearns out of getting the credit for the intermittent (blinking eye) windshield wiper.

Even the paint jobs on a lot of 1980's Ford trucks would start to peel after a few short years. It happened to me. When I took it back to the dealer to see what they could do about it they blamed it on Sherwin Williams and told me they would only pay for half the cost of a new paint job. I felt that since it was their foul up and I was the victim that by paying for half the job I would basically be paying for their cost. . .in essence they would have still charged me for the job but with a 50% discount. . .which was probably their mark-up. Just guessing. I remember so many Ford trucks driving around with fading/peeling paint. It was a widespread problem for a while.

Quality became a BIG issue, and lack of it almost broke the big three. I wont go into who should have gotten the blame at that time, but they really didnt even start a quality control department until their sales ...or lack of sales ...almost broke them.

Meanwhile, an American professor had to go to Japan to sell his ideas on quality control to the auto industry because the American manufacturers didn't want to hear it. You can see how that turned out for the American auto manufacturers.

Read a story recently that Ford are to stop selling cars other than the Mustang In the USA domestic market.
They will only offer the Mustang, SUVs and pick-up trucks.

Really?? I thought their Fusion was suppose to be car that got them back on track. It took care of the hybrid needs, the medium family car needs, and the various degrees in between.

Mel46 wrote:Really?? I thought their Fusion was suppose to be car that got them back on track. It took care of the hybrid needs, the medium family car needs, and the various degrees in between.

Check here: https://www.nbcnews.com/business/autos/ ... ng-n869256

gn2 wrote:Read a story recently that Ford are to stop selling cars other than the Mustang In the USA domestic market.
They will only offer the Mustang, SUVs and pick-up trucks.

I read the same.
F-150 remains the top selling vehicle in the States, I believe.
Fish

Is that because there's room in tha cab for a banjo and a rifle and you can carry a pig in the back?

Really?? I thought their Fusion was suppose to be car that got them back on track. It took care of the hybrid needs, the medium family car needs, and the various degrees in between.

Ford just had a major recall on the Fusion and some Lincoln model for loose steering wheel bolts that could cause the steering wheel to lose attachment.

http://www.autonews.com/article/2018031 ... ing-wheels

Meanwhile, an American professor had to go to Japan to sell his ideas on quality control to the auto industry because the American manufacturers didn't want to hear it. You can see how that turned out for the American auto manufacturers.

I think you are referring to TQM. . .or "Total Quality Management". It wasn't that well received here but the Japanese did certainly jump on that band wagon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_quality_management

Yes, I worked for a major defense contractor, as a quality software engineer. They were very much into Total Quality Management. We went to classes, had meetings, and tracked quality control issues constantly. Much of Europe runs on a single set of quality rules now, and they work quite well (ISO 9000). When we sell to European countries we have to meet those same requirements. Now our government expects the same quality from all of their defense contractors.

I wonder if American auto manufacturers follow those rules.