American Cars Vs Everyone Else's Cars

Reliant121 · Post by **Reliant121** » Fri Jul 03, 2009 9:56 pm

If you took one of our standard or large sized saloons and swapped it for a small American straight 5/Straight 6, you would have an IMMENSELY powerful car. Purely because we seem to make our cars much lighter for similar kinda sizes.

Kevsha · Post by **Kevsha** » Fri Jul 03, 2009 10:14 pm

Praeothmin wrote:The problem we have here in Canada (at least in Quebec), is that while the Asian cars will cost a bit more then its American counterpart, it's a lot more reliable (needs less repairs), will last longer, and is usually built better and looks nicer.

the problem with that is, the first part of that is a huge generalization and the second is opinion. a fact is that ford has replaced Toyota in quality. Generally they are easy and cheap to repair. I know more about this end of cars than most, i am a former mechanic for ford and i now work at a fleet managment company and manage the repairs of some 600,000 fleet vehicles. i see the total repair history of every type of vehicle that is sold in america. the trand that i see, in aberica imports are very expensive to fix, and break just as often. unfortunatly there is a stigma attatched to american cars that they are shit boxed, and its our own fault, but its hard to climb out of that whole..

Praeothmin wrote: there would be less traffic (if only because smaller cars take less space on the roads ).

the problem is that there are too many cars here that need to be big, work trucks, i have a truck because i need to tow a boat, can't do that with a little compact. the only thing that will happen if we all started driving small cars id ramp up the fatality rate

Kevsha · Post by **Kevsha** » Fri Jul 03, 2009 10:20 pm

[quote="Reliant121"] small American straight 5/Straight 6, quote]

well i get the idea, but you won't find very many straight 5s or 6s. we like our vees here. save for the small pickup from chevy/gmc and the H3. ford used to have a I-6for the F-150, a bullitproof motor, they never die and Jeep used them fro a VERY long time until 2004(?) when they brough out a new V-6.

stitch626 · Post by **stitch626** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 12:04 am

I have a question for you... non-Americans. How many of your cars can you fit 5 people (or six for my family, but we need a van for those trips) and a weeks worth of luggage each for a trip 1500 miles away?
Serious question btw. That is one reason our cars are so big.

Post by **IanKennedy** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 12:34 am

stitch626 wrote:I have a question for you... non-Americans. How many of your cars can you fit 5 people (or six for my family, but we need a van for those trips) and a weeks worth of luggage each for a trip 1500 miles away?
Serious question btw. That is one reason our cars are so big.

Most UK cars will carry five people. One each in the front seats and three on the back.

stitch626 · Post by **stitch626** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 12:38 am

I knew they could fit five people, but I'm asking the people and the luggage.
Are their trunks big enough to carry five huge suitcases?

Post by **IanKennedy** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 12:41 am

stitch626 wrote:I knew they could fit five people, but I'm asking the people and the luggage.
Are their trunks big enough to carry five huge suitcases?

I've no idea, it's like asking how long is a piece of string. What size suitcase for example. I've driven two US cars and they wouldn't fit two suitcases in the boot. Now OK, they where soft tops but one was fairly large, just didn't really have a decent boot.

Post by **Graham Kennedy** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 12:41 am

I have a Ford Focus; nothing special, but it will accommodate five people. It has a decent amount of space in the boot; I picked my parents up returning from a month in Australia and took all their luggage with space to spare.

It's only got a 1.6 engine, and is not exactly an acceleration king, but it will cruise perfectly comfortably at 70 and will hit 110+ if I hold my foot on the floor. The tank holds about 10 UK gallons, and it averages around 350 miles on that.

stitch626 · Post by **stitch626** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 3:28 am

Ok, I was just curious. Wait, a UK gallon is different than a US gallon.

On the differences in gas mileage, I've noticed that even with cars of the same size and engine, your's get better mileage (even if just a bit). Do you make yours out of lighter materials perhaps?

Post by **IanKennedy** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 4:30 am

stitch626 wrote:Ok, I was just curious. Wait, a UK gallon is different than a US gallon.

On the differences in gas mileage, I've noticed that even with cars of the same size and engine, your's get better mileage (even if just a bit). Do you make yours out of lighter materials perhaps?

There is a difference between the US gallon and the UK gallon. I spelled this out when we where comparing fuel prices a year or two ago. The differences are given here:

Gallons

However, it does not account for the difference in millage even for cars of an equivalent engine capacity. Other factors are, as you say, weight. Also, tuning, we seem to be able to take an engine and get more power out of it than you do. For example there are European sports cars that use US engines. Typically we will get more horsepower from that sa engine than the people who built it in the first place. That's without changing the engine capacity in any way, we don't for example bore the engine out to a larger size.

Reliant121 · Post by **Reliant121** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 9:31 am

stitch626 wrote:I have a question for you... non-Americans. How many of your cars can you fit 5 people (or six for my family, but we need a van for those trips) and a weeks worth of luggage each for a trip 1500 miles away?
Serious question btw. That is one reason our cars are so big.

I'll take my Dad's car as an example. He has a hatchback Hyundai i30, you Americans get the estate version named the Hyundai Elantra Station wagon or something along those lines. His engine is a 1.4 Litre, straight 4 with 107.5 bhp. She'll hit 110mph if you push her (Which is a beautifully satisfying noise i might add).

It'll carry 5 people easily as its fairly wide for its class, and the boot is blood huge. If you filled it to the brim, it could take that 5 person family's week long stuff, even if you have a clothes obsessed teen in your family. And the 1.4 doesnt feel strained. It has to work a little harder, and it might not make it quite up to 110mph (more like 100mph), but it is still a very comfortable drive.

On Graham's Ford Focus, our old car was almost identical to his only in white, and a 1.8 L engine, and that was verryyyy feisty for such a heavy car.

Praeothmin · Post by **Praeothmin** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 5:00 pm

Kevsha wrote:the problem with that is, the first part of that is a huge generalization and the second is opinion. a fact is that ford has replaced Toyota in quality.

I was talking through my and my friend's and family's experiences, and the Asian cars pretty much have shown themselves to be superior in quality over the years.

Of course, your experience as an ex-Ford employee may not qualify you as the most objective viewer either...

You may be right, it is possible that lately Ford has stopped building crap vehicules, but they will have a hard time making up for all the years people had so many propblems with their cars and trucks...

Kevsha wrote:unfortunatly there is a stigma attatched to american cars that they are s**t boxed, and its our own fault, but its hard to climb out of that whole..

And this "stigma" came to be for a reason.
You know that you can never make a second "First Impression".
As I said, if people have been given crap for so long, then it will take time for them to accept the idea that Ford, for example, now builds quality cars.

Reliant121 · Post by **Reliant121** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 5:52 pm

Interestingly enough, Ford are well respected reliability over here. My family has had fords for god knows how long, My dads old car was a ford, we;ve had fords since the mk.1 Ford Fiesta. Not a single one went wrong. The only one that the family has ever died apart from the Sierra (which was driven into the ground) is my grandads mk.1 Mondeo...which he has killed.

stitch626 · Post by **stitch626** » Tue Jul 07, 2009 6:21 pm

The only problem I have with Ford is their lousy suspension. And the companies past ethics.

Kevsha · Post by **Kevsha** » Wed Jul 08, 2009 9:52 pm

IanKennedy wrote: However, it does not account for the difference in millage even for cars of an equivalent engine capacity. Other factors are, as you say, weight. Also, tuning, we seem to be able to take an engine and get more power out of it than you do. .

one major problem here is the restrictions on emissions, thanks to CARB we have to choke the crap out our cars to get them to pass emissions. for example, in the mid 70's when the emissions laws came down on cars, the ford 460ci V-8 went from high 300- low 400 hp depending on the car it was in to less than 200! Even our diesel engines are rapped, look at this, this is fords new dual turbo 6.4L light duty diesel:

you cant even see the motor under all the emissions BS. it sucks

Praeothmin wrote:
Of course, your experience as an ex-Ford employee may not qualify you as the most objective viewer either...

You may be right, it is possible that lately Ford has stopped building crap vehicules, but they will have a hard time making up for all the years people had so many propblems with their cars and trucks...
.

ford doesn't build crap, i owened one ford that had (still going to under a new owner) 234k miles on it, another with 190k, and another with 169k. all never gave me trouble asside from minor maintanence.

well i think having to work on them gives me a somewhat unique insight, seeing the problems first hand and having to fix them. also seeing how this effects fleets as a whole also is pretty neat. to which i have to say if you ever buy a chrysler product, may god have mercy on your soul.

Praeothmin wrote: And this "stigma" came to be for a reason.
You know that you can never make a second "First Impression".
As I said, if people have been given crap for so long, then it will take time for them to accept the idea that Ford, for example, now builds quality cars.

like i said its the fault of the manufacturers that it is that way and they need to work to change it

American Cars Vs Everyone Else's Cars

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