Chrysler shutdown

[Alpine 1789]

Our companies just went on making BIG vehicles because they generated more money, but the people were wanting smaller, more fuel efficient cars.

I hear this all the time and don't buy it. Imagine what would have happened 5 years ago if GM CEO Rick Wagoner had announced to the world that GM was going to stop making so many profitable trucks and SUVs because they saw $4.00/gallon gas in the near future and wanted to build smaller, but less profitable cars. The shareholders would have thrown them out on their butts! Congress would have probably investigated GM to see why they were misleading stockholders. They built what the majority of the American public wanted to buy. The Japanese were able to sell plenty of the cars here that the rest of the world wanted, but they were scrambling as fast as they could to build large, profitable trucks. Witness the Toyota Tundra and the plans to build a Highlander plant in Mississippi.

Ford is in better shape financially, because it's foreign markets are going strong.

Ford is in better shape financially because they hit bottom a couple of years ago and mortgaged the company to buy a few more years. In hindsight, they are probably really thankful that this happened when it did. At least there was credit available at the time. And as for foreign markets, I could be wrong, but I believe GM is actually the strongest of the domestics outside of the US. I know they are the leading US manufacturer in China.

Toyota is expected to report a loss for 2008, the first time this has happened in something like 50 years. The world wide market is in shambles. I don't for one second think the domestics are necessarily well run and know their problems are deep and the result of decades of mistakes. But they are not unique and were on the right track before the financial meltdown crippled them.

 

[skywords]

My opinion amounts to a mouse fart but I will say it anyway. What the world needs is a peoples car that is affordable, simple, easily maintained and has the same parts year after year. It is built with minimal plastics and throw the emissions and safety standards out the window so it can be built cheaply with a small four cylinder engine that gets great gas mileage. The car with no frills just transportation. The current trend in automotive production with all the whistles and bells and new tooling every year is insanity and has led us astray.

My vote would be to build the Alpine and Rapier again out of aluminum with a modern four cylinder engine. No airbags, no catalytic converter, no On-star, no plastic headlight lenses. Just minimum daily requirement of automobile.

I'll bet they could build it and sell it for 6K. Built from aluminum it would go like a scalded cat and get 60 mpg or better. The design as we all know could be simplified with better production techniques.

Safety standards should be placed on the driver not the car. I am on the road all day five days a week and I see people do stupid stupid things when driving. Lets teach drivers how not to crash.

 

[tony perrett]

Rick, I think that you just defined the Volkswagen Beetle.

 

[Bill Blue]

Rick, I too think there should be basic transportation available, although I'm not so sure it would be purchased in very large numbers. Upgrades are so tempting and cheap. Electric windows are a perfect example. I sometimes think they have been developed to the point they cost little more manual windows. Who would want to go back to the old manifold vacuum wiper motors?

Anyway, I have often wondered just how much it would cost to produce a Model A these days. Not a duplicate of the Model A, but a car using modern technology and matching the benchmarks of the "A". Not much power, crummy brakes, crude transmission, no turn signals, bad ride, incredible pollution, etc. But it would have to a solid, dependable car as was the "A".

Bill