American Cars VS European Cars

[PerfAdv]

The new SSC from the US will begin to blow away the European competition, we just finished Road & Track, look for us in the Ampersand section...did I mention the standard Aero gets 24 mpg highway miles?

What is the SSC? What is the Standard Aero?

[Matra et Alpine]

What is the SSC? What is the Standard Aero?

http://www.sscautos.com/

[PerfAdv]

SSC Aero and Ultimate Aero. Impressive numbers. Love to see this car at Le Mans.

Pros: 787hp pushing 2,850 lbs and 1050 pushing 2650.
Cons: Forced Induction>reliability>race worthiness?

[Matra et Alpine]

torque's even more impressive versus the weight at 1100 Nm !!!

Will be interesting to see what next seasons DBR9 and 'vette do

[Zytek_Fan]

I heard the DBR9 will undergo a change on it somewhere to avoid getting a weight penalty next year

[PerfAdv]

Massive torque + equally massive horsepower = Nirvana

Atleast, really long burnouts and donuts galore.

[Zytek_Fan]

torque's even more impressive versus the weight at 1100 Nm !!!

Will be interesting to see what next seasons DBR9 and 'vette do

I will be flying an Aston Martin Racing flag

[greg.harvey]

You know who's really winning while we're trading musclecars and supercars? The Japanese! They have family cars selling globally with barely any modification while our manufacturers continue to observe the "US market" and "EU market".

Sure, in the past there was a vast difference between the US and European markets, but I wonder if the marketeers and advertisers perpetuate the myth today to cover mistakes. Let me give you an example:

Land Rover spouted some nonsense about cup holders not being big enough in the Disco for the US market a year or so ago, in an effort to explain away poor sales. Errrrr, SMOKE SCREEN! Hmmmm ... whatever you want to believe guys! Maybe your car wasn't good enough?? (Shock, horror.)

Then there's Chrysler who launch the Neon in the UK. It sells badly and the marketing guys say "well, you know guys, US cars don't sell well in Europe ..." No. The Neon is a dreadful, dreadful car! It shouldn't sell well anywhere!

I think of my aunt in Baltimore, MD, USA who drives a Toyota Corolla. Then I think of my aunt in Louth, Lincs, UK who drives .....

Yup! A Toyota Corolla. And then I get to thinking, what difference? The Japanese don't seem to notice it at all!

[Matra et Alpine]

mass production of cheap reliable cars needs cheap and reliable manufacturing. You cant afford that in US and msot of Eureop anymore so the Asian manufacturers will concentrate there. "New" companies can't compete at that level as it takes billions to create a new manufacturing/production plant and even more to put distributino and servicing locally. So "new" cars WILL only be in the niche markets where one car doesn't need vast invesetment in manufacturing and can return the same profit as 10,000 cheap cars

Astra and Focus et al are "global" cars - except for "you know where" who seem to always want it 'different' and then slag them for being inadequate

[greg.harvey]

Astra and Focus et al are "global" cars - except for "you know where" who seem to always want it 'different' and then slag them for being inadequate

Yer, that's a weird one. I don't understand the mentality of an organisation like Ford looking at the market behaviour of, say, Honda - who don't modify their cars between continents at all and sell very well - and then making a dumbed down "US" version of every car they produce by turning the suspension to slush, swelling the engine and tuning it down so that the power output is the same anyway! ???

If Honda don't need to do it to sell, then surely Ford don't either?

And surely Americans can't really want slushy suspension and higher fuel costs?

It's all very confusing ...

[PrevlingPushrod]

I don't know about you guys, but I'm going with the Americans. The Corvette is the best bang for your buck. 400 BHP for 56 grand, I like to see Porsche do that.

[Slicks]

I don't know about you guys, but I'm going with the Americans. The Corvette is the best bang for your buck. 400 BHP for 56 grand, I like to see Porsche do that.

*$43,000 is its base price.

EDIT: Why the hell is this thread not locked yet???

[Matra et Alpine]

*$43,000 is its base price.

How many are bought/sold for base ?
It's like the old BMW argument on cars in the UK. ie British cars are more expensive because our BASE models include things which were options on the continent. Supposedly if you taook a Europe-spec and added all the options to match the UK spec the prices were supposed to be "similar". Load of BS, but partailly true. However, doesn't mean "loss leaders" don't exist to get the mind to buy-in while the heart will add all the goodies and ruin the price-match

EDIT: Why the hell is this thread not locked yet???

please explain why you think so ?
Please use post #428 in your analysis.
Thank you.

Look, even YOU raised a new angle on pricing - "compare like-for-like"
That'll get more thoughts going - 99% of which will STILL show US cars are helluva cheap compared to UK versions

[henk4]

Look, even YOU raised a new angle on pricing - "compare like-for-like"
That'll get more thoughts going - 99% of which will STILL show US cars are helluva cheap compared to UK versions

May be we should also take into account the rebates given by US manufacturers and the subsequent financial consequences for GM in particular which is clearly on a stepp downhill road, using drum brake of the forties.

[Slicks]

How many are bought/sold for base ?
It's like the old BMW argument on cars in the UK. ie British cars are more expensive because our BASE models include things which were options on the continent. Supposedly if you taook a Europe-spec and added all the options to match the UK spec the prices were supposed to be "similar". Load of BS, but partailly true. However, doesn't mean "loss leaders" don't exist to get the mind to buy-in while the heart will add all the goodies and ruin the price-match

I couldnt tell you how many are sold base, but the point was how much power you get with X amount of money.

please explain why you think so ?
Please use post #428 in your analysis.
Thank you.

Because its beating a very dead, and rotting horse. Its the same argument over and over, with most people being very ethnocentric.