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Showing posts with label Cars - General. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cars - General. Show all posts


I was on my bike yesterday around the town I live and I took my camera. Well, I came across three old cars. I took snaps of them and here they are:

A 1957 Ford Prefect. A mild climate and a not too strict warrant of fitness regime means as long as they are reasonably maintained, you can have one. Something different. This is the 100E model and it was made from 1953 to 1959. A total of 100,554 were produced produced according to Wiki. That's just over 16,500 per annum, not large numbers.




1939 Austin 10.According to Wiki: It was launched in 1932 and was Austin's best-selling car in the 1930s and continued in production, with upgrades, until 1947.
I haven't seen them around that I recall, so I was thinking it was fortuitous that my camera was at the ready. Apparently 290,000 were made in total in the fifteen odd years they were made. I was amazed to think that the '10' was the best seller for the brand but on average less than 20,000 were made per year.




1964 Bond Equipe GT. Just when I though that was as good as it could get, the pièce de résistance. According to the official Bond car website, only 4,389 Equipe were ever made. I didn't know there were so many model variants or I would have taken greater note of what this one was. Now drawing on Wiki "The original Equipe, the GT, was based on the Triumph Herald chassis with a fastback fibreglass body and also utilised further Triumph parts including the windscreen / scuttle assembly, and doors. The September 1964 GT4S model saw revisions to the body with twin headlights and an opening rear boot. It was powered by the same, mildly tuned up Herald-based 1147 cc engine used in the Triumph Spitfire".
So the twin headlamps then suggest the GT4S model of which 1,934 were produced. One of them made it down to New Zealand and still in use. I noticed the seats needed reupholstering but overall in good condition.
Quite a mix of older cars. Nice to see people still value this sort of vehicle.

Older Cars Where I Live

We never get snow where I live, but recently we had a flurry of snow over night. By the time I went out with the camera, most had gone and only traces remained in sheltered spots. I sent off photos to friends about our rare 'snow fall'. My relative in Canada must have chuckled. Anyway, here is some real snow in Russia. I cannot imagine how it must feel digging your car out. Would anyone like to share a though if it is what you have experienced?





Snow And The Car


Cars of years ago were simple. Comparing a car of 50 years ago and today and you find the modern vehicle is so much more complicated. 50 years ago there seemed quite a gap between say a Mercedes and an Opel car. Today there isn't much difference, a Ford is not far off an Audi for example.

Which makes me wonder why. I can understand that premium brands such as BMW and Jaguar have to be special to command a premium price tag, but what benefit is there for a mass market brand getting close in quality them in quality? The premium brand can sell their car at a strong price, while the mass market cars cannot. In Europe, it is hard for regular car makers to make money, and trying to almost match cars with prestige image in quality but not price is part of the reason.

The Renault Group makes far more money per car with the Dacia brand than it does with its Renault brand. This is despite Dacias selling for a lower price. The difference is too much money is wasted trying to make a Renault a better car than the public want it to be. Surely mass market car brands need to be simplified and prices lowered. Many Europeans can no longer afford new cars at the price they are now. Dacia has shown that the potential for lower quality, lower priced cars is there.

According to ACEA,  in the first six months of 2013, Dacia sold 145,000 cars in Europe, for 2.2% share. It outsold Volvo, Honda, Suzuki and Mazda for example. If you add all the Dacias sold in Russia (not included in the ACEA figure and which are sold as Renaults), then Dacia models are proving popular. At least 90,000 Dacias - as Renaults - were sold in Russia for the same period as above.

When the Chinese come, they plan to arrive with inexpensive cars and of reasonable quality. Maybe Dacia will be a benchmark they will aim at, but with lower prices. I'm picking that if they do it properly they will establish a solid sales level in Europe.

In Summary: Brands like Ford and Opel need to make their cars less complex and more affordable (more profitable too). There will also be an increasing demand for even cheaper cars than those too, cheap and cheerful that is. Renault has highlighted potential in this segment and I am sure others will follow.

Simplifying Cars

I am not one to promote websites unless they offer something of high quality and accuracy. They also need to offer a goodly amount of free data. It also helps if they are open, friendly and quick to respond to enquiries. In all of those things, I find Focus2Move ticks the boxes. It was founded by Carlo Simongini, who is still a managing partner there.

The difference with what I do is apparent once you visit. I operate alone doing a hobby I enjoy, while Focus2Move is a business with resources to gather statistical data. Many consultancy firms are only really interested in selling to you, not in giving out information. On Focus2Move, while there is data you have to purchase, plenty of free information is there for the browser too. While that remains the case, it is something to be recommended and somewhat unique.

A Site I Recommend For Car Sales Data

 Britain's biggest private car collection is for sale for £100m. James Hull has filled a number of warehouses with cars from the past 80 years. Due to health issues the owner James Hull has decided to move them on. It seems he would like to keep the collection intact if possible. I would imagine he would get more individually but for sentiment I can see why he wants it that way.

The 450 car collection has some models that are rare and others with special history. If you want more about that, it is available on the internet. Suffice to say, it is an amazing collection of British cars of yesteryear, one very much worth keeping together.

Some cars here that are not so old, I remember them (yikes)
Some rather nice cars among this lot
A Jaguar collection 
Even a plane thrown in here

Britain's Biggest Private Car Collection For Sale

Even the best of ideas can fail. Below are some classic examples of failures in the automotive world that cannot easily be explained.

For the extrovert. Be seen arriving.

Minimalist. Not sure mad scientist look works though.

I think used to get to an island at low tide in the UK. Huge potential

Excellent visibility. Just avoid gravel roads.

Weigh anchor me hearty. Fantastic.

Amazing aerodynamics. 

Beautiful. Nice car too. Daihatsu were inspired by it for the Copen

So there you have a few wonderful automotive designs that never quite made it. Except for the Copen of course.

Car Ideas That Inexplicably Never Made It


When you see pictures of cars, often beautiful women are there as well. At car shows, women models adorn all the cars. Why is that the case? Sometimes it is hard to see the car! I have a couple of theories.

1) When a woman goes out for an evening in a nice dress, she wears beautiful jewellery that adds a great deal to her appearance. The sparkling accessories draw your eyes to her. Likewise, a beautiful model adds appeal to the shiny car at the motor show. That would be an obvious connection.

2) A more subtle reason is that studies show that women are more attracted to men who drive nice cars. Monetary success adds to a man's appeal to the fairer sex. So having an attractive model next to the car suggests that women will be drawn to a man who owns it. Beautiful women are to be associated with this car.

Whatever the reasons, there is a connection between women and cars. (As we know of course, no car can match a woman for beauty). We also know that classy cars - and the sort of woman that is attracted to the owner of such - can prove to be very expensive.

Beautiful Women And Cars - Why?

The competitors will be chasing Toyota, not VW 

The calendar year is about finished for 2015 so which car makers can look back with satisfaction and which ones will not? Divided into nations or regions for compactness, here we go:

USA: GM, Ford and Chrysler were all pretty neutral although Jeep did well. Tesla will be happy with progress being made so let's give them a win.

Germany: The three premium brands all did well so would be classified as winners. VW was on course to pip Toyota for top company by volume. A winning year turned into an annus horribilis in the end. It won't now be top and may never be so.

France: A few years back, the French car industry was in poor shape. It still isn't great but Renault is benefiting from it's Nissan alliance and PSA is working hard at achieving good business practice. So while there is much work to do, I would grant then a win for the progress made.

UK: Bentley and Rolls Royce consolidated so not enough to call that a win. Jaguar brought out the XE and Land Rover enjoyed success with the new Discovery Sport to say JLR were winners.

Italy: Fiat suffered from a poor situation in Brazil and not much good elsewhere. Meanwhile Ferrari has done OK but that's all. Maserati lost some ground with the Ghibli and Alfa Romeo had new models put back so losses there.

Europe (Rest of): Volvo is making progress after a flat period so a win for them.  Russia is doing poorly in car sales but Lada has done not to badly out of it but overall not a win. Škoda escaped form the VW debacle relatively unscathed, as did Seat. Neither set the world alight so a neutral year.

Japan: An undervalued Yen (how do they do that?) put Japanese brands on the front foot. A win for the car industry there. Suzuki also managed to free itself from VW so a double win for them.

Korea: Nothing startling there but steady progress continues for all of them so that would be a win in my book.

China: Exports were down and domestic sales have about peaked. No real progress by local brands so I'd call it a fail. Too much haste means little or no progress. 

Summary: The biggest winner was Toyota who have avoided being taken in by the vanity of being top, instead concentrating on trying to improve. There are things the Big T can do better and it is doing something about it. A model strategy for others to follow.

VW on the other hand is the opposite. It has things to improve on but instead went got sidetracked by the big prize of number one. In the process it lost sight of improvements it needs to make and has even been cheating to try get to the summit. A lesson to other manufacturers of how not to be.

Slogan Das Auto dropped

Winners & Losers : 2016

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