Disposable Car?
Alex3324 wants to know if we are driving disposable cars. I am sure some people are. The first practical disposable car was invented by a Mr. Henry Ford.
Ford Motor Co. has been perfecting it ever since! Every one that I have worked on is in some state of disolving into nothingness.
The reference was made to energy efficiency; if you wash with cold water the ony energy used is electricity to run the machine. Top loaders use a lot of water; it that’s hot, much energy is lost compated to a front loader.
And I’ll chime in with a late 60’s GE Mobile Maid portable dishwasher that is still doing dishes in my household. the only thing we had to replace was the silverware basket–I was able to find a compatible basket on Ebay about 3 years back…
Some “disposable cars” I have known are: British Vauxhall Firenza, French Renault Dauphine and Le Car, Yugo, Hyundai Pony, early Subaru models imported by Malcolm Bricklin, most imported British Ford models, all Fiat models imported into the US, and a few others.
Today’s better cars sold in volume have a long life expectancy and we are reasonably assured of spares from the manufacturer, after market, or “recycling yards”. However, in all cases, repairability could be better, as the late Checker Marathon proved.
Docnick must be correct!
I live where temperature varies up to about 130 degrees F. from season to season, we hope summer falls on a week-end, and spend six months driving on salt covered ice, a veritable torture chamber for cars.
I have personally witnessed just one of the vehicles Docnick mentioned. It was a Fiat…X-19… I believe. The thing was not what I would call very old. The amount and extent of rust damage was unbelievable. The windshield was even “rusting out”! You could look through holes in the metal(?) right around the winshield.
The only reason that Fiat cast a shadow in the general shape of a car is because all of its termites were holding hands!
How safe are some of the disposable cars and for how long?
To that list, I would add the late, unlamented Austin Marina. After all, did you ever hear of any other make of car suffering a broken crankshaft TWICE despite proper maintenance?
After myriad other problems with that bomb, the owner (whom I knew very well) wanted a “good American car”, and he decided to trade it in on a Plymouth Volare! After the Volare developed a habit of stalling while attempting to accelerate onto an expressway, and after it began to suffer from serious rust issues, he also dumped that piece of junk. Even Lee Iacocca, in his autobiography, admitted that the Volare/Aspen twins were just plain bad cars.
A friend of mine had to buy a new car in the 70s, and had to choose between a Plymouth Valiant (an excellent car in its last year of production) and the “new Volare”. He chose the Volare, and in spite of Ricardo Montalban’s crooning, the lack of inner fenders and rust protection made the thing rust out in record time.
My neighbor in the late 70s bought a Fiat 128 for his wife and it had the 3 piece rear bumpers. When he put his foot on the corner of the bumper to tie up a shoe lace, it promptly fell off!!!
I visited both San Francisco and Washingto D.C. in the early 1980’s. In both cities, Plymouth Volares were being used as taxicabs. The drivers were non-too-gentle with these cabs. I suppose that the Plymouth Volare was considered a disposable car, but it probably held up well enough for a couple of years of taxicab duty.
I had a slant six Plymouth Duster and I swear if I kept it the body would fall off before the engine would quit.
Anyways ,automobiles were planned obsolessece in those days.
And today’s aren’t?
Despite being disposable, the cars of yesteryear are still going strong. Granted you don’t see many unrestored, one owner 1950 vehicles around, but they do exist.