Not at all.
Ford sold off all the share of foreign cars except Mazda during the crash, to avoid federal bailout like GM, or foreign merger like Chrysler.
Ford may have helped Jaguarās reliability but did not own Jag long enough to make substantial gains in QC.
As far as Volare, many cars of that era had problems. Much from primitive environmental controls.
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By brother owned a Volare. One of the worse cars ever made.
Funny, now you know of twoā¦ lol
I have had my 1976 Volare Road Runner since 1987, and I had a 77 Aspen RT for years alsoā¦ My friend just got ride of his 1976 /6 4 speed more door (very rare) to another friend and none of them ever had a stalling issue anymore then any other Mopar, Ford or Chevy with a pre computerād carbā¦ And I promise you it has never had any issues pulling out in trafficā¦ lolā¦ Did they need to be rebuilt from time to time, yes, but what old carb doesnātā¦ Both 2 and 4 barrelsā¦
Is it a perfect car no, but what is from back then???
The only time I every remember having a carb issue (other then old and leaking) was when the stock fuel pump went out and I robbed the performance fuel pump off the bigger engine and carb and put it on the cruiser and it overwhelmed the floats and flooded the carb at higher rpmsā¦
Heck, I even had crud get in one side of the idle circuit on the T-quad and killed 4 cylinders at idle, but it still would take off once off idleā¦ lol
And that wagon will be bought up and most likely someone will drop a stroked 400/440 in it and make a mean sleeper, a guy on another forum just dropped a stroker 500ci in his panel wagon that looks almost just like the one for saleā¦
My folks bought one new. In the first month the dealer had the entire engine parts laying on the ground trying to figure out why it was burning oil. 80 mile tow in Montana and two days while they replaced the trans under warranty. Never could find what the air conditioning leaked. Flat tires, etc. I donāt remember all the details but when they parked it in front of the Plymouth dealer and traded, when dad came out the tire was flat again. Just mumbled their car now.
Ford had severe cash flow problems well before the 2009 credit crash. They sold just about everything to raise cash. They just happened to do it at the right time. Itās great that they did becasue it kept Ford operating and employing thousands of people.
Chrysler received about $7.8 billion in loans at the start of the credit crunch. They paid it back after 2 years. The loans were initiated by the Bush administration and continued by the Obama administration.
GM got about $51 billion when the federal government basically bought the company. They eventually sold all their stock for around $39 billion, leaving about $12 billion uncollected. Note that GM doesnāt owe that amount, itās the difference between the purchase price and sales price for GM. the government chose to make the sale at that time and could have held onto the stock longer to recoup more but decided not to. GM wasnāt bailed out, they went into bankruptcy and the federal government bought the US assets. Thatās how Chapter 11 works. They also came out considerably smaller than before the crash.
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āCar guysā preferred Datsuns.
Not sure what you meanā¦?.. lol
This should be common sense, really. With limited exceptions, such as Toyota pickups, people are just not willing to pay more than perhaps $1500 for a vehicle with this kind of mileage, even if itās in good condition and running well. The reason is because most people will accept that a vehicle can last for 250k miles with proper maintenance, but if it already has close to, or more than that, the question then becomes how much usable life is remaining in this thing? When the seller wants thousands of dollars for a 200k+ mile car, itās just not a good gamble.
Case in point. Thereās a 1991 Corolla for sale right now on Phoenix Craigslist with 270k miles, currently asking $2700, lowered slightly from $2900. For $1200, the car would have sold long ago. Even for $1800, someone would have eventually bought it thinking that if it lasts at least a year, they have covered their costs. For nearly $3k? No effinā way. Thereās probably not enough useful life remaining for that price, and once you start doing major mechanical repairs, the aquisition cost has to be much lower.
Iāve lived in Phoenix, there is probably not a spot of rust on the body, it is probably a bit sun scorched, maybe the headliner is drooping a bit, but that body rock solid and I bet the Parking Brake Cable is not āfrozenāā¦ L 
L . . .
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Maybe where you live. My son sold my 2005 4runner I gave him to buy a smaller vehicle and newer vehicle. Well over 300k miles. Sold for $2,500. The small auto lots are full of cars with vehicles over 200k miles and asking (and getting) 3-5k for them. Itās just the way the market is right now. The used car market is NUTS. I wouldnāt pay those pricesā¦but itās happening.
But a car like that should easily last 3 years. So 1800 * 3 = $5400. The mentality that many BUYERS have with a 300k mile car seems to be to junk it rather than do a $500 repair that will get them another year out of it. So they avoid >300k mile car is the first place.
Thatās why I think the >300k mile cars are in a different market. The person who owns it knows how much more life they can get out of it. It may be an original owner vehicle and that is lost once it is sold. Original owner adds a lot of value to a vehicle, and that can only be preserved if it is sold to a family member or friend. The owner knows the car very well. If they are selling it, itās because they know it is at the end of its life. So itās bad for the buyer in this situation since many of the cars being sold are known very well by the seller and theyāre selling it because it is next to end of life or being no longer economical to repair.
There was a Camry at a shop around here with 350k miles. It got scrapped because the original owner didnāt fix the oil leaks. Itās unusual for someone who knows so little about cars to have one make it that far. Once it that old, people just donāt get rid of them until they become uneconomical to repair. So there are a lot of >300k mile vehicles out there, just hardly any for sale.
They have been dipping the entire Body In White assembly in a 4 stage process for corrosion protection and paint prep for decades. The dipping process ensures all surfaces, including those inside surfaces, are treated.
There have been notable issues when the processes have changed along the way- like growing pains for new materials or methods, that led to specific examples of premature paint failures. But by and large, the corrosion protection for new vehicles has only continued to get better year after year. If you lived through the 70s, where you could practically see and hear the rusting process in real-time 
youād say today is astounding how well cars hold up.
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Yep, many around here, most are on buy here, pay here lots.
In his autobiography, Lee Iacocca said something along the lines ofā¦
There were probably a lot of people who wanted have me executed after they bought a Volare/Aspen.
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Many of those āsmall auto lotsā are the epicenter for the worse type of Used Car Salesperson. The vehicles are overpriced, but that does not matter to their target buyer, someone with little or no credit. They do their own financing and their bottom line is to get a good downpayment and they will finance anyone. The plan is to get enough monthly payments to make a profit and if the buyer reneges on the payments, they send out a recovery team to get the car back and if it still has any value, it goes back on the lotā¦
There was one case here (Hampton Roads, Virginia, (we have an Air Force Base, an Army Post, and a huge Naval Baseā¦) where a Navy Sailor had his car repossessed while he was deployed. When he got word that he was going to be deployed, he took a copy of his orders and a letter to the dealer so they would suspend his payments. He chose not to make payments by allotment as he had heard that sometimes the allotment does not stop right away and then you have to try to get your overpayments back (not always easyā¦).
With the orders and the letter the dealer told him no problem, but interest would still accrue. The Sailor deployed and when he returned, he found that his car had been repossessed for ānon-payment.ā Not only had the dealer repossessed the car, but had resold it for more than the sailor paid for it originally.
Here in Virginia, when property is sold at forfeiture for non-payment, the loan holder may only keep the amount owed and any fees associated with the sale. There was not that much left on the car loan and the dealer kept everything, include thousands in profits.
The sailor took the dealership to court and he use the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act and there are special protections for service members.
The sailor prevailed and the court really laid into the dealership, they had to pay the sailor all the money he had paid, the sailorās attorneyās fees, and as a penalty, they had to pay the sailor several times the original amount due to fraud.
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The steel mill I used to work in made one side electrogalvanized steel sheet for the auto industry. That product came on line around 1980.
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I owned 2 Datsun 510s. A 1972 model purchased in 1978 for $200 with rust already showing at the front and rear fenders. Bought another 510, this time a 71 in 1979 (?) with the same rust AND a see-through trunk floor. Fun to drive!
The engines were bulletproof but the bodies rusted like they were unpainted. But Chevy Vegas would show rust holes in 3 years, too.
By comparison, the GM X-cars were wildly better for rust than anything GM made up to that point. The cars themselves were crap, but the bodies looked good long after the owners got fed up with them.
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True. But the point I made (which is true)ā¦is people are buying vehicles with over 200k miles all the time.
I had that same problem w/my truckās carb ā¦ I got a lot of weird looks the way I was forced to drive ā¦ lol ā¦ fortunately, easy to solve.
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