Im unfortunately a bit older than that. In the 1980s and 1990s it was very prevalent around here. I explained several realistic scenarios in my thread explaining why older cars didn’t “last” as long as newer vehicles.
And you were proven wrong. I particularly like the fact that cars’ average age has doubled in that time, has nothing to do with odometer readings.
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The the reason why engines didn’t last back then was because carbs would run rich and wash the cylinder walls down causing ring wear… Fuel injection has all but eliminated old smoky killing the Skeeters…
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Back when I was a kid in the 60s, my father worked in a car dealership. He later told us that once a month:
- a guy would come to their dealership asking if they had any odometers to roll back.
- the dealership would tell him “roll this one back 10K”, “roll that one back 25k”, etc.
- the guy would privately spend a few minutes per car.
- I recall he got paid per car.
I don’t know what’s right. I remember a ‘60 minutes’ segment from around then that wholesalers did it commonly.
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In the early '50s, it was SOP for Caddy dealers to roll odometers back to zero. Their ads stated, “A pre-owned Cadillac is superior to a new car of any other manufacturer”. The ultimate in "puffing "?
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We thought so when we bought a two year old Cadillac Series 62 in 1964 instead of a 1964 Cutlass Supreme. That Caddie had more of everything, including gas. 