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Originally Posted by was92v
Many of the improvement were spawned by govt and insurance pressure. The awesome cars we have now are a direct result of pressure from the govt for fuel mileage and pollution controls mixed with a healthy dose owner outrage and Asian flight from that junk they made from 1974 -- 1993.
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Actually, the shitty cars starting in 1971 (aka, the "Malaise Era") were a direct result of government and insurance pressure. Just about every weight-adding, performance-reducing, cost-increasing safety measure was introduced between '66-'74.
Halogen headlamps- far superior to sealed-beam incandescents, currently the standard for vehicle lighting, available in Europe since the 1960s. Banned in the United States until 1978; even today common consensus is that European domestic-market cars have lighting superior to U.S. cars, but U.S. legislation forbids those developments from use in our market. Thanks, Auntie Sam.
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The same digitally mapped fuel injection system that allows them to pass emission requirements is the same thing that allows a GM 5.7 liter to make 425 HP and still get 28 MPG on the highway. Would we have cars that perform that well, MPH & MPG, if not for the fuel mileage requirements?
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Yes, we would. Why didn't we have digitally mapped fuel injection in 1960? Because the technology wasn't available. Chrysler experimented with mechanical fuel injection in 1958, and the components are now collectors items because it was such a dismal failure that they were mass-recalled. GM and Mercedes tried it as well, and all of them pulled it out of the market after a limited run. ABS? Lincoln tested a mechanical version in 1968; it wasn't until 1978 until Bosch/Mercedes had a system that was actually ready for mass production.
Crosley automobiles were getting 50 MPG in the 1940s. When the end of WWII brought back cheap gasoline and readily available large cars, it was the U.S. public that made their priorities clear; Crosley couldn't sell enough vehicles to stay in business, even selling new cars at used-car prices.
The Big 3 were always in competition with each other (back in the 50s and 60s the various GM divisions were in competition with each other, as well!)- if a new technology could be brought to market to improve performance and economy at the same time, at a reasonable price, they did it to increase sales! Witness the "Horsepower Wars" of the 1960s- it was all power, no fuel economy, because that's what people wanted- but R&D was unquestionably being done to prove engine performance. In 1955, the Chrysler 300 was the most powerful engine in the U.S. market (at 300HP); by 1965 the Chrysler and Ford factory Super Stock homologation cars were making over 500, and running 11.7s in the quarter... then the Ford "Cammer" came out with well over 600!!
Same with safety. When Ford brought seatbelts into the market as a safety feature, the public shunned them. I've owned four higher-end cars that had them as available options in the early 60s, and only one of those had that option selected by the original owner. The .gov pressure on that end has ALWAYS been focused on the driver, with the manufacturers being collateral damage.
So, to sum up:
to the
