Otherwise even the normies would realize how much better things used to be.This is what they took from us.>picrel: what used to be a cheap italian shitbox is now high-art compared to nuCars.
By 1990 we had cheap sedans doing 400,000 miles with minimal maintenance. Somehow, despite the massive shilling for environmentalism, we’ve regressed and cars are now disposable garbage, just like washing machines, refrigerators, and now even houses. Swapping fuel efficient and reliable engines into older cars should’ve been the focus of all this government spending, not encouraging manufacturers to fake emissions improvements by sticking tiny turbos onto tiny engines and boosting the fuck out of them.
>>29144686an alfa will never be high-art
>>29144686Older cars could get away with a lot for styling, because very little of the bodywork was determined by function or actual engineering. It was basically a hollow shell dropped on top of a ladder frame chassis, so whatever swoops or weaves or bends could be slapped on it.
>>29144692the mid to late 60s is when unibody construction really started taking off. Because it was so new though and they didn't really understand crash and handling physics as well as we do now, they had to adapt existing tech to it, like how chrysler used torsion bar suspension.
>>29144687>we’ve regressed and cars are now disposable garbage, just like washing machines, refrigerators, and now even houses.capitalism necessitates it, and it doesnt care how much green virtue signaling you do to offset that (which is literally all a complete fabrication anyway as it is with every corporation, see VAG). easy to maintain cars do not rake in profits.
>>29144687Jack Welch is the chief person to blame for this, damningly more so than anyone else. He destroyed American business doctrine.
>>29144687’ve already got a couple dozen new OEM Honda parts, on backup in my spare walk in closet, for my 8th gen Accord coupe. And more on the way. Everything from the entire suspension, to interior door panels, all the exterior chrome trim, all the exterior weather seals, all the exterior rubber pieces, and interior plastics, brand new Honda leather for the seats, soon I’m getting brand new Honda seat pads as well for the front seats (about $900+ per seat for just the foam). Essentially replacing anything that can be replaced without dropping the engine or transmission. And anything and everything that has even the SLIGHTEST bit of wear. The glove box had couple surface scratches so I paid $500 for a new one. Not concerned if others could see the defects, cause honestly they couldn’t unless they look very closely but I want to know everything is pristine and like new so there’s no shortcuts being taken.Should be like a new car. Just waiting until I have everything I want before I start putting it all together. Plan to have it for another 30+ years.
alfas still look good no matter what yeardon't greentext me
>>29144686Safety regulations and strict emission standards radically limited car design into the same homogenous box. This is why I believe EV is the best bet to bring back dmall cheap cars. But we need solid state for it to be reality.
>>29144717corporations can still make small cars today they just dont want to comply with the regulations for lighter classes. in addition mutts dont even like small cars to begin with, so its a non starter for them unless theyre forced into them by economic factors
>>29144686looks pure kino.
>looks at 1960s Alfa Romeo market in 2020sWhat modern car should I bubble wrap in case of rapid appreciation?The A110?The hated Supra?The LC500?
>>29145717A110 is a maybe, Nupra is too common and I have never seen a white guy drive a LC500. If I had to guess GR Yaris, nuTwingo, maybe the CMC Veryca, if we include commercial vehicles.
>>29144686>>29144698>capitalism necessitates itit was you Marxist faggots who wrote these retarded Big Brother laws and put a limit to the Free Market to begin with. If we didnt have retarded regulations and tax laws, we could still enjoy those oldschool machines and the corpos could keep making them. But nah, gotta have those safety features, gotta have those fuel efficiency ratings- those finance laws. YOU killed American enterprise because you wanted to snitch on people.
>>29144717>Safety regulations and strict emission standards radically limited car design into the same homogenous boxThis isn't true at all given all the modern cars that fall outside of this box. The truth is modern companies choose to make cars look like shit
>>29145794You are more right than the other guy but if car manufacturers made a quality easy DIY cheap car then how would they keep making line go up?
>>29145794Yeah dude lemme buy one of those immortal good old refrigerators from the 50s that never fucking breaks ever, and is easily serviceable if it does.
>>29145795>>29146899maybe the way to go is to be like morgan cars, just find your own little niche then keep trucking along. just sell cars that appeal to the 90s era of serviceability. styling will be a challenge since some people would like 60s cars, some 70s, others 80s etc. but then the idea would be to just profit from parts sales. your customers won't HAVE to buy your oem parts...but you bet your ass that they sure as shit will last a lot longer than the aftermarket competition.
>>29144687>Somehow, despite the massive shilling for environmentalism, we’ve regressed and cars are now disposable garbage, just like washing machines, refrigerators, and now even houses.Because this brings in more money.>>29144700It can't be attributed to one person because the conclusion is incredibly easy to come to. If I'm in the business of selling washing machines I don't want to sell a washing machine that will last forever. I want to sell one that lasts just long enough to convince you to buy another one from me.
>>29146938And yet, Toyota has been selling cars that last until the body rots as their business model and they're doing fine.
>>29146940Japanese companies have a tendency to focus on long term stability over maximizing profits. It wouldn't surprise me if they had the funds stashed away to operate at a loss for an extended period
>>29146961So, not following Jack Welch et al's philosophy of extracting every last dime, like I was saying?
>>29146962I didn't say every company in the world did it, just that its an easy conclusion to reach when you're working within our economic system
>>29144686You're going to be insufferable when you discover air cooled Porsches
>>29144687Sorry buddy, the chief engineer for maseratti was just in an ask reddit thread today and said its easily possible to go 250k miles without worry on their engines as long as you do maintenance, so I think you're wrong?
>>29145717You're in Europe if you're looking at A110s. If you were in the US you could bubble wrap an alfa romeo Giulia quadrifoglio for 35k and even buy spare engines off ebay for 2 to 4k. But you're in Europe so that'll be 80k for the car and 30k for the engines, luckily without tip.
>>29144718small cars are disliked because the interior space is tiny compared to in the past due to safety regulations forcing everything to have 1 foot solid steel between their safe space and the real world.
>>29145717Giulia QV. Cheap (for now), rare, practical, fun, looks good, RWD, double wishbones. It checks all the boxes for a classic, but it'll take probably 2 decades and by then gasoline might be outlawed. A110 would definitely be a classic if it had a manual gearbox, but it's basically a mid-engined Miata that only comes in automatic, and Toyota is going to release a manual mr2 soon that will probably be close enough in performance but include a MT. They're also extremely expensive for what you get. >>29145794Nobody voted or asked for this stuff, it's literal satanists trying to destroy everything good and beautiful in the world.
>>29146979wait, it's $4k for a QV engine in America? wtf.
>>29147004The people in the US who actually know shit about cars are buying American cars, not foreign ones. The Giulia QV is in a niche spot because it doesn't offer any substantial performance advantage over cars you can already get here that are familiar and easy to work on. most of the people it appeals to don't work on cars or really care about them beyond treating them like a fashion accessory from Europe. That leaves an extremely small enthusiast market for used engines, whether they're pulled from wrecks or sitting in warehouses.It's like Maserati in the US, except Alfa at least has cheap Mopar parts availability and thousands of base models sharing components. The maseratti is way worse for diy parts cost, but they still have a dealer network for wrenchlets while Alfa has almost none these days. It's basically a car for people who work on their own shit, exceptthose people in the US don't have a reason to pick one up themselves over actual mopar. I hear in the EU even old clapped out QV's are close to MSRP. In the US you can get them in the 30k range or near immaculate if you push up to 40k for the DI only models. Theres also opinions and content from the likes of doug and his estrogenic sissy stooges who don't know shit about cars, keeping prices low. Don't know why I keep watching their youtube shorts, just the ultimate shit tier opinions about everything and you can tell they've never done more than sit in traffic and look at the car.
>>29144706Be glad you still have easily available parts. The part of owning older cars I absolutely hate is hunting for parts, especially when you have to deal with subhumans who are on the verge of being legally retarded but they're the only ones who have the parts and unfortunately they know it and they act like it.
>>29145794>it was you Marxist faggots who wrote these retarded Big Brother laws and put a limit to the Free Market to begin withWrong. Corporations lobbied for those laws to solidify their grip on the market and squeezing out competitors.Why the fuck do you think car companies would deliberately make products that make them less money by needing less maintenance or need to switch to the next enviromentally friendly model?
>>29147812I felt like that mimog when I had my mopar. While rockauto kept costs down, having to wait on shit was a regular occurrence every few weeks. But between that, it was goddamn fun to drive.I now got an aussie car and I know aussie cars should therefore have readily available parts, but i also thought our market would just be too small for anything to still be available after 35 or so odd years. Pleasantly surprised to find I can still get some things like A pillar trims brand spanking new today. And people selling second hand parts are - for the most part - reasonable about pricing.
>>29148163>Why the fuck do you think car companies would deliberately make products that make them less money by needing less maintenance or need to switch to the next enviromentally friendly model?You are stating this as if it costs them nothing to make cars that last longer. Its also not linear, and they have to cope with an ever increasing pile of regulations that make it all the more difficult. They have to make the best possible car they can within a price range that the consumer will buy, competes with other cars in the segment, and turns a profit for the company to continue paying its employees and shareholders. Could they make a car that lasts a million miles? Sure, but they already make those now if you're willing to do the maintenance on those wear items. Just think of like a chevy malibu made today. There is nothing there that would stop it from getting to a million miles. But are you replacing the subframe bushings, engine mounts, wheel bearings and harness when it gets old? How much do you think it would cost to make those parts out of a material that lasts a million miles? What about rust? Are you embalming your car with fluid film or do you expect the manufacturer to significantly increase the cost of the vehicle so you don't have to do that? Door seals, plastics? how much do you think costs to make a chevy malibu with materials that are super UV resistant, can withstand the stress, strain and heat expansion cycles and salt weather, then making those at scale for a price anyone would buy, as opposed to just making one that lasts a good 15 years and when someone needs a replacement they just get the new one with updated tech and safety features? Maybe just admit you have no idea what the fuck you're talking about, you don't know shit about cars, you've never worked on cars, you've never sniffed at the thought of what it takes to design a car and haven't even thought of LCM for any product let alone car?Just put the fries in the bag.
>>29148459
>>29148235I am that Mimog because I own a second gen Probe and third gen Firebird in Europe. Mechanical parts are okayish but good luck finding anything for the Probe made out of rubber and the weatherstripping on those cars is notorious for disintegrating itself, even when well maintained. I just learned to live with it but it really assaults your eyes when coming closer to the car.
Let's consider the base price of a new 1997 240sx (with the lackluster KA24 engine and open diff) was $18.9k....that's over $40k today.You can buy new miatas and 86s that will blow the 240 out of the water for $30k, and the 86 even comes with a torsen lsd standard.Cars weren't cheaper. They did have less bullshit and could last as long as modern cars though, for sure.>>29148163This, it's not free market when companies or billionaires can lobby to set the rules.
>>29148459t. sad driver of a nu-Trailblazer
>>29148589>Ford Probe partsoof, RIP.
>>29148738I already committed to basically saving this car so I can't back out anymore. Paid out the ass to get most of the rust to be dealt with, and it's still not all done, and I still have a few mechanical niggles to deal with but it is what it is.
>>29148743KLZE>KLDE
>>29148764I know but right now I just want a working car with as little rust as possible. I also have the turd gen to take care of and it's not making it any easier either.
>>29148780Godspeed lad
