Consider buying American!

Your unions demand this? The UK ones don't. It makes no sense. Skills
have always been recognised by unions and appropriate remuneration sought
for them. Of course if you actually mean the same *conditions of service*
for all employees, that's a different matter.

It's also a problem with management if they give in to silly demands. Not
that I'm saying having standby staff is silly - I don't know the full
facts. And neither, I suspect, do you.

If a weak management give in to silly demands from unions they'll give in
to silly demands from shareholders, etc, too. The job of management is
actually to manage things efficiently - and if they can't or won't any
company is doomed. Unionised or not.

 

Did many Italian cars use Lucas parts? Not the few I've seen.
And I've owned and worked on many cars with Lucas electrics. Of course
some had problems - but then what electrics system is perfect? Certainly
not one Vauxhall I owned with mainly Delco stuff - I've never seen such
badly designed distributors ever.

Nice gag - but when I ask for examples I don't get any firm ones. Or at
least not from anyone who knows their electrics. Plenty of stories about
what their 'mechanic' said, though.

 

Ever worked on a transaxle? Even worse, ever paid someone else to do it?
--scott

 

Having worked on RR products, I can say that the Lucas electrics in them
were not "fine" by any means. A lot better than what was in the MGB, mind
you, but not fine.

I'm not sure who thought it was a good idea to have a high current headlight
switch and dispense with the relay, but the idea cropped up in a lot of
British vehicles.
--scott

 

it's not unions, it's management. as stated by others, germany is
extensively unionized, but highly productive, and mostly competitive.
and the reason is automation. robots are used extensively in production
there. lower production costs, better product, ability to pay higher
union-negotiated wages to employees.

that's exactly what we should do here - go to automation. it keeps
production capacity domestic, keeps revenues domestic, improves quality,
and most importantly of all, means we don't export our technology to the
chinese and pay for them to build, tool and staff factories that could
just as easily build tanks as well as cars.

one more time: robots and automation - keep production domestic.

 

"Robert A. Cunningham" ...

Orange you glad you know this?

 

seems you're not very familiar with the situation yourself - there's no
complexity difference between the two. and as stated by others, there
are many advantages to fwd for normal driving - that's why so many
vehicles use it.

 

The Honda Type 2 coolant uses a very different anti-corrosion package
than the conventional green coolants that use silicates. It also uses
a different package than GM's DEX-COOL although it's similar.

In fact, I think it gives better protection than the green stuff in
every engine, and the added cost is made up for the fact that you don't
have to change it annually like you do with the green stuff. The Honda
stuff is also superior to DEX-COOL and won't make brown slime the way
DEX-COOL will.

If you don't like paying the Honda prices, Prestone makes an equivalent for
the Honda coolant that costs less. To be honest, though, the Honda coolant
is good stuff and I know a number of people buying it to use in BMWs. But
the Prestone equivalent is only a little more expensive than the green stuff
and ought to be fine.
--scott

 

Yes, I think it is very appeeling, and we're not talking pulp fiction here
either.

 

I just bought a gallon of Toyota coolant (the premixed stuff) and it was
around $ 22. That is for a 50/50 mix that is ready to put in the car. That
makes it around the $ 40 to $ 50 price range per gallon. That was at the
local Ford/Toyota dealer. I don't mind the price so much as the feeling I
was getting ripped off.

The only brand I have bought for the last 15 years has been Toyota. That is
4 cars and one truck.

Standard joke is that the American parts are so cheep is because they are
always rebuilding them so there are plenty of replacement parts , where the
Toyotas don't break down and there are almost no recycled parts to put on
them..

 

And even worse is when they 'fire' the CEO for poor performance and give him
about $ 20 million to go or like Home Depot, $ 120 million.

 

Your unions demand this?[/QUOTE]

Yup.

Only now is this being addressed by GM, and only because the release of
this information was inevitable given their financial plight.

Only now is the union willing to negotiate that the broom-pushers are
lower paid than the guys bolting the cars together.

 

The main reason companies build FWD cars is simplicity of final
assembly. The whole drive train comes in on a pallet and can be
installed in minutes. They also tend to be a commodity item so you can
have Buicks, Chevy's and Cadilacs all using the same basic units.
Swapping for another engine trans combo involves minimal changes to
the rest of the car.

BTW anyone on a slippery road is using torque steer. Unfortunately in
a FWD, once you lose one factor, you lose them all. Your life is
hanging on the traction of 2 tires, not 4.

It is a similar argument to the reliability question. Hondas may run
longer before they need maintenance but when they do you are not
fixing them on the side of the road. They don't "fail safe". In the
case of the timing belt, there is one skinny piece of rubber between
running and total destruction of your engine. That was not true in the
American OHC motors I have owned.

 

Actually not. There are a multitude of taxes and tariffs and penalty fees on
America cars and the parts within American cars sold in Japan that make them
completely unsaleable price-wise in the Japanese market. That is why a law
was recently passed in Japan to exempt from those tariffs and fees vehicles
of a Japanese manufacturer that are being shipped form the U.S. back to
Japan. If the playing field was level, why pass such a law?

 

Wake up, dude, Japan, along with every other first world country with
the exception of the US, has universal health coverage and retirement
benefits, so Japanese companies, et al., have no direct health care
and/or retirement costs. Makes for quite a competitive advantage,
doesn't it?

 

His mind's made up, don't confuse him with facts.

 

Newer Hondas use a timing chain in the 4 cylinder engines. All current
Nissan engines use timing chains (and have for nearly a decade). I don't
think you can easily fix anything on the side of the road anymore, American,
Japanese or European. The complexity is the same no matter what the country
of origin.

 

LOL- I'd forgotten all about Monica. What's she up to these days, anyway?

Do you think she's hoping Hillary is elected?

 

The most recalled passenger car of 2007? The Nissan Altima (6 recalls). The
most recalled passenger car of 2006? The Honda Civic (4 recalls). I remember
several years back when Chevy had to recall a quarter million trucks to fix
a cruise control switch and it made the front page of nearly every paper,
including the Money section of the USA Today. In that EXACT edition of USA
Today Money Section, on page 6, was an article about Toyota having to recall
and extend the powertrain warranties on 3.2 million cars (mostly Camry and
Corolla) due to engine sludge issues. The highest percentage of vehicles
recalled over the past 5 years is not Ford or Chevy, it's Toyota. And that
is why the Chairman of Toyota had to issue a public apology in the Japanese
press

 

Wrong again.