Are ‘American’ cars going extinct?

Fox News ^ | July 04, 2014

[Olog-hai]

Want to buy an American car? Better get one while they last.

Only 10 vehicles qualified this year for the annual American-Made Index from Cars.com, and just three of them are from domestic brands.

The Ford F-150 pickup took the top spot for the second year in a row, while the Chevrolet Corvette Stingray came in seventh and the Detroit-built Dodge SRT Viper rounded out the list in tenth. …

[BwanaNdege]

“My Camry has over 150 thousand miles and only requires basic maintenance of oil, tires, brakes, etc,.”

Our current vehicles:

2004 Honda CR-V - 218,000 miles
1998 Ford E-350 Club Wagon 305,000 miles
1997 Subaru Outback - 242,000 miles

Previous cars:

1990 Mazda 626 - 426,000 miles (totaled in accident, otherwise running fine until the end)
1985 Subaru GL-10 235,000 ( mouse nest in the heater spontaneously combusted and burned the wiring, so we took it “off the road”. It now pulls a DR Road Grader to level the ruts in our 14-18% grade mountain road. The two speed transfer case and 5 speed manual transmission give two great “grannie gears” for pulling the grader up those hills!)

[BwanaNdege]

In your parts operation, could you detect any difference in specification that would make the Mercedes and Cadillac parts better than the Ford and Mitsubishi parts?

Back in 1978 I was going to school working on my Airframe & Powerplant Mechanic rating. During one class our instructor passed around a Cessna alternator, costing, IIRC, $435. Then he passed around the class another "Ford" alternator, asking us to determine the differences.

After 5 minutes of collective head scratching, no one could see ANY difference between the size, shapes, connectors, castings, visible wire sizes and insulation types. The instructor then show us a thumbnail sized "PMA" stamp, indication that it conformed to the FAA "Parts Manufacturer Approval" standards.

They had been manufactured on the same production line, but the Cessna $435 alternator had the FAA paperwork and the Ford $75 alternator did not.

[cripplecreek]

In your parts operation, could you detect any difference in specification that would make the Mercedes and Cadillac parts better than the Ford and Mitsubishi parts?

Over all not really but Mercedes was extraordinarily picky about some odd things but that's typical of German manufacturing. I was one of only 5 people in the shop allowed to paint the underside of 1.5 x 2.5 inch ashtray lids that would never be seen by anyone. They had to be absolutely perfect. An American rep from Merc did give me a decent explanation about why. He said that German workers weren't going to be that picky about them and it was a showpiece part that could be grabbed off a German assembly line at random and be perfect every single time.

Cadillac could be kind of picky in ways that didn't make much sense too. We had a problem with a tiny paint run on the bottom side of a doorskin. The robots just couldn't get it right, the paint was either too light or too heavy. Short of having a person stand there and paint that section by hand. Finally Cadillac came back with an acceptable parameter for the flaw. It was something that didn't interfere with the workings of the door and wouldn't be seen by anyone without laying on the ground and looking up at the bottom of the door.

[yldstrk]

My first brand new car was a Ford sedan whose undistinguished name I cannot recall. It was junk.

My second was a VW Passat Wagon. It too had issues, and the came over on a slow boat from Germany.

Then I had a new Eurovan which was broken for weeks at a time during a time that I had a new baby.

Since I got a Honda Pilot, my life has been automotively perfect. 2004 Honda Pilot 185,000 miles. I am petrified to get a new car because it will be a piece of junk.

[nascarnation]

Yesterday’s Independence Day parade there was a Pearl Harbor Survivor riding in a Honda SUV. Only a few of us old folks caught the irony.

[Hulka]

I will never buy a car from any company that took bail-out money. . .money that was used to cover for union excesses, fraud and abuse.

[sakic]

If Teslas ever fall into my price range, I am there.

Have two friends who own them who both maintain they will never buy anything else as long as Teslas are available.