(UPDATED FROM 5/1/2020) American automakers have always had a penchant for extravagant designs that can look overwrought compared to imports. Of course, this has been changing of late as foreign automakers — particularly the Japanese […]
(EXPANDED 10/24/2022) “Lower, longer, wider” was the domestic automakers’ dominant design approach until they were forced to downsize their fleet in the late-1970s due to federal fuel-economy standards. Since that time automakers have at least […]
(EXPANDED FROM 7/17/2020) One of the hazards of any kind of writing is that you can get too close to your subjects. In anthropology this has been called “going native.” Because we are human, we […]
Curbside Classic commentator Chris Cieslak (2021) noted that American Motors toyed with the idea of hiring John Z. DeLorean after he left General Motors. I haven’t read enough to write intelligently about why a potential […]
(EXPANDED ON 8/25/2022) Collectible Automobile has offered an unusually critical take on the 1978-80 Pontiac Grand Prix. A subhead summed up its case by stating, “There was no getting around the need for cars to […]
“Levine prolifically wined and dined the trade press, but he also took what he considered any disrespect for the brand personally. (And if he didn’t take it personally, he certainly acted as if he did.) […]
(EXPANDED ON 8/19/2022) In the late-1950s George Romney made headlines by arguing that the U.S. auto industry had become an oligopolistic dinosaur. Competition had become so weak — the “Big Three” controlled more than 95 […]
(UPDATED 9/23/2022) The easiest way to sum up the spectacular failure of the DeLorean Motor Company is to say that its founder was exceptionally unlucky. I am hard pressed to think of a worse time […]
“The US auto industry has been perhaps the best example of a sector falling into a rut and doling out progress at the minimum possible rate for at least 30 years. It’s criminal IMO that […]
(UPATED 3/9/2023) A few years ago Lotus Rebel (2021) drew upon our AMC Pacer story to suggest alternative approaches for that car’s design in a comment at Ate Up With Motor. That website’s publisher, Aaron […]
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