Quote:
Originally Posted by Electronic M
A lot of American cars 1980s and older were big and comfortable like caddies....all but the cheapest buyers tended to expect a big floaty car that they could comfortably take 5 hour drive for a weekend trip in.
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That's another reason why Americans typically like large cars: comfort for hours. In most of Europe, the farthest place you'd want to drive is maybe an hour away. In America, everything is much more spread out. Many people routinely commute to work 1 hour, and an hour back. A weekend trip might be 6 hours or more, often with the family packed into the car. Being trapped in a little shitbox for 6 hours is no fun.
Love the crash test video. It's important to remember that old cars like that Cadillac are not very good by today's crash test standards, but that little Datsun it was up against was far, far worse by today's standards. It probably weighed about half the Caddy. Those little old cars that everyone praises for their fuel economy were deathtraps. There's a good reason that the smallest modern Honda still weighs about 4000lbs.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Telecolor 3007
I think the import cars had also one other advantage: the adrees the public who wanted a small cheaper cars. Big powerful cars are good, but living in New York City, Boston or California will get you in nasty traffic; plus some people didn't had money for bigger cars. And American manufacturers quited for a time making small cars.
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Yes, definitely. There will always be people that prefer a small car. Probably in 1970's America, that was an underserved market.