There are a lot of opinions about what could or could not be built better in cars. The most interesting trend, obviously, is that people are just buying fewer

There are a lot of opinions about what could or could not be built better in cars. The most interesting trend, obviously, is that people are just buying fewer of them, so it will soon be a moot point. Doing maintenance never has mass-market appeal. The best approach, in my opinion, is actually the opposite of what most mechanics (or MechE/EE people) will say: we should try to achieve as much as possible in software, with the absolute simplest hardware. Consider that an electric car, the fastest growing product in the category, has a considerably simpler engine and drive train. The software rules the roost there. It's just a coil. The engine and batteries are not really maintainable (they're certainly recyclable). There's a lot of knowledge tied up in what you're saying, which is a really interesting point of view. But optimizing ICE vehicles and their attendant maintenance is sort of a dead end. Then again, I'm agreeing with the general idea: CAD is bad. But what should the right response be? Don't buy things that need CAD designs at all!