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The disappearance of the large, American made, rear wheel drive, V8 powered car (which got 24 MPG in the highway) is the result of group think in The Management

The disappearance of the large, American made, rear wheel drive, V8 powered car (which got 24 MPG in the highway) is the result of group think in The Management Class. A few left-wingers mocked the cars, so GM and Ford killed off profitable national security assets to avoid being made fun of.

RecycledEle 3y ago
I should explain how I know this. My dad was an officer in United Auto Workers Local 276 (Arlington, TX General Motors assembly plant) in the 1990's, when GM killed off the Caprice and Impala that were assembled in Arlington, TX.
- azemetre 3y ago
  How do you know they didn’t kill it off to hurt the union and relocate to areas with weaker worker protections? Seems more likely than the alternative.
  - local_crmdgeon 3y ago
    Weaker union protections than Texas? Think you’re just applying a narrative
    - cjrp 3y ago
      Mexico, China, Thailand, Vietnam...
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
    - azemetre 3y ago
      The poster I'm responding to literally said their Father was an officer in the autoworkers union in Texas...
  - linksnapzz 3y ago
    They didn't. Arlington assembly was converted to the SWB GMT-400 trucks in '96, followed by other fullsize. The plant tooling was already setup for RWD body-on-frame production, so the workers there could just...build those. Had GM not shut down Ypsilanti in '90? ...91? (the old bomber plant), they might've been able to continue producing large sedans there, in addition to trucks in TX.
- skywhopper 3y ago
  And the execs of GM explained to your dad that they were embarrassed by a few left-wingers?
  - RecycledEle 3y ago
    Everyone knew the leadership at GM was clueless. Nothing handed down to the assembly line made sense. They would jerk to a new course whenever an article in the Wall Street Journal made fun of them.
jemfinch 3y ago
Why do you call it a "national security asset"?
- RecycledEle 3y ago
  Law enforcement and many other parts of the government loved their large, American-made, rear-wheel drive, V8-powered cars.
sonicanatidae 3y ago
You should see what the right-wingers are up to, these days.
- Whoppertime 3y ago
  Making Japanese Sedans still?
  - sonicanatidae 3y ago
    Russian sedans for Jesus.
dashundchen 3y ago
Huh? Seems like a unfounded assertion that there was some prevelant left-wing mockery of American sedans at all, especially one that American auto executives would have responded. These companies care about one thing, what sells and makes them money. What's more likely is these were cars were boats built on ancient body-on-frame platforms into 1990's, which were killed in sales by Japanese sedans perceived as more efficient reliable (Honda Civic, Accord or Toyota Camry/Corolla). Not to mention the body-on-frame sedans were not up to increasingly stringent crash tests, which required crumple zones. The B-Body platform Impala you refer to is a variant of a platform that was introduced in the 1920s! Look at how much US market share GM bled in the 80s going into the 90s. The products were not competitive. The big three American manufacturers were viewed as unable to compete in the sedan space which is why they pivoted to the truck and SUV market, which continues through today (not coincidentally trucks and SUV benefit from CAFE standard loopholes along with the protectionist chicken tax, a 25% import tax on light trucks [0]) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax
- linksnapzz 3y ago
  >These companies care about one thing, what sells and makes them money. These companies are also run by humans, and are so in many ways prisoners to fashion as we all are to an extent, and are vulnerable to public obloquy, even from a public that's... dumb. >What's more likely is these were cars were boats built on ancient body-on-frame >platforms into 1990's, The ancient platforms you are talking about, were designed in the late 1970s. >which were killed in sales by Japanese sedans perceived as more efficient >reliable (Honda Civic, Accord or Toyota Camry/Corolla). Discussions of reliability aside, nobody in their wildest fever-dreams were cross-shopping a Buick Roadmaster and a Civic. >Not to mention the body-on-frame sedans were not up to increasingly stringent >crash tests, which required crumple zones. There is no real obstacle in making a body on frame sedan with crumple zones. Modern body-on-frame trucks have them. >The B-Body platform Impala you refer to is a variant of a platform that was >introduced in the 1920s! You're reading something, probably Wikipedia, and drawing incorrect conclusions.
mint2 3y ago
No offense but blaming the left for ford killing off a sedan sounds like a story viewed through deep red Texas glasses where anything bad is reflexively the lefts fault.
- joezydeco 3y ago
  Funny enough, Ford killed ALL of their sedans^ to focus on Texas-sized pickup trucks. ^(except for Mustang and Focus)
LeafItAlone 3y ago
That doesn’t seem to be supported by any evidence I can find online (other than your “that’s what my dad told me”). Rather, it seems that the old design no longer satisfied modern standards and was retired in favor of newer models that did. As one example: “For the 2012 model year, all Crown Victorias were produced for export; as the vehicle was not produced with stability control, it was no longer legal for sale in the United States or Canada.”
- linksnapzz 3y ago
  If Cadillac Fleetwoods had the same net $$$ per unit as Escalades, GM would be building them today. That said, it would've been possible to update those vehicles, like any other. When you're an institutional (gov't) buyer in the US, you are often obliged by your funding source to choose a domestic supplier of equipment. GM and Ford had the market split between them, so they knew their LEO customers would have to buy whatever they had to sell. Hence, police Explorers. Police Tahoes. Police F-150s.
  - RecycledEle 3y ago
    > If Cadillac Fleetwoods had the same net $$$ per unit as Escalades, GM would be building them today. I disagree. The Management Class at GM killed off the last great American-made, V8-powered, rear-wheel drive cars to appease journalists and environmentalists. After that happened, I hated environmentalists for several decades. I still despise The Management Class.
sneed_chucker 3y ago
Lol. The Crown Vic and American sedans in general were killed because fossil fuel industry loving Republicans allow a loophole to exist whereby automakers can totally avoid fuel efficiency taxes buy making their vehicles big and heavy enough to get categorized as "light trucks". That's why trucks and SUVs have taken over the road.
- linksnapzz 3y ago
  No, that's what we call "post hoc ergo propter hoc". Styles change, and my Grandparents loved their Fleetwoods and Town Cars and Chrysler Newports. My Dad wouldn't be caught dead in one. So, the market (outside institutional buyers) disappeared far faster than CAFE standards rose. The Chrysler LX-cars are the closest thing to those big old cars, and despite being a (very heavy) unibody, Chrysler sold millions of them profitably for the past 19 years.
dangus 3y ago
No need for the dumb conspiracy theories, the cars became obsolete. Combined MPG of 19. 224 horsepower out of a V8. The 3-cylinder turbo Nissan rogue is only short 20HP of that number. Huge size and weight for a relatively cramped interior. A Crown Victoria is about the same weight as a Kia Telluride 3-row SUV and it is about a foot longer, despite having less interior/cargo space. The Telluride has a naturally aspirated V6 that gets 291 HP with fuel economy at 22mpg combined in a box on wheels SUV. You can easily find 4 cylinder turbo vehicles that vastly exceed the power output of the Crown Vic’s V8. So a modern 3-row family SUV is shorter (easier to park), carries more passengers and cargo (40% larger interior volume), gets better MPG, has 70 more hp, gets 20% better fuel economy. In what universe would you buy a Crown Vic?
- linksnapzz 3y ago
  >Combined MPG of 19. 224 horsepower out of a V8. The 3-cylinder turbo Nissan rogue is only short 20HP of that number. No plausible buyer of a large traditional American sedan is concerned about engine specific output. They want plenty of torque at low, low RPMs (a properly-implemented diesel would've done well), and an engine that sounds right when revved, with the requisite # of cylinders (8). >Huge size and weight for a relatively cramped interior. A Crown Victoria is >about the same weight as a Kia Telluride 3-row SUV and it is about a foot >longer, despite having less interior/cargo space. Kia's online builder does not show where one selects the option for either a split bench front seat, or a shift lever on the steering column. All of that space...to waste on a center console. >The Telluride has a naturally aspirated V6 that gets 291 HP with fuel economy >at 22mpg combined in a box on wheels SUV. You can easily find 4 cylinder turbo >vehicles that vastly exceed the power output of the Crown Vic’s V8. Once again, stratospherically irrelevant to anyone in the market for this type of vehicle. The Ford Modular V8 series requires regular unleaded, has parts available ...everywhere...; and is with routine (and cheap) maintenance capable of going 400K without having so much as the cam-covers regasketed. Kia's recent Theta-II series GDI turbo 4s don't leave me quite so confident in their long-term reliability, especially if you're always wringing all possible output out of them. >In what universe would you buy a Crown Vic? The universe where in the early 1990s, my grandparents and their friends existed, had the opportunity to buy more sophisticated (complicated) foreign vehicles, and did not.

RecycledEle 3y ago

I should explain how I know this. My dad was an officer in United Auto Workers Local 276 (Arlington, TX General Motors assembly plant) in the 1990's, when GM killed off the Caprice and Impala that were assembled in Arlington, TX.

azemetre 3y ago
How do you know they didn’t kill it off to hurt the union and relocate to areas with weaker worker protections? Seems more likely than the alternative.
- local_crmdgeon 3y ago
  Weaker union protections than Texas? Think you’re just applying a narrative
  - cjrp 3y ago
    Mexico, China, Thailand, Vietnam...
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - azemetre 3y ago
    The poster I'm responding to literally said their Father was an officer in the autoworkers union in Texas...
- linksnapzz 3y ago
  They didn't. Arlington assembly was converted to the SWB GMT-400 trucks in '96, followed by other fullsize. The plant tooling was already setup for RWD body-on-frame production, so the workers there could just...build those. Had GM not shut down Ypsilanti in '90? ...91? (the old bomber plant), they might've been able to continue producing large sedans there, in addition to trucks in TX.
skywhopper 3y ago
And the execs of GM explained to your dad that they were embarrassed by a few left-wingers?
- RecycledEle 3y ago
  Everyone knew the leadership at GM was clueless. Nothing handed down to the assembly line made sense. They would jerk to a new course whenever an article in the Wall Street Journal made fun of them.

jemfinch 3y ago

Why do you call it a "national security asset"?

RecycledEle 3y ago
Law enforcement and many other parts of the government loved their large, American-made, rear-wheel drive, V8-powered cars.

sonicanatidae 3y ago

You should see what the right-wingers are up to, these days.

Whoppertime 3y ago
Making Japanese Sedans still?
- sonicanatidae 3y ago
  Russian sedans for Jesus.

dashundchen 3y ago

Huh? Seems like a unfounded assertion that there was some prevelant left-wing mockery of American sedans at all, especially one that American auto executives would have responded. These companies care about one thing, what sells and makes them money. What's more likely is these were cars were boats built on ancient body-on-frame platforms into 1990's, which were killed in sales by Japanese sedans perceived as more efficient reliable (Honda Civic, Accord or Toyota Camry/Corolla). Not to mention the body-on-frame sedans were not up to increasingly stringent crash tests, which required crumple zones. The B-Body platform Impala you refer to is a variant of a platform that was introduced in the 1920s! Look at how much US market share GM bled in the 80s going into the 90s. The products were not competitive. The big three American manufacturers were viewed as unable to compete in the sedan space which is why they pivoted to the truck and SUV market, which continues through today (not coincidentally trucks and SUV benefit from CAFE standard loopholes along with the protectionist chicken tax, a 25% import tax on light trucks [0]) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax

linksnapzz 3y ago
>These companies care about one thing, what sells and makes them money. These companies are also run by humans, and are so in many ways prisoners to fashion as we all are to an extent, and are vulnerable to public obloquy, even from a public that's... dumb. >What's more likely is these were cars were boats built on ancient body-on-frame >platforms into 1990's, The ancient platforms you are talking about, were designed in the late 1970s. >which were killed in sales by Japanese sedans perceived as more efficient >reliable (Honda Civic, Accord or Toyota Camry/Corolla). Discussions of reliability aside, nobody in their wildest fever-dreams were cross-shopping a Buick Roadmaster and a Civic. >Not to mention the body-on-frame sedans were not up to increasingly stringent >crash tests, which required crumple zones. There is no real obstacle in making a body on frame sedan with crumple zones. Modern body-on-frame trucks have them. >The B-Body platform Impala you refer to is a variant of a platform that was >introduced in the 1920s! You're reading something, probably Wikipedia, and drawing incorrect conclusions.

mint2 3y ago

No offense but blaming the left for ford killing off a sedan sounds like a story viewed through deep red Texas glasses where anything bad is reflexively the lefts fault.

joezydeco 3y ago
Funny enough, Ford killed ALL of their sedans^ to focus on Texas-sized pickup trucks. ^(except for Mustang and Focus)

LeafItAlone 3y ago

That doesn’t seem to be supported by any evidence I can find online (other than your “that’s what my dad told me”). Rather, it seems that the old design no longer satisfied modern standards and was retired in favor of newer models that did. As one example: “For the 2012 model year, all Crown Victorias were produced for export; as the vehicle was not produced with stability control, it was no longer legal for sale in the United States or Canada.”

linksnapzz 3y ago
If Cadillac Fleetwoods had the same net $$$ per unit as Escalades, GM would be building them today. That said, it would've been possible to update those vehicles, like any other. When you're an institutional (gov't) buyer in the US, you are often obliged by your funding source to choose a domestic supplier of equipment. GM and Ford had the market split between them, so they knew their LEO customers would have to buy whatever they had to sell. Hence, police Explorers. Police Tahoes. Police F-150s.
- RecycledEle 3y ago
  > If Cadillac Fleetwoods had the same net $$$ per unit as Escalades, GM would be building them today. I disagree. The Management Class at GM killed off the last great American-made, V8-powered, rear-wheel drive cars to appease journalists and environmentalists. After that happened, I hated environmentalists for several decades. I still despise The Management Class.

sneed_chucker 3y ago

Lol. The Crown Vic and American sedans in general were killed because fossil fuel industry loving Republicans allow a loophole to exist whereby automakers can totally avoid fuel efficiency taxes buy making their vehicles big and heavy enough to get categorized as "light trucks". That's why trucks and SUVs have taken over the road.

linksnapzz 3y ago
No, that's what we call "post hoc ergo propter hoc". Styles change, and my Grandparents loved their Fleetwoods and Town Cars and Chrysler Newports. My Dad wouldn't be caught dead in one. So, the market (outside institutional buyers) disappeared far faster than CAFE standards rose. The Chrysler LX-cars are the closest thing to those big old cars, and despite being a (very heavy) unibody, Chrysler sold millions of them profitably for the past 19 years.

dangus 3y ago

No need for the dumb conspiracy theories, the cars became obsolete. Combined MPG of 19. 224 horsepower out of a V8. The 3-cylinder turbo Nissan rogue is only short 20HP of that number. Huge size and weight for a relatively cramped interior. A Crown Victoria is about the same weight as a Kia Telluride 3-row SUV and it is about a foot longer, despite having less interior/cargo space. The Telluride has a naturally aspirated V6 that gets 291 HP with fuel economy at 22mpg combined in a box on wheels SUV. You can easily find 4 cylinder turbo vehicles that vastly exceed the power output of the Crown Vic’s V8. So a modern 3-row family SUV is shorter (easier to park), carries more passengers and cargo (40% larger interior volume), gets better MPG, has 70 more hp, gets 20% better fuel economy. In what universe would you buy a Crown Vic?

linksnapzz 3y ago
>Combined MPG of 19. 224 horsepower out of a V8. The 3-cylinder turbo Nissan rogue is only short 20HP of that number. No plausible buyer of a large traditional American sedan is concerned about engine specific output. They want plenty of torque at low, low RPMs (a properly-implemented diesel would've done well), and an engine that sounds right when revved, with the requisite # of cylinders (8). >Huge size and weight for a relatively cramped interior. A Crown Victoria is >about the same weight as a Kia Telluride 3-row SUV and it is about a foot >longer, despite having less interior/cargo space. Kia's online builder does not show where one selects the option for either a split bench front seat, or a shift lever on the steering column. All of that space...to waste on a center console. >The Telluride has a naturally aspirated V6 that gets 291 HP with fuel economy >at 22mpg combined in a box on wheels SUV. You can easily find 4 cylinder turbo >vehicles that vastly exceed the power output of the Crown Vic’s V8. Once again, stratospherically irrelevant to anyone in the market for this type of vehicle. The Ford Modular V8 series requires regular unleaded, has parts available ...everywhere...; and is with routine (and cheap) maintenance capable of going 400K without having so much as the cam-covers regasketed. Kia's recent Theta-II series GDI turbo 4s don't leave me quite so confident in their long-term reliability, especially if you're always wringing all possible output out of them. >In what universe would you buy a Crown Vic? The universe where in the early 1990s, my grandparents and their friends existed, had the opportunity to buy more sophisticated (complicated) foreign vehicles, and did not.