by "DaftRyosuke - So Long and Thanks for All the Fish!" (daft-ryosuke)
Published 12/27/2017 at 09:04
by "DaftRyosuke - So Long and Thanks for All the Fish!" (daft-ryosuke)
Published 12/27/2017 at 09:04
Tags: The Twingo Countdown
STARS: 5
Four Days until the Renault Twingo is legal for importation to the US.
"Flavien Vidal" (flyingfrenchy)
12/27/2017 at 09:21, STARS: 4
Yeah... no. Grew up with those surrounding me at all time. Can’t stand them. Also, importation into the US is based on the build date, not on the year model. You’D have to figure out when the first car was built and knowing France, it wasn’t built on the first of January... That would be national holiday :)
"Manwich - now Keto-Friendly" (manwich)
12/27/2017 at 09:32, STARS: 3
Why do you hate them... they look SOOO CUTE!!!
LOL...
Yeah yeah... I think I have an idea... they’re initially ‘cute’, but that wears off after you’ve seen it for the millionth time. And from a performance perspective, I’m guessing there’s nothing special about them.
It’s how I feel about Panther cars. Some people think they’re so great... but I’ve driven them and I think they’re shit... especially the older ones from the 1980s.
"DaftRyosuke - So Long and Thanks for All the Fish!" (daft-ryosuke)
12/27/2017 at 10:13, STARS: 1
I’ve explained it a million times. I’ve done the research. There were cars built in January, some as early as 1992.
"DaftRyosuke - So Long and Thanks for All the Fish!" (daft-ryosuke)
12/27/2017 at 10:14, STARS: 1
All Panthers are shit.
"Eric @ opposite-lock.com" (theyrerolling)
12/27/2017 at 10:16, STARS: 0
The Panthers have a special place more because they were the last BOF *cars*. They weren’t as good to drive as the GM B bodies, even though that platform was over 50 years old when it was retired. I always chalked it up to the fact it was originally designed in the Malaise Era and that forever tainted it.
"Jordan and the Slowrunner, Boomer Intensifies" (jordanwphillips)
12/27/2017 at 10:28, STARS: 0
I feel like most have been removed from the road as well, unless Europeans keep cars longer than us.
"Manwich - now Keto-Friendly" (manwich)
12/27/2017 at 11:25, STARS: 0
The last gen B-Body wasn’t really 50 years old when it was retired.
From a chassis/body design perspective, it was practically all-new in 1977 and had a huge weight reduction. And in 1991, it had a very substantial redesign where it got fattened up.
The last B-body had nothing in common with the B-body (except for the ‘B-Body’ designation) from 50 years prior
"Manwich - now Keto-Friendly" (manwich)
12/27/2017 at 11:26, STARS: 0
Yeah, but the later ones were less shit than the earlier ones.
"Manwich - now Keto-Friendly" (manwich)
12/27/2017 at 11:54, STARS: 0
And to expand on what I said in my last reply...
I think the B-body was better than the Panther because GM was still
mostly on its game when it was working on the 1977 B-body redesign. And
the 1991 redesign was a substantial update on what was the good basic
1977 design.
Ford on the other hand was a company
in greater turmoil in the late 1970s... with ‘Hank the Deuce’ still in
charge and well past his best-before date.
And when
the Panther cars were redesigned in the early 1990s, Ford was doing
this “almost good enough” thing with their car design. They would come
out with new designs that were better than the well-aged designs they
replaced... but it’s like Ford was incapable of seeing what competitors
were doing at the time.
For example... the updated
Lincoln Town car... they gave the Lincoln version the same SOHC 2v
engine that the Ford Crown Vic had... no DOHC 32V V8... not even planned
as an option. And this was done even though Cadillac was just coming
out with their Northstar engine that had a substantial HP/Torque
advantage.
And to make matters worse, in 1989, Ford
bought the basketcase that was Jaguar and as a result, resources were
diverted to saving Jaguar’s ass.
By 1997, Jaguar
had the new XJ8 with a DOHC 32V V8 either with 290hp or 370HP in
supercharged form. Meanwhile the much more profitable Lincoln still had a
Town Car with a 2V SOHC engine, with nothing competitive even as an
option. Even the redesigned 1998 Town car still had the crappy old 2V
SOHC V8 that topped out at a very noncompetitive 220HP. Lincoln also had
the “almost good enough” Continental with a new design for 1995 with an
“almost good enough” 260HP 4.6L V8 (compared the GM Northstar that was
in the 275-300hp for years prior).
So in essence, I believe the last B-bodies were better than the Panthers because GM’s management and planning was more on the ball compared to Ford during the design phases.
"jimz" (jimz)
12/27/2017 at 13:37, STARS: 0
ok, bets on how many days after that it’ll take for someone to actually import a Twingo?
"jimz" (jimz)
12/27/2017 at 13:37, STARS: 1
it’s “forbidden fruit” syndrome. People want it solely because they can’t have it.
"jimz" (jimz)
12/27/2017 at 13:39, STARS: 0
the downside is that apart from the Town Car, the later ones were almost never bought by actual people. it’s been 10 years since you could walk into a dealer and buy a Crown Vic (fleet-only after 2007) and I don’t think anyone other than rental companies were buying Grand Marquises for the last 7 years of its existence. Ditto the Town Car.
"DaftRyosuke - So Long and Thanks for All the Fish!" (daft-ryosuke)
12/27/2017 at 14:24, STARS: 0
Realistically? Probably a month.
"Manwich - now Keto-Friendly" (manwich)
12/27/2017 at 15:00, STARS: 0
“the downside is that apart from the Town Car, the later ones were almost never bought by actual people.”
Yup... and that’s tied to being uncompetitive from a performance perspective.
But fleet buyers don’t care about competitive performance. They care more about cheap operating costs. And that’s why the Town Car had the ‘airport limo’ market cornered from the mid 1990s until the Town Car was discontinued.
It wasn’t like that in the 1980s and early 1990s.
But after Ford bought Jaguar, management let the money-losing people at Jaguar have too much say and Lincoln was starved until they became the joke of the luxury segment.