What Are The Most Blatant Copy/Paste Jobs In Automotive History?

"Andrew T. Maness" (theroadlessdriven) 04/15/2015 at 13:30 • Filed to: Honda, HR-V, Crossovers, Design, Big Questions

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This is the gauge cluster of the yet to be released 2016 Honda HR-V and yet the gauge styling looks quite familiar does it not?

Oh right, Volkswagen has been doing their gauges that way for years now.

I know Honda isn't the only guilty party, just about every automaker borrows from another but when I sat down in the mess that is the HR-V, I just started chuckling. It's just so damn lazy, I want Honda to be better than this. Heck I want all the major brands to be better than this but they're not. In the crossover segment originality is dead, in fact I'm not sure if it ever had a pulse.

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If it wasn't for the fit and finish of the buttons would you be able to tell the Honda dash from the Audi dash?

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From the get go everyone just wanted to be like the brand that started it all, those crazy quirky folks from Fuji Heavy Industries. The thing is that their oddball way of doing things came from an honest place, they filled a gap in the market and then all the Japanese giants scrambled to get a piece of the pie. Funny that over the years Subaru has become more like Honda/Toyota/Nissan as those brands have tried (and failed) to be more like Subaru.

I point this out because Subaru has rarely hit the copy paste button when it comes to their design language. Yes, I know that since 2008 all their vehicles have looked a whole heck of a lot like everything else on the market but overall I think they've done a good job of sprinkling in things that keep their cars distinctly Subaru. This on the other hand, I think this is just a mish-mash of almost every bad trend in current automotive design.

The longer I stare at the profile, the more I see an unholy cross between a GLA and a Discovery Sport. Scroll down to look at the front, oh hey there 2016 Nissan Maxima fascia, what are you doing here? Finally look at the rear and you'll see taillights pulled from a Forester slapped on a lightly tweaked GLA rump.

It's hard to be original these days but somehow there are automakers that manage to pull it off.

How you ask?

The key to doing so is to not blatantly copy other designs and paste them together. Just take little elements of a great design and tastefully incorporate them into your existing design, you know like Ford did with the Aston Martin grille.

I think the overall design of the HR-V is pretty damn lazy but there are certainly more egregious examples of the copy/paste design route out there. What do you think they are?

-Andrew

Contact theroadlessdriven@gmail.com

rofl orloaf > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:33

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Obligatory

rofl orloaf > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:35

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Other than colors, I see no similarities between this and the Honda cluster.

Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:37

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Really? You call that similar? Maybe they used a similar number font, that's about it. I've seen far more egregious style copying than that. The first one that comes to my mind is Toyota essentially taking the EG Civic taillights and putting them on a Sienna

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:39

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SidewaysOnDirt still misses Bowie > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:39

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Textured Soy Protein > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:40

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Sorry, that's bullshit. If Honda is copying anyone's style of gauge cluster with the HR-V it's their own.

Fit

Odyssey

CR-V

Accord

Crosstour

jariten1781 > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:40

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Lit up like a Christmas tree. Has to be copying VW.

Sidenote: I don't think they look alike at all. The font is somewhat similar, but taller and that's it.

rofl orloaf > Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! 04/15/2015 at 13:40

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Suzuki tried harder.

SLR999 > rofl orloaf 04/15/2015 at 13:41

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I spent 30 seconds looking at it, now I'm just confused.

spanfucker retire bitch > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:42

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Uhhh, what?

Where are the similarities in the gauge cluster again? You want to point those out to all of us?

SlickMcRick > Textured Soy Protein 04/15/2015 at 13:43

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I'm glad someone said it before me. The OP is clearly reaching a bit. I tried hard to see the similarities between the two. The only similarities they have is that the gauges are both circular.

Milky > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:47

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Audi A8

Chrysler 300

rofl orloaf > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:49

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Also, the only thing Honda is "copying" with the HR-V is Acura. This line, for example, is reminiscent of the buttresses on the new NSX. The rear is all RDX. The front is all Honda.

Alex B > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:50

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I'm sorry, but they really don't look similar.

Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! > rofl orloaf 04/15/2015 at 13:53

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Yeah, they used the JDM (Yo!) tails. lol

Andrew T. Maness > jariten1781 04/15/2015 at 13:56

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Haha, I didn't even think of that!

It's the overall atheistic I'm talking about, not the arrangement.

Textured Soy Protein > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 13:59

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As for your other comparisons...

Side profile like a combination of Mercedes GLA and Land Rover Discovery Sport?

Nope. Maybe a slight bit of the overall GLA shape but not really, and I see absolutely nothing from the Disco.

Mercedes GLA rear with Subaru Forester taillamps?

Sure, the general proportions are kinda like a GLA, but how many ways can you possibly style the tailgate of similarly-sized compact crossovers? Those taillamps don't even look remotely similar to the Forester.

All I see in the taillights is the same shape as the Acura RDX.

Nissan Maxima fascia? You might have something there...

Except this is also Honda's new corporate face they started with the '15 Fit and are going to put on the rest of their lineup, starting with the next Civic.

Overall...seems like most of this stuff is just nonsense.

Andrew T. Maness > spanfucker retire bitch 04/15/2015 at 13:59

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The design language, not the arrangement of the gauges themselves.

The font, the needles, the overall atheistic.

Struck me as VW style from the moment I got in the car. Maybe the similarity doesn't translate through pictures.

spanfucker retire bitch > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 14:01

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I still don't see any similarity in design language. Maybe the fonts are similar? I can't tell. But anything else you're seeing no one else is.

It's a phantom aberration in your eye balls.

Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! > Textured Soy Protein 04/15/2015 at 14:03

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Well, they certainly aren't copying the Civic. lol

Andrew T. Maness > Textured Soy Protein 04/15/2015 at 14:09

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Front quarter panel, the wheel arch, the rake of the hood, that's all I'm talking about.

As for the Forester taillights I may have been stretching a bit there but I occurs to me there is a much better example.

jjhats > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 14:10

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I don't see what point youre going for on those gauges and I spent 3 minutes staring. is it the font? that's a very flimsy excuse for plagiarizing

Andrew T. Maness > spanfucker retire bitch 04/15/2015 at 14:11

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Damn my eyes!

Andrew T. Maness > SlickMcRick 04/15/2015 at 14:12

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I may have been reaching but I hold out hope that when the HR-V launches and people get in it, my views will be justified.

Textured Soy Protein > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 14:16

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The only thing in common with the Disco is the black plastic cladding around the wheel arch, and there are any number of crossover-y type vehicles that have this type of cladding.

The rest of the quarter panel and hood are completely different. The HR-V is much more sculpted where the Disco is nearly flat with a subtle radius out to the wheel arch.

The taillights are still much more Acura (with an added contrasting color on the turn signals) than Subaru.

Rico > Stapleface-Now Hyphenated! 04/15/2015 at 14:30

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Smh that gauge belongs on an arcade machine.

NoneOfYourBiz > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 14:49

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Ford and Mazdas platform sharing has led to some nearly identical design elements.

Mazda MX-3:

Mercury Sable:

I think there were versions even more similar than that; I recall a pair of these parked next to each other some years ago having me rubbing my eyes thinking I was seeing double.

VonBelmont > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 15:04

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Sedans don't have proper ass-ends anymore, just pseudo-SUV vestigial lumps that are a pain to open. I can see a case for it on compacts, but midsize and up it looks stupid.

What was wrong with a defined trunk?

The Powershift in Steve's '12 Ford Focus killed it's TCM (under warranty!) > Milky 04/15/2015 at 15:08

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You do realize that they use more or less the same transmission and likely went to the same supplier for shifter, right?

Milky > The Powershift in Steve's '12 Ford Focus killed it's TCM (under warranty!) 04/15/2015 at 19:32

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Lots of companies use the ZF 8-spd, none of the other shifters are this similar (well except for the new Chrysler/Dodge spin selector thing, like the Jags).

ranwhenparked > Andrew T. Maness 04/15/2015 at 22:21

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The Chery QQ/Daewoo Matiz is the most notorious, but there was also the ZIS 110/Packard Super Eight.

The Powershift in Steve's '12 Ford Focus killed it's TCM (under warranty!) > Milky 04/16/2015 at 08:06

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Just because other companies didn't buy the same shifter design, doesn't mean that Chysler couldn't have. Using an 'off the shelf' shifter design is cheaper than designing from scratch, and if anyone noticed the similarity then Chrysler wins by being associated with Audi. Are you suggesting that Chrysler nearly exactly copied Audi's shifter design just to put it on the same transmission Audi uses?

Milky > The Powershift in Steve's '12 Ford Focus killed it's TCM (under warranty!) 04/16/2015 at 09:22

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I'm sorry, I just can't remember the last time a designer did an interior and said "ah just get the shifter from the transmission company."

Now if you want to say maybe the interior parts supplier proposed the same design to both companies, I'll start to listen. But not the transmission company. Also since Chrysler now uses the spin selector that Jag designed first, doesnt it seem likely?

The Powershift in Steve's '12 Ford Focus killed it's TCM (under warranty!) > Milky 04/16/2015 at 10:26

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I think this might be one of the cases where the designers used what they had available:

Engineer: 'Hey guys, we're using this fancy new transmission from Germany. Good news - it's awesome. Bad new - it's expensive.'

Project manager: 'Ok, we need to hit our cost targets. We don't have money to blow on peripheral items like a shifter. Can we use an off the shelf solution?'

Engineer: 'Yes, as long as you don't mind it looking like an Audi.'

Project manager: 'I'mokwiththis.jpg'

Designer: 'What am I supposed to do with this? It doesn't look like anything else we have.'

Project manager: 'Put some piano black plastic on it and hope no one notices the similarity.'

The rotary shifter might be a case of parts bin engineering from ZF as well (since the 8 and 9 speed used in FWD and RWD Mopars are ZF designs) - pull the elevation mechanism used by Jag to cut costs, put a new knob on it, and hit the market with it. The control and signaling mechanism that actually talks to the transmission is already developed, so Chrysler gets a distinctive solution for relatively low cost.

Milky > The Powershift in Steve's '12 Ford Focus killed it's TCM (under warranty!) 04/16/2015 at 10:53

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That still sounds like a "Copy/Paste Job" to me.

ZacMS > rofl orloaf 04/21/2015 at 22:15

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Whatever it takes to get more Aston grills out there I say!

ZacMS > Milky 04/21/2015 at 22:16

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Jason B > Andrew T. Maness 04/27/2015 at 14:29

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Those “Honda” gauges are from from VW. They are current gen Mazda 6 and CX-5 gauges to be exact.