The Car Tangent, part 10...

The Italian company Fiat took control of Chrysler in 2011 after the German company Daimler had bailed Chrysler out during the great recession. As part of the transfer Fiat would share technology with Chrysler and help develop new platforms for future releases. Chrysler would help distribute Fiat cars through their dealership network as an additional concession. Undoubtedly the most popular of the Fiats was the small 500 series. It was to the Italians what the Beetle was to Germany and the Mini was to England. It was small, inexpensive to produce and tough as nails. It helped keep the nation going forward following the war. Like all great cars it became a cultural touchstone. It gave Italians a sense of identity. No other car looked quite like it. It was cute and quirky but also had some zip to it. It was also a durable car that could be passed down from generation to generation so long as it were taken care of. 

Fiat redesigned the 500 in 2007 for Europe but only recently brought it to the USA. Fiats had even less exposure in the US than even the original Mini. The company had to convince people in the US that the car was more than just a cute shape but also a solid performer. The new Mini had a reputation for performance thanks to BMW and Porsche lent its insight to make the Beetle sportier as well. The 500 had a performance package available by Abarth, the racing car manufacturer. Fiat had acquired the label decades earlier and applied it exclusively to their own rides as MOPAR and SRT did for Dodge.

The company took a page from the successful relaunches of the Beetle and Mini and went into advertising overdrive. Starting with a celebrity endorsement in late 2011 and then quickly following up with a Superbowl commercial. Ad campaigns were mostly on the humorous side, playing up the Italian tropes on passionate women, big family weddings and the difference between British and Italian sensibilities.

The original 500 was well known to car buffs the world over. In Japan the car became legendary. It was the preferred ride for the master thief Lupin the 3rd and his gunman Daisuke Jigen. The 1967 manga series Lupin III spawned several television shows, films and games. A few generations had grown up watching his exploits and took careful note of his European car. The Fiat was heavily modified but that didn't stop it from being wrecked by gunfire, bigger cars and off road adventures. The little car remained unstoppable, endearing it to audiences as Herbie the Love Bug had to western audiences.

Great cars were embraced by pop culture. It happened in every country. Songs were written about them, movies and television shows were produced around them. There were awe-inspiring machines that were limited only by the imagination. There was something universally appealing about the automobile. The ways in which each nation interpreted them were unique and at the same time very familiar. Many artists were able to caricature the lines of cars and feature them in comics and cartoons. The next blog will look at some of the best artists that worked outside of the car industry. These people nonetheless helped influence a generation of car lovers. If you would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!

The Car Tangent, part 9...

Before the IDx was unveiled, before the Challenger was resurrected and well before Fiat and Mini had modern releases there was one company that remade an icon. More important they remade it right. Volkswagen unveiled a car called the Concept One at the 1994 North American Auto Show, the show held in Detroit. It looked very much like a modern interpretation of the classic Beetle. The public fell in love with the car and pushed Volkswagen to pursue it. The following year a revised design was unveiled that looked a lot closer to the final design of the New Beetle. Volkswagen seemed to move quickly to the feedback. The car went on sale in 1997 and became an instant hit.

A generation had passed since the Beetle had last been seen in the US. Although the car continued to be manufactured in Mexico up until 2003 not many of those cars ended up in the USA. Advances in technology, safety and performance made the little car antiquated. People still desired the quirky shape. It was bold compared to the homogenized look of most mass produced passenger cars. But fans also wanted modern components under the body as well. Volkswagen engineers and California designers J Mays and Freeman Thomas collaborated to determine what a modern Beetle would look like and how it would exceed the expectations of drivers. Few could argue that what they came up with was nothing short of inspired.

No sooner did the Beetle hit the road than people began wondering out loud when the VW Microbus would get a remake as well. The "Bus" which we would call a van was almost inseparable to the Beetle in '60s counter-culture America. People seemed to equate the van to hippy culture and early environmentalists. Even the Pixar film Cars featured an organic fuel growing hippy bus named Fillmore. The SUV was a big seller in the US but people were longing for something more unique than the boxy shaped road tanks. Volkswagen was listening and wanted to predict where the curve was headed. The SUV was indeed popular but also a huge gas guzzler. If the Bus were to get a remake then it would have to be far more economical than any SUV. The engineers developed a couple of different concepts that they unveiled publicly.

One remake, dubbed the Bulli focused on hybrid technology, alternately switching between a gas engine and electric motor depending on necessity. The technology was sound and mileage very good for a large passenger car, however the public took exception to the shape. The profile was more aerodynamic than the original Bus and the mileage had been increased but the addition of a hood made it look like an SUV or wagon. The public wanted the Bus to retain its classic shape, similar to how the Beetle had been remade. Volkswagen engineers found that challenge difficult to meet. Both the classic Beetle and early Bus models had rear-mounted air-cooled motors. They were small and out of the way, giving plenty of interior space. Modern engines were water cooled and required more space. The trunk that used to be in the front of the Beetle now had a motor under the hood. The Microbus was given an engine compartment at the front as well and this changed its basic shape. Even the more streamlined all-electric Bus concept still had a bit of a bump at the front. This may have been more aerodynamic design and a better safety feature for head-on collisions but to audiences the concept Bus just did not work. 

German engineers managed to get a revisionist Beetle to work and they also had a hand in bringing back the Mini. Engineers at BMW were looking for a way to relaunch the British Mini but by incorporating everything they had learned over a lifetime of working on performance cars. They developed an engine and platform that would compliment either a BMW model or Mini model. This allowed designers the leeway to create a unique body and interior around the new base. The result was a car that maintained the familiar shape but was actually much larger than the original Mini and larger than most compact cars.

Most people did not seem to mind that the Mini was not that small, especially those in the USA. The car did not originally have a big of a following in the states. It was not mass produced in North America like the original Beetle. This was a second chance for the Mini to become a major player in a big market. Very few car companies would ever get a second chance to make the right impression. A solid ad campaign in print, television and online made sure that by 2001 the Mini was the most desirable new car on the road. People were willing to pay some heavy mark ups for a new Mini rather than put their name on a waiting list because the demand was so high. Both the Mini and the Beetle had managed to make triumphant returns. The tiny cars helped carry their respective nations back from brink of economic collapse following World War II. Both England and Germany had made leaps and bounds with automotive technology for over half a century. They were willing to incorporate all those lessons into their iconic rides and make them the platforms that would move the rest of the world.

The US was learning too, perhaps a little late, that a legacy should always be honored. Great cars defined a nation and helped shape a culture. The Big Three began rethinking what the Mustang, Corvette, Charger and Challenger muscle cars could become to the present era. They managed to meet every expectation and would undoubtedly inspire a new generation of car buffs in the process. There was one little car however that would be joining the relaunches. It would take advantage of the road paved by the Beetle and Mini, and more important from the Big Three during their time of crisis. We shall look at the last but certainly not least of the little cars that moved the world in the next blog. If you would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!

The Car Tangent, part 1...

Friends, welcome back to the beginning of a very long tangent. I have been on a racing, driving and general car kick over the past few months because a concept car shown a year ago was announced as actually going into production. It may seem obvious that the things that I am most passionate about get the biggest write-ups on this blog. I did mention why I did that in the About section of my blog. If you don’t care much for cars then just tune out for the next few weeks. I’ll get back into fighting games eventually. To get back to the subject at hand, Nissan showed off a fun little two door called the IDx at the 2013 Tokyo Auto Show. Both a street version called the Freeflow and a sport/racing version dubbed the NISMO (after the Nissan Motor Parts Racing Group) were unveiled. The announcement of a new concept car may seem insignificant, especially since just about every major manufacturer shows a new concept or pre-production car at every show. There can be dozens or even hundreds of new models at any one event. Audiences do not always have the time or patience to sift through them. However the response for the IDx was immediate. The general public and the press were all over the car, spreading images and articles online like wildfire. It was one of the strongest reactions that any company had gotten during a debut. The reason why may not have been obvious to everybody but those in the know recognized that Nissan was going back to a legacy design.

The IDx was a nod to the 1968 Datsun 510. Nissan phased out the Datsun name in 1986 although the recently brought it back in smaller markets, but I digress. The small car was popular in its day and predated the smash hit Fairlady-Z. The 510 was a cultural touchstone for the parents of people from my generation. Seeing it remade immediately brought back a sense of nostalgia. However there was also a sense of awe to go along with it. The IDx captured the essence of the classic 510 but included the modern conventions one would expect. Bigger wheels, sharper body angles, high tech electronics, engine and suspension that couldn’t have been possible 46 years ago were now available to the general public.

What Nissan did right by the IDx was apparent from the get-go. They did not simply call it the 510 and let the nostalgia critics tear it down. They would have too. The lights were not right, the grill was not right, the body lines were not right and the accents were not right for it to be a “true” remake of the classic 510. Instead Nissan wanted to demonstrate that their designers were going with a new idea but were also free to take cues from the company legacy. These designers had the freedom to make editorial decisions with the car and not put out another boring design based on sales numbers, as was the status quo for the industry. In fact Nissan reached out to the community and asked about 100 teens, the children of my generation what they were looking for in a first car. These were not run of the mill kids either but those that loved cars new and old. They loved the classic Datsun designs yet also wanted a car that was easy to customize, like something out of a videogame. From lights to fenders, seats and wheels, just about every component on the car was designed to be easy to swap out. The spirit of the classic two-door remained despite the radical ideas. The badge and color of the NISMO package in red and white livery gave car buffs a reason to do a double take.

The past was reborn and remixed in Tokyo that night. The decision to go ahead and turn the IDx Freeflow and NISMO into production cars filled my heart with hope. Car design was finally becoming fun again. It had been boring for the first half of my life. From the late ‘70s through the ‘80s there were not many cars, except for the exotics, that seemed to spark my imagination. I was crazy about cars as a kid but also knew that there were some bland cars that were as boxy and lifeless as my early drawings. Cars that once had formidable reputations like the Mustang and Corvette had fallen behind the curve. Something had to change and something did change when a wave of awesome imports hit the US. Whether they had better gas mileage, were more reliable or cost less than US automobiles it was apparent that America was embracing foreign autos. It took a long time for Detroit to take notice and even longer for them to do something about it. By the time the Great Recession hit the US auto makers were in too deep with the old modes of production and design. Change was the only thing that could help the industry and thankfully it was already happening. Nissan was not the only company that used a legacy design to re-launch a brand, if anything they were one of the last to do that. The next blog will look at how the muscle car was reborn. If you would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!