The big difference is testing. I had a '61 E-Type coupe and that was like a
slow cooker on a hot day. All I needed were some green apple or hickory chips
on the exhaust pipe and the numerous air leaks would have done the rest!
Seriously though, the boys from Coventry were completely mystified about the
cooling problems they had in Phoenix. After all, the cars were thoroughly
tested in London and the cooling system was completely adequate. So what if it
gets 40-50F warmer in the summer in Phoenix. Summer is summer, right? This is a
true story according to the Porter book. Even though Jag looked upon the US as
their prime market for the E-Type, they never tested it in the US conditions.
In advance, that is...
Things are different now. Everybody laughed at the Yugo, but what they did and
offered was very common for cars entering the US market in the '60s: no testing
and no quality. The only thing that made them remarkable in the long line of
failures (Fiat, Alfa, Renault, Peugeot, etc) is that they were one of the last
to come here completely unprepared.
Bob Melusky
CoolVT@aol.com wrote:
Look at the modern
cars! I mean so crowded that you can't see any ground looking from the top.
Now they start putting covers over most of the engine compartment and now a pan
under most of the car and this with the car putting out 300 horses and more.
These cars cool though. I think it must be good engineering and a
combination of dozens of things that have been considered and taken care of.
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