Text 14758, 97 rader
Skriven 2014-04-30 15:07:45 av Roy Witt (1:387/22)
  Kommentar till text 14694 av Kees van Eeten (2:280/5003.4)
Ärende: Cars
============
Greetings Kees!

 KvE>>>  In the mid 80ties Seat produced a number of cars that were
 KvE>>> identical to Fiat. They were sold by the Fiat Car dealers.

 RW>> So what you're saying is that Seat built Fiat designed cars for
 RW>> Fiat.

 KvE>  Well Fiat was one of the owners, the other was the Spanish State.

Sounds like what used to be a Dodge truck, now owned by Chrysler and
Mexico. It's called a RAM now.

 KvE>  I think they restarted as an assembly line and gradually expanded
 KvE> to making all parts locally. The parts on my Seat could easily be
 KvE> exchanged with Fiat parts.

That's true of a lot of cars these days.

 KvE>>>  I had a 850 Special.

 RW>> A German mechanic friend of mine in San Diego thought those (Fiat
 RW>> 850 Spyder) were the 'cat's meow'! He had one, but his wife and two
 RW>> kids wouldn't fit in it. Maybe that was why he liked it so much.

 KvE>  I remember having a picture on the wall of that car, when it was
 KvE> introduced. A real pi in the sky. The normal 850 was not as fancy.
 KvE> The special differed by having a better manifold, that gave it a few
 KvE> HP more. To make use of those HP's the wheels had a larger diameter.
 KvE> So the gearbox remained the same. All in all it was a bit faster.

LOL! I wouldn't term that as faster...maybe faster than a normal 850, but
not as fast as most other cars. Honda 750 could beat it.

 KvE>>> My impession was that the Spanish built cars were better than the
 KvE>>> Italian version. Especially the bodywork and paint layers.

 RW>> Siesta time must play a part in that. The more rest they got, the
 RW>> better the build.

 KvE>  It could be, but I guess they used local steel, which is of good
 KvE> quality. As far a I know there is no iron ore in Italy.

Iron is found everywhere, it may be that a poorer method of refining it in
Italy v Spain results in the difference.

 KvE>>>  Seat is now a subsidiary of Volkswagen just as the Tjechian
 KvE>>> Skoda.

 RW>> As sales slump, that seems to happen a lot. I remember when there
 RW>> were MGs, Triumphs, etc., all built by independent companies, then
 RW>> the sales went south, so they all merged under one company flag.

 KvE>  Not much left of that either. But if you ever visited an English
 KvE> factory 2o or 30 years ago, that would not surprise you. That and
 KvE> the strong position of the unions.

Of that group, I always like the Austin-Healy cars. They priceless today.
And, unions and taxes seem to kill a lot of things. We now have Toyota
headquarters moving from California to Texas because of it.

 KvE>  The hoarding of brands, by the remaining automotive industries is
 KvE> used to serve a wider audience. Audi is for those who would not dare
 KvE> to drive a Volkswagen,

I'd rather have a VW any day. Audi warranties require service to be done
at an Audi dealer and the engine oil, transmission and differential fluids
must be an approved Audi brand that you can only get from the dealer.

 KvE>  Skoda is for those, where the Volkswagen is just to expensive,

Stripped down models, then.

 KvE>  Seat caters to younger people. And would you by a Lamborgini if it
 KvE> was called Volkswagen. To many of my age a Volkswagen is still
 KvE> synonymous with the Beatle.

That was a good car, except for the bus...it couldn't get out of its own
way.

 RW>> We had the same
 RW>> experience here with Chrysler being absorbed by MB, then kicked out
 RW>> the door when their sales slumped even more.

 KvE>  They have an interesting history as well.

Over-engineering for one. Most of them are too expensive to fix, so they
get traded or scrapped.


    Have a day!

         R\%/itt - K5RXT

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