Palmer
Cameraman
Posts: 396
Online Status:
|
Post by Palmer on Apr 25, 2019 15:42:15 GMT
What a great thread this is...
I just wish there was one simple answer to the initial question but there is not!!!
Slow product development, questionable build quality, lack of funds and lack of clear management were just some of the factors that bought British car manufacturing to its knees but I am sure there were many other reasons.
The thing is is that we all think of BL being up against it, and rightly so, but the Rootes group (who were quite big and competitive until the late-1970's) struggled as did smaller British car companies of the time. It seems the only company that came through it all unscathed to this day was Morgan. Crazy!
We can opine about a myriad of things but the truth is is that we really did not give the public what they wanted at the time they wanted it. We always seemed to keep them waiting and when the wait was over it was too late.
The Rover SD1 and Triumph TR7 were exceptions (in the BL sphere) but they were never the cars they should have been from launch hence making them un-competitive when they should have been at the top of the tree.
It's all very sad but when you look at what other manufacturers were doing all over the world you can see why the British motor industry failed however sad it is to admit to!
We could have been an automotive powerhouse to this very day...
|
|
Cartman
Producer
Posts: 4,018
Online Status:
|
Post by Cartman on Apr 25, 2019 16:52:18 GMT
Poor product planning was a bit of a feature, yes. Ford got it more or less right for a long time, but seemed to lose it in the 80s. Of their earlier stuff, only really the Consul Classic, which was quite a good car, but it was expensive to make and lost money, the Corsair, again a decent car but a bit pointless as it was the centre section of a mark 1 Cortina with a different front and rear and the mark 4 Zephyr/Zodiac which wasn't a great design, were a bit below their standards.
BMC were very susceptible to errors in this area, we have already mentioned the farcical replacement of the Austin A60, another mistake was the 3 litre, which took over from the big Austin Westminster/Wolseley in 1968, when there was no need for it as the Triumph and Rover 2000s had taken the market for these big saloons away, it was based on the 1800 and was very ugly and heavy on fuel and was a sales disaster
|
|
Three Litre
Producer
Oscar 24
Posts: 3,418
Online Status:
|
Post by Three Litre on Apr 25, 2019 17:39:33 GMT
What a great thread this is...
I just wish there was one simple answer to the initial question but there is not!!!
Slow product development, questionable build quality, lack of funds and lack of clear management were just some of the factors that bought British car manufacturing to its knees but I am sure there were many other reasons.
The thing is is that we all think of BL being up against it, and rightly so, but the Rootes group (who were quite big and competitive until the late-1970's) struggled as did smaller British car companies of the time. It seems the only company that came through it all unscathed to this day was Morgan. Crazy!
We can opine about a myriad of things but the truth is is that we really did not give the public what they wanted at the time they wanted it. We always seemed to keep them waiting and when the wait was over it was too late.
The Rover SD1 and Triumph TR7 were exceptions (in the BL sphere) but they were never the cars they should have been from launch hence making them un-competitive when they should have been at the top of the tree.
It's all very sad but when you look at what other manufacturers were doing all over the world you can see why the British motor industry failed however sad it is to admit to!
We could have been an automotive powerhouse to this very day...
Quite right Harry. Unlike the Germans who just got on with it and made good reliable products not just motors. Or Panzers.
|
|
Three Litre
Producer
Oscar 24
Posts: 3,418
Online Status:
|
Post by Three Litre on Apr 25, 2019 17:59:55 GMT
Poor product planning was a bit of a feature, yes. Ford got it more or less right for a long time, but seemed to lose it in the 80s. Of their earlier stuff, only really the Consul Classic, which was quite a good car, but it was expensive to make and lost money, the Corsair, again a decent car but a bit pointless as it was the centre section of a mark 1 Cortina with a different front and rear and the mark 4 Zephyr/Zodiac which wasn't a great design, were a bit below their standards. BMC were very susceptible to errors in this area, we have already mentioned the farcical replacement of the Austin A60, another mistake was the 3 litre, which took over from the big Austin Westminster/Wolseley in 1968, when there was no need for it as the Triumph and Rover 2000s had taken the market for these big saloons away, it was based on the 1800 and was very ugly and heavy on fuel and was a sales disaster That 3 litre was awful. Also it was some feat of engineering to only get 125 hp out of 3 litre engine.
|
|
Three Litre
Producer
Oscar 24
Posts: 3,418
Online Status:
|
Post by Three Litre on Apr 25, 2019 18:03:23 GMT
I like this quote about the wedge Princess: -
"To quote a phrase in Parker's Car Price Guide from the 1990s, "an early critic suggested that the people responsible for designing the front and rear of the car were not speaking to one another".
|
|
|
Post by Dirty Epic on Apr 26, 2019 6:57:24 GMT
BL's 'Wedge' fetish back in then was similar to Ford's 'New Edge' style they had in the 2000's following on from the Focus. The big difference is Ford's approach generally worked and got copied by other manufacturers - just look at the likes of Kia and Hyundai's recent models, whereas no-one really took the same approach BL did back then with the Allegro, Princess, TR7 etc. IIRC the initial design concepts for these cars were much more sleeker and appealing than what got delivered again BL's 'committee's' and infighting compromising what could be delivered.
Interesting point about the Rootes group. The worst thing they ever did was getting tied in with Chrysler who basically asset stripped them and tried holding the UK government to ransom etc. Apart from the Simca designs Chrysler didn't bring anything new to Rootes when it was owned by them and the likes of the Hunter and Avenger were seriously dated by the late 1970's when the likes for Ford and Vauxhall/Opel were bringing out the mk3 Escort and mk2 Cavalier etc. It was only really the Talbot/PSA (Peugeot) sale that kept Ryton going until the closure in the late 2000's and how the staff at Linwood got treated by Chrysler was disgusting IMHO.
Would Rootes have survived without a tie-up with a larger global partner is debateable but out of all of them available back then Chrysler would have been last on my list and I'm surprised they've managed to survive all these years with generally poor/uninspiring models, milking the 'Jeep' cash cow and they themselves having to get bailed out by the US government, Daimler-Benz and now Fiat.
Good shout about Gaydon Villain and it's on my to do list for this Summer too.
|
|
Cartman
Producer
Posts: 4,018
Online Status:
|
Post by Cartman on Apr 26, 2019 7:48:49 GMT
I think what kept Chrysler afloat for a long time in the USA was the fact that they dominated the market for police cars and taxis, probably from the mid 60s to the 80s, big police orders made up for shortfalls in the rest of the market
|
|
Cartman
Producer
Posts: 4,018
Online Status:
|
Post by Cartman on Apr 27, 2019 16:35:46 GMT
An interesting website which has a lot of background information on the development stories on a lot of British cars of the period is AR online. A fair bit of it is about BL and BMC but some others are covered too and some of the most interesting stories are the ones about the crappy ones like the Maxi, Marina and Allegro.
|
|
Three Litre
Producer
Oscar 24
Posts: 3,418
Online Status:
|
Post by Three Litre on Apr 27, 2019 16:51:29 GMT
An interesting website which has a lot of background information on the development stories on a lot of British cars of the period is AR online. A fair bit of it is about BL and BMC but some others are covered too and some of the most interesting stories are the ones about the crappy ones like the Maxi, Marina and Allegro. Good adjective there describing those motors!
|
|
Cartman
Producer
Posts: 4,018
Online Status:
|
Post by Cartman on Jul 15, 2019 19:20:43 GMT
I've been reading up a bit more this week on the British motor industry as I picked up an interesting book about industry generally, from the charity shop for a quid! There's a chapter on the British car industry from its start point up until about the early 80s and it did have some very deep seated problems. Part of it was the fact that it had a very long history of very bad management. They were constantly taking people on then laying them off at very short notice and, it seems that the unions were kept out as long as possible, but when this was no longer possible it appeared that it was a case of "let's get our own back for being dumped on!"
Another one was just after the war, there was a huge export drive and it was insisted that British cars were exported to all parts of the world, where the tough conditions and poor roads were too much for them and this led to a bad reputation for reliability.
|
|