Know Our History - Henry Ford on the American Experience
 

I know that all of you reading this have more than a passing interest in cars, and this 1:52 American Experience program on Henry Ford will be very interesting to you; probably on several levels.

Video: Henry Ford | Watch American Experience Online | PBS Video

Henry Ford was brilliant but uneducated, visionary and paranoid, prescient and a domineering egomaniac, a teetotalling racist - in many ways he was the father of the 20th century manufacturing age - but he loved the 19th century better.

The Model T is still a model of a durable, practical, efficient and affordable car - exactly the kind of car we need to reclaim here in the 21st century.

The Model T also had an effect on world history, General Allenby (in charge of forces in the middle east in WW1) counted the model T as one of his 3 main advantages over his enemies.

The model T itself didn't last long overseas though - in Europe it failed due to the engine being too large (the HP tax), and elsewhere it rapidly became old fashioned. It was efficient in terms of being easy to fix and cheap to buy, in terms of fuel usage it was and is a pig but mileage travelled in those days was far lower.

The idea has been tried though, think of the "economy" cars of the world, e.g.

Trojan
Austin 7
Morris 8
Dixie Werk (Austin 7 under licence)
Bantam (Austin 7 US under licence)
Rosengart (Austin 7 France - you get the idea...)
2CV
Fiat Topolino
Fiat 500
BMC Mini
Subaru 360
Datsun 510
VW Beetle
Fiat 124/128

etc. right down to cars like the VW Up! (dare I say the Aygo :D ) - cheap to run and cheap to fix.

The "T" may have been a pig, but it got better than TODAY'S Uhmerican fleet average!

Frank, I think you are about right - the average car in the US today gets about the same MPG as the Model T.

I hope you folks get to watch the program - the thing that Henry Ford got right I think, is that the Model T was improved as needed, and they avoided planned obsolescence. We have Alfred P. Sloan (of GM) to thank for that...

Due to the nanny-state dictating which safety standards must be followed by every vehicle, and the average Joe not wanting to get rid of some ammenities to save some bucks on fuel and maintenance, it's pretty hard to see another vehicle with the same versatility of the Model T, among other vehicles of its time.

Volvos and Mercedes got a lot safer because their designers knew that protecting the owners of their cars was the right thing to do. They added passenger protection cells and shoulder seat belts and crumple zones. They put four wheel disk brakes with dual circuits of hydraulics (that each works on both front and one rear brake) and these saved lives.

But the car companies who are only motivated to change the "style" and "features" and actually *wanted* their cars to wear out quickly, couldn't be arsed to add *seatbelts* and *collapsible* steering columns and *disk brakes*, let alone exploding gas tanks or care two shakes about the weight or aerodynamics - why should we stand for that?

Planned obsolescence is probably the worst idea in modern economic history; because it has done more damage to our economy and even more importantly, it has done more damage to our world - without which our economy is meaningless.

Do you have comparisons for the other indicators - like maybe CO2, speed, braking performance, safety rating, aero, carrying capacity... ?

Whilst car makers did wrongly make style, looks and performance a priority I think that suggesting no car maker wanted to make sure the passengers were safe is stretching it a little. Whilst US makers were perhaps late to the idea of safety they still did stuff - like air bags.

Volvo's list is more impressive:

As for the economic model ? Think about seperating the baby and the bathwater here.

Car makers are no different from anyone else in wanting to sell you a newer "thing" - think ipad, iphone, samsung stuff, PCs, Macs, TVs - pretty much everything from Armchairs to Zumba courses.

In short it does drive innovation and things like doing more with less.

It also makes this possible

http://media.treehugger.com/assets/i...crop-smart.jpg

which today is stupidly expensive but may just change how designers work in the future like the original Prius and Insight did.

No, but they aren't relevant when the parameter is mpg.

MPG is not the only fruit.

I am fully aware of that. I realize that there have been advancements in auto tech over the last 100+ years. It is not news to me. What may be news to many, however, is that TODAY'S U.S. national fleet of crap consisting of SUVs, pickups, and maybe some cars here and there has an average MPG similar to that of the 100 year old "T". I find that pathetic and offensive.