Barracuda....Back from the dead

[MrObsessive]

Interesting thoughts about car design. As a kid in the '60's I could tell even then what cars were what. I might not have known if they were new or not, but I could tell by the "signatures" of the windshield pillars/rooflines, or the tailights what kind of car it was. I have to look twice today, and I consider myself a car guy.

One reason as mentioned that cars look the way they do today is government regs. Cars need to be taller (pedestrian safety), side impact standards affect the appearance of most cars------one of the main reason you no longer see true pillarless hardtops today.

But OTOH, society has changed a great deal today than what it was even from the '90's. Lets face it people ARE bigger these days, and not many folks want to cram themselves into small cars. Sure they sell, but then SUVS/Crossovers sell that much better.

One of the reasons I like my Challenger is that while it may be "retro", it's still a modern design by my eyes, and it CERTAINLY is distinctive. Some may sniff at the fact that it takes a lot of its styling cues from the original 1970 model, but the fact remains that FCA sells practically every one they make, and the Hellcat model is simply outta this world.

One of my wishes is to see "traditional" body styles make a return-------a scooch lower beltline, longer dash to front axle ratio, longer/lower trunks. Time will tell if these styling cues make it back into the mainstream.

I'm excited to see what the new Barracuda will look like-----I'm sure it will be a good seller as Chrysler seems to know how to style a car well IMO.

One more point--------let's face it..........there are MANY more manufacturers cars on the roads today than there were in the '60's! One can only style their cars so many ways without looking totally awful (some come to mind though), so you're bound to have quite a few similarities in the designs.

Just my 2¢ worth!

Edited August 29, 2015 by MrObsessive

[Jon Haigwood]

The future https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soJs3ZUYtLI

[10thumbs]

"Jellybean look", how true.  American cars may have become somewhat aerodynamic, but they still weigh too much.  I think the reincarnated muscle cars look funky because they're too fat looking.  Big fat tires, good.  Big fat bodies, not good.

[StevenGuthmiller]

Not sure I see your point, there is no nuance here. Both GM models, both same platform, neither looks remotely alike.

You're not serious, are you?

The Chevy has rectangular tail lights, and the Buick has......almost rectangular tail lights & an extra trim piece. That's nuance.

Name one similarity between the '60 Olds & Buick.

If it wasn't for badging, no one would ever be able to differentiate modern cars.

 

Steve

[StevenGuthmiller]

Here's a little experiment.

How many of us instantly recognize this car?

 

 

 

 

Now, how many of us instantly recognize this one?

 

 

I rest my case.

 

Steve

[SfanGoch]

Hmmm.......the one at the bottom is an instant classic, the memory of which will last a lunchtime.

Remember the old Wendy's ad?

That's what it's come to. Next!

Edited August 29, 2015 by SfanGoch

[MrObsessive]

LOL!! I remember that! 

[John Goschke]

You guys are cracking me up!

I remember my late Grandfather, who came of age in the late teens and 1920's, complaining that "all cars look the same today, not like when I was a young man" while I was oohing and awwing over the new '64s in Motor Trend (oh, man, that Galaxie 500XL!) in the fall of '63.

Seems every generation whines about the same things, among them, "all cars look the same nowadays." File that next to "Oh, these kids today and their crazy _____ (music, clothes, hair, etc.), don't have any_____ (respect, ambition, etc., etc.") along with the all-encompassing (and always inaccurate) "Life was so much simpler back then," and all variations thereof.

Of course that's coming from a geezer whose standard of comparison in car design is, "Is it as memorably beautiful as a '57 Dodge Custom Royal Lancer?" Now that I'm just shy of the same age as my Granddad was when he made the eternal "all cars..." complaint, I've finally learned to identify some of his beloved cars from the teens and '20s, but it gives me a headache because, well, "they all look the same," just as it does trying to sort out all the various SUVs, crossovers, and four-door "coupes" of today.

 

Edited August 29, 2015 by John Goschke

[Jon Haigwood]

The top car is a 57 Chevy Nomad,  The bottom cars is the iconic "Spandex wearing, Latte Drinking, Bike Riding, Standard Issue, New Age Dilrods" piece of "Stamped Out, Poly-coated, Plain as a Rock, Drives like a Tin Can, Lost in the Parking Lot, Looks like everything else"  automobile.

[StevenGuthmiller]

The top car is a 57 Chevy Nomad,  The bottom cars is the iconic "Spandex wearing, Latte Drinking, Bike Riding, Standard Issue, New Age Dilrods" piece of "Stamped Out, Poly-coated, Plain as a Rock, Drives like a Tin Can, Lost in the Parking Lot, Looks like everything else"  automobile.

Now don't get too nasty Jon!

That's the car my wife drives!

 

Steve

[Jon Haigwood]

Now don't get too nasty Jon!

That's the car my wife drives!

 

Steve

Except hers of course 

My wife drives a 2013 Dodge Caravan and we had to put a pink flying pig antenna topper on it so we can find it in the parking lot

Edited August 29, 2015 by Jon Haigwood

[SfanGoch]

Now don't get too nasty Jon!

That's the car my wife drives!

 

Steve

Jon wasn't including wives, or women in general, when making that comment. I believe it was directed to those Mr. Salty framed, AAA battery armed, latte foam sculpting kickball playing 35 year old teenaged beta males like Quaid, Montague, Hummus and Zach who live for the quirky, edgy and kewl. 

[Jon Haigwood]

Jon wasn't including wives, or women in general, when making that comment. I believe it was directed to those Mr. Salty framed, AAA battery armed, latte foam sculpting kickball playing 35 year old teenaged beta males like Quaid, Montague, Hummus and Zach who live for the quirky, edgy and kewl. 

exactly 

[SfanGoch]

Cars are like candy bars. The price goes up and you get a smaller product in the package. 

I'm a big dude who was recently awarded my own zip code and, I gotta tell you, I find that cars of recent vintage are uncomfortable as a passenger and driver. I feel like the oversized driver figure stuffed into the cockpit of a slot car. They might design them with a higher roof line; but, my cranium still scrapes the headliner. More of my two cents, I wish that floor shifts in auto tranny-equipped cars would disappear and column shifts were brought back. Not everything with wheels needs bucket seats and floor shifts so one could pretend he's Goggles Paisano while moving at 12 M.P.H. on the Long Island Expressway during rush hour. I actually liked my 1986 Ford Taurus Robocopmobile with the split front bench seat. I could nod off comfortably while spending seven and a half hours looking for a parking spot. 

 

Edited August 29, 2015 by SfanGoch

[Lovefordgalaxie]

I'll be honest with you, I don't know why I opened this thread, but I think I had slight hope to see what Fiat would do to the Barracuda. 

The fact is:

I drive a 41 year old car, a 1974 Ford Galaxie 500 manufactured in Brasil, and the car is a 1966 U.S. Galaxie for all that matters, even for buying parts online. She has a 292 Y-Block V8, a four barrel Autolite carburetor, a frame, points, condenser, four bias ply Wide Oval tires, cool dog dishes all around, and it's a car that can be trusted to never let you down. If something do happen, like a miss, or another little problem, you can solve it with your home tools, and maybe a new set of points.

I don't look at new cars sites, I don't read new cars magazines, I don't watch TV shows related to new cars, I don't pay attention to them on the street.

I just know I have two tons of car on my garage, that will fire up, and drive me to the place I want to go. She even has power steering, power brakes and air conditioning from the factory. What else do I need? Nothing.

 

[SfanGoch]

End of story.

 

[Aaronw]

I'll be honest with you, I don't know why I opened this thread, but I think I had slight hope to see what Fiat would do to the Barracuda. 

The fact is:

I drive a 41 year old car, a 1974 Ford Galaxie 500 manufactured in Brasil, and the car is a 1966 U.S. Galaxie for all that matters, even for buying parts online. She has a 292 Y-Block V8, a four barrel Autolite carburetor, a frame, points, condenser, four bias ply Wide Oval tires, cool dog dishes all around, and it's a car that can be trusted to never let you down. If something do happen, like a miss, or another little problem, you can solve it with your home tools, and maybe a new set of points.

I don't look at new cars sites, I don't read new cars magazines, I don't watch TV shows related to new cars, I don't pay attention to them on the street.

I just know I have two tons of car on my garage, that will fire up, and drive me to the place I want to go. She even has power steering, power brakes and air conditioning from the factory. What else do I need? Nothing.

 

Can you drive it 100,000 miles with no maintenance beyond oil changes and putting fuel in it? You can with most new cars, and that is what most people want, a car that they don't have to think about.

The majority of people are not "car guys", cars are appliances. Asking them what is under the hood is like asking you the same question about your dishwasher.

 

As far as the Nomad? Get a photo of a '57 Chevy, '57 Buick and a '57 Oldsmobile. Show those photos to a bunch of random people under 30 and see if they can identify them, see if they even notice that they are not different pictures of the same car.

Edited August 29, 2015 by Aaronw

[unclescott58]

The future https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soJs3ZUYtLI

Interesting commercial you posted a link to here Jon. Am I missing something in this commercial? Because Audi they're advertising looks no different to me than all the other vehicles shown in that ad.

[Lovefordgalaxie]

Can you drive it 100,000 miles with no maintenance beyond oil changes and putting fuel in it? You can with most new cars, and that is what most people want, a car that they don't have to think about.

The majority of people are not "car guys", cars are appliances. Asking them what is under the hood is like asking you the same question about your dishwasher.

 

As far as the Nomad? Get a photo of a '57 Chevy, '57 Buick and a '57 Oldsmobile. Show those photos to a bunch of people random under 30 and see if they can identify them, see if they even notice that they are not different pictures of the same car.

If I cared about what new cars can do, I would own one. I don't give a shait about what people do want from cars now. Couldn't care less. I don't even have friends that are not car guys. The conversation is not worth it. 

[SfanGoch]

As far as the Nomad? Get a photo of a '57 Chevy, '57 Buick and a '57 Oldsmobile. Show those photos to a bunch of people random under 30 and see if they can identify them, see if they even notice that they are not different pictures of the same car.

A large percentage of people comprising the under 30 demographic in today's world are shallow, low information, technology addicted, narcissistic me-monkeys who couldn't find New Jersey on a map or tell you who won the Revolutionary War. Asking them to notice any differences between cars is beyond their synaptic resources.

[Lovefordgalaxie]

A large percentage of people comprising the under 30 demographic in today's world are shallow, low information, technology addicted, narcissistic me-monkeys who couldn't find New Jersey on a map or tell you who won the Revolutionary War. Asking them to notice any differences between cars is beyond their synaptic resources.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah

That was a great one!!!! Talk about nailing something!

[Guest]

A large percentage of people comprising the under 30 demographic in today's world are shallow, low information, technology addicted, narcissistic me-monkeys who couldn't find New Jersey on a map or tell you who won the Revolutionary War. Asking them to notice any differences between cars is beyond their synaptic resources.

Exactly!

[Ace-Garageguy]

A large percentage of people comprising the under 30 demographic in today's world are shallow, low information, technology addicted, narcissistic me-monkeys who couldn't find New Jersey on a map or tell you who won the Revolutionary War. Asking them to notice any differences between cars is beyond their synaptic resources.

1) What's a map?

2) I texted all my friends, and the only one who'd ever heard of the Revolutionary War said Germany won, in 1975. Tribal knowledge is powerful.

3) We should all be trying to conserve synaptic resources (whatever they are).

 

Edited August 29, 2015 by Ace-Garageguy

[10thumbs]

In Europe, the folks who do nothing but attend their Smartphones are called the head down generation.  In my old days, head down meant something else.  Kids.

How about this;  I asked recently a younger type teenie girl employee who Martin Luther was?  She says he was a black dude that was anti-war.  I say no, not Martin Luther King, but the German guy, Martin Luther.  He was a bit older.  She says, he was Chancellor.

Now this is in Germany.  I live here.  But fact is, kids are not as informed as they used to be.

[SfanGoch]

I gotta deal with these wastes of oxygen daily ever since they transformed my post-industrial wasteland neighborhood of Greenpernt, Brooklyn into America's newest theme park. It might have been a post-industrial wasteland; but, it was my post-industrial wasteland. Guys like this one dressed up like 19th century newspaper boys and riding around on Penny Farthings who think "kewl" is listening to indie bands nobody ever heard of and hanging out with their pasty-skinned girlfriends Stephonica, Zoe and Cankleen, while discussing (interspersed with at least 5 "Like, Yah's per sentence spoken) the latest topic of importance: the $18 locally sourced, fair trade, curated handcrafted kale and egg sandwich washed down with a $10 latte from Cafe Rudin.

 

For those of you with Facebook accounts, you might appreciate the following exchange. Talk about clueless. For those not familiar with the term, check Urban Dictionary for the definition of "Coney Island Whitefish".