some blokes rant

[wotnowarninglight]

Chap at work recently paid 700 quid for a new steering column on his W reg Punto. The good old days eh? Triumph? Dr needs to increase the dosage on your meds mate! As for the BL stable, sure I used to be happy with my single speed wipers/manual plunger front screen washer and opening front quarter lights on my '73 Mk III Austin 1100... Crossplies were scary tyres and I certainly wouldn't want to have a crash in one!

Stilos have spent time annoying me but at least when my luck runs out I will have 4 star encap, ABS, EBD, ASR, Brake Assist & 6 Airbags to lessen the impact. The other thing is that the consumer demands ever more gizmo's for their comfort and convenience and the more that gets fitted, the more there is to go wrong AND it seems to afflict a fair few manufacturers, not only FIAT!

 

[arseofbox]

how about a car that is made with modern manufacturing methods, but without adding modern technology to it, and using retro styling. thats what i want, i've been saying it for years.

if they still made a lot of the cars from the 80's i'd buy them instead of modern crap. i want a series 1 rs turbo made using 2006 methods and materials. that would be a perfect car.

we are quickly heading to the day when windows will run your car and whenever windows crahses so does your car. full drive by wire is going to be the big turning point, when technology decides when you turn, brake and accelerate. thats a scary though. power steering failure will have a whole new meaning for the drive by wire generation of cars. and imagine what fiats will be like by the time that happens, you'll turn left and it'll accelerate, you brake and it turns right.

I think thats right personally. Im very dubious about the brake by wire strategies a lot of cars have now, throttle by wire less so (the car isnt an inherent hazard if its not moving!).

But yes, personally I think the Sierra Cosworth 4x4 / Delta Integrale HF 4WD driveline was nearly perfect.....I just dont see how getting Active Yaw Control to kick in can be a good thing, all it shows to me is that you can't control the car when it does let go! Its the same reason Id love something like a Noble \ TVR etc, proper drivers car

 

[custard]

think theres some rose tinted glasses here on old cars.
i dont know about you but i remember having to be out most weekends tweaking points,tracing faults,playing with float/idle/choke settings.
having to sit for 20 minutes nursing the car to idle on a freezing day,
spending an age on tappit clearences etc
and many more
nowadays you go out,fire it up and drive off with little dicernable difference over the warmed up engine.
okay when all this technology goes wrong it costs and TBH silly little mechanical things annoy me more as its its old school engineering

 

[T14086]

Very true Custard

I get abit sick of doing points/float/jets on my old bikes every season (although its a great feeling when riding them) at least the metal used on old brit bikes was of better quality than the stuff used on early jap bikes.

The thing is people talk about about safety items (ABS/VDC/TCS etc) but what folk dont realise is they dont really go wrong these days.I can honestly say I have changed only one ABS control unit (multipla-water damage due to leaves) in 4 years,5 wheel sensors(4 due to incorrect fitting/wheel bearing damage by other independent garages) in this time.
I have been fortunate (unfortunate?) to have worked in many dealerships for other manufacturers & I can honestly say Fiat are better (from a tech points of view for renewing parts) than the others.OK i'm not biased (believe it or not) and will admit that old punto had column/ECU problems but overall Fiat are definately no worse than anyone else & it p*sses me off when people come on here slagging them just because they have a problem....think about this for a second,how many reasons are there for any car not starting/running or driving correctly,hundreds? Things do go wrong with all cars infact everything wether its a washing machine,mobile phone even the human body!.In Fiats case I would say 85% are wiring faults (poor connections) rather than actual component failures,thing is how many parts were changed unnesesarily? (didnt spell that right did I )
Good diagnosis/training is the key to modern car fault finding & no matter what people here think of Fiat technicians,again from someone who has worked for many other makes I can say Fiat techs are well trained & above average in knowledge compared to others I have worked with.The thing with Fiat technicians is that they are encouraged to help/share information with each another insteard of keeping it to yourself (knowledge is power?) which can only be of benefit throughout Fiat dealerships & hopefully customers.
As Custard stated...these days you just jump in your car & drive off (unless you own a stilo & have to wait few secs for it to complete its 'checks' or you risk warnings popping up) due to 'strategies' in the ECU & lets not forget fuel consumption/safety & emissions are so much better in modern cars.

 

[Ulpian]

All true.

I thought my rear interior light had failed the other day and took out the unit to get at the bulb. As soon as I began fiddling with the bulb holder thingy the light came on. Just a connection shorting a bit I guess? Anyway, it works fine now, and the price of a bulb saved!

Old cars were hell in winter. Always churning away waiting for them to fire up, then the smell of unused petrol, and the stalling if the choke wasn't quite in the right place. And this with new ones too. And they had to be serviced every 3000 miles don't forget.

And they rusted. There aren't many left, and those that are have been treated with kid gloves all their lives.

I will admit that in warm, dry climates some old cars could last a good time and were easy to fix. But they needed a lot of fixing!

We drive a lot faster and harder these days, and treat our cars like white goods (I do), by which I mean we just expect them to work. Period.

In the old days cars were kinda luxuries and had to be forgiven a lot more.
It was the Japanese who proved cars could be reliable - but they still rusted and all the old ones are long gone.