the most american cars.

The Cars.com American-Made Index By Kelsey Mays, Cars.com What Are the Top American-Made Cars? Cars.com's American-Made Index rates vehicles built and bought in the U.S. Factors include sales, where the car's parts come from and whether the car is assembled in the U.S. We disqualify models with a domestic parts content rating below 75 percent, models built exclusively outside the U.S. or models soon to be discontinued without a U.S.-built successor.

cars.com

number one and two, toyota and honda.

what is wrong with this picture?

[edit on 8-8-2010 by rubbertramp]

Easy answer.

Unions.

Toyota and Honda don't have them.

reply to post by rubbertramp


It's been this way for over a decade!!!

Last time I looked, a few years ago, the #1 vehicle for US parts and man-hours was the Toyota Sienna Van.

That is why foreign cars are moving on up in quality, and American cars are moving down!

When Mazda is building Fords you are not getting an American car anymore. I worked in the automotive repair field for 15 years, and you have to check the VIN number to get the right parts on these things. You can have 2 Ford Explorers side by side, same year, make, model, and color, and you may have 15 different sets of parts on the dam things!! You have to find where it was assembled, which part of the year it was manufactured, is it California equipped, etc., etc.

RIDICULOUS!!

this kinda' disgusted me.
i've never had a 'new' car. i always drive american, and am pretty good with a wrench.
i can't work on any of this new stuff anyhow.

Originally posted by rubbertramp
this kinda' disgusted me.
i've never had a 'new' car. i always drive american, and am pretty good with a wrench.
i can't work on any of this new stuff anyhow.

Nope, wrenches are a thing of the past. You need a good electrical tester and an OBDII scanner. You need a firm understanding of electronics and resister/capacitor circuits.

Very soon, cars will be going to a 42 or 44 volt system. The days of our 12 volt wet cell battery and alternator or quickly ending. We will have regenerative braking instead of alternators. We now have "drive by wire" and electrical power steering pumps and a/c compressors to take load off the engine.

Nope, instead of backyard mechanics, you better off finding a decent hacker! No exaggeration, because all these "chips" that dial up the horsepower and streamline fuel economy are exactly that! They are hacked systems.

the newest thing i owned was a throttle body chevy pick up.
running codes was enough.

I spent seven years working for General Motors as a United Auto Worker.

Unions are a blessing and a curse. While they protect the worker and his
wages, they also create an apathy and sense of entitlement that is
unproductive for many of the workers. Those who work the hardest
and complain the least receive the worst jobs, while those work the
least and complain the most receive the best jobs.

The subsequent bureaucracy and politics make it hard for the enterprise
to remain competitive in a global market. Unions are one of the reasons
America was built so quickly and stoutly, and one of the reasons we are now
losing our middle class as the world grows smaller.

[edit on 8-8-2010 by rival]

reply to post by rival


Well said. Im a union man my self but not for an auto corporation. We have a saying about unions. Unions are for the f**k ups and the suck ups.

reply to post by The Endtime Warrior


Yep. My best story involves sweeping my work area. There were
small metal fragments accumulating in my work area. Things I could,
and did, begin to stumble upon, making for uneasy footing. So, without
much thought, I grabbed a broom and just pushed the stuff out of my way.
Maybe ten seconds of bother, I didn't pick it up or sweep the whole area.
Long story short, a janitor witnessed my transgression and called my
supervisor. I got reprimanded, the janitor got payed an extra few hours
because of the loss of his guaranteed job, and then gave me attitude
(very self-righteously I might add). The whole thing was ridiculous.

I have been telling my American friends to be wary of the auto industry in your country, and to take a lesson from what happened here in the United Kingdom.

After World War II we had a strong, if a bit traditional automotive industry in Great Britain. We made everything from top-of-the-line sportscars like the Aston Martins to great compact family cars like the Morris Minor.

Somewhere along the line the business practices became idiotic, mega-mergers and cars competing with other models from the same manufacturer took the once-great British auto industry and made it a joke. Even great innovations like the Mini were subject to insane design-by-committee rehashes and the list of could-have-been great cars would take up more than a full post here.

Eventually we nationalized the largest company in the industry, and build quality went from marginally acceptable to downright horrible.

Now, sure we still make great cars in Britain, but they are either monumentally expensive works of art, again the Aston Martins come to mind, or they are made by companies from other nations. Today, Jaguar is owned by Tata Motors of India, after being a Ford company before that.

Imagine America, the day that your Corvette is designed in Korea or China even though it is still made in Detroit.

You are starting to see the beginnings of this now, the Chrysler Group is now 20% owned by Fiat, an Italian company that is dictating that their cars start to be sold alongside American ones at dealerships.

I am not saying that General Motors will end up the way of British Leyland, I'm still reserving my opinion on that, but it is a cautionary tale. You may wake up one day to find your major manufacturers gone as you know them, and if you want a truly American car, your options may be down to prohibitively expensive or used.

Well, this has brought up an oppurtunity for me to play with numbers.

It's 50/50 as far as which companies have the most American cars. Five of the 10 are Japanese while the other five are American.

I'm a proponent for workers rights, so I can't say 'blame the unions' because I don't understand the intracacies or the reasoning behind Ford's reasons for outsourcing their parts manufacturing...my guess would be the assembly workers unionized before the manufacturers did.

If Toyota has reasonable management then their workers will have less reason to form a union, win/win for all.

i hate unions and whats been said in this thread is the truth

another reason is american autos are not in the picture is in my opinion

american auto makers/designers make ugly cars.

if they would start designing a "hot" car is will sell like hot cakes for alot of americans if it looks good they really dont care about how it runs

second thing they care about is price.


but then agian toyotas maybe hondas are more american made that american autos.....

theres a is a big difference between american made and american assembled.

how many parts going into autos are acutally made here these days?


outsourcing-unions-taxes-regualtions+fat union pensions= the death of american jobs/industry.

and we all know whose idea those were.


feel free to disagree

The British car industry went from this




to this




In less then 14 years...

So so sad

Originally posted by neo96
i hate unions and whats been said in this thread is the truth

another reason is american autos are not in the picture is in my opinion

american auto makers/designers make ugly cars.

if they would start designing a "hot" car is will sell like hot cakes for alot of americans if it looks good they really dont care about how it runs

second thing they care about is price.


but then agian toyotas maybe hondas are more american made that american autos.....

theres a is a big difference between american made and american assembled.

how many parts going into autos are acutally made here these days?


outsourcing-unions-taxes-regualtions+fat union pensions= the death of american jobs/industry.

and we all know whose idea those were.


feel free to disagree

I won't agree with you on the unions but I will agree with you that American auto companies have to get some good looking cars again! What is with the carved-with-a-chisel look over there these days? Have GM, Ford and Chrysler forgotten that a car with curves can be just as attractive as a woman with them?

I am also wondering why the upper class of American cars is what it is these days. Here, there is a waiting list to get a new Morgan Aero 8 despite the car costs as much as two or three new Toyotas.

The last American car I can think of that lived up to the European idea of an amazing sports car was the Ford GT. Sure these days you can get a crazy body kit or every bell and whistle in a Mustang, but it is still going to look like a shoebox that has some bits cut from it with a knife, and everyone else will have the same bloody thing.

If American car designers could remember what made the great successes of the past so magical and come up with cars like the original Corvettes, Mustangs, Thunderbirds, Roadmasters GTOs, Chargers and Road Runners again instead of searching in vain for some retro-kitsch remake, then yes I think you're cars would be hot as hell again!

The image of American cars in Britain, and I'm guessing throughout Europe is pretty terrible, and we tend to see them as Gas guzzling beasts that have terrible handling and awful awful build quality,

I'm struggling to remember the last time I saw a U.S car on the streets of London apart from the occasional prowler and a few Neons.

Apart from the time a few years ago when a very very sexy middle aged women passed by me on the road in a 1960's bright red Ford GTO and nearly made me crash into a lamp post because I was looking at her so hard.

Originally posted by davespanners
The image of American cars in Britain, and I'm guessing throughout Europe is pretty terrible, and we tend to see them as Gas guzzling beasts that have terrible handling and awful awful build quality,

I'm struggling to remember the last time I saw a U.S car on the streets of London apart from the occasional prowler and a few Neons.

Apart from the time a few years ago when a very very sexy middle aged women passed by me on the road in a 1960's bright red Ford GTO and nearly made me crash into a lamp post because I was looking at her so hard.

Reputations can be overcome though, it's hard but possible. Ten years ago I thought Volvos were some of the most boring cars on the road. They were fit for the family man whom every interesting or fun shred of his personality had long ago been sunk into a dull office job. Today I love my turbocharged Volvo C30, it's one of the most fun cars I've ever driven.

America can do this too, I think the majority of us Europeans want you back making eye catching beautiful cars that run well and will last and last. There is something timeless about certain American cars. Nowadays people talk about unions and outsourcing and the bottom line so much, but the real reason your nation's carmakers have gotten in trouble, and out of touch with the driver, is because they have forgotten that a car is a special thing. All of the Big Three took their creations for granted, and now with everyone trying to score cheap political points over it this makes it even worse.

I truly do believe that great cars are things of beauty, as much works of art as industry. America seems to have forgotten that, and I think that's why you're now in even more trouble than you think. The world is waiting to see what the Big Three can show us, and now more than ever it is time to take our breath away.

It's an interesting point you make, and I would tend to agree with you, but I think that the production of all goods, not just cars, are going in a certain way.

Everything is built to appeal to the largest possible market and built down to the cheapest price possible, and instead of taking any pride in the product being better then the competition, now pride is taken in a product being easier to produce or cheaper then the competition.

The only example that I can think of is that my dads 1960's rogers amplifier and Gerrard turntable built 50 years ago sounds and looks better then any sound system that I could afford to buy today anywhere

[edit on 9-8-2010 by davespanners]