Detroit Motor Show 2006 / UK journalist's view

It might interest some of you to read a well-known UK journalist's preview
of the imminent Detroit Motor Show. Retro continues to be in.

http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22750-1973413,00.html

The article appears in today's Sunday Times, the UK's biggest-selling
quality Sunday paper.

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling
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America rolls back the years
The Detroit motor show reveals US car makers, under siege from
imports, bringing back old names, reports Ray Hutton


Chrysler's design for a new Dodge Challenger is a
lot like the old

American car makers are discovering that nothing sells like
nostalgia. This year's Detroit motor show, the trendsetting equivalent of
Paris Fashion Week, revives the greatest car names of the 1960s and 1970s.
The big three - General Motors, Ford and Chrysler - have opened
their catalogues from years gone by and revived the glamour of films such as
Bullitt and the hot summer nights of Bruce Springsteen lyrics.

At the show, which opens on Saturday, Ford will unveil the
Shelby Mustang GT500 coupé and convertible. Both variants are throwbacks to
the machines that made Ford famous on the track in the Trans-Am racing
series.

General Motors is showing off a Chevy Camaro, one of the cars
produced in the 1960s to rival the Mustang. It will be reborn with a 400bhp
V8 engine pinched from GM's Corvette, although it won't be on sale for
another three years at least.



Chrysler is unveiling a prototype of a Dodge Challenger, another
rival to the Mustang, that is due to be in the showrooms in two years' time
and is a dead ringer for its 1970 namesake.

With falling sales and consumers deserting traditional brands in
favour of cheap imports from the Pacific rim, car makers hope that by
reviving the names still immortalised in film and song they will
re-establish themselves on the American cultural landscape and invigorate
sales.


"We need to remind people of the cars that made us great in the
first place and bring glamour back to the showrooms," said an American car
executive.

Back in the 1960s and 1970s the Beach Boys wrote about fantasy
Corvettes (In My Car) and Chevrolets (Cherry, Cherry Coupé) and Don McLean
drove his Chevy to the levy (American Pie). Springsteen built a Challenger
(The Promise) and drove a 69 Chevy (Racing in the Street) while Wilson
Pickett's Mustang Sally helped sell Fords to the masses. Today cars are
still mentioned in songs more than any other product, according to
Brandstand, a US marketing firm.

While they look much the same as their ancestors, these retro
cars have much better performance, come with all mod cons and meet safety
and exhaust emissions standards.

The new Shelby Mustang will be powered by a 450bhp version of
the supercharged 5.4 litre V8 engine that powers the Ford GT. It takes its
name from the tuned versions of the Mustang produced by Carroll Shelby, now
82, who devised the original Mustang GT500 in 1966.

Dodge is now a brand of DaimlerChrysler and the new Challenger
will be built on a shortened Chrysler 300 chassis platform that includes
Mercedes multi-link independent suspension. It is likely to cost about
$35,000 (£20,000).

The car makers aren't doing this on a whim. By opening their
back catalogues they hope to recover the slide in sales that sent them into
the red last year. Chrysler has already proved that retro sells. In 2001 it
introduced the popular PT Cruiser, with a style reminiscent of the 1930s.

Ford's facsimile of the 1967 fastback Mustang, fabled as the
star of the great car chase in the Steve McQueen film Bullitt, is already
selling well. So well in fact that Ford still can't make enough to meet
demand. Some 165,000 were bought last year.

With prices starting at just $20,000 it is a snip, and imports
are available in the UK for as little as £22,000. At the other end of the
price scale is the £126,000 Ford GT, introduced 40 years after the original
GT40 and feted as an instant classic on both sides of the Atlantic.



Some of the other retro designs will soon be on their way across
the pond. The Dodge Caliber, a chunky hatchback designed to compete with the
Focus and Astra, will be coming to Britain in July. It incorporates design
elements from rough-and-tough Dodge trucks.

Could the vogue for retro styling lead to a reinvention of other
classics? Get ready for a relaunched Pontiac Firebird or Plymouth Barracuda.
The annual Detroit motor show is the most important in North America and for
many car makers North America is the most important market in the world. No
wonder, then, that the show is noted for its number of new production models
and prophetic concept cars.



Other cars on show at Detroit for the first time include a
four-seater Aston Martin, the Rapide. The concept car is a stretched DB9
with four doors and a possible rival to Porsche's forthcoming Panamera,
though no decision has been made to produce it.

Mini will give a preview of its redesigned car and unveil a US
version of the Traveller concept that was shown at the Frankfurt and Tokyo
motor shows last autumn. Volvo, which teased audiences in Detroit last year
with a photograph of its small C30 coupé, presents the real thing this time.

The Nissan Urge is a kind of stripped-down 350Z with the
minimalist character of a Lotus Elise.


It still a concept but there are hopes it will progress to
production as another relatively inexpensive sports two-seater.

More manufacturers are testing the American market with small
cars, hoping to follow the fashion success of the Mini and Toyota's funky
Scion xB, aimed at younger buyers.

Mazda is considering a little coupé derived from its Kabura
concept. The Reflex is a Fiesta-sized concept car from Ford of America,
while South Korea's most ambitious car maker is showing the shape of things
to come with a neat hatchback called the Kia Soul.

Among bigger cars there are trends towards crossovers between
SUVs and conventional estate cars, exemplified by the Buick Enclave, Ford
Edge, Lincoln Aviator and Mazda CX-7.

Another theme of the show is petrol-electric hybrid power
systems pioneered by the Toyota Prius and Honda Insight.


The North American International Auto Show at the Cobo Center,
Detroit, opens to the public on Saturday and runs until January 22

 

As I type this (11:30 am sunday) I'm watching the local NBC affilliate
in Detroit (WDIV - channel 4) as they cover the first press day of the
show.

They are showing the unveiling of concept cars, announcing award
winners, etc. They are broadcasting live from Cobo center. They
just showed the GM Enclave concept (official unveiling at 2:15 pm).

Honda Civic wins 2006 North American car of the year.

They are talking about Chrysler's elaborate unveilings in the past and
how this year is sure to top them all, and how they make everyone
around sign NDA's prior to the unveiling.

 

11:47 am

Truck of the year (North American truck of the year?) is 2006 Honda
Ridgeline.

Honda is first company to win both car and truck of the year in same
year.

 

Ford Reflex concept looks like Crossfire with gull-wing doors.
Especially the rear end.

http://www.leftlanenews.com/2006/01/03/more-pictures-of-the-new-ford-reflex/

 

See what I mean here:

http://www.leftlanenews.com/2006/01/08/detroit-2006-ford-small-is-big-reflex-concept/

 

Live coverage is finished until 7 pm tonight, then a wrap-up at 11:30
pm.

Charity preview night is next friday night which would put the first
day open to the general public on Saturday Jan 14.

Until then, here's a link to up-to-date news from the show:

http://autoblog.com/2006/01/08/the-shows-about-to-start/

 

In those years I couldn't stand the large NA cars, so I went import.

Looks like that may again be my direction, I'm sad to say.
I really enjoyed the great NA cars of the 80s/90s though, but the nice
ride appears over for me.
I'm just a contrarian perhaps, that's how I invest and it works as the
sheep follow in other directions.

How can they ignore the fast rising gasoline prices? Obviously bad long
range planning, so now they have to bend the metal a bit to sell the
over large cars they planned several years back when low cost gasoline
was the norm.