Random Thoughts... [Automotive Edition]

I saw a new Polo/Golf today, had no idea which one it was... IMO they both look exactly the same. I have the same issue with the 207/308
 
Aston Martin said:
I saw a new Polo/Golf today, had no idea which one it was... IMO they both look exactly the same. I have the same issue with the 207/308
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Best way to tell is the rear end:

800px-VW_Polo_V_20090717_rear.JPG


vs

800px-VW_Golf_VI_1.6_20090620_rear.JPG
 
Striking Workers Shut Down Chinese Honda Factories: Where Is Slave Labor When We Need It?
By Bertel Schmitt on May 27, 2010

From Reuters to The Nikkei [sub], the world is abuzz with the shocking news that Honda had to shut down assembly lines at all of their four Chinese auto assembly plants after workers at a Honda transmission factory in Foshan in southern China walked off the job. While the job action barely registers in the Chinese press, my phone in Beijing rings off the hook. Common question from abroad: ?Are they allowed to do that?? There goes another myth.

Before we get to that, the facts: Monthly salaries for factory employees at the transmission factory average 1,500 yuan ($220). The workers want something between 2,000 yuan ($300) to 2,500 yuan ($370) a month, same as what the folks at Honda?s auto assembly plants receive.

On Monday, talks between workers and management broke down. Workers walked. With just-in-time production, the effects were immediate: Honda had to send Monday?s night shift home at their Zengcheng plant (Accord) and at a plant in Huangpu. Yesterday (Wednesday) night, the Honda factory in Wuhan, which makes the Civic, ran out of transmissions and was shut down.

As of this Thursday afternoon in China, all Honda factories remain closed with no end in sight. The Nikkei [sub] said this afternoon that Honda has no plans to obtain transmissions from Japan. A signal that Honda wants to play hardball: If the workers in the transmission plant strike, jobs elsewhere are imperiled.

Now, back to the question. Are Chinese workers allowed to strike? It may come as a surprise to some that strikes are a common occurrence in China. Slavery has been abolished long ago, and you can?t force someone to come to work. China is a signatory to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, including the right to strike. As long as workers walk off the job, the only recourse a company has is to fire them for breach of contract.

Militant picketing, Teamster?s style, blocking of plant entrances and so forth would fall under ?illegal assembly to break the public peace? and can attract police action. Which doesn?t mean that strikes are always peaceful. Last year, rioting steel workers killed the manager of a steel factory in Jilin, then attacked the police. A factory that made Nerf toys for Hasbro was ransacked by laid-off workers after they had overwhelmed security guards and police. A Philips factory needed the protection of riot police after 1000 workers went on strike. Chinese workers learned from their French colleagues: Taking managers hostage is a common occurrence. No wonder that a little strike at a transmission factory doesn?t get much traction in the Chinese media.

As far as Honda goes, this is the third strike they had in China this year alone. The car market is surging, the workers want a piece of the action. Possibly, enough to buy a car. As China?s economy grows, the oversupply of workers has lessened. Massive government infrastructure projects gave jobs to workers back home in the hinterlands, which lowered the supply of migrant workers.

Not everybody is happy about this. As Tokyo is getting ready to go home this evening, The Nikkei [sub] muses: ?In China, mounting worker frustration over pay levels and working conditions is disrupting the operations of Japanese carmakers, who are growing concerned that they might be unable to keep pace with wage increases.?
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This makes me all warm and fuzzy inside, chinese workers need higher wages. The cars they produce cost just as much as cars do in Europe, which is an indication of how underpaid they are.
 
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Called the Citro?n's seller;

There's a pressurised hose/pipe under the hood that's gone, and it sprays all over the engine bay after a while. The car starts and works otherwise; all electrics work and it's been looked after every now and then. It's last been in use in 2005, and while the body doesn't really have rust, the seller couldn't say anything about the underbody as it's his dad's old car or something. "Well, it's the 2.0 "Tampere" model with a Renault engine, so that might explain why it works, but since it's a French car that costs 270 euro, it can go either way." So, it's not driveable at the moment, and I don't know if it has any qualifications for a MOT after being out of commission for five years. But; if the hose is the only major issue, if the underbody is not hopeless, if it can be made to pass MOT it would be a cracking summer car. I'll keep my eye on the ad.

And yeah, the air-con is dead.
 
Exactly.

Looking at a Finnish Citro?n specialist's spare parts listing, but since I don't know the exact hose that's gone, it's a difficult to guesstimate the difficulty of the fix.
 
public said:
Exactly.

Looking at a Finnish Citro?n specialist's spare parts listing, but since I don't know the exact hose that's gone, it's a difficult to guesstimate the difficulty of the fix.
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You can do it. Just buy it, since you will REALLY regret it later if you don't.
 
public said:
Called the Citro?n's seller;

There's a pressurised hose/pipe under the hood that's gone, and it sprays all over the engine bay after a while. The car starts and works otherwise; all electrics work and it's been looked after every now and then. It's last been in use in 2005, and while the body doesn't really have rust, the seller couldn't say anything about the underbody as it's his dad's old car or something. "Well, it's the 2.0 "Tampere" model with a Renault engine, so that might explain why it works, but since it's a French car that costs 270 euro, it can go either way." So, it's not driveable at the moment, and I don't know if it has any qualifications for a MOT after being out of commission for five years. But; if the hose is the only major issue, if the underbody is not hopeless, if it can be made to pass MOT it would be a cracking summer car. I'll keep my eye on the ad.

And yeah, the air-con is dead.
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You know if this was any other frenchie then a CX (apart from the DS obviously) I would laugh SO hard hard at the mere thought of buying a 20 year old french car witch costs 270 euro's :rofl: ......but its a CX, I loved those things, its still gonna land you in a world off issues, cost an arm and a leg to restore, make your girlfriend leave you , loose your job, ruin your life......but its a goddamn CX, Buy it!
 
I just had the most surreal moment ever. An old primary school mate of mine just put a status on facebok saying he'd crashed his car on a dual carriageway. The reason? He hit a deer.
 
Yes, but he hit the deer and therefore can prove that his crash was in fact deer-related. :D

Unlike, well.....
 
I was merely stating that it was a deer related incident. :p Close enough I'd say - its just the British deer aren't quite as fast as the Slovenian ones so can't get out the way in time...
 
public said:
Exactly.

Looking at a Finnish Citro?n specialist's spare parts listing, but since I don't know the exact hose that's gone, it's a difficult to guesstimate the difficulty of the fix.
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Pff. Pressurized hose?

HARDWARE STORE.
 
Yepp... it's more of a pipe. And I'd need to check the underbody with a hammer etc etc.

I emailed a guy I know, who is a French car enthusiast (when we were doing military service together, he had seven French cars, drove around in a Renault 25 and was fixing a 604); he used to own several CX:s and might know something about the car, since he's from the same region. At the very worst, he could tell me how hard it could be to get the car driven/towed 200 kms.
 
Real men make their own 10,000psi test hydraulic hose out of metal they mined and processed out of their own yard.
 
AiR said:
This makes me all warm and fuzzy inside, chinese workers need higher wages. The cars they produce cost just as much as cars do in Europe, which is an indication of how underpaid they are.
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I have had a theory for a while...

Currently people buy Chinese products (cars included) because they are so cheap. And the products are cheap, because of cheap labor costs. BUT, as China improves the people's standard of living (15 years ago they didn't have cars, now it's the biggest emerging market), and their wages increase...the product cost will increase too.

So there would no longer be a reason to buy Chinese, but because their factories would be producing massive amounts of goods, we would be buying the same Chinese...crap...for the price of US or EU made products.
 
Or, what my dad did; He basically kept a huge stock of old parts coming off Nike Hercules missiles, after they were decommissioned and subsequently scrapped in the early 90s. Most of the parts he kept are hydraulic pressure hoses, nuts, bolts, washers, mounts, brackets, as well as tools such as pipes, wrenches, torque meters etc... No solid rocket boosters... :sad: Basically, that stuff won't fail. Our old Range Rover's cooling system and fuelling lines were almost all Nike parts, most of which is designed to hold more than 300'000psi...

_HighVoltage_ said:
, but because their factories would be producing massive amounts of goods, we would be buying the same Chinese...crap...for the price of US or EU made products.
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Yes, but... That will certainly reduce the profitability of outsourcing to China drastically. Which means it will (again) be profitable to start or maintain manufacturing in the US, Europe and Japan, since labour costs will be the same..
 
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