[19x03] February 10th, 2013

[19x03] February 10th, 2013


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You sure come across as both.

Well, if that's the case, then you come off as an abrasive little ass with a chip on their shoulder.


Who said I was merely trying to insult you?

I did. Your logic = "I disagree with him, therefore he must be stupid". :rolleyes:

No, your opinions are less valid because they're wrong. And do you really think you're the first person to make these particular accusations? By the way, the way you stated them, you didn't express them as opinions. You stated them as fact.

That's your opinion. Nonetheless, you merely stating that, "I'm wrong", doesn't make it so. No, I don't think I'm the first, nor will I be the last. Your last sentence is a non sequitur.

You'll find out that if I do so, it'd be a first for me here. And I don't plan on breaking my streak.

Reinforces my first point.

So you admit that you went off without knowing what you were talking about. A little research here could have disabused you of those notions.

I didn't say you were right; I merely said you had a point and I could see where you're coming from.

Yes, there is. Engines, for one.

I'm quite sure that that is the only difference. The chassis, suspension, electronics, body panels, glass and subsystems are all basically the same.
 
I don't want to go into the details, so here are 2c: I work for the German branch of an American company. We both develop products for our individual markets, and naturally, we also share products from time to time. Now, the majority of American products we are asked to introduce to the German market needed at least a major makeover, sometimes a complete rebuild. The reasons mostly are quality and usability issues.

The American products we get always look good on the outside, have nice surfaces and a good feature list, but when you take them in your hands and start to use them, you notice that there is little substance behind the surface. As a conclusion, it appears to me that a "quality product" to an American is something which has a lot of good features and looks good. In contrast, a "quality product" for a European (speaking for the Germans here) is something which is built well in every single detail and also down to the very core. It doesn't need to have an endless feature list, but when you use it, you must feel it was engineered from the ground up to be a quality product, and that a lot of thought has gone into even the tiniest detail.

That is what Clarkson is on about when he criticises America. He criticises that things look good on the surface, but start to fall apart (figuratively) as soon as you lay a hand on them. That there is no substance behind the shiny surface. That of course does not expand to all branches of engineering, and also he does not say that Americans are not able to engineer quality products. But it applies to many products of daily life. Let's stay with the Ford Mustang as an example. I personally know two people who have had the current V8 Mustang as a car. Both said that it has a lot of power, which is nice. And then, both sold the car much sooner than they initially intended to, because they said it is so hard to control on a wet road even if you just want to drive normally that they were too scared to do so, which in turn meant that they didn't want to live with that car. So on the surface, you get a car with loads of power for little money, which seems very attractive to any car enthusiast. Nonetheless, if it turns out that you can not really use that power and that it is rather disturbing than helping in daily traffic, there is little point in having that car. As a product for the European market, the Mustang would never have seen the light of day, simply because it is not refined enough for the European market. That is exactly what Clarkson concluded.

I can see where you're coming from; the Germans have always had a reputation for quality products (and rightly so). However, the Germans aren't necessarily the best at designing and engineering everything as many people may think - especially the Europeans, as a whole, (As JC and TG continually try to claim when they say "European car"). There are some manufacturing industries in which the Americans excel, and in some cases are the best at, especially electronics, software and aerospace. I live in Germany (moved here about 4 years ago) and I know many Germans who refuse to buy anything but Apple products precisely because of the quality designed into them down to the very core - basically all of the reasons you mentioned regarding your products (whatever they are). Having watched nearly every episode of TG and after years of listening to JC's opinions regarding the US, you're likely to think that America is full of nothing but brain-dead, sheep-shagging rednecks, who couldn't find their way out of a paper bag. This only started getting underneath my skin when I got to know many Europeans, in both Germany and the UK, over the last 4-5 years and realized how smug some of them tended to be. Funnily enough, the British always tried to take the credit for German innovation and engineering skill by labeling a German product "European".

I currently work in the tire industry, helping to design and build new tires for various vehicle classes, ranging from tractors to ultra-high-performance racing tires, and I can tell you that there really isn't one single nationality that excels at making car tires; there are only manufacturers that excel at making the best-performing tires - but that is just my industry.

Regarding the Mustang, I'm usually not one to defend American car manufacturers, but, in the end, Ford designed the Mustang and Cobra for a specific type of person who has completely different desires and priorities compared to a more "white-collar" individual. The Mustang was not designed for people with a more refined taste in cars - that's what the Ford Mondeo or Focus was designed for. So, I'm not sure where JC gets off in comparing apples to oranges. If he wanted to buy a more refined, high-performance American long-distance cruiser, he should have purchased a Cadillac CTS-V or a Corvette, but then again, he was only allotted 35,000. As for the Mustang not being suitable for the "sophisticated" European market, that might be true, but it sure does turn a lot of heads, and I personally know a few Germans who've had their American muscle cars specially imported at a pretty penny. I think that definitely says something in and of itself.

Personally, I own an Audi A4 2.0T (which is German engineered, as my German colleagues love to incessantly bring up) and I love the car and I've constantly told my German colleagues of the wonderful experiences I've had with German cars and that their country certainly makes some very exceptional cars. Long story, short, I've gotten a bit sick and tired of many Europeans seeming smugness and sense of superiority, especially when all I've done is compliment their countries and express admiration for many of the fine products that originate in their countries.
 
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I don't want to go into the details, so here are 2c: I work for the German branch of an American company. We both develop products for our individual markets, and naturally, we also share products from time to time. Now, the majority of American products we are asked to introduce to the German market needed at least a major makeover, sometimes a complete rebuild. The reasons mostly are quality and useability issues.

Sounds just like what I'd expect in this type of situation.

The American products we get always look good on the outside, have nice surfaces and a good feature list, but when you take them in your hands and start to use them, you notice that there is little substance behind the surface.

Exactly.

I remember how excited I was when the 2005 Mustang came out.. until I sat in one. I don't even have to go into the driving experience. The dash looked cool on photos, but utterly cheap in RL and to my European eyes. The top part of it (that "roof" thingy spanning the entire width) was so loose that you could bend it up and down about 3 -5? easily - on a brand new car. Cheap, "scratchy" plastics, no metal applications but metal looking plastic-parts, etc. True: They use cheaper parts for the interior of some Euro-cars as well, but usually those are only to be found outside your line of sight (where you usually don't see them) and not on parts you'd touch regularly.

he goes on and on about how unrefined a American cars are, and then he talks about how refined the Ford Focus (also American) is. Anybody else notice a bit of a disconnect there with Clarkson's thinking?

The Ford Focus isn't American. At least not the one Clarkson refers to when he says "Ford Focus". It's been developed in Europe, for the European market to compete with the VW Golf, Vauxhall Astra/etc. Plus the Focus doesn't use a live rear axle..:D

The presenters don't bash US cars because they "hate" the US. They (especially Clarkson) have mentioned more than once how baffled they are by the fact that a country which sent the first man to the moon can't seem to come up with a decent car. And they have a point: How is it that worldwide it's cars like the VW Golf or Toyota Corolla that are the biggest sellers and a by-word for quality? It's not American cars - not by a long shot.

One thing you gotta understand about Clarkson (and a lot of other Europeans) is that we "love to hate" the US. Sure, we mock stuff like cars with live rear axles/leaf springs/pushrod engines.. but that doesn't mean we hate the US. Again: It's more like that we don't understand how an otherwise highly innovative country can be so backwards in some respects. Don't get me started on that whole creationism-thing you guys got going over there ... ;)


S.
 
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The Ford Focus isn't American. At least not the one Clarkson refers to when he says "Ford Focus". It's been developed in Europe, for the European market to compete with the VW Golf, Vauxhall Astra/etc. Plus the Focus doesn't use a live rear axle..:D

If the Ford Focus isn't American, then the BMW X5 isn't German. While what you said about the Focus could apply to the first and second generation Focus, there is, for all intents and purposes, virtually no difference between the American Focus and the European Focus. And all Fords are technically American by default, the same goes for X5s manufactured in the US being German. It really doesn't matter where they are manufactured, in my opinion.

Here's an article on the third-generation Focus: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Focus_(third_generation)

The presenters don't bash US cars because they "hate" the US. They (especially Clarkson) have mentioned more than once how baffled they are by the fact that a country which sent the first man to the moon can't seem to come up with a decent car. And they have a point: How is it that worldwide it's cars like the VW Golf or Toyota Corolla that are the biggest sellers and a by-word for quality? It's not American cars - not by a long shot.

It's mainly because of the 1980s and the 1990s when American manufacturers started to let quality slip in favor of higher profit margins. However, this differs from industry to industry. The most highly regarded construction machinery company is Caterpillar and the highest-quality farming equipment comes from the US (John Deer). I'd say that US auto manufacturers have made tremendous strides quality-wise in the last decade or so.

One thing you gotta understand about Clarkson (and a lot of other Europeans) is that we "love to hate" the US. Sure, we mock stuff like cars with live rear axles/leaf springs/pushrod engines.. but that doesn't mean we hate the US. Again: It's more like that we don't understand how an otherwise highly innovative country can be so backwards in some respects. Don't get me started on that whole creationism-thing you guys got going over there ... ;)
S.

There are both highly intelligent and stupid people in every country - the same goes for companies. Oh, and I definitely agree with you on the Creationism thing...At least the US doesn't have state-mandated religion class, as well as an official state religion complete with a religion tax...:p Though, to be fair, an openly atheist candidate would have a hell of a time getting elected POTUS as of now....

Have you read my reply to the Interceptor?
 
Secondly, Clarkson's got a lot of nerve going on about how uncivilized America is. Has he conveniently forgotten the London riots of just a few years ago? Britain didn't come off as too civilized then, did it? He's obviously never been to Seattle, San Francisco, Portland, Boston, Vancouver or New York. Maybe he should pay Sheffield and Nottingham, in northern England, a visit after traveling to those American cities and get back to us. Not all Americans are dumb ignoramuses either - in a country of nearly 320 million people, you're going to find stupid and intelligent people alike. Would appreciate it if the show would quit its America bashing.

Hmm....I seem to recall reading something in last week's episode's comments by another American...

Americans are (generally) known for not giving a crap about what people from other countries think about them ...

Sounds like some Americans do give a crap what others think... ;-)

As for Clarkson's comments...he really is an equal opportunity basher. Sure, he says positive things but he bashes pretty much every country they mention - including his own. Most people know not to take him seriously. (same goes for offhanded comments made by Hammond and/or May)
 
Did anyone else find Hammond eminently unlikable at times during the race - especially when he said he would enjoy denying James and Jeremy the chance to watch a Champions League match, despite not wanting to go himself. Sometimes I do see bit of a vindictive side to Richard.

Plus had I have been James, I might very well have punched him at that point. "No offence mate" as he disingenuously said to James.
 
Toyota/Subaru ? watchable
News ? watchable
SIARPC ? still nursing a semi
Race ? somewhat tired, less "tension" than in earlier races

6/10
 
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Did anyone else find Hammond eminently unlikable at times during the race - especially when he said he would enjoy denying James and Jeremy the chance to watch a Champions League match, despite not wanting to go himself. Sometimes I do see bit of a vindictive side to Richard.

Plus had I have been James, I might very well have punched him at that point. "No offence mate" as he disingenuously said to James.

I figured that was one of the few times that their 'characters' came into play for this episode. They're supposed to show those personalities to the camera. Wouldn't surprise me if either they all had tickets to the match after all, or if Richard gave his ticket to James.

Didn't seem any different than James & Jeremy damaging Richard's car in last week's US trip, so he'd lose the race to Mexico...or any of the many other times they've intentionally done something to mess up one of the others.
 
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Does anyone know the "epic" sounding track that is playing in the background when Clarkson switches to talking about the Subaru? I know i've heard it before but I can't remember where.
 
Well, the point of introducing the cost limit for the car, as explained in the episode, was that the car has always won these races so far, so they intended to make the car fight with one hand tied to the back to make the race more difficult for it. Of course, as demonstrated in the piece, getting loats of horsepower for little money is still possible, and horsepower doesn't really decide who wins either. Therefore this cost limit is more or less window dressing, but the idea still stands.

I don't want to go into the details, so here are my 2c: I work for the German branch of an American company. We both develop products for our individual markets, and naturally, we also share products from time to time. Now, the majority of American products we are asked to introduce to the German market needed at least a major makeover, sometimes a complete rebuild. The reasons mostly are quality and useability issues.

The American products we get always look good on the outside, have nice surfaces and a good feature list, but when you take them in your hands and start to use them, you notice that there is little substance behind the surface. As a conclusion, it appears to me that a "quality product" to an American is something which has a lot of good features and looks good. In contrast, a "quality product" for a European (speaking for the Germans here) is something which is built well in every single detail and also down to the very core. It doesn't need to have an endless feature list, but when you use it, you must feel it was engineered from the ground up to be a quality product, and that a lot of thought has gone into even the tiniest detail.

That is what Clarkson is on about when he criticises America. He criticises that things look good on the surface, but start to fall apart (figuratively) as soon as you lay a hand on them. That there is no substance behind the shiny surface. That of course does not expand to all branches of engineering, and also he does not say that Americans are not able to engineer quality products. But it applies to many products of daily life. Let's stay with the Ford Mustang as an example. I personally know two people who have had the current V8 Mustang as a car. Both said that it has a lot of power, which is nice. And then, both sold the car much sooner than they initially intended to, because they said it is so hard to control on a wet road even if you just want to drive normally that they were too scared to do so, which in turn meant that they didn't want to live with that car. So on the surface, you get a car with loads of power for little money, which seems very attractive to any car enthusiast. Nonetheless, if it turns out that you can not really use that power and that it is rather disturbing than helping in daily traffic, there is little point in having that car. As a product for the European market, the Mustang would never have seen the light of day, simply because it is not refined enough for the European market. That is exactly what Clarkson concluded.

Partly this may be cultural, but I believe a big part of the reason is tax. The Mustang isn't very expensive in America, not much more so than other less powerful cars. As most European countries have zealous taxes on anything more than a 1.4 litre engine (my country is the worst I have to admit) a Mustang would comparatively be a lot more expensive than in America. For that price, it is reasonable to ask for better build quality which at those higher prices would be a much smaller part of the cost. Which means when facing the choice between an expensive Mustang and a little bit more expensive M3 people would be more inclined to go for the M3.

We Europeans (and Clarkson) tend to view cars like the Mustang with big V8s and a lot of power as competitors for cars like the Audi RS5 or the M3 or the CLK AMG when they probably are not. It's the same story for pickups with a lot of cylinders.
 
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Does anyone know the "epic" sounding track that is playing in the background when Clarkson switches to talking about the Subaru? I know i've heard it before but I can't remember where.

There's a separate section for discussing "What's That Song".
 
I figured that was one of the few times that their 'characters' came into play for this episode. They're supposed to show those personalities to the camera. Wouldn't surprise me if either they all had tickets to the match after all, or if Richard gave his ticket to James.

There is no reason for those silly characters--there is absolutely no chance in hell that Richard doesn't know how to pronounce Pele.
 
but I believe a big part of the reason is tax.

Naaaw. Tax is the least of your financial worries with a Mustang. Can't speak for the NL, but in Germany I'd "only" pay 380-400 Euros more per year compared to my Golf. That's, what? Six, seven tanks of gas? Gas-consumption, insurance and cost of repairs/spare parts would be much bigger worries to me.

*And*: The sheer cost of buying the car and its cost in relation to much more modern and more sophisticated cars would be. I just found some new 2012/13 V8-Mustangs for sale in Germany and the cheapest were ?40,000. That's roughly the same money as a well equipped Golf R or a "naked" BMW 135i Coup?. In the US, the cheapest V8-Mustang is priced closer to a well equipped GTI. If that were the case over here as well, I'd probably be driving around in a Highland Green Bullitt-lookalike rather than in a Golf right now - live rear axles be damned. :D.

S.
 
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There is no reason for those silly characters--there is absolutely no chance in hell that Richard doesn't know how to pronounce Pele.

Not disagreeing with you...it is a shame that the characters have rather taken over the regular personalities. I'm sure you could find many many things that each of them have said/done "in character" that you just know is not what they'd really do.
 
There is no reason for those silly characters--there is absolutely no chance in hell that Richard doesn't know how to pronounce Pele.

I think the biggest shock of the piece for me was the revelation James actually likes football.

And I felt what Hammond said about "winning to deny them the pleasure of going to the match" was extremely low. Sabotaging Richard (or another one's) car in a race is meant as a practical joke - but that was just cold.
 
I think the biggest shock of the piece for me was the revelation James actually likes football.

And I felt what Hammond said about "winning to deny them the pleasure of going to the match" was extremely low. Sabotaging Richard (or another one's) car in a race is meant as a practical joke - but that was just cold.

I think you are reading way far too much into the scripting there .....

Besides which if you look back through Jeremy's tweets he states that he went to 2 Champions League matches in 2 days - one of which was this one it appears - so either it was Jeremy's ticket all along that was being used as a prop, or Richard gave him the ticket - Richard has no interest in football and would never have gone to a match on his own rather than spend an evening in a bar with James and the crew!

https://twitter.com/JeremyClarkson/stat ... 1997573121
 
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