US Regulations makes the rear bigger?

RICKS said:

And what happens when Polly-soccer-mom backs into your 60's Mustang bumper in a parking lot? It's rigid steel, it doesn't have any give or flex, so it buckles from the little 2mph nudge from Polly's SUV, and you've got to buy an entire new bumper.

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Actually it is worse than that. When the bumper on your 60s Mustang buckles it will smash right into the rest of the car resulting in serious body damage. I was rear ended pretty hard by a moron a few months ago in my 96 GT. All that happened to the car was that the bumper was scratched and I had to replace one of the side reflectors. If I had been hit in the just as hard in my 66 Mustang I would have had to not only replace the rear bumper but the car would also require replacement or major repairs to all of the back panels, the quarter panels, the gas tank and the trunk.



QCStang, that was funny. Seems like a lot of people only like capitalism if it helps them.

RodStang said:

Actually it is worse than that. When the bumper on your 60s Mustang buckles it will smash right into the rest of the car resulting in serious body damage. I was rear ended pretty hard by a moron a few months ago in my 96 GT. All that happened to the car was that the bumper was scratched and I had to replace one of the side reflectors. If I had been hit in the just as hard in my 66 Mustang I would have had to not only replace the rear bumper but the car would also require replacement or major repairs to all of the back panels, the quarter panels, the gas tank and the trunk.



QCStang, that was funny. Seems like a lot of people only like capitalism if it helps them.

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Yep, just a tiny tap and your bumper takes-out the taillight panel, the wrap-around ends of the bumper swing into your 1/4 panel, tweaks your valance, and you're off to the body shop for $1000-1500 in body repair and painting, hoping to god he gets the paint matched correctly, and can make a blend at the top edge of the 1/4's that doesn't shout at you from 50 feet away. In the front, 65-73 Mustangs are even MORE fragile. These days, you can get tapped in the front or rear and you rarely have much more damage beyond a scuff & paint on a new repro bumper cover (cheap). And if you REALLY get whacked, all of the crush and crumple zones engineered in from the bumpers and throughout the car that are DESIGNED that way, absorb much of the extreme energy that is involved with an impact, keeping your brains safely inside your noggin, not splattered all over the steering wheel or headrest. Ron Jeremy, I know I slammed you kinda hard here, but I think you know alot about the gentle art of boot knocking flicks, but very little about applied physics or engineering.

That's called capitalism. What are ya, some kind of commie pinko?

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He wouldnt' know, he doesnt' know what a communist (or socialist or any of that other spew he keeps throwing around) means.

As for the bumpers, I have no idea why you decided to talk about chrome bumpers, but as was addressed, the biggest reason we don't have them is no one wants them. With all the car modifying that goes on today, have you ever seen anyone transplant a chrome bumper onto a modern car (if so... well... you couldn't have seen many ha)? No one wants it. Plus the aforementioned cost and lack of give. They're also heavy. Doesn't work.

And before you condemn the Japanese and Euro automakers, you should take a look at them. Ford and GM need to not follow where Chrysler went, and make cars competitively. Ford's current aggressive (tons of new, bold cars and trucks) business plan might help, but it could also backfire if the styles don't catch on. The truck market could very well go the way the car market did. Anyone read about the Nissan Titan? It is as good a truck as the new F150 and superior in some ways. Toyotas mid-size trucks are excellent. GMs lineup looks relatively boring at the moment, so they had better do something to excite their lineup. I'm actually thrilled to see Volvo engineers working on Ford cars... Volvo has been known for decades to make extremely high quality cars.

I think Ford and GM have the time and resources to turn it around, but its not going to be easy. And guess what... its how well the US companies imitate these LIBERAL foriegn brands that will determine whether they still exist in a couple decades.

You'd be surprised at what I know.

Anyways, I forgot that Ford owns Volvo. You are absolutely right. We Americans had to bail them out. The reason why Ford bought Volvo was because the Swedes who owned Volvo were incompetent and they didn't run the company right and they almost went bankrupt. Since Ford bought out the company things have improved at Volvo. Thanks to the Americans. We always have to clean up other people's messes in the international corporate world. The Volvo purchase is one example. I guess that this is what we get for globalization. Even though Ford owns Volvo, I still hate Volvo automobiles. I never liked them. They always looked ugly. If Volvo starts building some nice looking cars, I will change my mind. But as long as they build ugly cars, I don't care for Volvos. I will stick to my Mustangs. I only buy American cars and I only support America.

As for the bumper standards, each time we get our front or rear cheap plastic bumpers tapped into, our bumpers will need to get repainted. I am sick and tired of repainting/replacing the plastic bumpers on all the cars that I own when they just get tapped into. If these same cars had metal bumpers, there wouldn't be any scrapes and scratches on them and they wouldn't need to get repainted or replaced most of the time. But as long as we have cheap plastic bumpers, we will have to take them to the body shop every time a moron backs into them. How many of you here have had this same problem? I know that I have had it with every car that I have owned that had a plastic bumper on it. Don't tell me that a plastic bumper holds better than a metal one when some idiot taps into it or backs into it. It doesn't. You have to either replace it or repaint it. You wouldn't have this problem if the bumper was all metal. Why? Because a metal bumper doesn't get scraped and scratched as easily as plastic does when someone taps it or lightly backs into it. That's why I don't like plastic bumpers. And I tell you again. I don't care for the bumper standard laws. They are still stupid laws that are made for people to pay more money for cars. Air bags, bumper laws and the stupid environmental clean air anti-pollution laws cost the consumer more money when they purchase a car because the car has to have all the extra junk that's not needed put on the car. That's why we can't buy a decent car anymore for $10,000. When you add all this stuff on a vehicle you have to pay more money for a car. I don't go for that.

But volvo's are square. And you don't like round cars.

SVTdriver said:

But volvo's are square. And you don't like round cars.

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Don't feed the pigeons.

Not the current Volvos. They all have rounded out body panels. I hate rounded out body panels all around a car.

During the old days, Volvos were too boxy. I hate the cars that are too boxy too. I don't like cars that are too boxy and too rounded. Period.

A proportionate car which I like is the 1999-2004 Mustang and the 2005 Mustang. They are not too rounded and not too boxy. They are proportionate. Do you know what proportionate means? They are proportionate. That's how all cars should look like. Proportionate. How many times do I have to say this. Proportionate.

You have a very particluar range of shape you like don't you?

Personally, I find trapezoids and dodecahedrons quite offensive.

The only thing I want to know is if this guy is really Ron Jeremy.

"THE **** KING"

Thats it.

Thanks.

Yes, I am the REAL one. It's nice to meet you.

Ron Jeremy said:

I did some research back in the late 90's and I found out that auto manufacturers make BIG profits on trucks. For example, a 1999 Jeep Grand Cherokee only costs Chrysler $15,000 to $17,000 to build. They then turn around and sell it for $32,000 to the dealer and the dealer turns around and sells it for $35,000 to $38,000 to the consumer. That's too much of a markup that the auto manufacturers have for an SUV like that. That's why all cars are expensive. Auto manufacturers are selling them for too much to the dealer and the dealer is selling them too much to the stupid consumer. A decent car should not cost anymore than $14,000. But noooooo. The manufacturers have to gouge the dealer and the dealer in return has to gouge the consumer. That's not fair. That's nothing more than just plain robbery.

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Ron,
You may be right about those figures as production costs. You're missing the costs of research & development, governmental testing requirements, manufacturer overhead, marketing, and warranty liability expenses.

You CAN buy a decent car today for around $14k. It won't be american made, it won't have much power, it won't be real comfortable for a long trip, but it will be a decent car to commute around town and will probably have a 10 year/100,000 drivetrain warranty. The Hyundai's & Kia's fill that inexpensive place in the market. Most people just want more.

During your research, I'm sure you found that today's cars are not much more expensive than the cars of the 60's, when taking inflation and economic conditions into account. The cars of today are, however, much more powerful, fuel efficient, faster, safer, and convienient than cars of the past.

I don't think anyone is gouging anybody, Anyone who has owned automobile stock over the last 20 years, has seen little return on their investment. American automobile companies are hemoraging cash in an attempt to provide consumers with a product that they want, while keeping costs minimized.

Ron Jeremy said:

Yes, I am the REAL one. It's nice to meet you.

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Same here.

off topic /

back to the ORIGINAL subject, I think I read somewhere that they actually had to make the rear hang out more so it wouldn't be classified as a compact and therefore get hit big cause of the power/fuel economy stuff....am I right?

and for Ron's comments about chrome bumpers, safety crap, etc....Ron, considering your career, etc., I would suspect you have a decent amount of cash laying around (more than me at least)...so if you hate plastic bumpers and saftey equipment and price gouging and everything else you complain about, why not just sell your 2 mustangs and go buy some nice classic cars? seriously...they have chrome bumpers...they don't have saftey crap...they havenice styling, etc, etc, etc. I really can't understand WHY you own NEW cars and are wanting another NEW car, when, from your comments, you seem to prefer the days of old. that's about all I have to say about that.

And I too was wondering if you were in fact the real Ron. Nice meeting you. And Ron, can you do me a favor? Please tone down the political stuff. I know you have a right to express your opinions on our political system and others, but we're here to talk about cars. I don't doubt that you know what socialist/communist/whatever is, and I don't doubt that you actually have quite a bit of intelligence, but seriously man, people's opinions won't be swayed by your political comments.

(P.S. that was not an attack on you or your opinions Ron..I really hope I won't have a rebuttal to read next time I'm on here)

No problem. I understand what you mean here.

I've owned quite a few classic cars in the past 10 years. My favorite classics are the late 60's Lincoln vehicles. I really love the old 69-71 Lincoln Mark III's. I was given one of these cars as a gift by Vanessa Del Rio that starred in one of my movie flicks. I still have the car up to this day. Vanessa Del Rio always wanted me to have this car and she bought it for me as a gift when I won an award for one of my movie flicks back in the early 80's. As for my own Mustangs, I would never buy anything else. I love my Mustangs. I want to buy another Mustang in the next 2 years or so, but I want to see how the new 2006 Cobra is going to look like before I make my decision. In the meantime, I am a very busy person working with Warner Brothers on the Surreal Show and on other film projects around Hollywood. I seem to be in big demand around here and am always busy making my own flicks when I am not doing the Surreal reality show.

I hope to someday meet all my fans in here just like I do when I travel all around the country signing autographs at various popular night clubs around the country. I wish you well and keep your head up.