'Wheeler Dealers' Brit vs Yank electrics

I've had a few '60's and '70's Britmobiles along with some US and Italian stuff of the same time frame and can say that Lucas stuff is really no worse than anything else of the era. (That's not to say it was any good.) The biggest thing I see with them, 40 years after they were built, is corrosion of the alloy used in the terminals.

In the 1990's the big push was to environmentally friendly plastics for automotive wire insulation. We see that now as wires which have the last 1" or 2" of copper exposed because the insulation shrank (really bad on Chrysler cars). It also gets brittle with heat and then crumbles.

I find the show entertaining, but the two things that stand out for me are:

a) They never really check the car mechanically unless something is making a noise or a shimmy. No compression check, no coolant system checks, etc... If it runs sell it.

b) They love the rattle can paint. I guess it is perfectly acceptable in the UK to drive a nice car that was painted with spray cans from the hardware store.

Funny enough that the newer episodes aren't that bad. I actually sorta like the triumph stag that they showed on june 1st. I believe they are upto season 8 now, all the ones they show over here in the US are from season 4 or 5.

Andrew

I guess I somehow missed it....

If "positive ground was an era thing and not a location thing"? why do I remember seeing a '67 Ford Cortina with a large sticker on the underside of the hood warning it had a positive ground electrical system (I would assume so Ford dealers/techs in the U.S. didn't install batteries in Cortinas "backwards") yet I can't remember any car I've owned from the 50s or 60s that had positive grounds three wire electrical system?

GTwannaB wrote: I find the show entertaining, but the two things that stand out for me are: a) They never really check the car mechanically unless something is making a noise or a shimmy. No compression check, no coolant system checks, etc... If it runs sell it. b) They love the rattle can paint. I guess it is perfectly acceptable in the UK to drive a nice car that was painted with spray cans from the hardware store.

Keep in mind, they a) are doing a show for entertainment in b) 2 half-hour segments. Hard to be incredibly thorough withing those constraints. For all you know, they do check everything over off-camera.

The rattle can stuff is mostly in the earlier episodes where they're working with dirt-cheap cars--not so much on the pricier ones. Anyway, the whole "bodged" aesthetic of it should have serious GRM appeal, IMHO.

GTwannaB wrote: I find the show entertaining, but the two things that stand out for me are: a) They never really check the car mechanically unless something is making a noise or a shimmy. No compression check, no coolant system checks, etc... If it runs sell it.

I would say that's pretty normal in the UK. It also explains why you see so many cars grinding to a halt in a cloud of steam once the outside temperature reaches 75.

integraguy wrote: If "positive ground was an era thing and not a location thing"? why do I remember seeing a '67 Ford Cortina with a large sticker on the underside of the hood warning it had a positive ground electrical system (I would assume so Ford dealers/techs in the U.S. didn't install batteries in Cortinas "backwards") yet I can't remember any car I've owned from the 50s or 60s that had positive grounds three wire electrical system?

Well, I would presume that the 67 Ford you saw was a 60's era car, but perhaps I'm confused? And I'd believe it had that warning because it was a positive ground. The Brits were slower than the US automobile manufacturers to switch to negative ground (which did gradually win the battle). Tractor and heavy truck and some military equipment were much slower, and some are still positive grounded.

Not sure what you're talking about with regards to a three wire electrical system. Are you talking about John Deere and their floating ground system? That was a nightmare, with 12v negative, 12 volt positive, a non-chassis neutral wire "floating" between them , and 24 volt total potential across the two hot legs. That was not a popular system, and thankfully did not catch on.

The rest of the world stopped positive ground in the early 50's the era lasted a bit longer in England which is why In the late 60's a Ford dealer would need to be reminded that one car was still being built backwards

I thought it was funny when he was complaing about the handling. He said it pushes in the corners and if you give it any gas the back end will step out..... throttle steer anyone?

Also he kept referring to it as an american muscle car, not as a sports car? If it has more than 150 hp it's no longer a sports car?

foxtrapper wrote: When it comes to defective electronic dashboards, the US companies take the cake. They all fail, and are non-replaceable or repairable. There's a whole lot of cars in the junk yards just because the dashboard failed.

There's a place locally that repairs instrument clusters. They repair your unit so that you don't have to reflash anything. It's fairly cheap as far as electronics work goes, too.

I see ads for mail-order cluster repair all the time, too.

And it was a fairly easy and inexpensive repair too, even from the UK. Not even remotely like troubleshooting and replacing a melted Spitfire wiring harness.

OK, last night they referred a couple of times to the "bulletproof" nature of Porsche electrics and accessories. From a '70s 924, no less. That is just nuts.

Yah, I saw that and chuckled.

Lucas Prince of Darkness. I carried a box of new coils in the trunk of my Minis, went through three on one winter trip to Toronto. Not to mention Hydrolastic suspension...

OK, the GTI episodes talked me out of ever wanting another MK1 Scirocco. I hate electrical problems.

And why does the little guy always interrupt Edd when Edd is getting chuffed? I am not sure what the term means but it sounds like something that shouldn't be interrupted.

Otto_Maddox wrote: Didn't he also say that Corvettes don't handle all that well? Something about how the back end will kick out if you stomp on it in corners? Don't V8 TVRs do the same?

I'd imagine anything RWD with a powerful engine would do the same.

They crack me up on that show sometimes. The thing that got me the most was them leaving on the rusty lug nuts on the cars with bright shiny wheels, I think the MR2 they polished the wheels and then installed the old rusty nuts back on, I could have slapped them both.

I've been DL'ing the later episodes we haven't gotten in the states yet for the later seasons and now that they have a little more money to play with they seem to be doing a better job of taking care of the little things, especially getting good paintwork done.

klopperoo wrote: Many dont consider american cars to be classics.

Which explains all the "American Car Only" car clubs in every corner of the planet and the great pains and expense those folks go through trying to get American cars imported to thier country.

Not being pro-American....but click here: http://www.oldcarsweekly.com/auto-club-directory-3

There is a good bit of "Say what" material in this thread

96DXCivic wrote: The original anti-theft device- Lucas Electric products. If Lucas made guns, wars would not start either. Back in the '70s Lucas decided to diversify it's product line and began manufacturing vacuum cleaners. It was the only product they offered that didn't suck. Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone. Thomas Edison invented the light bulb. Joseph Lucas invented the short circuit. I've had a Lucas pacemaker for years and have never experience prob... How to make AIDS disappear? Give it a Lucas parts number. Quality Assurance phoned and advised the Lucas engineering guy that they had trouble with his design shorting out. So he made the wires longer.

I've got a whole sheet of these "Lucasisms" somewhere.

Some of the others I rememeber are:

"Contrary to popular belief, Lucas does not own the patent on darkness. However, sudden, unexpected darkness is another matter."

"Lucas was the original inventor of the intermittent wiper."

"The Lucas three position switch-- smoke, smolder and burn"

Lucas theory of electricty.....smoke moves back and forth in the wire casings....when smoke is visible something is broken!

Man, zombie thread revived by new reader troll with lots of tired Lucas jokes. I must really have some serious time to waste...

Hey man! It's about how American cars are (were) made bad and handled bad!!

klopperoo wrote: ...Americans are regarded worldwide as bad engineers, cars especially, hence nobody imported them...

How does this relate to the concept of English being 'the language of engineering' and all of the students that come to this country to learn engineering and other scientific fields from our universities?