USA Woodie

[Reckless Rat]

I have to admit I'm like Malcolm. The Americans seem to have the ability of taking a perfectly good European design and making a total bollocks of it. The Ford Escort and Ford Mondeos are prime examples. This Bantam just looks wrong. It's too high at the back and the roof looks like Kim Kardashians arse. But whatever, each to his own. I wonder if the restorer is as good at making sheds as our Martin...

[Malcolm Parker]

I have nothing against America, Hugh.   What I can't understand is why our little island nation thinks it has to emulate everything American.
I think American cars of the 1950's are wonderful but they would be no use on the narrow country lanes in my neck of the woods.    Likewise I think an Austin 7 would be pretty useless on the roads of America.

[Mike Costigan]

I wonder how many potential original buyers of that Bantam woody were put off by the tiny door opening - even the original R saloon had easier access than that!

[Hugh Barnes]

I suppose I am a little bit sensitive given the fact I have an American wife and spend a lot of my time there. It's not all like NCIS or a John Wayne movie.. Not a bit..

[Erich]

Well, as an American on this thread, I am not in the least offended. I think its atrocious. But then, I am reminded that a Bantam was the inspiration for Mickey Mouse's car in the cartoons. American automotive styling is much like the American meals referenced here. When its good enough, you add more. A single cheese burger is nothing anymore. "do you want to supersize that" is the common question. Soft drinks at the burger joints are never small, medium or large At best, they are medium, large and extra large, where the medium is as big as a large was when I was growing up. Anything small is considered, "cheap" or "crap". The bonnet badge on a DB5 is a good example. In America, the entire bonnet would proclaim, "Aston Martin" in huge letters, with wheel arch extensions, etc. The difference between understated elegance and brash, cartoonish, advertising. America, the land of big meals, big cars, and big people.

All this said, I am surprised at the the number of American cars seen at UK auto shows. Wannabe Americans?

Erich in Mukilteo

[Tony Griffiths]

I have nothing against America, Hugh.   What I can't understand is why our little island nation thinks it has to emulate everything American.
I think American cars of the 1950's are wonderful but they would be no use on the narrow country lanes in my neck of the woods.    Likewise I think an Austin 7 would be pretty useless on the roads of America.

Here, well-illustrated, is the very reason why:

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It's been to Weight Watchers

[JonE]

I just wonder what is going to happen to all the big yank cars as the fuel price carries on up in the UK.
I've often wondered how people running big petrol 4x4s cope, but then I guess it's the same with smokers - you just do it.
Another plus for Sevens!

[Erich]

jon, during the last downturn of the economy 14 years ago, used car lots were filled with 4 x 4 pick up trucks that had either been sold or repossessed(many are bought on "time"). I suspect with the higher fuel prices here, though not as high as the UK, those large 4 x 4s are going to start showing up on the lots again. Hell, even a set of tyres for those trucks cost more than I paid for my daily driver modern!

Erich in Mukilteo

[Andy Bennett]

The first business trip I made to the US I had to hire a car and asked for a 'compact'. I was given the smallest available, a Chrysler NewYorker 5th Avenue. It took me half an hour to walk around it to check for scrapes and I nearly puked the first time I tried to go around a corner.

I find US a wonderful, weird, frustrating, interesting place. It's a bit like trying to summarise Europeans as a single entity and expecting to compare an Italian with a Dutchman or an Irishman and to come up with a single description. Can't be done because it is so diverse. I have friends made in all parts of the US, some of whom are horrified that gun ownership allows 18 year olds to arm themselves to the teeth and go shootin' and some of whom will happily walk the streets of Texas with a gun in their belt just in case they come across said 18 year old and he needs puttin' down.

Gotta love the place, even if I still don't really understand just how diverse it really is it after 30 years of visiting.

[Erich]

Andy, the large car experience isn't unfortunately, an American thing. When in the UK in 2019, we were going to visit the birth place of my significant other's grandmother in Bishops Waltham. In Winchester,I had reserved a nice compact car, a Vauxhall. But no, when we arrived at the Enterprise office, we were proudly told, "I have the pleasure to tell you we have upgraded you by two levels." The car was enormous and I took it back the next day, as soon as they had the one I had ordered. I hate "supersized cars". They are bigger on the outside, but surprisingly not much bigger inside.

Erich in Mukilteo