anotherview wrote:
Thanks to materials science and mechanical engineering along with competition from Japan. You may recall that at one time, American automobiles required an overhaul at 50,000 miles. Then the Japanese cars entered the market with engines that lasted 250,000 miles with basic care (like regular oil changes). Car buyers switched to Japanese cars. Etc.
The reason the Japanese automotive industry was so good back then was their manufacturing plants had new equipment. Installed in the late fifties early sixties. The US automakers we're using equipment installed in the 20s and 30s. The Japanese basically forced them to upgrade their equipment. My father worked for Ford. In the transmission manufacturing end. They took a Japanese transmission apart to investigate how they could do certain things. They quickly discovered that they could not hold the tolerances of the machineing. This was in the very early 60s. Obviously since then the manufacturing machines have been updated. Not taking away from the Japanese. I enjoy the people and culture. That was the original reason they kicked out butts so bad for a bit.