Chod on C4???? Place your bets.

[warren t claim]

The whole DeLorean project is pretty historical and the amount of money Thatcher put in to it was immense.

[Lord Sterling]

Sounds like a load of contrived shit to me. Yes, Jon is correct though. Television producers on major channels need to create something that'll appeal to the masses rather than what they see as a 'select few' or specialised audience. It's all about ratings.

 

The problem with this is that it doesn't really educate people as such, it doesn't open their minds to a new way of thinking. Instead it creates the kind of people we'd usually give a wide-berth to, the bar room/armchair expert who think they know everything their is to know about classic cars because they watched one television show that made it sound really easy or its easier to digest and understand or that it continues with the flow of what is popular rather than factually correct.

 

I doubt I'll be watching to be honest, apart from the DeLorean, I don't find the list of cars appealing at all.

[warren t claim]

The Ford Escort RS Bitcoin might make good viewing but we need to realise that the classic car magazines that survive have to contain the sort of stuff we don't really like so the classic car television programmes are likely to be the same.

[FredTransit]

wot no transit?

[jmsguzzi]

Why couldn't they do something like the Rover P6/Jensen Interceptor. Surely those are cars that appeal to both "twat in pub" and us.

[HMC]

It'l be mass appeal stuff,  ultimately to sell the advertising space wedged around it

 

Ill probably watch it shamelessly, but i agree totally.

 

Our kind of telly would give them viewing figures to finish their careers off, it would be a cult thing that has a small, dedicated fan base. Sound familiar?

[trigger]

I think we are long over due a decent program about the Ford Cortina's history, I could feature in it too with my silly wig and dixie horns.

[HMC]

^ Any sort of automotive social history of the car in the UK aught to have cortina content as for a lot of us they were a slice of family life

[Lord Sterling]

I think what we also need is a new, more positive focus on the achievements of the British car industry, particularly on stuff by BMC/Austin/Rover etc... stop banging on about unions, poor workmanship, weak componants and poor mangement. Forget them for a once and look at the stuff that was brought out, the stuff that wasn't, the advancements in technology and popular cars.

 

This, sadly will never happen because its too popular to bash BMC/Austin/Rover products.

[New POD]

Six cars that tell the story of post-war Britain?  I nominate:

Land Rover

Mini

XJ6

Cortina

BMW 3 series

X5

Seems to sum it up really... any other candidates?

 

nah Each of yours should be replaced by the following miss understood beasts.

 

Marina Pickup (Our local farmer couldn't afford a landy)

Imp (a better car - apparently)

Dolomite (It had wood)

Avenger (My father had 4 cortinas but after the first 2 he had an avenger)

Cavalier mk2 (The car that saved GM in Europe?)

Discovery (The Car that saved Land Rover?)

[warren t claim]

Looking through the cars we've listed I see many were the subject of The Car's The Star with Quentin Willclock.

[Richard]

It's on Channel 4 so there will only be seven minutes of material in a one hour slot anyway.

[Sudsprint]

ABFC

 

New list:

 

Episode 1  'The Renault 12' - and how every teacher in the UK was forced to own one in 1973

 

Episode 2  'The Triumph 1300TC' - thermos flasks, county cricket and a tale of suburban respectability

 

Episode 3 'The Hillman Super Minx ....not back in Vogue' - why Mr 1960's preferred his Tincorner

 

Episode 4 'The Polski Fiat 125P' - all that stuff about it being worse than the Fiat 125 was just rubbish

 

Episode 5 'The Daimler DS420' - Death becomes her ...a Jag looking front end, and a bloody sinister looking rear end   

[dugong]

I know Wilsonofabitch gets a lot of bad press on here but TCTS was a great bit of TV. Superbly made, too - particularly the Jaguar Mk2 episode.

[Bobthebeard]

It's on Channel 4 so there will only be seven minutes of material in a one hour slot anyway.

Not only Channel 4. Discovery and National Geographic et al seem to be largely composed of stuff without any actual content. Be it aliens, ancient aliens, Roswell, Area 51, bigfeet, JFK, Atlantis, old cars or whatever.....

The same "experts"* (Greek chap with big hair, Nick Parp, etc etc, ) are wheeled out for each "....... Exposed" and say precisely nothing at all meaningfull about the subject of the programme. Nothing is ever actually "Exposed" or even slightly proven. Just another hour of experts and adverts.

Mainly adverts... If recorded on Sky plus or whatever, and fast forwarding through the adverts the actual programme lasts about 20 minutes, and leaves you absolutely no wiser whatsoever about the subject matter.

[richardthestag]

Da internetz said;

 

Cars such as the Ford Escort Mexico, MGTC, Mini Cooper MK1, Triumph Stag and the DeLorean.

 

 

 

as much as I like any of these cars and have a very personal interest in one of them

surely this is a list of the downfall of BL

 

DeLorean robbed the money that could have funded something slighly better than the Ital.

 

Stag could have been a world beater and thrashed Mercedes at their Ewing SL game but for tight fisted management and rushed / non existent development. Effectivily was the start of the end

 

Mini Cooper - urban legend or not were these all not sold at a loss? (According to Ford)

 

MG TC - lovely prewar design sold post war. Surely XK120, Jowett Javelin / Jupiter would have better reresented this period. Mind you we should all be thankful that they are not doing a fucking MGB

 

Escoat, every one of these sold was two fingers up at BL as to how to do it properly

 

I shall watch it like you lot and join in the hearty rivet counting debate about what was right wrong etc.

 

I need to go and dig out that Mike Brewer hatchet job they did on a stag. The word was that it woz a ringa lol

[Pillock]

Maybe Coopers were sold at a loss or maybe it was sour grapes. If it was at a loss it did BMW a favour since estate agents were tripping over their shiny shoes to pay the premium for the sporty Bini.

[New POD]

Mini Cooper - urban legend or not were these all not sold at a loss? (According to Ford)

Not the Cooper, but the mini. It is well known that when the competition bring out a new car, a car manufacturer will buy a few and strip them down, to do a full competitor analysis.

 

They've done this for decades, so Ford will have given sub assemblies to their New Product Costing Teams and done an estimate of the cost.

 

I imagine that someone in BLMC was using a cost model that used something called contribution to fixed costs. As long as the variable costs helped pay the factories bills then they will not have been bothered. If you have a factory building that has spare capacity, and you don't want to close it, then it works okay in the short term.

 

These days they apply Activity Based Costing, and if a product line isn't making a profit with all the costs it incurs applied then they kill it, and all the costs.