Nature or Nurture?
An inquiry into values and attitudes.
Just one man's experience and outlook. (You can take that as a kind of disclaimer.)
At first I was going to launch into one of my very favored, but very tired subjects, "What kind of car should I be driving?" Blah, blah, blah, blah. I stopped myself just in time to have some mercy on that poor horse. So I redirected to another question; "What do I expect and want from a car, any car?" This might be a more profitable question to pursue, since I have my own individual ideas of what will satisfy my needs and my inclinations. These ideas are a product of my experiences. So hands off the poor horse and let's proceed.
Where do we get our attitudes about cars? How we feel about them and what we expect of them?
Keeping in mind all my grammar school teachers that told me that they "didn't like my attitude!"
First, I want to restate my first commandment of the car hobby; that everyone will experience and participate in the hobby in the way that is fulfilling for them. There is no right or wrong way. Nobody's choice is right, better, or the only way to participate in the hobby.
I was looking through the current issue of Hot Rod magazine. On the front cover there was a '54 Chevy that was totally tricked out. The big blurb on the cover spelled out the words: Pursuing Perfection! The entire magazine has features on this perfection, a show winning Camaro, the Good Guys car of the year. Then there was a '57 Corvette, a decrepit, forgotten barn find that was rebuilt into a high dollar show stopper. Only the basic body was retained.
These articles did not particularly impress me, automotive perfection has never been a personal goal of mine, and it fails to elicit a lot of fascination or admiration.
In the article describing the '54 Chevy, it detailed the years of painstaking work that were done to it. The entire suspension, front and rear, and steering was reconfigured, the frame was modified until almost nothing of the original was left. The engine and driveline was totally changed and a high horsepower engine was installed. The body and interior were very tastefully constructed and meticulously detailed. It was quite a transformation, almost nothing of the original vehicle remains as it was built. The author stated that this was the usual procedure for this particular builder.
I found myself asking "why?" Why spend so much time, effort, and money to turn a hum drum '54 Chevy into something that it was never meant to be? I mean it wasn't like it was a Mercedes Gull Wing, an Auburn Boat tail Speedster or even a '32 Ford. Why ?
There was an column on the last page of the magazine about being realistic when getting your car painted. It stated that every owner tells the shop that he wants his paint job to be "show worthy." Well, at least until they tell them the price! Why? A paint job like that is extremely expensive, and unless the rest of the car is also going to be completely upgraded it really doesn't make any sense. The original paint job applied by the manufacturer wouldn't have been considered to be show worthy. How can spending more on a paint job then the car is worth, make any sense?
Why do I think that all this stuff is wrongheaded and maybe just plain dumb?
For one thing, why should anybody want a car to be better than it was when it was new? That '54 Chevy was the best that it was going to be when it rolled off the assembly line in 1954. Trying to bring an old car back to it's original state is called restoration, that is expensive and difficult enough. Why try to make it something that it never was?
That Chevy was the cheapest and lowest feature car that was offered by GM. If you wanted a better car you would have chosen an Oldsmobile, a Buick or especially a Cadillac. It certainly wasn't a sports car, Chevy had just introduced the Corvette, the year before. There were other sports cars available from Europe, for example the Jaguar XK 150 was available. Not to mention even more expensive cars like the Alfa Romeo or Ferrari.
For the most part, the best paint job that a car will ever have is the original. It is applied to pristine new steel, before the car was assembled. The finish was baked on to the component parts before the car was put together, so all the body was painted the original color, the door jambs, under the dash, the floorboards, the trunk etc.
There was an article years ago in Hot Rod where a famous builder stated that if he couldn't make the underside of the car as pretty as the top side, then he wasn't interested in building it! The pictured '67 Mustang had glossy custom paint everywhere, the frame rails, floor boards, under the hood, with chrome and polished stainless steel components. Obviously this was a high dollar, show only car. Again I have to ask "why?"
Is that thing really even a "real" car anymore? If it's considered a sculpture of a car, then that might make sense. But it would never be operated and driven like a real car. The underside of a Rolls Royce doesn't get that treatment, the underside of an Mercedes Benz doesn't get that treatment. Why should an old Mustang?
Back in the days of coach built cars, the frames were suitably painted and finished, The bodies were painted top and bottom. The engines were painted, with porcelain finishes on manifolds, with chrome and polished brass fittings.
But they weren't finished as nice as the body. They were designed to be exposed to road hazards, debris and weather. To make the the underside too pretty would have seemed quite unwise and a display of vanity. Totally unnecessary.
So why do I feel this way?
Maybe because I used to build cars. My entire family did. I saw them come down the assembly line, bit by bit, piece by piece. They emerged freshly painted, with spotless new interiors, all brand new mechanical components and they smelled so good! They were as good as they were ever going to be.
They might have been only Chevys and Buicks, but they were nice and new. Nobody expected them to be finished like a Rolls Royce or even a Lexus! So why would you try to do this thirty years later?
I feel a similar way about a car's performance. What level of performance do I expect from a car? Of course I am influenced by my personal history.
My Father always drove full size or intermediate American cars. Chevys and Pontiacs with V8 engines and automatic transmissions. My Dad did not like the base six cylinder engines or manual transmissions. Certainly not a wheezy foreign car with an under powered four cylinder engine!
I have always had a thing for Cadillac. Up until the mid 1960's the fastest cars on the road were always Cadillacs, Lincolns and Chryslers. Have you ever heard of the Pan American road race? What cars were winning that race? I always planned to drive a Cadillac and I did for many years. These cars were surprisingly quick, and effortless high speed cruisers. If you drove a Cadillac, any year Cadillac, you already had a perfectly suitable road car. There wan't any real need to increase the performance.
As the 60's progressed the Big Three upped their game and built specialty cars like the Corvette, Thunderbird, Chrysler 300, and the Buick Riviera. Later in the decade the muscle car emerged.
These cars fulfilled a different mission, but all had adequate power to deliver effortless performance.
There was a time when the car hobbyist had to build their own high performance "special." These were the classic hot rods, they were built, not bought. At the time there were not cars like this available for the average American consumer.
Perhaps it can be seen as a personal failing, but I have never enjoyed competition. It may be a result of my personality, personal experiences, or something else, but I've never enjoyed competing against others. That may explain my lack of interest in sports, whether engaging in actual participation, or just watching as a fan. That extends to automotive sports as well.
I'll admit that a lot of my automotive attitudes were formed and influenced during my prolonged exposure to motorcycles. Motorcycles are built in a lot of different configurations; touring, street, dirt, or sports. But perhaps the biggest thing is that they are built in distinct engine displacements and power outputs. Small motorcycles are slow and under powered, unsuited to many tasks. Larger motorcycles have an excess of power, they could do most tasks easily. I was well acquainted with how that the lack of power in the smaller models really restricts your usage. The first bike I rode was a 5 hp. Honda 50cc. Top speed was only 40 mph. Acceleration from a stop was glacial. There were hills in my neighborhood that I was unable to climb. I was limited in the territory that I could explore. I remedied that by buying a bigger motorcycle. Now I could expand my territory and wander further. That process was repeated until I achieved the 750cc and 1,000 cc level.
I didn't really try to hop up my smaller bikes to make them more powerful. Though I did dream about it. The most obvious and easiest way to obtain higher performance was by getting a larger, more powerful motorcycle.
My general orientation has been to select a vehicle that was already engineered to handle the specific tasks that I need. My Dad's advice was very simple but very true- If you want a faster car, then just buy a faster car.
Despite all that being said, it's not as if I'm against making improvements to a car for increased performance, which for me translates to over the road performance.
Also in this issue of Hot Rod was an article about the Optima Ultimate Street Car Challenge. This is similar to the SCCA auto cross and Time Challenge competition. The pictures were great, almost every different kind of vehicle you could think of. Classic muscle cars, modern pony cars, even pick up trucks! Seeing these vehicles being used to drive hard on a track is really gratifying.
For me it all boils down to one thing. Cars are meant to go places, preferably places that are far away. Anything that adds to the success of this mission is okay with me. Obviously, different vehicles will do it differently. Some will transport an entire family and gear, some will transport a load of parts to a swap meet, others will transport the driver, or a couple in snug comfort on a driving adventure. It could be racy, rough riding, and fast. It could be silent and smooth, it could squeeze the most distance out of a gallon of gas, it might deliver the most distance in the least amount of time. What matters is that it's taking it's driver somewhere that they want to go.
It has to be as reliable as possible, maintained in ready to go condition. If the driver doesn't have confidence in it, then it's worthless. Likewise if it's too valuable, too pretty, or too fragile to be put to the test. Sometimes this expense is not monetary, sometimes the excessive value is emotional.
You can love a car too much to actually drive it. That's why I know that I could never own an Aston Martin DB7. I would worry about it all the time, worried that "something" might happen to it. I recall how Doug DeMuro described owning his Ferrari. He said that he would drive it somewhere than straight back home. It wasn't a car that he'd drive to the mall, the movies, or park out of sight at the curb, while he had dinner at a restaurant. He was either engaged in driving it, or it was in his garage. I'm not judging him for that. Most regular car enthusiasts would have to make a lot of sacrifices to acquire their dream car and they are very protective of them.
I remember a lady that I met who had an older 1970's Corvette. She had owned the car for years, it had been her daily driver and it had sustained the normal wear and tear that all cars pick up in daily use. Then she decided that it could use a really good new paint job, so she had that done. Now it looked great but she constantly worried about it. After parking it at the store she would come out and look for door dings or marks that indicated that someone had backed into the front or rear bumpers. While driving it she was deathly afraid that a rock would be kicked up and chip her shiny new paint. For years she had enjoyed driving her car without an excess of worry. Yes, it was a Corvette, but it was just her old car. Now it was beautiful and she was miserable.
Years ago on the last page of a Street Rod magazine their was a cartoon strip illustrating the process of starting up your car after a build. The last panel instructed the owner to pick up a handful of gravel then walk ten feet in front of their finished car. Now throw the gravel at it! Painful to be sure, but at least you didn't have to worry anymore about when it was going to pick up that first chip! It was already done and you could quit worrying and enjoy driving your car.
And that should be the most important thing.
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