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Date:         Wed, 13 Jan 1999 21:02:29 -0800
Reply-To:     Ari Ollikainen <Ari@OLTECO.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Ari Ollikainen <Ari@OLTECO.COM>
Subject:      OFF-TOPIC: Re:USA Vs. Japan vs Europe
Comments: To: DRodrig420@AOL.COM
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

>My car was indeed assembled in Pennsylvania. However, that is NOT the >deciding factor in how a car feels when you drive it. It's the engineering >behind it. The Europeans(Germans in particular) engineer things differently >than the Japanese, and Americans. That's where a car gets it's "feel." How >many people out there can honestly tell me that any given Ford, GM or Chrysler >product "feels" the same way as a VW, Volvo, Honda, et al? > >-Dave >'88 GTi 16v (Assembled in Westmoreland, Pa) >'88 Vanagon GL Wolfsburg (Assembled in Germany)

Have you ever *driven* a Taurus SHO? A car capable of 140mph and blessed with trailing throttle oversteer...admittedly, its 24v DOHC V6 with dual-induction manifold was put together by Yamaha but it very definitely had a "feel" and it wasn't Japanese, nor German, and not quite what you'd probably class as "American", either.

Oddly, moving from my 86.5 (the original) 16v Scirocco to the SHO was not at all difficult since they shared similar qualities such as the ~7Krpm redline, gobs of torque steer under hard acceleration, incredible handling and the willinginess to be DRIVEN...not to mention the trailing throttle oversteer which was especially handy for decreasing radius off/onramps. A Driver's Car.

We now return you to the program in progress..."How the ageing population of Vanagon drivers will light up the night skies with Gigalumen replacemnt headlights to aid their declining nightvision"

1/2 ;^)

OLTECO Ari Ollikainen P.O. BOX 3688 Networking Technology and Architecture Stanford, CA Ari@OLTECO.com 94309-3688 415.517.3519


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