balthazar

Who’s numbers.

GM and Ford. And Chrysler is a wholly-owned foreign subsidiary.

Vast majority of production for the US market are still US plants & support entities. And the grand total of US investment over time is astronomical. If we're going to embrace 'globalism' of the industry, then we likewise 'should' trumpet GM running plants in other countries, no? Not me, but maybe you. Question; are South Carolina mercedes' "American" vehicles?

GM & Ford have been investing in manufacturing in the U.S. for 112 and 117 years.

Holy shit this is great shit :

“Honda has American content...” That’s the thorn right there.

• Cleaned / degreased / edge-smoothed 1 front window regulator. • went thru 5 shelves of B-59 parts; re-familiarized myself, segregated extra parts into storage. • Pulled my 2 front & 1 original rear bumper out to evaluate. Rear is burnt toast. 1 front is a suitable core for rechroming. Have a line on a local rear bumper core. • Bought rechromed front bumper guards off B-59 restorer I bought from before.

^ What question does that chart answer? None of them (OK; I opened 2) show U.S. numbers.

Except for the Riv : all snoozers. Good fodder for the white belt/ pants/ shoes crowd. It was a carry-over from the prior 2 decades.

"Government efficiency".

Nah; the ‘big picture’ list; the one that takes into account the company’s in-country investments etc.

Where’s the ‘macro’ list?

403 is also a 'windowed' block- where they cast the webs running down to the crank journals with large holes in them. It's too weak for anything above stock spec. Don't know if the 307, 350, 260 are the same, but no one modes those displacements (maybe some 350s).

• Same 'H' pattern, rotated 90 degrees. Literally the same operation as a floor-shift. • Manual brakes have 1 advantage over power; power assist limits the force you can apply. Manual brakes apply as much force as you can put on the pedal. • Drum brakes have a distinct advantage over disc- they're 'self-energizing', which means they 'brake easier' than discs. And if you have excellent, large drums, they cancel out the other advantage of discs- no fade. I believe disc set-ups are often lighter in weight tho. • I've driven these 3-spd on the column vehicles: '53 Merc, '64 Ford Custom, '76 C-10 pickup. I think I also drove a 3-spd van once... hazy there.

'41 top tax rate was actually 88%. It did hit 94% in '44 & '45, then edged down a bit to 91% in '46 - thru the '50s. Had to pay for the War. It was 81% in '39, 79% in '38-'34. All these numbers are too high, and none of them prevented new millionaires from being made. It was 91% in 1960, and the number of millionaires grew by 600+% from '44 to '60. 'Not wanting to be seen in rich cars in the '30s' was a social construct, not a Gov't-sourced one. It's not about 'rigging', tho it would be if Gov'ts confiscated wealth in order to fatten their own pockets. Big Gov't is by far the most wildly inefficient manager of money in the known universe. No accountability, no sense of reality. And if "big corporations don't pay taxes" and "Millionaires / billionaires don't pay taxes" and the bottom 47% don't pay taxes..... WHO'S LEFT? Where does the richest corporation in the US, the IRS, get it's $3.5 TRILLION from?

It's seldom a new factoid comes my way about post-war American cars (up to circa 1980). This is one I just learned : first gen Rivieras have detachable door skins, so the door internals can be accessed / serviced. Never saw this on any other car.

I got so much shit. Believe it or not- this alley is the after pic of cleaning it out. There was a full sheet of ply, a spare B-59 hood, and a bunch of other flotsam that prevented walking down that side. Threw some stuff out, hood is leaning against the outside of the building until I can get it into my storage container. Can't necessarily tell from this, but the car is shifted over (to the left) about a foot & a half past the door opening. Going to return that snazzy piece of art to a car (instead of a shelf), air the tires, move it over, and roll it outside, wash it. It hasn't been outside... I can't remember how long it's been. I remember it outside... dimly, once. My son has been itching to work on it, and even tho I can't mentally process major complex surgery on 2 vehicles at once, perhaps I should actually try.

I sold my ‘94 in ‘09. B-59 is going to have crank windows.

I am used to PW but I don’t hate manual- my ‘94 had crank windows. NBD.

Well, we are talking about '71- I doubt AM-FM was standard on much below Cadillac. I have one on my '64, but that (or '63) is the first year. Pontiac vinyl in the '60s was stupendous quality- most people mistake it for leather. Not sure if it was the same quality by '71. Grand Ville had standard variable-ratio PS, power discs and a 455... with a standard 3-spd. Upholstery was actually a knit nylon & vinyl combo- not taxi grade at all. The 3-spd just seems like an anomaly today.

Wait- I thought some bought manuals because they LIKED them?? ? Chances certainly are that those 6/4/2 units are long gone. I know of a really clean '70 Catalina Safari 3-spd, saw it at a car show a couple years ago, then again this month- it had been smacked into by a drunk. No bigger deal than a floor-mounted manual; you're doing the same thing in the same position... It was not only standard, it was the standard. Didn't find Olds' info, but the 3-spd was standard on the '71 LeSabre, LeSabre Custom & Centurion.

3-spd was actually standard in ALL ‘71 full-size Pontiacs in the beginning of the MY. Numbers built: Catalina : 144 Catalina Brougham : 6 Bonneville : 4 Grand Ville : 2 Grand Prix had 116 manual trans cars, tho those were likely 99% 4-spds.