Do all cars look alike? How car makers are giving up on individual characteristics and design attributes

What you see here are station wagons of two design brands that give quite a bit for their distinctive characteristics and design attributes. But you really have to look for the details to see the differences! The "man from the street" probably couldn't tell which car is coming from what brand, if you removed the batches. Don't understand me wrongly, both cars are pretty and certainly well shaped and designed, but they lack differentiation. And it's not just these two cars, it's the whole lot we can buy today. Aerodynamics, safety and apparently today's tate influence what the designers can do. Too sad!
By the way, if you haven't been able to identify the two cars: BMW 5 Series Touring 2010 and Citroen C5 Tourer 2010.

From the RAID Prolog in Zurich

Accidentally I ran into the opening ceremony of this year's RAID Prolog in Zurich today. It's refreshing to see so many classic cars in the center of Zurich where usually only 2010 Mercedes and Porsche drive around. Already in the morning the cars gathered at the Burkliplatz were impressive with Alpine A110, Lancia Flaminia, Facel Facellia, Alfa-Romeo Giulia SS, collections of Jaguar XK and E-Types, Porsche 356 and 914 and even a Citroen DS transporter with a Dino 246 GT loaded. If you want my opinion, they could do this every day!

Classic sportscars safety isn't as bad as you thought ....

... if you watch the crash test TopGear showed in its last episode. The setup was taking a truck, driving a traditional hatchback or a sportscar against it and see the difference.
And if you take a really flat car and tweek the height of the truck a bit you can proof anything of course.
But, of course, this is not to be taken seriously. Safety of classic cars is primarily dependent on the driver, as the car will not offer a lot of passive and active safety features. If you are aware of this, then all is fine. So drive carefully, look ahead and plan for safety tolerances.

Great choice of individualist's Limousines in 1980 - Citroen, Alfa-Romeo, Saab, Rover and Lancia

In 1980 there was quite a choice when you wanted to buy a limousine. You could go for a Mercedes E or BMW 5 Series just as today, but there were also some really individualistic limousines available if you didn't want to swim with everybody else. Auto Motor und Sport assembled this nice group of five cars: Alfa-Romeo Sei, Lancia Gamma i-e, Rover 3500 V8 S, Saab 900 Turbo and Citroen CX 2400 GTI. This gave you a choice of very different shapes, but also a broad range of engine technologies. The Alfa-Romeo 6 came with a V6 and six Dell'Orto carburetors, the Citoen had a straight four cylinder engine with fuel injection, the Rover was propelled by the ex-Buick V8 with SU carburetors, the Lancia had a four cylinder boxer engine with Bosch L-Jetronic and the Saab 900 Turbo had a Turbo aspirated straight four cylinder. While the engine choice was quite diverse, the power output was quite comparable, ranging from 130 to 158 hp. 0-100 km/h could be reached in 9.4 to 10.9 secs. Top speed was 192 to 202 km/h. The Rover and the Alfa were fastest thanks to the superior engine power output. Interestingly the Rover was the most fuel efficient car with 13.6 l/100 km despite the largest engine and the highest number of cylinders. None of the cars was all wheel driven, the Alfa and the Rover powered the rear wheels the others the front wheels. Roughly DM 27'000 to 31'000 had to be on your bank account if you wanted one of these cars, 2.5 to 3 times of what a Ford Fiesta Festival would have cost you then.
I guess we can only dream of so much individualism today!

A car Still Live - Mercedes /8 Coupé, Renault Espace, Citroen Type H

Following up on my recent post concerning classic cars in the winter, here's another picture, I would call it a "still live". It brings three classic cars together that probably are on very few people's "cars to be collected" list. The Mercedes /8 Coupé was designed by Paul Bracq and was both popular because of its clear and straight forward lines but also because of its reliability. Even today you can find them (and the limousines) as daily commuters. The Citroen Type H (and its sisters) represented a very practical truck type car for people in need of transportation capacity. It's design again was unique and its habit exactly like you would it expect. The last of the three cars is the Renault Espace, one of the first series. After an adventurous engineering phase with multiple car brands taking care off (i.e. Chrysler, Matra, Renault) and with significant English involvement (very few people know this) it became the start of a new car category, sporty family vans. Seeing these three cars gathered in the snow showcasing such different approaches and objectives and colors typical to the time when the cars were built is fascinating.

Classic Cars in the Winter time

Many/most of us probably couldn't sleep well if they knew their cherished classic car being parked on the street during the cold winter nights with salt on the streets and snow everywhere. Well, there must be people thinking differently as these pictures show. They have all been taken in Berlin this week. All of these cars are classics and some of them even are technology master pieces. My favorite car here is the Citroen Maserati SM. It's kind of the combination of the Citroen ID/DS with the six cylinder Maserati engine. The shape is breath taking and it certainly was a pleasure to drive when new and fresh. But also the ID/DS pictured here is a collector's item and the Mercedes-Benz SLC as well. Hopefully somebody will rescue these cars eventually and bring them home in a warm garage!

How the design of car door and wing surface has gone more and more complex

When people compare cars they usually will look at the major design elements, such as the overall shape, the "face" and maybe the lights and the bottom, some will also look at the color however this is of course not really a design element. Few will actively notice the design tricks applied by the car manufacturers. One of these tricks is the the surface design of the car doors, the wins and the panels on each side of the car. While a few years ago theses surfaces were mostly flat and maybe rounded, maybe with some moldings, today more and more designers now use kind of "creases" and concave and convex surfaces. This is influenced also by the fact that most cars are painted in metallic colors that can make something out of these complex shapes. Take a look a modern cars yourself and compare them to old ones, you will notice the differences! By the way, the picture shows a Volkswagen Beetle/Bug, an Opel Kadett B, a Volkswagen Golf Mk1, a Mercedes 190E in the first row and the new BMW 5-series, Citroen C5, Volkswagen Golf Mk6 and the Mercedes C class in the second row.