car design thread

Dear John and Jeff,

Back in December when we were discussing the design of my 500 Mondial Series II I was looking for a particular photo which helped define the sculpture and function relationship. I finally came across it today at
https://www.flickr.com/photos/23310531@N04/21595797711/in/album-72157658477705489/

It is one of my favorite views and solidifies the fact that Scaglietti was indeed an artist.

Best regards,

Robert

 

Aussies rule!��

 

Peter D of AutoExtremist sure seems to like Ed Welburn. Managed to make progress with GM but certainly not worthy of having a bronze next to Mr. Earl or Billy boy.

Jeff

 

A couple might be better located behind the outhouse.

 

Any points for correct guesses?

 

Not surprised with the answer. Gets way politically incorrect for someone that has to remain friendly with the industry.

Since I don't have that problem:

Since Mitchell recommended against Irv he might have done something but one has a hard time denigrating an industry icon.

Jordan likely wanted to put Irv's in the bottom of a urinal.

Cherry did the same to Chuck's. Maybe in the toilet in his office bathroom. That way he could crap on him.

Not as familiar with Ed's politics so he may not have had scores to settle. Or, maybe he did.

 

- and too frequently on our highways and byways

 

Latest issue of Collectible Automobile has my letter to the editor on the humpback Chrysler Imperial. The designers at Chrysler talked of it as the proposal that would not die during the Cordoba and Mirada design project. It just sat there to the side with no one working on it.

At least it was a better humpback design than the Versailles.

Jeff

 

More info, please....

 

What became the Imperial was one of the other developments of the Cordoba and Mirada. In the summer of 1978 there was clay of this that sat adjacent to the real work of the Cordoba and Mirada as they continued getting closer to production. The designers referred to what would become the Imperial as the proposal that wouldn't die. It wasn't approved to continue but no one would allow it to be stripped down either. It just sat.

Here is insight into the internal politics of Chrysler at that time. This was pre-Iacocca. In the regular cafeteria for the design and engineering building they posted weekly sales charts. Fools, absolute fools. What this showed was falling sales for everyone to see. The VP of Design was Dick MacCadam. He was generally well regarded and seemingly liked. But the man with corporate power was Hal Sperlich, VP or EVP of Product Planning. He had lost out in some Ford power play (not unexpected in the blood sport of Ford politics). So, he had come to Chrysler and had "the power".

I can't talk of the transition of "the won't die clay" into the Imperial but I can discuss how things were happening in the studio. Sperlich loved the then current Continental Mark V. This car kept being rolled in and out of the studio; much to the chagrin of the designers. The directions were to damn near copy the cross sections. The designers had already lost having plan view. This had resulted in 14: wheels instead of 15" - aero numbers had been compromised. The designers were upset with this since they talked about how the original Cordoba had been complemented on the wheel size to body relationship. For those that will understand - Chrysler did not model minimum bend radius. The fish line was left in and the radius was done in the digitizing tapes. GM would absolutely never do this and it showed because a minimum bend might be altered to make a look better.

Now back to the Imperial. The hump back style goes straight back to the 1975/76 Seville. It was well documented and known around the industry that Bill Mitchell had taken a liking to the Daimler limousine. There had been Seville proposals with the humpback. This was documented in Car Styling. Everyone in design looked at Car Styling. 2+2 = 4. The humpback "Imperial" cam from this. Can't say if the Versailles (Ver-sails - in absolute derision with a hayseed in corner of mouth) had been underway at Ford pre Sperlichs departure. What one sees is that both Ford and Chrysler were trying to figure out a solution on something that GM was toying with.

The Imperial was a far, far better interpretation of the humpback that the Ver-sailes. But, neither one should have moved forward. At Chrysler the designers in the studio had no use for this but so typical of the organization, they had no power. I remember there being 15-20 people having reviews of the clay. All the designers stayed in their cubicle and every once in a while peered over the cubicle to get a clue how much longer this would last. Of the group only 3 were actually making any discussions: Sperlich, MacCadam and the studio manager. Invariably all the others milled around without any participation. The designer just waited to find out the "decision" so they could shake their head. Some really talented guys had been relegated to just surviving the system.

I d remember a Citroen CX being brought in to the studio. Now that was interesting. Far better than the Mark V. An aberration in the scheme of things. They also had a Maserati Merak, no clue what anyone was thinking with that.

 

Thank you very much...

One can certainly see the relationship between the Mark V and the Mirage. Slab sides.

 

Oops... Not Mirage... Mirada.

And the equivalent Cordoba.

 

Wow!! I must say car designs are really very nice.

 

Granite-finished dashboards that don't weigh as much as mountains sound really cool.

I'm not so sold on Bentley's new exterior ideas, but production interiors such as the Bentayga's look really inviting.

All the best,
Andrew.

 

VIP aircraft have been doing very thin stone applications for near 30 years. A couple mm thick done as tiles about 1/2" x 2". This allows a degree of flex so it doesn't crack. Not just granite and marble but semi-precious stones like malachite, lapis, mother of pearl, tiger eye and a bunch more.

Jeff