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Can you just sit down and write out why you have something against imports rather than going around picking on them? I mean this link, which clearly makes a statement against some cars, which believe me are disliked by Honda owners serious about making their cars fast, just as much as domestic fans like you. This is apples and oranges. There are ricers, and then there are serious import drivers like myself. We don't go for tinted windows, Type R stickers, and grapefruit launcher exhausts. My car is not like that. It looks mostly stock. But it has a supercharger among many other go-fast parts. Is it an import? Damn straight. Is it a rice burner? Hell no.
I recognize that domestic owners and drivers probably base their opinions on these ricers, and then their hostility towards imports is justified in my book. But it's not fair to judge all imports being as such, because they're not. Many people admire and respect import manufacturers like Honda, and if you can see fit to actually learn about their technology, you would see that what they can do with a set engine displacement puts the capabilities of ANY domestic manufacturer to shame. I apologize for being short, but I am pretty tired of this crap. I get VERY offended when people call my car a "rice burner" or something like that, because a rice burner, if you must call them that, is a car that is modded to look flashy and be loud, while boasting NO capabilities for actually running fast.
I can state some serious objections to most domestic manufacturers approach to automobile engineering. The fact that many domestic engines stop making torque in literally HALF the rpms (and sometimes even less!) than some Honda, Toyota, BMW, Porsche, and Ferrari engines (just to name a few) can go to and still make reliable power. I scoff at American engines with their poor efficiencies and astronomical power losses (often making less than 60 horsepower per liter - and they call that a performance engine) when people try and trash talk the imports. Besides, what would you rather represent: stagnant technology, or that which is state of the art and cutting edge, forever thinking forward. (This is a rhetorical question, by the way.)
Many of the top quality cars of today produced by Ford do not even use their own technology. I know, Bill Gates used Windows to become the richest man in the world, and he wasn't even the inventor - he saw it a trade show and capitalized on the idea.. big time. Well, it's the way of the world, but note that for example, the key ingredients to the Ford Focus: Great handling (which came from a Ford developed in Europe) and a Zetec engine (which uses engineering principles of - you guessed it - Honda engines). The ever popular, great handling Lincoln LS? Also had its suspension developed in Europe (its powertrains, by the way, are only mediocre - developed here in the US).
The American manufacturers are beginning to wake and smell the coffee, and realizing that if they don't get caught up with the imports on the technology front, they are going to be left out in the cold, like Chrysler (who was bought out by Daimler-Benz) and GM (who is losing more money than OJ sponsoring months and months of court room antics by the "dream team" ). They still must rely on big displacement V8's and low prices (hell, with less money being invested in research and development, they've got no excuses for charging the high prices that the imports charge) to sell their cars and dupe people who have inherent pride in American engineering into thinking they're getting the best. But the truth is it's only a matter of time before the foreigners just eat them right up, even right out of the box. The new Acura IS 2.0 (replacement Integra) will have a 2.0 liter engine with 220 horsepower. The New BMW M3 has a 3.2 liter engine with 333 horsepower. They're catching up, and the Americans have no choice now but to use foreign technology to stay at the heels of the cutting edge.
I'll give you that the classic American design parameters of pushrods, two valves per cylinder, etc. continue, to date, to have the edge in some aspects of performance on the technological powerhouses that the afore-mentioned import manufacturers release here in America. And that's only because they rely on the golden rule: big displacement = big power. And that's it. It's a one-trick puppy. The imports are trying to bend the rules, to use less to make more; they are achieving a lot, and I think it's commendable. But your bullshit of coming into import forums to pick on our choices in cars is just that - bullshit. You have made it clear where your opinion stands and if that's all there is to it, and you can't make any acknowledgement of the achievements of import manufacturers, we certainly don't care to hear about it.
Edited by: JD@af
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