Why customising cars is still cool

Why customising cars is still cool

02 August 11 19:04 ET

By Helen Soteriou

BBC News

Burbank, North Hollywood, California

Meet George Barris. You might not recognise the name, but you might just recognise the car next to him.

He is the man responsible for designing the iconic Batmobile for the 1960s Batman TV show, as well as other famous movie cars.

George, not one to shy away from self-promotion, styles himself as the "king of the kustomizers".

Customising involves enhancing the styling, functionality and performance of vehicles, and George has been "tricking out" cars since 1940.

As a reward for helping out at the family restaurant, George and his brother Sam were given a 1925 Buick. They fixed it up and experimented with the appearance of the car, which they then sold on for a profit.

After trips to the hardware store to pick up some paint, and the kitchen store to get some pots and pans for hubcaps, George then proceeded to take all the knobs off his mum's dressing room cabinet doors to use in the car's grille.

"But when I got home that night, and poor mum couldn't get in her cabinets because I had all the knobs off - I was grounded for a week," he reminisces.

Hollywood stars

His first job was about a year later, customising a car with a set of cat-eyed tail lights for which he charged $10. From here he moved to LA and was involved in illegal street drag racing.

The movie industry took an interest in this world because it was colourful and exciting, and there were many stories to tell about racing in the streets and crashing.

This marked the beginning of his customising work for films, with High School Confidential being his first movie project.

And as Hollywood increasingly fell in love with George's ideas, so did the Hollywood stars passing through the doors of his shop in Burbank, North Hollywood, requesting a Barris creation.

John Wayne, Elvis Presley, the Beatles, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Sonny and Cher are just a few names that came to George wanting something special for their vehicle.

"Sonny and Cher came to me, and they were going to do a movie, and Ford says here's a Mustang for them," says George.

"So I said to Cher, 'What colour would you like?' and she said, 'I want hot pink, white fur, white patent leather'. Sonny said 'I'm not going to drive a pink Mustang', so I said, 'okay I will get you two, a his and hers'.

"His, I put leopard skin in it. I painted it in gold. Hers is in pink with white pearls."

But when did customising actually start?

Peter MacGillivray is vice president of events at Sema, an organisation that represents accessory manufacturers, distributors and marketers in the customising industry.

"The [customising] industry was born after World War II. Some theories suggest that service men and women got a taste of high horsepower aircraft engines during the war - they translated that knowledge and interest into grassroots motorsports activities after the war," he says.

At about the same time, US consumers began to form car clubs, compete in races and more importantly, modify their vehicles to perform better, he adds.

Mr MacGillivray believes that customising took off in the mainstream because the notion of personalisation had become part of our culture.

He also states that popular culture, such as music, movies and TV shows have embraced customised cars.

"Heck, the most popular video games in the world are automotive-related and they feature customised cars," he says. "Consumers are inundated with messages that customising is cool."

Interdependent industry

But interestingly, due to changing consumer trends, the big car makers are not able to stay on top of consumer tastes, so they are not the ones making a lot of revenue in this area.

"The typical Sema manufacturer is a small business that is best suited to stay on top of the trends and tastes of the consumer," Mr MacGillivray says.

But despite being profitable, the industry has not been immune from the economic downturn.

And due to the interdependency of the industry, the economy has had a domino effect on the different businesses that are linked together.

"We were hit hard when the economy downturned as most of the products we offer are not necessary items and are discretionary income," says Mike Spagnola, president of Street Scene Equipment, which offers over 2,800 different parts for cars and trucks.

"Because we build most of our products in the United States, the downturn not only affected us, but our local suppliers as well.

"The good news was that we didn't need to import large quantities of products from overseas which allows us to keep our inventories in line."

Mr Spagnola believes the customising consumer falls into one of three categories: The "younger crowd", who has purchased a used car or truck and wants to individualise it. Such a person might buy a few accessories at a time as he or she has some extra money.

Secondly, the "over-50 crowd" who can now afford the car they always wanted and wants to do everything at once to make their car unique. That buyer might go to a dealership and order a car with the products already on, or leave the dealership and immediately want to accessorise the car.

And the third group are people who want products to make their car safe or roadworthy. This group tends to buy items such as replacement mirrors and mud flaps.

Mr Spagnola says that over the last few years he has seen a resurgence in older vehicles being accessorised as customers wants to keep their vehicle for longer instead of buying a new one.

As for George Barris, now in his 80s, his infectious love of designing cars is still prevalent to all who meet him.

And just like the customising industry, George shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

"You dream at it. Even at night when you are home and watching TV, and all of a sudden something goes by and you say 'oh, look at that, I can take that' and right away I'll sketch something."

Technology That Makes Left Feet Obsolete

Cars With Clutchless Transmissions Allow Drivers to Shift Gears Themselves, but Now There's No Need for a Floor Pedal

SEPTEMBER 7, 2011  

By JOSEPH B. WHITE

The Wall Street Journal

Fewer than 10% of the cars and light trucks sold in the U.S. last year were equipped with traditional manual transmissions and clutch pedals—even though a manual usually provides better fuel economy. New technology offers the fuel efficiency of a stick shift without the hassle of a clutch.

European car makers for several years have been expanding their use of clutchless, or automated, manual transmissions under various names, responding to consumer demand for fuel-saving technology in a market where fuel is expensive.

Now, clutchless manuals are crossing the pond.

Ford Motor Co.'s new Fiesta subcompact and Focus compact both come with a choice of a six-speed manual transmission as standard equipment, or a six speed "PowerShift" transmission, which is Ford's version of a clutchless manual.

Using PowerShift, the driver can choose between cruising along with the floor-shifter in "D" (for drive), letting the transmission's software do the shifting. Or the driver can pull the shift lever back one more notch to "S" (for shift) and press buttons on the side of the shift lever to change gears manually.

The D mode operates and feels like an automatic, except for a subtle but noticeable stutter when moving out of first gear. It's a catch familiar to someone who's driven an old-school manual—the car is engaging a clutch. But it has provoked complaints from some buyers of the new Focus. Ford has launched a campaign to educate buyers about the clutchless manual and is considering ways to recalibrate the transmission to smooth out the performance.

The PowerShift is currently a pricey option—it lists for about $1,000 on top of the roughly $16,500 starting price for the car. But it allows the Focus to get up to 38 miles per gallon on the highway, a 2-mpg improvement over the regular six-speed manual. A Focus SFE model equipped with PowerShift and other fuel-saving technology gets up to 40 mpg on the highway.

"Customers are getting used to it," says Craig Renneker, a senior Ford transmission engineer.

Even among cars favored by driving enthusiasts, clutchless transmissions are becoming the norm. At Porsche AG's U.S. arm, 55% to 65% of the buyers of Porsche sports cars buy a clutchless manual transmission, which is marketed as the PDK—short for "Porsche Doppelkupplungsgetriebe." The new 911 model making its debut in Frankfurt next week will be offered with a seven-speed manual or a seven-speed clutchless PDK. For most buyers, the PDK would be faster, says Alexander Schildt, manager of product planning for Porsche Cars North America.

"You need to be a world-class driver to beat the PDK" with a clutch manual, Mr. Schildt says.

Volkswagen AG offers clutchless-manual technology, which it calls DSG, in several models. General Motors Co. and Fiat SpA's Chrysler Group are considering the technology, the companies say. Meanwhile, auto makers are improving their conventional automatic transmissions to narrow the gap with manuals.

Some other auto makers, including Nissan Motor Corp., Honda Motor Co. and Subaru offer continuously variable transmissions, or CVTs, in certain models. CVTs eliminate both clutches and gears. Power is transmitted from the engine to wheels using a system of belts and cone-shaped pulleys.

Toyota Motor Corp.'s $400,000 Lexus LFA super cars use computer-controlled hydraulic systems to control gear changes and a single clutch. In lower-priced cars, company officials say, Toyota is likely to expand the use of an automatic transmission that can be operated in full manual mode. While the mechanics of these systems are different, the driver gets to choose whether to shift the gears, or not.

The upshot is that so few U.S. customers want what used to be called "standard shift," that auto makers are dropping manuals altogether from high-volume models, such as the Ford F-150 pickup.

Manuals are still available in some mass-market American cars mainly because they allow car makers to advertise a lower base price and provide better fuel-economy numbers than heavier automatic gearboxes. A good manual can make a car more fun to drive, which is why sports cars such as the Ford Mustang, Chevrolet Corvette and some high-performance European cars still offer manual gearboxes.

Learning the stick shift was once a rite of passage for many drivers in the baby boom generation. But fewer and fewer younger drivers are bothering to master the art.

"It's very rare to find it taught in modern driver education," says William Van Tassel, manager of driver training programs for the AAA national office, who says he drives a stick-shift 2004 Porsche 911. The AAA has a textbook that explains how it's done, but real-world practice is essential.

Car collectors and enthusiasts bemoan the demise of the stick, and some are trying to fight the trend. Car and Driver magazine has launched a "Save the Manuals" campaign, complete with a Facebook page. Hagerty Insurance, the leader in the business of insuring classic cars, staged an event in Dearborn, Mich., in July called "Operation Ignite," which included instruction for teens in driving a stick. Hagerty is planning to run similar programs over the next several months in Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago and Vancouver.

"The No. 1 concern that hundreds of thousands of car collectors have is that young people aren't participating in the hobby," says McKeel Hagerty, the company's chief executive.

Declining interest in truly driving a car will consign classic automobiles to museums and show displays. "Because there are no manual transmissions, kids don't learn to drive," he adds.

Write to Joseph B. White at joseph.white@wsj.com

Van shirts

I stumbled upon a bunch of shirts like this. Who's interested?

South Sudan's First Female Mechanics

from the Guardian UK

'My mechanic's overalls will make me a role model for other women'

Despite prejudice and opposition, four girls are training to become South Sudan's first female motor mechanics

Trainee female mechanics (left to right) Nura, Natalina and Gloria in the workshop. Photograph: Laura Powell for the Guardian

Laura Powell

The Guardian, Friday 15 July 2011

Nura Koleji rubs her toe in the ochre dust, hugs her knees to her stomach, and keeps her eyes firmly downcast – until we hit on the one topic she is bubbling to talk about. It is not how she fled her village of Lanya when AK47-wielding soldiers arrived from the north during the Sudanese civil war. Nor how they kidnapped her brother to train him as a child soldier; how she watched as they picked out victims and shot them; or how her two uncles were among those butchered in front of her.
It is not even the topic I am here to speak to her about – why she decided to train as a mechanic. What really riles Nura is men's dominance in the workplace. Last week South Sudan, became an independent country following a 22-year war that ended in 2005. And in this brand new country, women such as Nura are keen to see changes.
"We have a saying that one hand is not enough to clap. It's true," she tells me. "We need both sexes, not just one. There's an hereditary attitude in my village that women are weaker. I ignore those words and despise the people who say them because I have louder words in my heart telling me I am strong."
Nura is not an activist; she has never heard the word "feminist". She is a 20-year-old, softly spoken Sudanese girl, wearing oil-slicked blue mechanic's overalls. When she graduates next year she, along with three other female classmates, will have defied the odds to become the first women mechanics in South Sudan.
By the time we meet at 9am, I've dressed, had breakfast and negotiated the potholed roads of Juba, Southern Sudan's de facto capital, to reach the technical college, a secondary school where the 470 students (85% of whom are boys) train to become electricians, bricklayers, carpenters or mechanics. Nura, meanwhile, has collected water from a borehole, swept her family's compound, poured tea for her six younger siblings, revised, and picked mangoes before her two-hour walk to school. After classes finish at 3pm, she will sell the fruit at Juba market and put the earnings towards her £41-a-year school fees.
As her 16-year-old classmate Pamela Daniel says: "If you live here, everything is a struggle. But if you don't struggle, you may as well spend your life asleep because nothing will come to you."
Nura chose this profession partly because she loves cars, partly because she would love to drive (but has neither the money nor facilities to learn), and partly because she wanted technical skills and a trade, rather than a traditional academic education. One motive, however, supersedes the rest; Nura believes there are no female role models in Southern Sudan and her ambition is to become the first.
This is quite a task for a girl whose mother is absent (she was separated as they fled Lanya during the war), whose father has no job, and whose income from trading mangoes leaves her with just enough money to pay school fees and buy shoes, but not enough for an exercise book. Even so, Nura has already overcome obstacles that halt the education of the majority of her peers.
Though 87% of Southern Sudanese women are illiterate, Nura and her classmates can read. While they live with their parents, the majority of girls in South Sudan girls are married off at 13. "Parents value the dowry more than their girls' education and freedom," says English teacher Emelda Elizulai Melling. And with the average dowry around 200 cows (vast numbers of the population earn less than £97 a year and the cheapest cow costs £280), it is not hard to understand why.
Even menstruation is a challenge. "When a girl has her period, she does not attend classes because she doesn't have the appropriate facilities," says Angelina Alel Habib, spokeswoman for Plan International in Southern Sudan. Luckily for Nura and her classmates, their teacher spends part of her wage on sanitary towels for the girls.
Then there is the fact that as the only four female mechanics students in a class of 60 boys, they faced relentless teasing and family opposition. "My neighbours laughed [at] my overalls. They said girls should not be mechanics," says 17-year-old Natalina Kiden, who would like to be a chauffeur but "doesn't want to rely on men for anything" – not even fixing a car.
Pamela, who hopes to train as an aeroplane mechanic, spent three days persuading her mother to let her go to technical college. "She thought automechanics was a dangerous and dirty job for men," says Pamela.
Nura, meanwhile, likes her overalls, despite the ridicule they provoke. And she doesn't worry that men might find her independence unattractive, or that when she marries, her husband might ban her from working. "I'll talk to my husband in a polite way and make sure he accepts my work," she tells me. "He will not refuse. I am determined. I will keep talking until he lets me."
This, after all, is a society with stringent gender-based traditions. "When women pour water for their husbands, they must kneel as a sign of respect," says Habib. And while sharia law was not imposed in the south of Sudan as it is in the north, its strict code has still restricted women's behaviour; for instance women are not supposed to speak in public. "One of the exciting changes our independence will bring is that women will finally be able to speak freely," says Habib.
Other equalities, such as increasing numbers of women in the workforce from the current 30%, will inevitably take longer. "It is not easy for men to adjust to the new economic status of women," warns mechanics teacher Francis Osumba. Juba college, which was built in the 1950s, only began accepting female students in 2005 to study bricklaying, and automechanics in 2008.
So far the students have mastered welding and engine cleaning, learned the entire anatomy of a car and even been taught how to make tables and chairs using scrap sheets of zinc – despite a poorly equipped workshop.
Nura dismisses these obstacles with touching optimism. Does she worry that male owners of car repair firms will be reluctant to hire a girl? "No," she says, insisting she will instead be a walking role model when women see her on the street in mechanic's overalls.
Osumba agrees: "The girls want to disprove people who say mechanical work is just for boys. It is not easy for them but they've passed their first and second year exams so why shouldn't they be given the same chance as the males?" Why not, indeed.
• To hear more about Juba's students: http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/interactive/2011/jan/11/southern-sudan-juba-students-audio-slideshow

Modern Muscle

Muscle Cars, No Midlife Crisis Required

Big Engines, Throwback Looks Lure Baby Boomers and Twentysomethings; But Rising Fuel Prices and Regulations Loom

By JOSEPH B. WHITE at the Wall Street Journal

Detroit muscle-car mania is back.
For the first time since the Carter administration, three big Detroit brands, Ford, Chevrolet and Dodge, all offer rear-wheel-drive coupes that boast a distinctively American blend of in-your-face styling and big horsepower numbers.
How big? Try a 444-horsepower Ford Mustang Boss 302, which can be ordered with a special "Laguna Seca" package that essentially makes it a street-legal race car. Or consider the forthcoming 2012 Chevy Camaro ZL1 that will deliver 550 horsepower from its supercharged V8. Meanwhile, Chrysler LLC offers a Dodge Challenger model with a 470-horsepower Hemi engine that can run from 0 to 60 miles per hour in under five seconds.
These monster engines are shoehorned into back-to-the-future body styles that telegraph the core target market for the cars: baby boomers who lusted for these cars in their teens and 20s, but settled for Japanese compacts, minivans and sport-utility vehicles. Equally important to Detroit marketers, though, is capturing the imagination of car enthusiasts who don't remember the '60s and '70s—they weren't born yet.

"It's the attitude of the customer," less than demographics, says Mustang brand manager Jim Owens, who has a customized Mustang of his own that packs 650 horsepower under the hood. It is an attitude that says, "Hey, look at me!" he adds.
For Detroit car makers that were struggling to survive just two years ago, the buzz generated by muscle cars provides a much-needed shot in the arm for their brands. The official Mustang Facebook page, for instance, has more than 1.5 million followers—about twice as many as the Ford Motor Co. Facebook page.
But similar to the mid-1970s, when fuel prices soared and new regulations forced auto makers to shift strategies, a cloud is gathering over the muscle-car party just as it is revs up. Amid gyrating gas prices, the Obama administration is pushing a proposal that could boost fuel-economy standards to 56 or 60 mpg by 2025, leaving muscle-car makers with some tough choices down the road.
The current revival "can last for a few more years until the fuel-economy standards become ever tougher," says retired GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz, the patron of the Camaro's rebirth. To raise fuel economy, future muscle cars might feature the superefficient eight- or nine-speed transmissions beginning to appear in luxury cars, or have electric-hybrid systems, though these technologies would add thousands to the cost of the car, Mr. Lutz says.
High mileage standards could make V-8 engines an expensive rarity, says Jeff Schuster of the market research firm J.D. Power and Associates. But Mr. Schuster says muscle-car style could survive in more affordable cars that simply used smaller engines under the hood.

"You'd see V6 or even turbocharged four cylinders," he says. Buyers could get "a muscle shell, but not the muscle car."
For the time being, though, the new approach appears to be working. Sales of the Camaro and Challenger rose 13% and 10%, respectively, in June, outpacing growth in sales of all passenger cars, according to Autodata Corp. Mustang sales slipped 2%, but on average, customers paid more than $36,000 to buy one, up nearly 12% from a year earlier, according to data from AutoTrader.com.
"The performance per dollar was hard to beat," says Juan Barnett a 30-year-old Defense Department employee who drives a 412-horsepower, V8 Mustang GT around Washington, D.C., and maintains a blog for enthusiasts. Nostalgia for the late '60s Mustangs had little to do with his purchase, he says, since the Mustang GT is a fast, sporty car that can still accommodate a child seat for the baby he and his wife are expecting.
Car lovers of a certain age may like to reminisce about the glory days of American muscle, but buyers of today's muscle cars are getting better vehicles by every measure, beyond just room for a baby seat.
The 1967 Camaro Z28, for example, had a V-8 engine rated at 290 horsepower. That's less than the V6 version of the 2011 Camaro, rated at 312 horsepower and 29 mpg on the highway. About half of Mustangs and two-thirds of Camaros are rolling onto the street with efficient, but strikingly powerful V6 engines, as consumers hedge against high gas prices. Today's muscle cars also come with airbags, stability control and robust brakes, which were all lacking in the classics.
Chevrolet marketing executive John Fitzpatrick says Camaro buyers cluster in two age bands—20 to 30 years old, and 45 to 55.
"We definitely see more than a baby boomer audience," he says.
GM's successful tie-in with the popular "Transformer" movie series is one element of the auto maker's strategy for cultivating the next generation of enthusiasts. Chevy is launching a limited run "Bumblebee" Camaro, with a distinctive yellow paint job and bold black stripes, that looks like the Camaro that transforms into a fighting robot in the latest Transformers film.
Angela Naff of Henry, Va., says she bought her first Camaro in 1995. Now she's a collector and owns six of the new models, which she drives to gatherings at the Charlotte Motor Speedway in North Carolina and other places where enthusiasts show off their cars and swap stories.
"It's just a passion," says Ms. Naff, a personal-fitness trainer who runs a website for Camaro fans. She keeps an eye out for Camaros with unusual colors or option packages to add to her collection. "They had an orange with white stripes," she says. "We jumped on that."
As for Dodge, the Challenger ran behind the Mustang and Camaro in sales years ago, and it does again today, selling about 3,300 a month, or less than half the Camaro's and Mustang's sales in June. Those sales figures have prompted speculation in the auto-industry press that the car and its strongly retro styling statement won't last.
Chrysler says it has worked to upgrade the car's performance, adding a new 305 horsepower V-6 engine that gets 27 mpg on the highway, up from 25 mpg for the previous V6. The Challenger SRT8's Hemi engine has a feature that shuts off four cylinders to save fuel on the highway, and the interior of the car has been reworked. Sales are up 14% so far this year.
And last year, Chrysler offered a "Furious Fuchsia" Challenger in a limited run of just 400 cars.
These low-volume variations of modern muscle cars have a shot at becoming collectors' items in 30 years, just as their 1960s and 1970s originals are today.
Write to Joseph B. White at joseph.white@wsj.com