Should we be getting behind Brexit by boycotting German cars
Discussion
RobM77 said:
LuS1fer said:
Have to say that German cars have never appealed to me.
I've had a few but I was never a fanboy
Why have you owned a few if they've never appealed to you?I've had a few but I was never a fanboy
Other than that, a knackered old Golf GTI 8v which was slow and very rusty.
Had about 30 cars that weren't German.
I said German as they do seem to be the major country in the EU and have the biggest car industry, I imagine.
In terms of purchasing, I am thinking in terms of supporting those manufacturers who produce cars and engines in the UK - if we don't, I imagine some will ship out Jag, LR, Toyota, Honda etc.
As for the "they can sell all they make", about 1 in 7 cars sold in the UK is German and the UK is their main export market.
So, in 2014, a fifth of their production went to the UK and about 820,000 vehicles were exported to the UK.
More recently "Germany sells about 14% of all the passenger cars it makes domestically to the UK, a little over one in seven. (That makes up about 18% of the passenger cars it exports, a little under one in five)".
So yes, if the small matter of 820,000 cars can be sold elsewhere, rock on.
The GMan said:
OK, so where does Mini sit as they are currently produced in Oxford? Or the supply chain in the UK that supports BMW?
No issue with that but the question is whether that will remain the case or whether they will leave the UK. Nobody really knows because it's all bluff and bluster, on both sides.What we need to look at is supporting whoever creates UK jobs, god knows we'll need them.
Bodo said:
Looking at the profile of the OP, he acquired two cars since he opened this in 2017:
Absolutely correct (though I originally thought the Fiesta was Spanish TBH) but I was talking about new cars and thinking more about the "allegedly premium" German cars who charge for being German, appealing to the aspirational brigade.In addition, both mine were used cars and bought because they were the best deal available, to buy outright. That availability is down to people who bought them new, originally.
Had the Peugeot 208 GTi been a little bit better then the ST, I would have bought that but it wasn't.
The Insignia I bought actually uses the 1.6 Peugeot engine so has a French heart, even if it is built by Opel. Nobody pays a premium to own one hence it was competitive.
I actually wanted a Hyundai i30N but couldn't justify the extra £8k required.
Finally, we're not quite out of Europe yet.
Magnum 475 said:
There again, we could buy British Cars.
There's JLR - lots of bling but not much build quality, and actually Indian owned, not British.
Or Toyota, for the little time that they'll stay post-Brexit. Oh, wait. They're actually Japanese.
Or MINI - oh, hang on, they're owned by the Germans.
British Cars you say? What British cars? There really aren't any. Which is probably not a bad thing as most British designed cars of relatively recent years were, well, a bit s
t really.
I'll stick with German cars. I wish there was a way to identify 'Leave' voters and make them pay the additional costs / duties for those of us with the sense to realise the Brexit was going to be a monumental fustercluck, but sadly that's not possible.
Don't forget Honda.There's JLR - lots of bling but not much build quality, and actually Indian owned, not British.
Or Toyota, for the little time that they'll stay post-Brexit. Oh, wait. They're actually Japanese.
Or MINI - oh, hang on, they're owned by the Germans.
British Cars you say? What British cars? There really aren't any. Which is probably not a bad thing as most British designed cars of relatively recent years were, well, a bit s
t really.I'll stick with German cars. I wish there was a way to identify 'Leave' voters and make them pay the additional costs / duties for those of us with the sense to realise the Brexit was going to be a monumental fustercluck, but sadly that's not possible.
It's a somewhat simplistic view though as they provide British jobs and contribute to the UK economy;
SMMT data - Manufacturing Data – Cars, Commercial Vehicles and Engines
Over 1,300,000 cars built in the UK in 2019.
Car exports down 14.7% in 2019, with 1,055,997 shipped worldwide – 81% of total production.
Over half of these exports were to the European Union, 54.8%
Mr Tidy said:
Morgan might just qualify as British, even if the Speed Six does have a BMW engine. 
Italian owned - https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/motoring/...
RMDB9 said:
Ideal for the wide, open roads in England.
Most modern cars are just as big.Take the Challenger which is shorter than a BMW 5 series and no wider because US widths include the non-folding door mirrors.
The 6 series is considerably bigger and that's before we reach the leviathan SUVs.
Sway said:
Didn't Mustangs outsell Audi TTs for a few years?
It remains the best selling coupe in the world.It goes with the Audi TT for total sales but what I found interesting was that, in Europe, the Camaro outsells the GT86, BRZ and 370Z by some margin.
https://carsalesbase.com/european-sales-2019-exoti...
Kent Border Kenny said:
I’m still not able to get along with the interiors and packaging of most US cars. I really do like my cars to have a high quality interior, or at least one that does a great job of giving the right feeling and looking good.
Although they are nowadays often styled reasonably there still tends to be far too much scratchy plastic.
It's a trade-off. Frankly, I couldn't care less what the interior looks like behind a 650 plus hp car.Although they are nowadays often styled reasonably there still tends to be far too much scratchy plastic.
Ironically, Dodge are owned by Fiat.
928 GTS said:
So, Brexit result is everyone in UK buys LHD US cars with 5.8L V8. Who would have thought. Didn't Chrysler 300 have old MB underpinnings? So is this solution flawed also as there can be German design parts in those Fiat's? In any case they all need to be manual as automatic box is ZF. Those pesky Germans again.
They were owned by Daimler Benz from 1995.They have tended to be the red-headed stepchild of US motor manufacturers.
Killboy said:
If we get American cars, I wonder if its more likely that the roads fill up with Dodge Neons than Dodge Chargers? 
They stopped making those in 2003.Ironically, perhaps, there is a modern Mexican Neon which is a Fiat Tipo and they marketed the Alfa Guilia as the Dodge Dart which crasjhed and burned in the US market.
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