Both the ideas of "all British cars will fall apart because they were built improperly" and "British engineers are responsible for these great cars from x country" are contrived statements from the likes of Clarkson to make ignorant generalizations based on trends from the 1970's and promote national pride, respectively. Less so the second one (Brits are certainly known make great race cars), but it annoys me how the statement seems to ignore the significant amount of parts and expertise that tend to from the original country and just how common it is for companies to outsource and reuse.
All the examples I used above were no more or less accurate than they needed to be and absolutely nothing to do with Clarkson-like generalisation. The MX5 really
was built at the prototype stage by a small company in Essex (it was also influenced by several British sports cars, the concept imagined by an American journalist called Bob Hall and built by the Japanese), the GT40 really
was developed by Lola in Slough (designed in the UK, built in the States with an American engine and raced by several nationalities) and the Shelby Cobra really
wouldn't exist had Caroll Shelby not rather liked the AC Ace.
They all had plenty of input from elsewhere as you'd expect but they're all examples of supposedly "crappy" British engineering.
It's the concept of all British cars for some reason being rubbish that I object to, rather than someone preferring the cars of another country. There's nothing partisan about it and I'd be equally as irritated if someone came out and said "all American cars are crap".
This also goes for modern production cars. The V12's in Aston Martins are basically two Ford Duramax V6's welded together
Poor example.
First, Duramax is a Chevy diesel engine used in trucks (corrected while I was typing). Secondly, the engine you're referring to, the Duratec V6, was jointly developed in the UK and Germany. Thirdly, the V12 Aston engine, while co-developed with Ford, is a
long way from being two Duratecs joined at the crank, though admittedly it is still being assembled in Germany.
That, and like anything else, the engine is only one aspect of a car. The Elise and Evora currently use Toyota engines, but it doesn't mean the rest of the car is badly developed.
With regards to Rolls and Bentley, they're undoubtedly excellent cars now, but then there's never been a point where that hasn't been the case anyway... and they managed to last for a hundred years or so before they were bought by German companies, so they must have been doing something right.
Not the way to go mate...
