Why are European manufacturers so dominant?

[Ryan81]

So, it just occurred to me that throughout the decades, European performance cars have radically outnumbered and outperformed their US and Japanese counterparts.

For instance, let's take the 1990s as an example. I can't remember any American supercars that could outperform the likes of the XJ220, F1, GT2, Diablo, EB110, F50 etc. The only one from the early to mid 90s that comes to mind is the Corvette ZR-1 C4.
Ford had the GT90 but it was only a concept. The Chrysler RT/10 looked and sounded nice but handled like a sleigh on rails. Wasn't until the turn of the millennium that Dodge produced the Viper GTS and Chevrolet the Corvette C5 Z06.

As for JDMs, the only one that comes to mind is the NSX Type R, excluding the likes of the Nismo 400R etc which was just a one-off and even then, non-competitive alongside the European powerhouses above.

I understand that they had less horsepower and perhaps weren't trying to match the likes of Bugatti, Ferrari, Porsche, Lamborghini etc but my question would be, why?

Even the 70s and 80s were completely devoid of serious competition from the US and Japan. In the 60s, Shelby produced the awesome Cobra 427 S/C. But that's it, just another one-off.

Even to this day, the Europeans are way out ahead. Again, why?

 

[Tornado]

It probably helps that Europe barely had emission standards until the late 90s; but a lot of it is because the performance tier above upper spec Corvettes and the Viper requires engineering investment that wouldn't carry over into the rest of their automotive range for the US automakers. Same for Japanese marques. The fact that half of the examples you listed were sales bombs and/or were attached to perpetually bankrupt companies probably makes it the smart play.


I do have one note, though:

XJ220

Diablo

I think you'll find that American hands were all over these two cars.




The former is in fact how

Ford had the GT90

 

[phillgt2002]

It probably helps that Europe barely had emission standards until the late 90s; but a lot of it is because the performance tier above upper spec Corvettes and the Viper requires engineering investment that wouldn't carry over into the rest of their automotive range for the US automakers. Same for Japanese marques. The fact that half of the examples you listed were sales bombs and/or were attached to perpetually bankrupt companies probably makes it the smart play.


I do have one note, though:


I think you'll find that American hands were all over these two cars.




The former is in fact how

This was pretty much most of what I was going to say. The U.S. and Japan had stringent emissions during the 70s and 80s, and Japan ended up building cars that were able to meet those standards.

 

[Ryan81]

Interesting theories that do make sense. However, the US had muscle cars with huge engines that drank petrol the way a thirsty person in the Sahara desert would drink water. Some of them were lucky to get 7 or 8mpg on a good run. Surely, their emissions standards would have been rock bottom?

I do agree with the emissions regulations on Japanese cars, however. I think a 3 litre would have been tops at the time with most being between 2 and 2.5. And the 'official' gentlemen's agreement of having 276hp max although in reality many of the 90s JDMs were and early 00s were hitting the 320-330hp range (Supra and R34 Skyline)

I guess when it comes right down to it, profit was the main reason that US marques didn't try to invest in cars that would have outperformed the high spec 'Vettes and Vipers. At least, that's the message that I'm reading. Their ethos was more "High performance at affordable prices" rather than "High performance at high prices" 😂

 

[Tornado]

Fuel mileage isn't emissions. You can pay a fine and easily ignore fuel economy standards in the US (though the domestic manufacturers understandably tried hard as hell to avoid doing so). You cannot sell cars at all in the US that don't meet emissions requirements; which is why most European cars were downrated in power for the US market and sometimes had to do things like hack off compression, adopt finicky early fuel injection systems while they remained carbureted in Europe or use entirely different engine specs that were only for the US/Japan. Sometimes they didn't bother and didn't sell cars in the US at all. You couldn't buy a 911 Turbo or Countach in the US for the first half of the 1980s because of this unless you imported it and modified it yourself.
For that metter, the main reason the US has the draconian 25 year import ban is because of Mercedes' ineptitude at meeting US emissions in the early 1980s.

 

[Ryan81]

Fuel mileage isn't emissions. You can pay a fine and easily ignore fuel economy standards in the US (though the domestic manufacturers understandably tried hard as hell to avoid doing so). You cannot sell cars at all in the US that don't meet emissions requirements; which is why most European cars were downrated in power for the US market and sometimes had to do things like hack off compression, adopt finicky early fuel injection systems while they remained carbureted in Europe or use entirely different engine specs that were only for the US/Japan. Sometimes they didn't bother and didn't sell cars in the US at all. You couldn't buy a 911 Turbo or Countach in the US for the first half of the 1980s because of this unless you imported it and modified it yourself.
For that metter, the main reason the US has the draconian 25 year import ban is because of Mercedes' ineptitude at meeting US emissions in the early 1980s.

But it just seems so contradictory. The US is one of the biggest polluters of greenhouse gases on Earth yet it feels it needs to import European and Japanese cars and then "gimp" them to bring the power output down by 20 or 30hp, all supposedly in the name of "emissions standards"
During the 1970s, there were "gas guzzlers" like the Challenger, Charger, Chevelle, Superbird, Camaro, Mustang Boss, etc that were all 6 litre plus jobs. I never remember the UK or Japan having gas thirsty monsters like that. Nowhere close. I can't believe that the emissions spewed out by a 1973 Skyline GT-R would be anywhere close to those. Or a 1976 Ferrari 512BB.

I personally think there's another explanation and that is the government does not want to saturate the US car market more than is necessary with non-US marques in order to keep GM, Ford etc competitive and viable. And I honestly wouldn't blame them. The first duty to any government should be to work in the interests of its citizens and products.
I think that's another reason why the collective "West" is now so anti-Chinese with the likes of MG making massive in-roads into the UK market. They fear that saturation will start to bring the prices of their own marques up, consumers will jump ship and eventually lead to bankruptcy.

 

[Strittan]

Even to this day, the Europeans are way out ahead. Again, why?

Can’t it be that it’s just a matter of culture differences? What’s the big deal? It’s the same with music, movies, food and the way houses are built. It differs depending on where you are.

Why is a football round everywhere in the world except in America?

 

[Ryan81]

Can’t it be that it’s just a matter of culture differences? What’s the big deal? It’s the same with music, movies, food and the way houses are built. It differs depending on where you are.

Why is a football round everywhere in the world except in America?

You could be right. I'm just curious as to why European marques have a lot higher end performance cars than the US or Japan. Whether it's the British, Italians, Germans, French, Swedes etc.
They seem to have a far richer history when it comes to specifically performance-oriented cars, whether road legal or in motorsports.

With music, movies, food and houses, these things aren't necessarily competing head-to-head to find which one is better. They all just exist and it's a matter of preference which one you prefer. But records (like a lap on the Nurburgring or top speed or 0-60) are there to be challenged.
Yet, since the 1980s, almost all record breaking vehicles have come from Europe. Even those American and Japanese cars that have tried are few and far between.

I know this probably sounds very anal and pedantic to many (I have a way of pi**ing people off) but I find it fascinating.

 

[HarVee]

Can’t it be that it’s just a matter of culture differences? What’s the big deal? It’s the same with music, movies, food and the way houses are built. It differs depending on where you are.

Why is a football round everywhere in the world except in America?

This is the best answer.

I won't speak for Japan, but in the U.S. we tend to favor luxury cruisers and big pickup trucks over high performance sportscars. Part of this, I think, is because of both the great depression and WWII, and as such it wasn't really until the 1950s when America gained what is to be considered its first sports car, the Corvette. That's 50 years of automotive existence in the country without a high-performance orientated vehicle that appealed to the masses.

 

[Liquid]

The roads are very different which, after thinking about it, might play a part. As @Tornado alluded to, US manufacturers haven't historically done much investment in good-handling cars or top-end sports cars because there are no inheritable benefits to the rest of the range.

To put it in very broad strokes, American cars didn't handle well because they didn't need to; American roads are generally very long, very straight and very wide in grid networks. A stylish sports car or supercar with nice handling offered nothing, couldn't be used to its potential and couldn't pass anything down to the executive and compact classes.

 

[Gorefast]

Can’t it be that it’s just a matter of culture differences? What’s the big deal? It’s the same with music, movies, food and the way houses are built. It differs depending on where you are.

Why is a football round everywhere in the world except in America?

I support this Idea. During the 20th century european carmakers were mainly comparing with other european carmakers, sometimes with their neighbours (Ferrari and Lamborghini for example). So, if there is a sportive Coupé at your rival you needed one by yourself.

That changed late in that century and suddenly american and japanese cars were also in the game. Unfortunately this didn't lead to more and better models...

I was curious about this thread as I read the headline. In a retrospective of a Sports Car fan you might be right.

 

[05XR8]

This is the best answer.

I won't speak for Japan, but in the U.S. we tend to favor luxury cruisers and big pickup trucks over high performance sportscars. Part of this, I think, is because of both the great depression and WWII, and as such it wasn't really until the 1950s when America gained what is to be considered its first sports car, the Corvette. That's 50 years of automotive existence in the country without a high-performance orientated vehicle that appealed to the masses.

Pretty much. I grew up in a time where anything smaller than a Nova(which I was always told, as a kid, was a very economical car to buy ) was a “death trap”.

 

[Scaff]

Unfortunately this didn't lead to more and better models...

Disagree on the better part, the Honda NSX most certainly changed the game in two key area for supercars, those of reliability and usability.

Prior to the NSX if you bought a supercar you accepted that reliability and usability (for example the Daytona is well know to be a dog to drive at pretty much anything but flat out and the parking 'techniques' for a Lambo's of the era are hilariously daft) weren't a given and that was simply part of the deal. The NSX was a key factor in driving a change that you could have supercar levels of performance with reliability and usability, and the European manufacturers most certainly did take notice and change.

 

[Meythia]

A stylish sports car or supercar with nice handling offered nothing, couldn't be used to its potential and couldn't pass anything down to the executive and compact classes.

That is no different in the rest of the world except for Saudi Arabia, where those who possess these cars also possess the government one way or the other.

the Honda NSX

Honda didnt want to solely stick to be "the reliable family car" brand, but they couldnt simply remove the "reliable" part without consequence. So the logical option is to be "the reliable any car" brand further on

 

[Gorefast]

Disagree on the better part, the Honda NSX most certainly changed the game in two key area for supercars, those of reliability and usability.

Prior to the NSX if you bought a supercar you accepted that reliability and usability (for example the Daytona is well know to be a dog to drive at pretty much anything but flat out and the parking 'techniques' for a Lambo's of the era are hilariously daft) weren't a given and that was simply part of the deal. The NSX was a key factor in driving a change that you could have supercar levels of performance with reliability and usability, and the European manufacturers most certainly did take notice and change.

As I read my sentence again I can see that the meaning is unclear. In my opinion the growing competition did not bring more interesting or better models of german carmakers. I think they underestimated their new rivals.

Regarding the NSX I am 100% with you. It is one reason for the success of the Porsche 911 as most of them aren't kept "species-appropriate"...

 

[ScottPuss20]

Can’t it be that it’s just a matter of culture differences? What’s the big deal? It’s the same with music, movies, food and the way houses are built. It differs depending on where you are.

Why is a football round everywhere in the world except in America?

The football isn't round in Australia.

 

[Eunos_Cosmo]

I'll offer this theory-

At the turn of the 20th century, American cars, with the advent of the Ford Model T, were seen as tools to be used by common people. In Europe the use case for cars was different - Europeans did not need to cover distances as big or as frequently as many Americans did, common people did not really need cars even if they could afford them - and so the resulting cars for Europe were more higher end and specialty rather than for the masses. I'm taking Japan out of this because Japan was in a far different place economically in the early 1900s and cars were probably very rare and not domestically built.

So American cars prior to 1910 were largely produced for middle-income Americans and European cars were produced largely for high-income, aristocratic Europeans.

European aristocrats in that time period had a lot of time on their hands, exploring and inventing new forms of leisure and motor racing developed out of this. Whereas early American automotive performance might have been home mechanics tweaking their Fords, the Europeans had a lot more money & interest to put into development of racing cars, which is why you see the proliferation of low volume European performance and racing cars in the first few decades of the 1900s.

So I guess my argument is that automotive performance/racing culture effectively started in Europe in the first decades of the 1900s, and by the 1940s (even with two world wars) it was already extremely well established. Americans didn't seem to start caring about it until the 1960s, and Japan even later than that in any concerted capacity.

I think there are other factors too. The road network in the USA (particularly in the car-loving suburban centers of the midwest, south, and west) is significantly different than Europe and American manufacturers have not prioritized dynamics because things like curvy mountain roads are not as ubiquitous as they are in Europe, so American cars evolved more into soft & comfortable cruisers. Most Americans who need a car probably live in a place with little topographical diversity, so the roads are straight and flat. Where that isn't true, European cars are more popular. If you take an inventory of pre-1970 cars in San Francisco and compare it to the same category in Dallas, I think you'll find far more European examples in SF.

 

[Tornado]

But it just seems so contradictory. The US is one of the biggest polluters of greenhouse gases on Earth yet it feels it needs to import European and Japanese cars and then "gimp" them to bring the power output down by 20 or 30hp, all supposedly in the name of "emissions standards"

There's no "supposedly" about it. That's just what happened. Carbon dioxide was not the particular emission that the European cars were failing to keep in check in the United States by the late 1970s. Carbon dioxide is directly tied to fuel mileage, and the United States government by and large did not consistently care about fuel mileage until Obama was president (and other than occasional specific years the populace certainly never has). What the United States government cared about was smog; hence why the US went so far as to carve out a specific exception to allow CARB to set its own, even-higher emissions standards because it was so bad in California. That's why catalytic converters were basically required on US market and Japanese market cars starting from 1975; whereas they weren't required in Europe for nearly two more decades.


That's also why diesels were never popular in the United States; since in addition to usually being more expensive with more expensive fuel they tended to be dirty in a specific way that the United States government didn't like (remember who it was who found out what Volkswagen was doing) and the fuel mileage benefits didn't mean anything in a country where nobody cares about that to begin with.

I never remember the UK or Japan having gas thirsty monsters like that. Nowhere close.

British marques, just like German and Italian marques, were perfectly capable of making things that were just as piggish on fuel as American cars from the 1970s. And both of those cars notably also had quite a lot of problems actually getting to the US market as well. The XJS V12 had 10% of its power lopped off the top each time Jaguar redesigned its engine. A US V8 Vantage is a regular V8 with a Vantage body kit and interior and none of the performance; and emissions troubles eventually got so bad that Aston had to withdraw from the US market entirely only a few years into the life of the Virage.

I can't believe that the emissions spewed out by a 1973 Skyline GT-R would be anywhere close to those. Or a 1976 Ferrari 512BB.

A 1973 Skyline is undoubtedly for all intents and purposes just as bad as an equivalent 1973 Challenger. There's not much point in splitting hairs when it comes to early 1970s performance engines; and that's a major reason why those two engines (the S20 engine in the GT-R and the Chrysler 340 engine in the Challenger Rallye) were both gone before 1973 was even over. A 1976 Ferrari 512BB (a car never sold in North America just like the early Countach wasn't because Enzo Ferrari didn't want to even try making it emissions or crash test compliant) is undoubtedly far worse for emissions than a 1976 Trans Am 455.

I personally think there's another explanation and that is the government does not want to saturate the US car market more than is necessary with non-US marques in order to keep GM, Ford etc competitive and viable. And I honestly wouldn't blame them. The first duty to any government should be to work in the interests of its citizens and products.

That is why there is the 25 year ban and the Chicken Tax and the briefly-implemented Reagan administration voluntary input restrictions; but it had nothing to do with why you couldn't buy a 911 Turbo in 1983. If emissions issues weren't such a big deal at the time Porsche and Ferrari and Lamborghini and Mercedes Benz wouldn't have had so many problems meeting them while the Japanese marques (who had similar regulations in their home country) could generally breeze through them. But they did, and it hurt their image for decades for the public to know that they were being sold a lesser car than was available elsewhere. The United States was by far the biggest single market for the kind of cars those companies were selling (especially in the Reagan years) and those marques still regularly skipped out on selling certain cars here completely or offered extremely compromised versions because that's all they could do. Early fuel injection systems bootstrapped onto engines designed for carburetors that still retained them in Europe throughout the 1980s. Compression ratio drops. Engines downsized beyond the point where it actually makes sense for the application. US market-specific engines with power numbers just as bad as those of the regularly maligned domestic cars.


One cannot overstate how hard it was for even the large European manufacturers to meet US/Japanese emissions standards throughout the 1980s when they didn't have to bother with anything similar in their home markets; and inability for the smaller European companies to do so regularly led to them withdrawing from the US and Japan entirely every time the engine they had hitched their wagon to to sell cars with stopped meeting emissions standards. In the US market there was no 959. There was no F40 (the Federalized model didn't come out until near the end of the car's production run in the 1990s). There was no 288 GTO. There was no V8 Vantage Zagato; or even a real version of the regular V8 Vantage. You had the Countach 5000QV, which impressively even in federalized form still produced over 400 horsepower. You had the Testarossa, which in the US was admirably only very slightly downrated to 380 horsepower. You had the 911 Turbo when it returned to the US market in 1986. And you had a C4 Corvette if you ordered the B2K package through your dealer. Those were the four most powerful and fastest cars you could buy in the US in the 1980s; and none of them were available before 1985. There was no pre-fender flare Countach. No variety of Berlinetta Boxer. No 911 Turbo. The most powerful Corvette had 205 horsepower. I don't see how you can consider how having an entire region of the world where manufacturers who specialized in performance cars didn't have to deal with any of that stuff for two more decades than the ones in other countries did as anything but extremely beneficial to them.

 

[Ryan81]

You make some valid points and you no doubt have more knowledge than me on this subject as far as the nuances go.

I think for me, there's probably a more simple explanation as to why European marques dominate the performance sector. There's just a lot more well-established marques which specialise in performance oriented models.

You can't buy an 'affordable' Ferrari, McLaren, Bugatti, Porsche, Lamborghini etc. Even the cheapest models are out of most people's price ranges. Whereas, Chevrolet, Dodge, Ford, Nissan, Toyota etc produce many family cars, vans, small hatchbacks etc and therefore have a broader range of vehicles with different performances.

I think it was also mentioned that perhaps they just don't have the engineering expertise or financial resources to put so much of their investments into their R & D branches. However, there are smaller companies like Hennessey, SSC and Saleen that do exist but just produce cars on a very limited scale. I believe that Koenigseggs are very difficult to import to the US yet the Venom GT and the Venom F5 would both be rivals to the Regera, One :1 etc. I would think the emissions would be just as bad on both.

 

[McLaren]

As for JDMs, the only one that comes to mind is the NSX Type R, excluding the likes of the Nismo 400R etc which was just a one-off and even then, non-competitive alongside the European powerhouses above.

They built 40-44 of them with the intention to build 100 over all, & it was definitely a competitive rival in its era given it was an 400Hp AWD sports car capable of 4 second 0-60s which was plenty fast back in the 90's.


The top 3 are noted at Tsukuba with lap times of 1:03.73 (F40), 1:04.00 (400R), & 1:04.25 (GT2). For comparison's sake to the cars you listed, the F1 has a listed time of 1:04.62, the F50 at 1:05.81, & the Diablo has a 1:07.66 noted time in 1 Best Motoring video.

 

[Tornado]

I believe that Koenigseggs are very difficult to import to the US yet the Venom GT and the Venom F5 would both be rivals to the Regera, One :1 etc. I would think the emissions would be just as bad on both.

And you would be right. Notwithstanding that John Hennessey is a conman/thief, the Venom GT is no more a legitimate competitor to a Keonigsegg:

Then my car is:

And thus is basically irrelevant to any conversation about production cars; because it isn't one and Hennessey can basically just ignore emissions laws and tell you to make sure to register it in Montana.


And with regards to the F5, I've never seen any evidence that it is street legal at all. Hennessey claims that you can drive it under Show and Display exemption and the motoring press breathlessly regurgitates that, but that list of cars can be looked up right off the NHTSA website, it's not on it (though several Koenigseggs are) and it wouldn't be because Show and Display applies to foreign cars imported for extremely limited road usage and not domestic cars built by some guy in Texas who's trying to bypass American automobile standards. I'm assuming they are just registered as kit cars; if they are ever intended to be registered (or even built) at all.

 

[SuperSportX]

For the example you used in the 90s alot of it comes down to whether or not the brand would profit greatly from it, mainly the American brands. The GT90 would've been a show stopper but the car had heating issues IIRC with the engine and I imagine the reaction would've been even worse than when Jaguar replaced the V12 with a V6, not to mention a car like that would've been probably more expensive than a McLaren F1 in 1995 which for even a millionaire would've been alot of money for what was essentially just a show car. The most expensive production car of the 90s the CLK-GTR even had a hard enough time being sold that Mercedes-Benz still had 5 left over chassis by 2001/2002 which all became the roadster models.

Brands like Chevrolet, Dodge and Ford had alot of rad prototypes that I think definitely would've had buyers but they probably wouldn't have been very profitable. I imagine something like the Dodge Copperhead would've done well with college/hs aged people looking for a cheaper alternative to a Viper.