X Minus One is amazing! We have a lot of fun with that on long drives.

Also they weren’t singled out, other American companies producing small cars/fire traps did get sued. Ford caught actual criminal charges not because they had money but for the elements above when they came to light.

Their victory (bought with famous lawyers) helped set a precedent that ensured American corporations are an effective shield against liability and real consequences even in truly horrendous deliberate, documented harms.

It wasn’t unique in small American cars in those couple decades (notable for rushed designs with an indifference to safety across the board) but the numbers were a bit worse. They stood out for Ford’s extensive crash tests, and well-documented knowledge of the lethal design flaw, their early decision to pay out for deaths rather than make a quite inexpensive design change, and recall, and for the decade of expensive legal battles and PR campaigns where they lobbied against federal rear-end collision safety requirements which would have saved lives and identified the problem. They were happy to throw money at every aspect of the problem except for the part that kept burning their customers alive.

Also it wasn’t just the gas tank design but flaws with the frame and (essentially cosmetic bumper) which jammed every door even in minor rear end collisions.

This was half the problem with the Ford Pinto - the big name in burning people alive after minor collisions.

People already have hardware access to their own cars and make stupid modifications all the time. That’s what vehicle inspections are for. Heck, I know police aren’t generally popular on this instance but stopping vehicles with unsafe modifications they spot on the roads falls under their purview too. I’m from a state with inspections but have a friend who wasn’t and her stories about the beater cars they drove (missing floorboards, reach out the window and push on a metal rod to use the brake) tell me the system basically works. At least as well as it can while transportation infrastructure is arranged so cars are a basic necessity for huge swaths of the country.

Thanks! I’ll take a look and see what I can find

I quite recommend the Swindled podcast episode on the Pinto:

https://swindledpodcast.com/podcast/124-the-pinto/

Warnings for blunt descriptions of horrible injuries and tragic deaths. And incredible corporate malfeasance.

Especially right after an accident when they’re dazed or panicky. There’s a reason emergency exits are usually clearly marked and intuitive to use.

The important thing is that the orks trust it

That might be too much authenticity

They’ve all been making bigger cars with ‘luxury’ features included by default so they can charge more per car for years now. They’re focused on finding ever-better margins. Selling tons of cheap cars seem to be a far lower priority than selling a few expensive ones. And researching new designs and EVs in general cuts into profits.

The explanation I saw in another conversation was that certain settings (I think one-pedal driving?) for regenerative braking make it feel like you’re constantly switching between accelerating and braking with no in-between. Like as soon as you let off the accelerator the brakes come on, no ability to just glide along, so it feels very lurching. I love the idea of recovering power from regenerative braking so I guess if I get the chance to look for an electric car someday I’ll have to make sure it can be configured to just happen when I actually use the brake.

Seems like local industry only wants to focus on ICE vehicles so there’s not much to protect

The webcomic Black Squires

https://m.tapas.io/series/black-squires/info

In the US, bans on foreign cars which limit the number of ‘someone elses’ pretty dramatically.

Personally I also suspect a bit of collusion - they could sell it for less and undercut the competition but they all make more money if nobody cuts their price.

The belief in natural heirachies is baked into everything they do.

There are some interesting proposals for electric ships using containerized batteries which can be loaded/unloaded with the same cranes they use for shipping containers and charged in port. https://cleantechnica.com/2025/05/24/beyond-the-harbor-electrifying-short-sea-routes-and-hybridizing-blue-water-shipping/

It may not be suitable for transoceanic trips but a lot of shipping follows the coasts or even travels by river where this may be more practical.

The lack of official touchscreens/GPS/center console media etc seems like a good step - at the very least, unnecessary antennas and microphones should be easier to spot/replace with an old MP3 player with one annoying song.

So genuine question: are the parts like batteries/motors safe and otherwise good enough to be used in ICE conversions? Or is there some kind of software/network boobytrap to be circumvented? The car itself is a horribly flawed surveillance box, but it seems like the flaws I’ve seen are mostly a sort of problem by compilation, like the finished product is worse than the sum of it’s parts. Is there a chance at least that this overproduction could help provide parts for conversion vehicles?

Genuine question: would fiberglass and resin adhere to this material? I’m familiar with it from patching up old boats and canoes and could see that being an easy weekend project.