Godfrey DiGiorgi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > That is the modern world, however. To change from that basis into a > low-tech, non-manufacturing culture is likely something that will not > happen anytime soon unless there was catastrophic pressure to deal with.
No need for low-tech to get anywhere. Leaving deliberately built-in wear and obsolescence out of modern car designs would be a great step in the right direction. My Volvo 480 wasn't scrapped because of corrosion or mechanical wear but because the electronics went bananas. Stood right in front of the house like an orchestrion with everything electric (wipers, lights, horn, washers, you name it) going on and off at 1 second intervals. The broken ECU turned out to be so ridiculously expensive that I scrapped a car which would mechanically have been good for many more miles. My life-long car electrician, the guy who'd actually *repair* components like alternators or replace broken relays, has closed his shop. Nowadays, if something like a wiper interval control fails you don't simply replace a relay but the complete ECU for hundreds of bucks. This is where modern car design stinks. Ralf -- Ralf R. Radermacher - DL9KCG - Köln/Cologne, Germany private homepage: http://www.fotoralf.de manual cameras and photo galleries - updated Jan. 10, 2005 Contarex - Kiev 60 - Horizon 202 - P6 mount lenses -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
