Where did the British car industry go wrong?

[fillyboy]

Notch mentioned on another thread it was all the fault of Maggie Thatcher, I reckoned it was the Trade Unions, Red Robbo and the like, ajohn says he know the real story but I'm not sure he'll spill the beans.
Any thoughts?

 

[IT Minion]

Brexit obvs.

 

[catlad]

We are still importing huge quantities of coal to fuel are power stations 40 yrs after thatcher said they redundant!

 

[EddieM]

We are still importing huge quantities of coal to fuel are power stations 40 yrs after thatcher said they redundant!

Can't be that much we only have 5 coal powered power stations, used solely for peak demand, we have many weeks when we are coal free. 2018-2019 only 5% of power was coal generated.

 

[Brigadier]

Shoite designs, thrown together, intransigent workforce, ineffectual management, self-serving unions, complacency....

Perm any six of those six, for starters.

 

[EddieM]

Shoite designs, thrown together, intransigent workforce, ineffectual management, self-serving unions, complacency....

Perm any six of those six, for starters.

You forgot lack of investment to have modern factories and processes.

 

[Bodd]

Maybe when Rover were on their last legs the Government of the day could have brought British for the emergency services and local authorities.

With input from BMW and Honda. They were not bad cars at this time..

 

[Burnerman]

Not just the motor trade, although the products were terrible......zero quality control, strikes at the drop of a hat.
Working with the C.E.G.B. During that time, worked stopped ( if indeed it had ever started) at 10am every Friday until noon. The reason? For the workforce to fill in their pools sheets
I arrived on site with a truck with an alternator rotor on board at Radcliffe power station in Notts, in the 1970’s all the way from Blyth B station. Got there at 2pm Friday but they wouldn’t unload me as it was too close to knocking off time at 5.....maximum time for the thing to be craned of was one hour. Spent the whole bloody weekend in the cab
The workforce hated the management and they also hated themselves. Horrible times.
John

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

It was due to many things, Thatcher was just the last straw - the unions, work to rules, strikes, poor design and poor build quality. The Japanese offered much better cars in many respects and they got better as the years went by, whilst our troubles just got worse. BL was by far the worse and vehicles I tried hard to avoid, even buying Russian at one point. A few of the better British marques managed to survive and prosper.

 

[Tigercubrider]

Very short sighted management who had the "the public will buy what we make" attitude
The unions didn't help, but British factory management was poor

The British motorcycle industry suffered the same issues but mainly due to management complacency and ancient equipment. The whole NVT /bsa collapse was due to Dennis Poore who asset stripped the companies. When triumph (meriden) closed, they were still using machine tools that had been dragged out of the rubble after Coventry was bombed. Triumph had a whole series of modern engines drawn up but were told to keep producing the 1938 design.

Famously, when Norton moved, the old guy on a machine retired. The new factory couldn't get the component that he made correct, so took him to the new factory. Ah! He said. You need to ram a chair leg in there or the machine won't run true. Their stuff was pre ww1.

There are some good documentaries on YouTube at the moment with stories about management wringing every last penny out of old designs

 

[catlad]

Well Eddie according to the coast series I was watching last week Port Immingham imports 14,000,000 tons of coal per year and provides 50% of our electricity at the moment.

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

I arrived on site with a truck with an alternator rotor on board at Radcliffe power station in Notts, in the 1970’s all the way from Blyth B station.

I have worked at both as a contractor in my time.

 

[Burnerman]

If we have several weeks without burning coal, that’s great.....we just turn the gas up to spin the gas turbines
A place called Blyth not too far from me was a huge coal exporter. All gone now of course, they now import coal from Colombia. Great.
John

 

[Burnerman]

I have worked at both as a contractor in my time.

Interesting stuff, Harry! I was involved with Blyth because it was local to me when I did my engineering degree helping to research boiler steam drums.
The management sent me to Radcliffe because they felt like it......no idea if it still exists.
John

 

[JohnD]

Well Eddie according to the coast series I was watching last week Port Immingham imports 14,000,000 tons of coal per year and provides 50% of our electricity at the moment.

It doesn't.

Perhaps it was an old film you watched.