Keith, Thanks for the time machine. Makes me want to vomit that about all Americans know are 283 Ford Falcons and the whole bastardized ilk when they trip back into time.
God.... to own a mini anything when Detroit was at its worst.... Hey...wait a minute....they still are....! Todd Swearingen ----- Original Message ----- From: Keith Addison To: biofuel@yahoogroups.com Sent: Saturday, April 27, 2002 1:24 AM Subject: Re: [biofuel] So, You Want to Buy a Green Car ... Or Do You? >I drove a BMW minicooper yesterday, and although it was cute, I would not >call 33mpg on premium unleaded "clean"......... Hi Steve You want to take it out on a really tight and twisty mountain road that you know really well. Wait a mo while I shift gear... right, Old Fart mode... These young people of today - "yesterday" he drove one. I drove one in 1963. Hot little thing, then, handled really nicely. The Minis were introduced in 1959, replacing the old Morris Minor, which is a sort of 4-wheeled equivalent of a DC-3 Dakota. Start to consider that level of technology a bit and you get to thinking it's all improved a helluva lot since then, but somehow everything's gone steeply downhill, and could these two things have something to do with each other? If you really like KISS and AT, maybe you'll stop with the Dakota and the Morris Minor. Do they still make Morris Minors in India? They were, until recently. Elsewhere they're collector's items. Anyway, the Mini replaced it, and cost at the time 499 British pounds sterling (about a thousand dollars?). 850cc 4-cylinder, the Cooper version was 1,000cc, much faster. I had a Mini, my first car. I had another one a few years later, working on a newspaper in Johannesburg. I used to go to Cape Town for the weekend, one thousand miles, put my foot down and took it off again when I got there 12-13 hours later. Need big cars for big distances? Nope. The Mini and the Mini Cooper were made by an old company called Austin that had recently merged with another old company called Morris, and finally became BMC (British Motor Corporation), and then died. The story of British industry. What's really interesting about the Mini is the design. It was a real trend-setter, the first transverse-engine front-wheel drive, and the basic design has hardly changed in more than 40 years, just steadily improved. The only comparison I can think of is the VW Beetle. Beetle owners and Mini owners hated each other. So why change models every year? Could it be perhaps just marketing and a packaging job? I think that's a strong point in the Mini Cooper's favour. In deciding which car's green and which isn't the eco-costs of manufacturing ought to be considered, and this kind of design continuity surely lowers those costs. So, though the fuel economy isn't that great (it never was - was surprised to see it rating "green" in that story), it might be cleaner than it looks at first. The Japanese love Mini Coopers, by the way. Regards Keith > >Steve Spence >Subscribe to the Renewable Energy Newsletter: >http://www.webconx.com/subscribe.htm > >Renewable Energy Pages - http://www.webconx.dns2go.com/ >Human powered devices, equipment, and transport - >http://www.webconx.dns2go.com/2000/humanpower.htm >[EMAIL PROTECTED] >----- Original Message ----- >From: "Keith Addison" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: <biofuel@yahoogroups.com> >Cc: <biofuels-biz@yahoogroups.com> >Sent: Thursday, April 25, 2002 9:23 AM >Subject: [biofuel] So, You Want to Buy a Green Car ... Or Do You? > > > > http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12917 > > AlterNet -- > > So, You Want to Buy a Green Car ... Or Do You? > > Allie Gottlieb, Metro Silicon Valley > > http://www.metroactive.com > > April 19, 2002 > > Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Please do NOT send "unsubscribe" messages to the list address. To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Stock for $4 and no minimums. FREE Money 2002. http://us.click.yahoo.com/k6cvND/n97DAA/ySSFAA/FGYolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Please do NOT send "unsubscribe" messages to the list address. To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
