Note for mods, a little OT content to illustrate a few points. Kindly delete if felt inappropriate.
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Originally Posted by AutoNoob There is a big difference between making combo/a la carte meals and making multiple optioned cars. |
Oh yes, totally agree. For one, making meals to serve every customer's satisfaction every single time is very difficult, in a way more difficult than making cars because unlike cars, the demanded food has to be served in a matter of minutes and unserved, perishes in a matter of hours. Ask McDonald's, a 22 bn $ + revenue company (little less than Suzuki, Volvo, Mazda which are around 25 bn $ IIRC and little more than Tata motors which is around 20 bn $).
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I didn't wanted to be harsh, but I have to be in saying that do you know anything about mass manufacturing of cars (or any other complex system of similar size or bigger).
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My knowledge or ignorance about anything is irrelevant since I'm not the one putting on airs of superiority here. I have made a few observations on the topic in discussion and if you feel so hot about them as to make comments as quoted right above, I suggest that you kindly soak your harshness in cold water for a while and turn it into amiability lest the heat earn you a rebuke.
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I'll suggest all those who are giving such analogies to first study (if possible then visit) how such things are made and understand how much planning and effort is required. |
If you do have knowledge of assembly line cost escalations involved in customisations of various kinds, we'll all be grateful if you shared it with us. If the abovequoted was just meant as a slight for me to shut up simply because you don't like what I wrote, forget it, you only put your foot deeper in your mouth with such unsubstantiated talk.
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All such people can take the above words as a mark of protest from the people who are sweating to produce each car, including me.
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I don't see any reason for a protest, with due respect to your sweating in car production. A resistance to change is the recipe for extinction of an industrial process. If customisation were so impossible, we would all be driving only black cars. Perhaps you know who wrote this: "Any customer can have a car painted any colour that he wants so long as it is black". A very great man that, still fell prey to rigidity in the end.
Finally, I mean no offence to AutoNoob or anyone else even if they disagree with me and would feel nice if the discussion remains friendly.
If customisation were so impossible, we would only have one variant of each car model and not the three to four variants that we have today. I'm only talking of taking this one or two steps further. With the rate at which previously high end features such as steering audio controls, AT, ACC, cruise control, ABS+EBD, ESP and others are making way to lower segment cars, customisation becomes more viable with each passing year.
ABS and airbags should not be clubbed in the options. Airbags could be optional for anyone who values their safety a little less but ABS should be mandatory across the board in all vehicles because a skidding vehicle is essentially out of control and a hazard to others in the vicinity. And this is not just on wet roads. A tyre can skid on a perfectly dry tar road if the day is hot and the braking at high speed harsh enough to lock the wheels (known as reverted rubber aquaplaning). The point is, I may have ABS in my car and I would also not like the cars around me to crash into me because their owner wanted to save a few thousand bucks by not having ABS. It's the principle of mandatory third party insurance. A very long post now. Enough for the time being.
PS- Why I insist on bringing on comfort features in the gamut of safety features as options is that over long drives (exceeding three-four hours), stamina, available concentration power and drain on energy due mounting discomfort assumes a rapidly increasing impact on safety. Even on shorter drives, discomfort=distraction. Not all comfort features would contribute as aid to safety but some definitely do.