kscarbel2

A great man, wonderful human being and Allentown, Pennsylvania native has gone to heaven.

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https://www.bigmacktrucks.com/topic/31209-when-the-dodge-boys-sold-trucks-down-under/

David Phillips, Automotive News / July 2, 2019 Lee Iacocca, the mastermind behind the Ford Mustang and the straight-talking captain of Chrysler’s historic U.S. rescue and 1980s turnaround that brought him acclaim as America’s most famous CEO and car salesman, died on Tuesday at home in Bel Air, Calif., a neighborhood in western Los Angeles. He was 94. The death was reported by The Washington Post, which cited Iacocca's family. The cause was complications from Parkinson’s disease. Iacocca, a natural huckster and tireless competitor with Italian roots and a penchant for cigars, vinyl car roofs and Greek-temple grilles, defined the role of the imperial American executive -- first as president of Ford Motor Co., then as chairman and CEO of Chrysler -- for much of the last quarter of the 20th century. With a sometimes brash, no-nonsense style and fiery tongue, he was the towering public face, corporate pitchman and voice for the American auto industry’s triumphs and challenges. “I think America is getting an inferiority complex about Japan,” Iacocca lamented before a group of Chrysler executives in one late 1980s TV commercial. “Everything from Japan is perfect. Everything from America is lousy ... now that’s got to stop.” Doug Fraser, the late UAW president and Chrysler director, once pegged Iacocca “a hip shooter deluxe.” Newsweek, in a 1963 profile, said he could be as “direct as the thrust of a piston.” Playboy called him "a businessman of the old school, a guy who smells the territory and goes with his gut." Fierce competitor In the early 1980s, with the U.S. auto industry on its heels amid soaring gasoline prices, inflation and rising Japanese imports, Iacocca’s optimism and fierce competitive spirit helped revive Chrysler and renew Detroit’s fortunes. “The most amazing thing about the guy is that he just never gives up,” the late Ben Bidwell, a longtime Ford executive and later Chrysler vice chairman, once said of Iacocca. “Every day he gets up and every day he attacks. You get discouraged yourself. But he just never, never, never gives up on the company, on its products, on whatever.” Iacocca was hailed as “Detroit’s comeback kid” in a March 1983 cover story in Time. Two years later, when asked to name the person they most admired for a 1985 Gallup Poll, Americans ranked Iacocca third -- behind President Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II. The next year, Iacocca placed second in the survey, behind Reagan and ahead of the pope. At the end of his storied automotive career, spanning the late 1940s to the early 1990s, Iacocca admitted what many colleagues had already discovered: He was better at managing and leading during turbulent times than good. “I’m built that way,” Iacocca told the Associated Press in December 1992, the month he retired from Chrysler. “Some guys fight better with real ammunition … on maneuvers they goof off. My adrenaline flows when you’re really in the trenches and things are tough.” Risky gamble on pony car Iacocca’s keen product planning skills were behind Ford’s risky gamble, soon after the Edsel flop, to bring the Mustang to market in 1964. The first so-called pony car, with its low price and sleek styling, was an instant sensation and gave a new generation of young Americans another reason to fall in love with Detroit metal. With just $45 million to develop and build -- what he called "an unheard of low amount at the time to design and push a new car line through to production" -- the overnight success of the Mustang put Iacocca on the fast track at Ford. “Few people understood the sizzle that existed between the car and a driver better than Lee Iacocca,” historian and author Douglas Brinkley observed in his 2003 book, Wheels for the World: Henry Ford, His Company, and a Century of Progress. Iacocca’s second home run, the minivan, was an innovative people hauler that spawned a new segment in the 1980s, became one of the most profitable consumer products ever created, inspired a raft of copycats and helped Chrysler reap billions of dollars in sales for decades. The design was inspired by a former colleague at Ford, Hal Sperlich. “He could sell you anything and back it up with his sales talk, logic and facts,” the late William Clay Ford Sr., grandson of Ford founder Henry Ford and a longtime Ford executive and director, once said of Iacocca. “He is an extraordinary salesman, an extraordinary talent.” The Chrysler years Chrysler was hemorrhaging cash and careening toward bankruptcy when Chrysler Chairman and CEO John Riccardo hired Iacocca to become president and COO of the company on Nov. 2, 1978. The same day, Chrysler reported nearly $160 million in third-quarter losses -- a staggering pile of red ink for an automaker and a company record at the time. While he had just been fired months earlier as president of Ford Motor Co. by Henry Ford II, in one of the Motor City’s most acrimonious splits, Iacocca was quickly embraced as Chrysler’s savior. “It’s a coup, and a good one, and we thank Henry Ford II for it,” a dealer told Automotive News the week Iacocca joined Chrysler. Less than a year later, Riccardo, exhausted by efforts to secure a government bailout, abruptly retired and Iacocca became chairman and CEO of Chrysler on Sept. 20, 1979. In a 1992 interview with Automotive News, Iacocca said the situation when he arrived at Chrysler was far worse than he had expected. “I knew it was bad, but I didn’t know that bad,” he said at the time. “What I didn’t know was how rotten the system was. How bad purchasing was. How many guys were on the take. How rotten it was to the core. That stunned me.” U.S. loan guarantees With Chrysler’s financial woes mounting and bankruptcy looming, Iacocca successfully lobbied President Jimmy Carter and Congress in late 1979 and early 1980 to obtain a $1.5 billion loan guarantee from the federal government. In return, Chrysler came up with $2 billion in cost reductions. The controversial rescue backed by the federal government was unprecedented for the auto industry and American business at the time. Iacocca worked tirelessly to secure it. He enlisted Chrysler dealers from around the country to lobby their local representatives. “We set up a war room and had every [congressional] district in the 50 states covered,” Iacocca recalled in 2006. “We got the leading dealer in each district” to organize the effort. To secure the loan guarantee, the company needed to raise $1.4 billion. Iacocca oversaw a series of drastic cost-saving measures -- “equality of sacrifice,” he called it. On Oct. 25, 1979, Chrysler and the UAW reached a tentative contract agreement that gave the union a seat on the company’s board of directors. In return, Chrysler was granted $203 million in concessions by the union. Altogether, nonunion Chrysler employees swallowed $125 million in pay cuts; suppliers and dealers threw in $180 million; states and cities with Chrysler plants chipped in $250 million and the UAW accepted $462.2 million in concessions. Iacocca, setting an early example of sacrifice, had reduced his salary to $1 a year. Pitchman supreme Over time Iacocca gutted Chrysler’s senior management team, recruited former Ford colleagues and hired a few star outsiders to remake the company. He scuttled the company’s archaic sales bank that saddled dealers with unwanted inventory and instituted dealer and consumer rebates. Iacocca’s first commercial plug for Chrysler came in a 1979 print ad. It featured Iacocca’s signature below a 1,052-word statement in which he presented the company's sweeping case for federal loan guarantees. His commercial TV debut came later that year in an appearance at the end of conventional spots that pitched models such as the Plymouth Horizon. “I'm not asking you to buy any car on faith,” he said. “I'm asking you to compare.” After Chrysler secured the loan guarantees, Iacocca moved into a starring role in the company’s marketing. America had given Chrysler some “breathing space,” he bellowed in one commercial, adding: “Now watch us go.” The introduction of the front-wheel-drive, four-cylinder K cars in 1980 fueled the automaker’s rebound, eventually generating billions in revenue and profits. Iacocca had first tried to market such cars in the 1970s while at Ford. It was a high-stakes gamble. Iacocca played a minor role in the development of the K cars but he was charged with making sure they were a success. “At Chrysler, the K-car was the last train in the station,” Iacocca wrote in his 1984 autobiography, Iacocca: An Autobiography. “If we failed here, it was all over.” He took to the airwaves again in 1981 to tout the K cars’ fuel economy, value and roominess. After a slow start, the company sold more than a million Dodge Aries and Plymouth Reliant cars in the first few years -- enough to generate cash to develop other models. Chrysler repaid its loans in August 1983 -- seven years ahead of schedule -- in a feat celebrated by Iacocca at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York. A year later, Iacocca was behind the lectern again to introduce a radical vehicle that would define the company for decades. The minivan In the early 1970s, Sperlich, then a vice president at Ford, proposed the minivan, but was spurned by Ford CEO Henry Ford II. After Sperlich left for Chrysler in 1977, soon to be followed by Iacocca, the idea for a minivan finally took off. Iacocca, recognizing the American family’s need for fuel economy, roominess, comfort and function at a modest price, had long believed the minivan would be a success. “You can say what you want about Iacocca, but he has very good marketing instincts, and he could see the potential for this kind of vehicle,” Sperlich said in a 1999 interview with Automotive News. “We had done extensive market research and found out there were people who liked it from all walks of the automobile kingdom.” Advanced engineering on the minivan started the week Iacocca joined Chrysler, Sperlich said. The success of the Plymouth Voyager and Dodge Caravan minivans was built on the earlier triumph of the K-car platform with fwd and a four-cylinder engine. The vehicles were fuel efficient and big enough to seat six people. Iacocca was convinced there was a market for such a van with a low step-in height and what he called “garageability.” The Voyager and Caravan, introduced in 1984, became two of the hottest new products of the 1980s. Household name By the mid-1980s, Iacocca was a household name, appearing regularly in commercials to tout Chrysler’s lineup, often taking shots at Japanese rivals and daring U.S. consumers to buy a rival car if they could land a better deal. With the 1982 Chrysler LeBaron, Iacocca hatched what became a signature pitch: “If you can find a better car, buy it.” In another 1982 ad, Iacocca argued that if everyone drove a fuel-efficient K car, “we wouldn’t have to import a single drop of OPEC oil for gasoline.” Iacocca’s 30-second spots reached 97 percent of American households an average of 63 times apiece, Time magazine reported in 1985. He was lampooned by comedian Phil Hartman on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” and became a frequent cartoon subject in comic strips and the editorial pages of the nation’s newspapers. People magazine anointed him the new Italian Stallion -- a sex symbol for the Corporate Age. His name was tossed around as a possible presidential candidate. At one point, Iacocca tried to dampen the speculation by suggesting noted sex counselor Dr. Ruth Westheimer would be an ideal running mate. “We’d make a terrific ticket,” Iacocca quipped in 1987. “I’d tell them what to do and she’d tell them how to do it.” He turned down an appointment to a U.S. Senate seat for Pennsylvania and was courted to become Major League Baseball commissioner by George Steinbrenner, the late owner of the New York Yankees. Best-selling author President Reagan in 1982 appointed Iacocca head of the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation created to help raise funds for the renovation and restoration of the landmark statue in New York Harbor. Iacocca: An Autobiography, lived on The New York Times bestseller list for 88 weeks. The book was an overnight sensation and proved popular in all social strata and in all regions of the country. Sales topped 200,000 copies per month in Japan and it became a must-read among “the Saudi technocratic elite,” Time magazine said. In its review of the book, The Wall Street Journal called Iacocca the “Motor City’s most famous motor mouth.” Iacocca would write two more books: Talking Straight in 1988, and 2007’s Where Have All the Leaders Gone?, in which he railed against excessive executive compensation, political gridlock in Washington, the competitiveness of the Detroit 3, why America couldn’t build a competitive hybrid and other hot topics of the day. Spending spree With Chrysler on the mend -- it posted record profits of $2.38 billion in 1984 and $1.64 billion in 1985 -- Iacocca hatched plans to build a modern technology center 30 miles north of Detroit, in Auburn Hills. The $1 billion project opened in 1991. Chrysler also went on a spending spree, snapping up Gulfstream Aerospace Corp., FinanceAmerica, Electrospace Systems, Lamborghini and a major prize, American Motors -- including AMC’s profitable Jeep brand -- for a combined $2 billion. Iacocca aimed to diversify Chrysler’s revenue sources and help shield the company from future economic downturns. But the acquisitions raised the automaker’s breakeven point and, combined with several poor product calls, produced another period of losses for Chrysler. With the company back on the ropes, Iacocca was forced to sell assets to raise cash and focus on Chrysler’s core automotive operations. In a 1995 speech, Chrysler President Bob Lutz said Chrysler’s crisis in the late 1980s was almost as dire as the one that required Iacocca to secure the government-backed loans a decade earlier. “We had sort of put our product development on autopilot, which resulted, as you know, in a string of bland, look-alike cars and trucks,” Lutz said. Bashing Japan Fresh models such as the compact Neon, revamped minivans, a redesigned Ram pickup and the new Jeep Grand Cherokee helped right Chrysler once more and the profits started flowing again in the early 1990s. Still, Detroit automakers continued to battle Japanese automakers and lose U.S. market share, and Iacocca never passed up a chance to champion Detroit’s cause. He was particularly vocal in a speech after returning from a historic trade mission to Japan with President George H. W. Bush and U.S. business leaders in January 1992. “I for one am fed up hearing from the Japanese, and I might say some Americans, too, that all our problems in this industry, all our problems, are our own damn fault,” a vitriolic Iacocca told the Detroit Economic Club. “We do not have idiots running General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, or our suppliers. And our workers are not lazy and stupid.” Time to go A few months later, with Iacocca’s reign at Chrysler winding down -- he had turned 65 in 1989 -- he faced mounting pressure from some company directors to identify a successor. Iacocca stayed on longer than Chrysler’s traditional retirement date to, as he put it, finish the job when the company’s fortunes soured again in the late 1980s. Chrysler had begun to lose top executives such as Gerald Greenwald and Steve Miller when directors realized Iacocca had no plans to step down. The board, worried about Wall Street’s growing concern with Chrysler’s succession plans, began to realize that Iacocca really didn’t want to retire, Newsweek reported in March 1992. After considering insiders and outsiders, including Roger Penske, Iacocca personally chose veteran GM executive Robert Eaton to succeed him, a selection Iacocca later regretted in his 2007 book on leadership. Iacocca retired as chairman and CEO of Chrysler at the end of 1992 at age 68. In typical Iacocca fashion, his retirement became an extravagant road show -- a monthslong affair, with farewell parties in Washington, Las Vegas, Paris, New York, Detroit and Palm Springs, Calif. The guests in Vegas at the University of Nevada arena included former U.S. House Speaker Tip O’Neill and entertainers Frank Sinatra, Vic Damone and Wayne Newton. For a farewell dinner at the Greenbrier resort in West Virginia, gold-lame napkins were flown in from Illinois. Guests received a crystal paperweight in the shape of the Chrysler pentastar and engraved with Iacocca’s autograph. In one of his last TV spots as chairman, Iacocca introduced Americans to another new styling concept -- what Chrysler called “cab forward,” in which the wheels of a car are pushed out to the corners of the vehicle and the cabin is expanded. It was featured prominently on a new generation of large sedans: the Chrysler Concorde, Dodge Intrepid and Eagle Vision. “Well, it’s here. ... It’s time for me to step down and retire as chairman of Chrysler … ” Iacocca boasted in the ad. “You know, I’ll tell you, when it’s your last turn at bat, it sure is nice to hit a home run.” Italian roots Lido Anthony Iacocca was born on Oct. 15, 1924, in Allentown, Pa. His parents were Italian immigrants who helped operate a hot dog restaurant, Yocco’s Hot Dogs. Iacocca’s father, Nicola, made and lost a fortune more than once while starting a car rental agency and investing in real estate, a movie house and fast-food restaurants. In school, Iacocca was popular and smart, but could also be brash and quick-tongued. In third grade, he walked onto the stage in a play in the lead role as king while chewing stick gum that a girl had handed to him offstage. He received a lowered grade on a report card as a result of the incident and was punished severely by his father. In 10th grade, Iacocca contracted rheumatic fever and was forced to give up sports and instead embraced reading and joined the debate team. He graduated from Allentown High School in 1942 and went on to graduate from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., with a degree in industrial engineering in 1945. He earned a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Princeton University in 1946 and joined Ford as an engineering trainee that same year. Iacocca lasted only nine months as an engineer; he became disenchanted during Ford’s tough “Rouge Loop Course,” in which trainees learn the basics of car manufacturing. He was assigned a job as an automatic transmission engineer but turned it down. “I learned at Princeton that pure research did not fascinate me,” he told Time magazine in 1964. He left engineering and began his career in sales and marketing at Ford’s Chester, Pa., district sales office. “I was eager to be where the real action was -- marketing or sales,” Iacocca wrote in his autobiography. “I liked working with people more than machines.” He became a Ford zone manager in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., in 1949. Iacocca met his first wife, Mary, then a receptionist at Ford’s Philadelphia office, in 1948. They married in 1956 and had two daughters, Kathryn and Lia. Mary died of diabetes in 1983. Iacocca would marry two more times. He wed publicist Peggy Johnson in 1986, but the couple divorced eight months later. Johnson died in 2000 of a heart attack. Restaurateur Darrien Earle became Iacocca’s third wife in 1991. The couple divorced in 1995. Young Turk at Ford Iacocca began his meteoric rise to the top of Ford in 1956 when he introduced the “56 for ’56” campaign. With a 20 percent down payment, customers could purchase a 1956 model Ford for $56 per month for three years. The marketing concept was a success, and by 1960 Iacocca was elected a vice president and chosen general manager of the Ford Division. He was just 36 at the time and the youngest person ever to oversee the giant Ford Division. Only Henry Ford II, it was often said, advanced faster through the ranks at Ford. Iacocca later described his years heading the Ford Division as one of the happiest periods of his career. He was eager to develop a sporty, moderately priced vehicle to tap into the youth-oriented culture that was beginning to flourish after the somnolent 1950s. The Baby Boomers were moving into prime car-buying age. When the Edsel was dropped in 1960 after just its third model year, and $250 million in losses, many Ford officials, notably chairman and CEO Henry Ford II, were reluctant to approve the Mustang project. But Iacocca -- who didn’t design or style the car -- pressed on and eventually won approval for the project with an original price tag of $75 million that was whittled down to $45 million. Iacocca created a clandestine group of engineers -- dubbed The Fairlane Committee after the Dearborn, Mich., inn where they met secretly -- that set several broad goals for the car. It had to seat four passengers. It needed a generous-sized trunk. The hood had to be long to suggest a powerful engine, while the rear deck should be short – to underscore lithe and speed. The Mustang proved a revolutionary vehicle when it debuted in April 1964. In a marketing coup, Iacocca appeared on the cover of both Time and Newsweek the week the car came out. “Lee sensed how big the Mustang’s potential could be sooner than anybody,” Donald Petersen, who worked as a liaison between the Mustang’s engineering and marketing teams, and who later became Ford chairman and CEO, told Automotive News in 2003. “He really went for it. He never gave up.” Some 1 million Mustangs were sold in the car’s first two years of production -- the quickest a new nameplate had ever achieved that milestone. In 1989, AutoWeek wrote that “the two cars that have most influenced the shape and design of products worldwide in the last half of this century have been the Mustang and the minivan.” The Mustang’s success won Iacocca one promotion after another in the 1960s, culminating in 1970 when he became president of Ford. Miscues, too In addition to the Mustang and minivan, Iacocca’s other hits include the Cougar (the Mustang’s cousin at Mercury), Lincoln Continental Mark III, Ford Maverick and Jeep. With a convertible version of the Chrysler LeBaron, Iacocca revived the soft-top market after it went dormant in the 1970s. Despite his reputation as a product genius, Iacocca also stewarded some of the industry’s biggest product flops, notably the TC by Maserati, a car marketed by Chrysler in the 1980s. He also missed an opportunity in the 1960s that would have made Ford the first Detroit automaker to sell a fwd car in the states -- ahead of GM and Chrysler -- when he scrapped plans to market the Cardinal, which Ford had developed in Germany and proved to be a big seller across Europe. Under Iacocca, Chrysler also created the Eagle brand -- a vestige of the AMC deal -- but it was dropped after the 1998 model year. In 1988, Chrysler and Fiat signed a pact that allowed Chrysler to sell Alfa Romeo vehicles in Canada and the United States. The distribution deal was scrapped in 1991. At Ford, Iacocca was an early and vocal opponent of passive safety systems such as airbags only to actively embrace them later to help distinguish Chrysler’s products. And in 1987 he was forced to apologize publicly to American consumers after Chrysler was indicted for odometer tampering. “The first thing was just dumb,” Iacocca said candidly in July 1987 after Chrysler admitted it had disconnected odometers as part of routine product testing near a St. Louis assembly plant. “We test-drove a small percentage of our cars with the odometers disengaged and didn't tell our customers. The second thing, I think, went beyond dumb, and reached all the way out to stupid -- a few cars were damaged in testing badly enough that they should never have been sold as new. Those are mistakes we will never make again. Period.” The company was fined $120 million. The Pinto: ‘Lee’s car’ Iacocca also was responsible for the ill-fated Ford Pinto. He rushed the Pinto through production because, he was convinced, Ford needed an inexpensive subcompact car to compete with the small imports making inroads in the U.S. in the early 1970s. The Pinto quickly became known as “Lee’s car.” He demanded that it weigh no more than 2,000 pounds and sell for $2,000. Ford, under pressure from safety advocates and facing numerous lawsuits, recalled the Pinto in 1978 because the design of the fuel tank made it vulnerable to explosion after a rear-end collision. Mother Jones, in a 1977 article, had first reported that Ford knew about the issue with the Pinto’s fuel tank but continued to produce the car anyway. In his autobiography, Iacocca denied negligence by Ford. “There’s absolutely no truth to the charge that we tried to save a few bucks and knowingly made a dangerous car,” Iacocca wrote. “The auto industry has often been arrogant, but it’s not that callous.” In the end, Ford recalled 1.5 million Pintos. The automaker was the subject of more than 100 lawsuits because of the Pinto and paid millions of dollars in restitution. Battles with the Deuce Iacocca was president of Ford from 1970 until he was fired on July 13, 1978, by Henry Ford II after 32 years at the company. He was just the latest to join a famous fraternity -- the long list of men such as Ernie Breech, John Dykstra, Arjay Miller and William "Bunkie"Knudsen -- who climbed to a top post at Ford only to be pushed aside by a mercurial Henry Ford II. Ford and Iacocca regularly clashed over product plans, executive appointments, spending priorities and other strategic matters. Iacocca spent years building a power base at Ford -- often keeping track of subordinates and product ideas in a little black book. He appointed executives he knew would support him and his programs. "In terms of everything that really counted," Iacocca wrote in his autobiography, "I was more important than Henry." “Personable and tough, fun but aggressive, Iacocca did not so much arrive at the president’s office at Ford as wrap it around himself,” historian Douglas Brinkley wrote in Wheels for the World. In 1975, Henry Ford II launched an investigation to determine if there was any wrongdoing on the part of Iacocca. And in one of his final moves to undercut Iacocca, Ford created a three-person office of the chief executive in 1977. Ford was chairman and chief executive; Iacocca was named president and COO; and Philip Caldwell, formerly head of Ford’s international operations, became vice chairman. But Ford, in a memo that riled Iacocca, decreed that the vice chairman would act as the chief executive in the absence of the chairman. “It was a real crack in the face,” Iacocca wrote in his autobiography. “Every time there was a dinner, Henry hosted table one, Caldwell hosted table two, and I was shoved down to three. It was public humiliation, like the guy in the stockade in the center of town.” Iacocca told Automotive News in July 1978 that he was canned because Henry Ford II didn’t “want strong guys around.” Ford dismissed Iacocca to prevent him from becoming the company’s CEO, Ford later said in an interview before his death in 1987. “I didn’t want him around simply because I didn’t want him to be chief executive of the Ford Motor Co.,” Ford said. “My standards are higher than that.” Ford added, “There are lots of reasons I let (Iacocca) go. One of them is he’s not really a good chief executive. Not from a broad viewpoint. Secondly, he’s too conceited, too self-centered to be able to see the broad picture.” ‘An audacious plan’ In his autobiography, Iacocca wrote that Ford fired him simply because he didn’t like him. “I wanted to force him to give me a reason because I knew he didn’t have a good one,” Iacocca wrote. “Finally, he just shrugged his shoulders and said: ‘Well, sometimes you just don’t like somebody.’” Iacocca crafted what authors Peter Collier and David Horowitz called in their 1987 book, The Fords: An American Epic, “an audacious plan not just to survive at the company but to prevail” that entailed lobbying outside directors to keep his job. In his 1990 book, Henry: A Life of Henry Ford II, Walter Hayes, the former vice chairman of Ford of Europe and one of Henry Ford II’s closest confidants, wrote that Iacocca tried to oust Henry Ford II by suggesting he was senile and no longer able to run the company. Iacocca denied the claims in Hayes’ book. Franklin Murphy, former chairman of Times Mirror Co. and a Ford director at the time, told The Los Angeles Times in 1990 that he was convinced Iacocca tried to make a pre-emptive strike against Henry Ford by going to the board to oust Ford. Corporate fat cat Over time, Iacocca -- once a symbol of self-sacrifice for accepting only $1 a year to help rescue Chrysler -- came to personify the trappings of corporate America and Detroit’s longtime excesses. Early in his career, he could be so stingy at times that he would bring light bulbs home from the office so his wife wouldn’t have to buy any. More than once during his high-profile career, Iacocca found himself defending his pay and stock options, notably among journalists from Japan, a frequent subject of Iacocca’s rants over trade policy and where executive compensation is far more modest. His reputation took a big hit in 1988 after Chrysler decided to close a longtime American Motors plant in Kenosha, Wis., eliminating more than 5,500 jobs. Every Democratic presidential candidate that year blasted the move. Sen. Al Gore Jr., D-Tenn., ahead of Wisconsin’s April 1988 primary, pointed out in an ad that featured a smiling Iacocca that the Chrysler CEO “made $20 million in 1986.” In a May 2, 1988, cover story, Business Week called Iacocca -- America’s highest paid executive in 1986 and second-highest the next year -- the most overpaid executive while delivering shareholders the least “bang for the buck” of any corporate leader in 1987. Iacocca's retirement package -- he dreamed of matching the power and status of Henry Ford II -- became the subject of intense negotiations with Chrysler's board of directors. Even as his retirement neared, Iacocca came under fire for the cash, company stock and other perks that Chrysler directors routinely dangled to entice him not to leave the company or retire early. At his last shareholder meeting as Chrysler CEO and chairman in May 1992, Iacocca defended his compensation when a Japanese shareholder, speaking through an interpreter, noted that Japanese executives average only $350,000 in annual pay, vs. $1 million or more in Detroit. “But that doesn’t count the $1.5 million in country club membership for the Japanese,” Iacocca said. “They think we’re all fat cats here, but I don’t see any monks over there where the perks aren’t as obvious.” Post-retirement After his retirement from Chrysler, Iacocca never really left the stage, still eager to speak out and cash in on the next big consumer product. He appeared on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” in March 1993, began commanding $75,000 for 30-minute speeches and in 1995 became a director of Koo Koo Roo chicken, a California restaurant chain. Iacocca also shot back into the headlines in April 1995 by teaming with billionaire investor Kirk Kerkorian, a leading Chrysler shareholder, in a bold bid to take the company private. But Eaton, Iacocca’s successor, viewed the takeover attempt as hostile. The ensuing fight, carried out in public for months, turned ugly and personal and singed Iacocca’s reputation. Iacocca blamed Eaton for failing to do enough to improve Chrysler’s quality ratings. Chrysler canceled some of Iacocca’s stock options. Plans to name Chrysler’s new headquarters tower in Auburn Hills in honor of Iacocca were scrapped. Chrysler sued Iacocca in December 1995, alleging the former chairman divulged confidential information to Kerkorian while Iacocca was still a consultant to Chrysler. As part of his retirement, Iacocca continued to be paid $500,000 a year as a consultant and received company perks until the end of 1994. Chrysler contended he violated the consulting pact and that he abrogated his duties as an officer and director. As part of a 1996 settlement that ended the takeover bid, Iacocca received $53 million -- $21 million from Chrysler and $32 million from Kerkorian’s firm. Iacocca also was prohibited for speaking publicly about Chrysler for five years after the settlement. Later in 1996, Iacocca told Fortune magazine in a cover story that he had “flunked retirement.” In 1998, Iacocca was back in Detroit, teaming with former GM Chairman Bob Stempel to announce their effort to create lightweight electric vehicles. Iacocca was chairman of EV Global Motors, a Los Angeles company aiming to design and market the vehicles, and Stempel was chairman of Energy Conversion Devices, a maker of nickel metal-hydride batteries under its subsidiary, Ovonic Battery Co., in Troy, Mich. “This is the changing of the guard,” Iacocca, then 73, said during the announcement with Stempel. “In the new millennium, for young people it’s going to be an electric world.” Iacocca branched out again with Lido Motors, a partnership that marketed neighborhood EVs for use in retirement communities. While Iacocca was convinced aging Americans would slowly embrace EVs -- “You’ve got to stay with your market,” he told The Detroit News in 2002 -- he eventually abandoned the market. In 2000, he founded Olivio Premium Products to sell an olive oil-based butter substitute. Iacocca donated all of the profits from the company to diabetes research, a cause he had supported for years because his first wife, Mary, died of complications from the disease. According to Olivio’s website, Iacocca has donated more that $25 million to diabetes research. By 2005, he was appearing with the rapper Snoop Dogg, actor Jason Alexander and others to pitch Chrysler’s employee-pricing deals in TV commercials. The four spots signaled the official end of the bitter feud between Chrysler and Iacocca over the 1995-96 takeover attempt. In June 2008, with Chrysler facing another dark hour, Iacocca was invited back to corporate headquarters at the request of then-Chairman and CEO Bob Nardelli. Iacocca had been gone for 16 years but still showed some vigor at age 83. And ever the optimist, he offered another dose of encouragement as the company grappled with slumping SUV sales, rising gasoline prices and lingering scars from the scuttled DaimlerChrysler merger. “Don't get panicked,” Iacocca told about 1,000 workers at a meeting at the Chrysler Technical Center in Auburn Hills, The New York Times reported. “Things are going to be OK.” And they were, only after Chrysler was rescued again by the U.S. government and an Italian. This time, Fiat’s Sergio Marchionne. A Chrysler legacy In July 2010, just a year after Chrysler’s second federal bailout and bankruptcy, the Walter P. Chrysler Museum in Auburn Hills honored Iacocca with one of four inaugural Walter P. Chrysler Legacy awards. It was one of Iacocca’s last visits to the sprawling tech center and corporate campus that he helped build. And with Chrysler on the cusp of another U.S. sales rebound, he sounded like the optimistic and determined Iacocca many Americans came to know in the 1980s. When he reached the lectern after Marchionne’s introduction, an 85-year-old Iacocca told the gathering he was “really honored” and personally touched by the familiar faces in the crowd -- Sperlich and Greenwald, among them -- who spent the “last 25 years trying to keep Chrysler afloat.” Then, in one of his final pep talks that echoed his commercials decades earlier, Iacocca said he was counting on Marchionne, who died in 2018, to “bring over the Fiat label, put it together over here” and help give Chrysler “a huge boost” in the small-car market. “The Big 3 is coming back … we’re in for a little bit of prosperity after a few, little rough time,” Iacocca told the homecominglike crowd. “Let’s count our blessings and let’s get together and make this work. OK?” .

MAN Truck & Bus Press Release / June 27, 2019 We’ve got a solution for your challenges: Our MAN agricultural vehicles are perfectly tailored to the special needs of the agricultural industry and efficiently master operations between the field and the processing plant. .

Iveco Truck & Bus Press Release / July 2, 2019 The on-road IVECO S-WAY is the first vehicle in the new IVECO WAY heavy range, developed to deliver a complete package of features and services focused on the driver, on sustainability and on an advanced level of connectivity-enabling new customised services. The IVECO S-WAY was launched at a global event held in Madrid, involving global leader partners Amazon, Shell and Microsoft. IVECO presented today its new IVECO S-WAY heavy vehicle for on-road missions in a milestone Convention held at the IFEMA exhibition centre in Madrid, Spain, to its dealer network, its sales people, customers and the representatives of the international press. Hubertus Mühlhäuser, Chief Executive Officer of CNH Industrial, presented the strategic outlook and vision of CNH Industrial at the event, which was opened by Gerrit Marx, President Commercial and Specialty Vehicles. Also invited to speak were representatives of the brand’s global leader partners Amazon, Shell and Microsoft, companies known for generating ‘creative disruption’ through their innovations. At the event, Hubertus Mühlhäuser, CNH Industrial CEO, commented: “Within CNH Industrial, IVECO is part of something bigger and uses the synergies within the Group. This new flagship Heavy Duty Truck is not only an achievement for the IVECO brand, it is also an important milestone for CNH Industrial as a whole.” With this launch, the brand is introducing its new IVECO WAY heavy range that marks a strong shift towards providing customers with an integrated transport solution, economically and environmentally sustainable, in which the services around the product become more important than the product itself. In his speech, Gerrit Marx explained: “We want to become the Easiest-to-work-and-innovate-with Truck OEM for our suppliers and customers, while tailoring our vehicles around a Driver´s life, which today is more than just the route he travels. Sustainability also entails our responsibility to make this job, which is crucial for our society, a more attractive and enjoyable one… which goes beyond just adding leather and wood applications.” IVECO S-WAY: the IVECO heavy truck for the next decade The IVECO S-WAY carries over all the advances introduced in the previous generations and adds a new cab entirely redesigned around the driver’s and the owner’s needs. In the face of fierce competition, logistics operators need top-level uptime, efficiency and productivity from their fleets. The new IVECO S-WAY perfectly meets this requirement, providing a complete package of features and services without equal, developed with focus on driver centricity, sustainability and a new, extended level of connectivity aimed at reducing Total Cost of Ownership. It is more than a product: it offers a business model that covers the vehicle’s entire life cycle and helps IVECO’s customers to meet their own customers’ requirements. The driver-centric design of the new cab provides first-rate living and working conditions with a spacious environment, outstanding driving ergonomics, and a well-planned layout that combines functionality with comfort. The design also addresses driver safety with the reinforced structure (ECE R29.03 cab crash compliant) and much improved visibility all around and in all conditions. In redesigning the cab from the ground up, IVECO has taken every opportunity to deliver cost savings and productivity gains to the benefit of the owner’s profitability. The new design optimises aerodynamic performance, further increasing the vehicle’s excellent fuel efficiency by up to 4%. Also contributing to the low Total Cost of Ownership are design features such as the multi-piece bumper that dramatically reduces repair costs, as only the affected part needs to be replaced in the event of damage. IVECO S-WAY: the 100% connected truck The new, advanced Connectivity Box in the IVECO S-WAY is a powerful connectivity enabler and true game-changer. It collects, processes and exchanges data in real time. It works off a service platform developed in partnership with Microsoft that provides safe data storage and management, and many value-added services. Owners and drivers are constantly connected with the vehicle on their mobile device or PC through the user-friendly MyIVECO portal and app. The IVECO S-WAY uses connectivity to enhance the driver’s life on board, providing a superior driving experience with advanced driver assistance and driving style features combined with services developed to help them operate effortlessly and efficiently, accessed through the user-friendly MyIVECO EASY Way App. The IVECO S-WAY’s advanced connectivity has also been developed to help logistics operators to ensure their businesses’ profitability by maximising the vehicle’s uptime, providing a consistent and predictive service with My IVECO Way Solutions, and delivering low Total Cost of Ownership. It also unlocks a new modular offer of premium personalised services, including professional fuel advising, fleet management and maintenance, to optimise the fleet’s performance and efficiency. IVECO S-WAY: the sustainable truck The new IVECO S-WAY builds on the outstanding sustainable performance of the brand’s heavy line, achieving further reductions in PM, NOx and CO2 emissions. True to its heritage, it combines low TCO with low emissions. This is achieved with the exclusive HI-SCR after-treatment system and through the exceptional fuel efficiency resulting from the advanced engine technology and Hi-Tronix transmission, and the multiple fuel-saving solutions such as the Smart EGR. For logistics operators wishing to run a ‘green’ fleet, the IVECO S-WAY Natural Power remains the only LNG truck offering a range of up to 1,600 km for long haul missions with 460 hp. With this vehicle, they will benefit from all the advantages of natural gas, the only immediately available low-emission alternative to diesel in the heavy segment, which delivers Particulate Matter emissions 99% lower than diesel, 90% less NO2 and, with biomethane, CO2 is 95% lower, near zero. IVECO WAY Range: the “customer-centric” way The IVECO WAY range, with its new name, signals the brand’s approach that fully exploits the possibilities offered by connectivity – a new way of being ‘customer centric’ by creating a set of solutions to support the customers every step of the way in their vehicle’s lifecycle and beyond. Its focus on the customer extends to the driver, by raising the bar on the quality of life on board. It introduces a new way of operating, where connectivity puts the driver, owner and IVECO on board the truck, working together to build the vehicle’s business case and ensure its profitability – as expressed by the range’s pay-off: IVECO. DRIVE THE NEW WAY. The new IVECO WAY range is the culmination of a product innovation cycle that saw the introduction of the IVECO S-WAY’s predecessor with its 11% fuel efficiency reduction, the first true natural gas long-haul solution in the industry, and the X-WAY family for light off-road missions. It addresses the key trends driving the transport industry: a blurring of the lines separating the vehicle and the services around it, the advanced connectivity, the need to attract and keep highly skilled professional drivers, and increasingly demanding requirements in sustainability. .

Volvo Trucks Press Release / July 2, 2019 Volvo Trucks is upgrading its D13 diesel engines for Euro 3, Euro 4, Euro 5 and EEV markets, with new software and hardware updates. The changes mean enhanced driver support and combined they can enable fuel savings of up to three per cent in long-haul operations. .

I had another lunch today, this time with that Chevrolet heavy truck dealer principal himself. What I was told is all true, except the trucks were two C65 mediums instead of Titan 90s, and they had 5.9-litre John Deere "6359" engines. .

The creation of the Series 60 was as important in American truck engine history as the high-torque rise Mack Maxidyne powerplant.

What I see is Virginia is giving the Swedish foreign aggressor 222 acres of land, and US$500,000. The Virginia taxpayer had no say in the matter (how's that for democracy in the country with a "government of the people, by the people, for the people"?). I say, if you want to come profit in our country, you need to pay for it ("If you want to play, you have to pay").

Saw this comment on Yahoo Finance: "Interesting, if you pay to get your brat into college you go to prison. if you break into the country and bring a bunch of brats with you you all get free college , welfare and an EBT card along with healthcare and a smart phone plus anything else you ask for."

Why new Volvo jobs will 'transform' Pulaski County Tommy Lopez, WSIS 10 / July 1, 2019 Plus, the 5 reasons why one expert believes Volvo chose Dublin PULASKI, Va. - Pulaski County will be “transformed.” That’s what local leaders are saying after Volvo announced on Friday that it’s bringing 777 more jobs to its Dublin plant, investing $400 million. Economic impact Local leaders said the county is going grow immensely as a result of the investment. County administrator Jonathan Sweet said the new Volvo employees will earn a combined $40 million and the new jobs at Volvo will create 2,000 other jobs that will support the plant. “It's so impactful and, quite frankly, it's transformative,” Sweet said. Local leaders say this kind of advanced manufacturing has the highest multiplier effect compared to other industries, meaning its impact is even greater on other industries, infrastructure, housing and much more. Leaders know they need everything from more housing to new shopping centers and are making plans to expand. The county is using this big win to try to attract investments in other sectors, like technology, and it’s taking advantage of the prepared graduates from Virginia Tech, Radford and the community college system. “It's exciting to see the access Pulaski County has into talent,” Sweet said. Earlier this month, the county passed a program so every high school graduate can go to New River Community College for free. Why Virginia won Economic development expert John Boyd, who owns a consulting firm, said Virginia is creating the playbook for how states win over companies for investment. He said the commonwealth has five key factors that it emphasizes that allow it to stand out: -Right-to-work status -Low cost of doing business -Incentives -Tax structure -Workforce training “It really cements this as a center of gravity for the trucking industry. Very exciting news,” Boyd said. He believes the investment fits into Volvo’s plan to cater to the needs of companies like Amazon, FedEx and UPS, which rely on last-mile truck deliveries. He also thinks this paves the way for a focus on emerging technology, like self-driving capabilities. “Because of that, truck production is a growth sector. It's a highly-coveted sector within the context of advanced manufacturing,” Boyd said. He said locations in Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley and in Greensboro, North Carolina, made strong cases to beat out Dublin for the Volvo expansion. .

This country has gotten too "thin skinned", too politically correct. In this case, what in the world??? If one "cherry picks" facts for the sake of argument, one can now successfully argue for or against anything. Whatever happened to telling those in the minority........."no". It's impossible for everyone to get their way.

The Wall Street Journal / July 1, 2019 Nike Inc. is yanking a U.S.A.-themed sneaker featuring an early American flag after former NFL star-turned-activist Colin Kaepernick told the company it shouldn’t sell a shoe with a symbol that he and others consider offensive. The sneaker giant created the Air Max 1 USA in celebration of the July Fourth holiday, and it was slated to go on sale this week. The heel of the shoe featured a U.S. flag with 13 white stars in a circle, a design created during the American Revolution and commonly referred to as the Betsy Ross flag. After shipping the shoes to retailers, Nike asked for them to be returned without explaining why. “Nike has chosen not to release the Air Max 1 Quick Strike Fourth of July as it featured the old version of the American flag,” a Nike spokeswoman said. After images of the shoe were posted online, Kaepernick, a Nike endorser, called Nike officials saying that he and others felt the Betsy Ross flag is an offensive symbol because of its connection to an era of slavery. Kaepernick refused to comment. .

Truck News / June 28, 2019 CLIFFORD, Ont. — Canada’s biggest antique and classic truck show is underway in Clifford, Ont., about 170 kilometers west of Toronto. The show has attracted 200 trucks on the event’s 10th anniversary, said organizer Chris Hall. “Although we are a show, it’s important to know that Clifford has become a reunion to so many veteran drivers who make the trek annually to catch up with old trucking friends.” The event, organized by the Great Lakes Truck Club, is being held at the Rotary Park, and will feature three days of activities including a food booth, beer garden and barbecue. The 2019 Theme Truck is the Western Star, a brand which began production in Kelowna, B.C., in 1967. The truck is known for its ruggedness and classy lines. All models of Western Star are on display at the show. Historian Dale Bridge will also be at the show, displaying his trucking patch collection. Bridge, from Oswego, Ill., has the largest collection in North America of U.S. and Canadian trucking company logos. The show began in 2009 as an added attraction to the long-running Clifford Rotaryfest. “An integral part of the show is dedicated to the owners of newer rigs with traditional styling who appreciate the classics,” the club said. It said many drivers have purchased antique trucks “only to be part of Clifford.” The show closes at 4 p.m. on Sunday.

Truck News / June 28, 2019 GREENSBORO, North Carolina — Volvo Group will invest $400 million over six years to upgrade the New River Valley (NRV), Virginia, plant that produces all Volvo trucks sold in North America, the Swedish company announced on Friday. The plan includes expansion of the industrial footprint and installation of a variety of state-of-the-art equipment that will improve plant efficiency and deliver even higher product quality for customers, it said. The investment will create 777 new jobs. “The outstanding product line currently produced at NRV has strongly positioned Volvo Trucks for the future,” said Peter Voorhoeve, president of Volvo Trucks North America (VTNA). “This investment is another sign of our confidence in that future, and will help us prepare for even more exciting products – powered by both diesel and electric drivetrains – in the coming years.” The expansion will be eligible for a Virginia Major Employment and Investment grant of up to $16.5 million and other incentives, the company said. Virginia’s Pulaski County will support the project by giving Volvo 222 acres of adjacent property to expand the truckmaker's plant, and also donating $500,000 toward site improvements. .

Commercial Carrier Journal (CCJ) / June 28, 2019 Cummins announced Friday it has agreed to acquire Hydrogenics Corporation, a developer and manufacturer of hydrogen fuel cell modules and hydrogen generation equipment. As a part of the transaction, The Hydrogen Company, a wholly-owned subsidiary of L’Air Liquide, S.A., and Hydrogenics’ largest equity shareholder, will maintain ownership in the company. Cummins Chairman and CEO Tom Linebarger called Hydrogenics “one of the world’s leading fuel cell and hydrogen generation equipment providers,” and said Cummins looked forward to formally closing the deal, at which time “we will share more details about the acquisition and our strategy to offer a broad portfolio of power solutions to meet our customers’ needs.” Following the unanimous recommendation of the special committee of Hydrogenics Board of Directors, all non-interested directors of Hydrogenics have already approved the transaction and have recommended that Hydrogenics shareholders vote in favor of the transaction that offered $15 per share in cash. “It takes vision and an innovative spirit to take on next generation technologies and provide the environment for them to grow,” Hydrogenics President and CEO Daryl Wilson said. “Hydrogenics has worked for 24 years to emerge as a global leader in fuel cell and hydrogen solutions in the power industry. We are deeply honored to now join with Cummins on the transformative journey of next generation clean power solutions.”

Senate bill would require DOT to finalize speed limiter mandate Commercial Carrier Journal (CCJ) / July 1, 2019 A bill introduced late last week in the U.S. Senate would require the U.S. Department of Transportation to resume work on a rule to require heavy-duty trucks to be equipped with speed limiters and require a limited speed of 65 mph. Sen. Johnny Isakson, a Georgia Republican, filed the legislation June 27 into the Senate’s Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. It would require all new trucks to be equipped with speed limiters set at 65 mph, as well as existing trucks with speed limiting capabilities to have the same cap. Due to Executive Orders signed by President Trump in his first days in office, DOT’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration tabled a rulemaking that sought to institute a speed limiter mandate. The agency was scheduled to publish a proposed rule in September 2017, but has since moved the rulemaking to a long-term agenda item. Isakson’s bill likely won’t gain the traction it needs to prevail in Congress, though he could try to attach it to a larger transportation bill, such as an annual DOT appropriations bill or a highway authorization bill.

2020 Mustang Shelby GT500 to start at $73,995 Michael Martinez, Automotive News / July 1, 2019 Ford Motor Co.'s most powerful street-legal vehicle will come with a hefty price tag. The automaker last week confirmed the 2020 Mustang Shelby GT500 will start at $73,995. That includes a $1,095 shipping fee and a $2,600 gas guzzler tax. But the car can easily stretch past $90,000 with add-ons. The carbon fiber track package will cost an additional $18,500, Ford said. A handling package costs $1,500, and a technology package will set buyers back $3,000. Various paint options, such as a black roof or over-the-top stripes, cost $695 each. An optional carbon fiber instrument panel is $1,000. The vehicle will go on sale this fall. The supercharged 5.2-liter V-8 engine boasts 760 hp and 625 pound-feet of torque, and Ford says it will achieve a 0-to-60-mph time in the mid-3-second range. .

BYD launches electric bus output at 2nd North American plant Automotive News China / July 1, 2019 BYD Co., China’s largest electrified vehicle maker, opened its second North American electric bus assembly plant, in Newmarket, Ontario. The 45,000-square-foot factory will first focus on assembling buses for the Toronto Transit Commission, Canada’s largest transit operator, BYD said last week. Last year, BYD landed an order from the Toronto agency for 10 40-foot-long electric buses with an option for 30 more. Prior to the opening of the plant in Ontario, BYD shipped electric buses from China to transit operators in other areas of Canada. They include St. Albert Transit, Grande Prairie Transit and two other transit operators in Alberta. BYD opened its first electric bus assembly plant Lancaster, Calif., in 2013. The factory now employs about 1,000 people. The Ontario plant is BYD’s sixth electric bus plant outside China. The company also assembles electric buses in Scotland, Brazil, Hungary and France. BYD, based in Shenzhen, is listed in Hong Kong and Shanghai. It is partly owned by U.S. billionaire Warren Buffett. For the first five months of this year, it delivered 119,082 electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles globally, more than doubling the tally a year earlier. The number includes 1,467 electric buses. .

Detroit chips in with an overhead camshaft six Commercial Motor / March 14, 1987 Over the past decade Detroit Diesel Allison — General Motors' diesel engine and automatic transmission-manufacturing subsidiary — has seen its share of the North American Class Eight (top weight on-road truck category) engine market dwindle away almost to nothing. Of the 130,000 or so Class Eight vehicles which were sold in North America last year, only 5% had Detroit Diesel engines. Once DDA would have been disappointed if its market share had dropped below 30%. DDA's vee-eight and vee-six twostroke engines never found favour with European operators, mainly because of their poor fuel consumption. Now they have suffered a dramatic decline in popularity among American operators too, primarily because of reliability problems associated with water leaking into the lubricating oil. GM has now restructured its diesel engine division, merging it with the diesel engine business of agricultural equipment manufacturer John Deere to form a 50/50 joint venture company which is to be called Dedec (Detroit Deere Corporation). It has also introduced an all new truck engine which has taken seven years to develop and is designed to leapfrog its competitors, chiefly Cummins and Caterpillar, in technical innovation, performance and market share. Donovan Downham, Dedec's vicepresident of sales and marketing, is confident that the new engine, designated Series 60, will capture "at least 22% of the US heavy duty diesel market in the next five years." Dedec's plans for selling the Series 60 engine in Europe are less clear, but there is no doubt that it will become available here. Floor, the Dutch specialist vehicle builder, has one of two Series 60 prototypes which have been shipped to Europe. Foremost among the other European vehicle manufacturers who are at least potential customers for the Series 60 engines are ERF, Foden, Seddon Atkinson, Kassbohrer and Perlini, the Italian manufacturer of on/off-road trucks. Another surprising name on the list of possible customers for the new engine is Dal (and Leyland Oaf). The Dutch manufacturer needs an engine to take it into the 300kW-plus onroad truck sector which is becoming increasingly important in Europe, and its own 11.6 litre engine, with a maximum power rating of 270kW (360hp) would probably be unduly stretched at much higher ratings. The Series 60 engine could provide Daf with a more costeffective option than a new engine development programme. In the USA truck manufacturers who are already fitting Series 60 engines in their Class Eight models include Freightliner (owned by Daimler-Benz), Kenworth and Peterbilt (part of Paccar) and Volvo White, in addition to GM's own truck-building division, GMC. There are two displacements in the Series 60 family: 11.1 and 12.7 litres. The larger engine has a 15% longer stroke than the 11.1 litre unit, sharing its 130mm bore and all but eight of its component parts. Unlike earlier Detroit Diesel engines this one is built to metric dimensions and, unlike the 71 and 92 Series Detroit two-strokes — which will remain in production — its designation bears no relation to its swept volume in cubic inches. All Series 60 engines are in-line, six cylinder, turbocharged and air-to-air charge-cooled four-strokes. Uniquely, for an engine of this size and type, the Series 60 has a gear driven overhead camshaft, and it is the first diesel engine of any type to go into full production with a fully electronic control system for its fuel injection equipment as standard. The DDEC (Detroit Diesel Electronic Control) system became an option on vee-six and vee-eight 92 Series twostroke engines in 1985 (CM August 24). NEW STANDARDS The engineers who designed and developed this engine say their objective was to set new standards in fuel economy, reliability, durability, noise level, and exhaust emissions. It is in the first and last of these areas that the electronic control of both fuel metering and injection timing plays a crucial role. For all twelve US variants of the new engine, with maximum power ratings from 186kW (250hp) to 298kW (400hp) at speeds of 1,800 and 2,000 rpm, Dedec's performance curves show that in terms of full load minimum specific fuel consumption the Series 60 matches, or in some cases is slightly ahead of the most fuel-efficient truck engines which are currently on the market, Like some versions of the Cummins 10 litre engine, Gardner's 12.7 litre 6LXDT and the latest Perkins Eagle 12.17 litre, the Series 60's SFC dips as low as 189 g/kW-h (0.311b/hp-h). Significantly, it does so while comfortably meeting the current US Federal and even the more stringent Californian limits on diesel engine exhaust emissions. "This is a 50-state engine," says David Merrion, Dedec's vice-president of product engineering. He is also confident that by 1991, when even tougher emissions limits come into force in the USA, including a new limit on particulates emission, the Series 60 will be able to meet them without the bulky exhaust systemmounted particulate traps which all diesel engine manufacturers are currently experimenting with. Some Dedec engineers believe that without such severe exhaust emission limits the Series 60 could break the 183g/1W-h (0.30Ib/hp-h) barrier, which would certainly put it ahead of all other production truck diesel engines. As it stands, the Series 60 is claimed to give on-the-road fuel economy ranging from two to 15% better than any of its current US competitors. When development work started on the Series 60, in 1980, it was intended that it would only be made in 11.1 Litres capacity. As the demand for power outputs above 261kW (550hp) steadily increased during the early eighties, however, DDA's engineers reached the conclusion that they would need a larger capacity to satisfy this demand without compromising durability — all Series 60 engines are intended to cover 800,000km (500,000 miles) before requiring a major overhaul. Merrion says the reason for not simply derating the 12.7 litre unit for power outputs below 261kW is that the penalty in fuel consumption caused by the parasitic losses of the bigger engine would be about 3% worse than with the 11.1 litre unit. Increasing the swept volume of the 12.7 litre engine for still higher power outputs has already been considered. There is enough space between the engine's wet cylinder liners for a larger bore version to give a swept volume of around 13.7 litres, and it is this engine in which DAF has shown particular interest. http://archive.commercialmotor.com/article/14th-march-1987/24/detroit-chips-in-with-an-overhead-camshaft-six

"In the early 1980s Detroit Diesel, then still a division of General Motors had a 3.2 % market share and was hemorrhaging money. The two stroke engines they were then building which were technologically similar to the engines Deere used in the 435 and 8020 tractors were unlikely to ever meet the new emissions standards that were coming. So Detroit Diesel approached John Deere who was having its own struggles due to the 1980s farm economy, about merging engine building operations. Plans and negotiations soon began. 4000 to 5000 GM workers would be assigned to the new company along with another 2000 from Deere. Company headquarters would be in Detroit and the Redford Township engine plant and Romulus parts distribution and engineering center would also be used. All of the other Detroit Diesel operations such as those building engines and Allison transmissions for light trucks as well as locomotive engine operations would not be affected. Deere plants affected would be the engine facilities in Waterloo, Dubuque and Saran, France. Things progressed to enough of a degree that in March of 1987, a few brochures and ads were printed that included the new company’s name, Detroit Deere Corporation. However being a deal was finalized, Roger Penske who a few years earlier had purchased Hertz Truck Leasing and was Detroit Diesel’s largest customer sent a team who along with GM’s John Farmer put together a 700 million dollar deal in a matter of weeks with General Motors holding 20% of the note for 10 to 15 years. The Romulus site was sold off and Allison Transmission was kept by GM, at least for awhile. Penske’s group also hammered out a new contract with the UAW that markedly decreased absenteeism and grievances. The new Detroit Diesel then went full speed ahead with production of the Tech 80 engine developed by Arn Vanderbock. That engine was later named the 60 series and market share soon climbed from 3% to 35%." --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Detroit series 60 was developed by Mr. Arn Vanderbock who was an engineer at Cummins. He proposed it to Cummins. They declined. He came over to Detroit Diesel. https://talk.newagtalk.com/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=685481&DisplayType=flat&setCookie=1

Dual-clutch gearbox complaints haunt Ford Michael Martinez, Automotive News / July 1, 2019 The Ford Focus and Fiesta are fading away in the U.S., but the headaches caused by the small cars' PowerShift dual-clutch transmissions live on. Ford Motor Co. never conquered the long-term reliability problems on the gearboxes that thousands of customers complained would shudder, jerk and hesitate. Although engineers helped solve some early glitches with software updates and redesigned parts, Ford issued more than 20 technical service bulletins related to the transmissions, which were code-named DPS6. In 2014, Ford extended the transmissions' warranty by two years and 40,000 miles. Litigation over the transmissions remains unresolved. Ford reached a settlement in 2017 for a class-action lawsuit covering 1.9 million owners, but the settlement is being challenged in a federal court in California on the grounds that not enough owners would be compensated. A separate mass-tort case involving thousands of customers is pending in Michigan. Former Ford CEO Mark Fields has been ordered to testify by July 31 in a series of cases involving customers who opted out of the class-action suit. A Florida judge last month denied Fields' motion to avoid testifying. Ford also has been forced to pay up around the world; last year it lost a class-action lawsuit in Thailand and separately was fined $10 million by a court in Australia. "They have a major PR and customer-satisfaction nightmare on their hands," Gabe Shenhar, associate director of the auto test program at Consumer Reports, told Automotive News. "It's still not well sorted out." Customer complaints Ford introduced the six-speed PowerShift transmission in 2010, playing up the gearbox's fuel-economy benefits. But customers soon began complaining about jerkiness and a lack of power, and the transmission — along with the troublesome MyFord Touch infotainment system — contributed to Ford's plunge to No. 20 in Consumer Reports' 2011 reliability survey from 10th the previous year. Many customers weren't used to the dual-clutch gearbox, incorrectly assuming it would behave like a regular hydraulic automatic transmission. The PowerShift used two dry clutch packs in place of a normal automatic torque converter, which tended to make buyers think the car wasn't properly accelerating. On the reliability front, the clutches would overheat and often showed signs of premature wear. Ford made some changes in 2012 that it believed would solve most of the problems, but complaints continued. The company also directed dealers to make fixes that often included replacing clutches and updating the transmission control module. "They made it marginally more palatable, but each update came with some loss of fuel efficiency and power," Shenhar said. "Customers weren't happy." The warranty extension Ford eventually offered was a "pretty clear conclusion" it didn't have a permanent fix, Shenhar said. Angry customers have turned to the courts, arguing that Ford knew about the defects but sold the vehicles anyway and then blamed owners for not driving them properly. Although Ford reached a settlement in 2017 that would give customers $2,325 if they opt in and meet certain qualifications, that settlement is being challenged by groups that argue the deal would let Ford off the financial hook. The automaker's lawyers argued to keep the settlement in front of three appeals judges in April. An answer is expected by December. The automaker, in a statement, said it does not comment on pending litigation but is committed to providing top-quality vehicles for its customers. "We continue to deny the allegations in this lawsuit, but rather than continuing with the litigation, Ford entered into a settlement agreement with lawyers representing these plaintiffs," the statement said. "That settlement is fair and appropriate and we look forward to final court approval." Fields testimony A number of customers opted out of the class-action lawsuit, and their suits have been combined into a federal case in California. That's where Fields comes in. The former CEO was Ford's president of the Americas when the cars with the dual-clutch transmissions were launched. "The deposition is critical to investigating and confirming that Ford's executives at the highest level knew of the problems with the transmissions and intentionally concealed that information and sold the Focus and Fiesta to the public anyway," Russell Higgins, an associate attorney at Knight Law Group, which represents a number of individuals in the case, told Automotive News. Fields, who was replaced by Jim Hackett in May 2017, is a senior adviser at TPG Capital, a global asset management firm. "Mr. Fields is sort of where the buck stopped in terms of corporate knowledge," Higgins said. "It's important to have him be able to talk about his actions and what he knew."