In the 90s, cars from the 70s and 60s were seen as classic, but in 2022 cars from the 90s or 2000s can still be seen in daily use, and in terms of body design, many don’t even look that far off modern cars. What happened around the late 80s?

Question

Edit: great responses, Reddit. People have largely addressed the form factor aspect of my question. But am I wrong in sensing that cars from the late 90s seem to be more reliable and functionally acceptable in 2022, than most cars from the 70s were in the 90s? Was there some engineering breakthrough that made them more long lived?

In: 91

Answer 1

TLDR: The 70s Gas crisis and Climate Change

In 1973 the OPEC nations started an oil embargo on the US and other nations that supported Israel during the Yom Kippur war.

This caused fuel prices to skyrocket, and there were shortages throughout the US for a time.

The embargo lasted till March 1974 when it was negotiated away, but had long lasting economic effects. Americans no longer had *Cheap gas*.

Gas guzzling Detroit made *classic* cars were suddenly out of fashion and demand for fuel efficient European style small cars suddenly increased in the US market.

Japanese manufacturers like Toyota, Honda, and Datsun (Nissan) benefited greatly from this and their increased market share started to eat away at domestic manufacturers (GM, Ford, Chrysler).

Throughout the 80s environmental concerns rose and laws were passed to force manufacturers to make more efficient cars which essentially forced manufacturers to adopt smaller engines, lighter bodies, catalytic converters, and electronic engine management.

Manufacturers also switched to unibody construction for cars, where as previous cars were built like truck with a body ontop of a chassis, modern cars don’t have a frame anymore with the strength coming from the body panels themselves.

Aerodynamics became more and more important and the body shapes of cars all started to look similar because it became about aero efficiency, not style.