I’m Gaku, a male member.
When I was younger, I drove an Italian car—a Lancia. Among them, there was a series called the Delta Integrale, which had many passionate fans. I was one of them.
It cost about as much as a luxury car, but things like the air conditioning not working or the engine not starting were pretty common. Someone I knew even had gasoline leak and his car catch fire on the Shuto Expressway.
Thanks to that car, I learned how to handle all kinds of repairs, and I developed the mental strength to stay calm when something went wrong—because it was perfectly normal for something to happen all the time.
Since around 1995, I don’t think there have been many imported cars that catch fire while driving. So I don’t think you’ll actually die from one.
It’s a very memorable car, and my wife and I still talk about it from time to time.
When it comes to papa-katsu (compensated dating in Japan), I still prefer passionate, wild girls who are a handful but warm up to me—rather than the refined, sweet, universally liked type.
I’ll answer too, as Maezawa from the president’s office.
Um… was this question from about 30 years ago?
It’s true that, around 30 years ago, people often said imported cars broke down a lot, and you could hear plenty of stories from people who had actually experienced it.
(Although, if anything, they seemed to enjoy telling those stories.)
Even back then, though, German manufacturers had a good reputation, as I recall. BMWs were especially popular and were jokingly called “the Corolla of Roppongi.” The joke was that BMWs were the most common cars in Roppongi, while Corollas were the most common cars in Japan.
But times have changed, and these days…
You don’t hear people saying that cars break down simply because they’re imported. I suppose they studied Japanese cars and evolved into vehicles that are less prone to breakdowns.
When I think of Italian cars—Alfa Romeos and Ferraris, for example—I still get the impression that they might break down, but that’s probably just an old image lingering in my mind.
Come to think of it, I’ve heard that Ferraris up to around the 308 were so difficult to start that even amateurs couldn’t get the engine running. Even the owner had to judge how far to press the accelerator depending on the temperature. If they got it wrong, the engine would flood and become very difficult to start.
With cars from that era, it seems almost inevitable that people would think of them as constantly breaking down.
These days, I hear that even Ferraris start normally.
The scheduled replacement parts may be expensive, and some repairs can only be done in the country of origin, so they probably cost a lot to maintain.
Even so, you don’t hear many stories about modern cars breaking down frequently.
That said, engine control has been handled by computers for about 30 years now. With a personal computer, people more or less accept that it might break down after five years. But if a car’s computer failed after five years, you’d probably think, “Why did it break so soon?”
So perhaps part of the impression that something is reliable or unreliable comes from our own expectations.
Many automotive computers last 20 years without failing, whereas very few people are still using a 20-year-old computer.
There’s a famous story that the Celsior used the world’s most advanced technology at the time, and that Mercedes seriously studied it because of how quiet it was.
I seem to remember hearing that the driveshaft was connected while being measured with lasers, resulting in less error than in any other car, but I can’t find anything about it even after searching. Maybe that technology has become commonplace by now—or perhaps I’m remembering it incorrectly. It’s a mystery.
I once drove a Celsior as a rental car（笑）. It was a great car. The 4.0-liter V8 was an excellent engine.
(I think it later became a 4.3-liter.)
I was surprised when the Celsior became the Lexus and the price suddenly doubled.
At the time, it seemed like young delinquents preferred driving Cimas, but as a car, the Celsior felt far more polished and complete.
Still, I’m puzzled about why Papuwa likes the Celsior. I don’t think he had even been born when the Celsior was released, so he wouldn’t have experienced the impact it made back then.
Maybe he simply likes the design.
Even if the Celsior is an amazing car, old cars break down in all sorts of places. Unless you can figure out for yourself what has gone wrong, repairs can be difficult.
My own car is newer than a Celsior, but it’s fairly old too.
Once, I went out, parked, finished my business, and then found that the engine wouldn’t start when I was ready to leave. The starter didn’t make a sound.
I thought the battery might have died, so I called roadside assistance. The battery was actually holding more than 12 volts—though admittedly, that was a little low（笑）—and naturally, even trying a jump starter didn’t get the engine running.
In the end, they called a recovery truck and had the car transported to the dealer, where it was repaired later.
It turned out that the starter motor had simply died.
Before that, the engine suddenly started sounding like a horizontally opposed engine, and I thought, “What on earth is going on?”
At first, I suspected the spark plugs, so I replaced them just in case, but that didn’t fix it. My guess was wrong, though not entirely off the mark: the problem was actually the direct ignition coils.
A year later, the power transistor failed too.
In any case, newer cars are easier to drive without having to worry about anything, so I feel that newer is probably better.
(Though I understand that newer cars are expensive, which makes things difficult.)
You won’t really understand these things until you experience them, so perhaps you should stick to your original plan and buy the Celsior.
Once you become a working adult, you can get a car loan, after all.
I believe the Progrès was marketed as a “small luxury car.”
It was built to the same standards as the Crown—meaning Toyota’s highest standards, with extremely tight tolerances—while maintaining roughly the same width as a Japanese 5-number-class vehicle, making it easier to drive on Japan’s narrow roads, especially in Tokyo, where there are so many narrow streets.
But it didn’t seem to be particularly successful.
> Italian and French cars are fun to drive on mountain roads, just as you’d expect from the character of their people. You can really feel the “cat’s paw” suspension too.
Peugeot—the French marque—has an incredible “cat’s paw” ride.
I remember thinking, “How can it be this supple and still hold the road so well?” I suppose that’s exactly why it’s called a cat’s paw.
I didn’t feel the same thing as much with Alfa Romeo, though.
Incidentally, the first time I drove a Peugeot, I had trouble figuring out where reverse gear was. It was marked to the left of first gear, but no matter how many times I tried, I could only engage first.
I spent quite a while wondering, “How am I supposed to reverse?”
People who know the car will understand, but reverse is in a rather unintuitive position, isn’t it?
Oh, and I’m talking about a manual transmission.
When I traveled to Italy, the rental car I happened to get was a Lancia. Every time I parked, local people would come over to take a look, so I thought, “I guess even an ordinary Lancia is popular here.”
The reason it probably didn’t seem like an ordinary family car to them—although at the time diesel cars were popular in Europe, and the diesel engine was so slow to rev that I couldn’t understand what anyone saw in it—was likely the overwhelmingly strong image of the Lancia Stratos.
The Lancia Stratos with a Ferrari engine was an incredible car, though（笑）.
> What made me think, “I’m glad I bought it,” was the sound of the engine echoing as I drove through tunnels.
Ferraris do seem to rev their engines in tunnels a lot（笑）.
> The most fun car I’ve driven was probably the now-discontinued BMW naturally aspirated inline-six.
The BMW M3 was pretty good too. I mean the naturally aspirated version.
Since the original 3 Series was so committed to a 50:50 front-to-rear weight distribution, I imagine the M3 was close as well.
I was amazed at how naturally a car handles when the weight distribution is close to 50:50.
Most Japanese cars are front-heavy, after all. The only exceptions I can think of are the FD3S RX-7 and the Eunos Roadster.
The 1980 Supra also advertised a 50:50 distribution, but I remember Keiichi Tsuchiya writing that when he took one racing, he discovered they had added weights to achieve 50:50, so the race car itself didn’t actually have a 50:50 balance.
A fake 50:50（笑）.
I’m Kazu, a male member.
Apparently, if you end up with a lemon, it tends to break down often and cost a lot to maintain. Fortunately, I’ve never bought one of those.
What made me think, “I’m glad I bought it,” was the sound of the engine echoing as I sped through tunnels.
P.S.
Even with recent imported cars, I still feel that their electrical systems are less reliable than those of Japanese cars. Personally, I don’t think Bosch can hold a candle to Denso.
The first car I ever drove, apart from a driving-school car, was a second-generation Toyota Celsior. I think it’s a good car, but Toyota cars all feel a bit too similar to me. Driving them doesn’t bring me much joy. Mercedes-Benz is much the same in that regard, although European cars do seem to have nicer-quality interiors than Japanese cars.
I’ve never owned a Celsior, but I remembered something an insurance agent once told me: young people often liked driving used Celsiors, so they were involved in a lot of accidents, and the Celsior had high insurance premiums on the vehicle-class rate table.
> Ferraris often rev their engines in tunnels, don’t they? (laughs)
I wrote about the sound of the engine echoing as you speed through a tunnel, but I should have called it the exhaust note.
That sound echoing when you press down on the accelerator is such a sensual experience that you can actually feel your brain releasing its own drugs. It becomes addictive because you can experience something more sensual than most sex just by pressing one pedal.
Italian cars are often said to break down easily, but even when people say Ferraris from the 1990s onward are prone to breaking down, I can’t quite relate. That said, as you can tell from the fact that Ferraris use dry-sump systems, they’re not very easy to service. I seem to remember a clutch replacement costing around 800,000 yen, for example.
I’m Hikōki, a male member.
Whether an imported car breaks down really depends on luck. If something goes wrong with the engine or transmission, it’s usually repaired free of charge. I’ve owned Japanese cars for over 30 years and imported cars for over 20, and I haven’t really had the impression that they break down that often.
Italian and French cars are fun to drive, especially on mountain roads, true to their national character. You can really feel their “cat-like” suspension. They drive exceptionally well, but their trade-in value is terrible.
German cars have an excellent overall balance. Some can go 200,000 kilometers without ever needing a brake-pad replacement, and they don’t even leave brake dust on the wheels—their durability is on a completely different level. On the other hand, their batteries and electrical systems are inferior to those of Japanese cars, and their start-stop systems respond far too slowly by comparison.
When it comes to cars, the best thing is to keep driving the one you truly love.
I’ve never owned one, but I still can’t forget the designs of the first-generation Cima and the first-generation Eunos Roadster.
Recently, I saw a Toyota Progrès on the road. Back then, it was touted as the ultimate in Japanese cars—“with the quality of a Celsior, even exceeding the Crown.” I took one for a test drive, but I’m glad I didn’t buy it…
My impression from the test drive was that it was almost too quiet, with no character at all—bland and scentless, so to speak.
