These Are The Cars Automakers Should Build After Elon Musk Kills The Pesky NHTSA

Non-Jalop answer: I would love to see a unification of safety codes between the EU, Japan, Korea and the US. This way, if Toyota makes too many Kei vehicles for their market, they can export some to America cheaply and sell them here. It would allow for enthusiasts to special order stuff like Alpines or the like and not have to wait 25 years. This would also benefit American companies in a way too, so that quality vehicles that are to the current American buyer’s tastes (like the Malibu) could be left in production for longer and use Asian or European markets to absorb the excess instead of Hertz and Avis.

Jalop Answer.

The list is long. I like the Morgan, hate the price. If Morgans or something like it could be sold in America for $30k instead of nearly $100k, I would...

Not buy it. Automatic? Eww. But also, I can’t imagine driving around in a world of giant Cybertrucks in a car with a wooden frame.

The cost of a Morgan likely comes less form regulatory pressure and more from a simple lack of economies of scale — the company isn’t selling hundreds of thousands of Super 3s every year. But, with President-elect Trump floating the idea of putting kids in auto factories, maybe labor costs will be driven down.

Submitted by: hoser68

Crazy answer: A triple diesel engine pickup truck with a 6 inch lift installed at the factory. I mean, the EPA’s going to get a gut punch, too, so might as well make a FerdRamChev F-Teenthousand Denali with a 6.7 Power Stroke up front, a 6.6 Duramax in the middle, and a 6.7 Cummins bringing up the rear.

What are those extra engines doing? I don’t know, but they’re all going to smoke like steam engines and bald eagles will circle the truck at all times. AR-15s come embedded in the walls of the bed.

Realistic answer: Nothing substantially different. Even if the feds roll back regulations we’ll have California, the states that follow California law, and most of the rest of the world that will remain strict on emissions and/or safety. Automakers will continue to build cars that can be sold in the most markets rather than do the old 45-state thing.

The triple MaxStrokeCummins engine will either bring about world peace, through unity, or destroy everything good left on this earth. My money is on the latter, despite how good the name is.

Submitted by: Mercedes Streeter

We could hand out Darwin Awards like candy if rocket/jet cars were allowed on the road.

Here’s hoping any eventual future rocket cars fare better than Homer’s. As a side note, I definitely thought the rocket car appeared in a Bart level, but I must have been thinking of the Honor Roller. You give me anything Space Shuttle-themed and I will remember it forever.

Submitted by: Artificial Stupidity

Finally, Ford, GM, and Ram will be able to sell the vehicles everyone has been demanding! Diesel pickups that replace tree hugging hippie crap emission controls with full time coal rolling, sport multiple side saddle fuel tanks on both sides, have three row seating, come lifted from the factory, and replace all those libtard mandated airbags with stylish chrome spikes. Freedumb!

After decades of airbag supremacy, we finally swing to the other end of the pendulum: The Tullock Spike.

Submitted by: bryanrmorris

If I can’t get a Suzuki Jimny, what even was the point of destroying the American experiment?

The thing about experiments is that they don’t really ever fail or succeed. They only provide results, whatever resolution a given experiment comes to. That’s not failure, it’s a data point.

Submitted by: JB.

Forward Control Jeep (legs are over rated anyway)...

Look how happy this little guy is! Don’t you want to bring him back into the world, without all the pain of traditional necromancy?

Submitted by: towman

POP. UP. HEAD. LIGHTS.

Don’t particularly care on what, just bring em back.

Are you telling me you don’t want to see more of that face again? The United States was the last country to eliminate pop-up headlights, we should be first to bring them back.

Submitted by: GMart

Literally every car from the Mad Max franchise. I want a V8 Interceptor. Or a car that’s three or four other cars smooshed together.

The thing about the V8 Interceptor is that you can just import an XB Falcon and make one. You don’t need to wait for the dissolution of our administrative state to do that, you can get on it now!

Submitted by: preparetosurgetosublightspeed

Let the horsepower wars and alternative fuels combine!!

Street legal nitro methane funny cars. All they would need would be an AC system.

I’m reminded of a scene from “Fast & Furious,” the fourth Fast film, where Vin Diesel gets on a guy’s case for running nitrometh. Such animus for alternative fuels, Vin! I guess his allegiances are pretty well-signaled, though, if I had to guess.

Submitted by: Anthony Thornton

There is much more upside than downside. We might actually see a $20k Corolla or Civic if they slash CAFE and roll back emissions standards that caused vehicle bloat (emissions allowances related to vehicle size/weight). No more mandated back-up cameras, systems to “detect impairment”, return of governors on janky GPS systems, or pedestrian safety standards that only really target cars, complicating and compromising designs and aero efficiency. We would likely see a return of the sensible hatchbacks, sedans, and even regular size trucks blue collar workers can afford NEW.

The thing about regulations is that they’re written in blood. If an automaker can charge you the same price you’ve always paid for a car, but offer you less safety and less fidelity in construction, it will. I’ll eat my hat if this gives us a $20,000 Civic.

Submitted by: Jordan

The best vehicles would be some that are legal in the countries people are fleeing to. That way they can bring and keep the car after reregistering it at the destination.

So, for the EU, a roadworthy safe vehicle (I.e. no huge pickup, and certainly no CT), and for South America, a couple of different versions.

And for people fleeing to Japan: Kei cars, lots of them, as the US will reintroduce internment camps, sooner, rather than later.

Are you planning to flee? I know a lot of people are talking about it, but emigrating to another country is difficult and expensive — it’s not something a lot of people have access to. What’s the work visa situation where you’re going?

Submitted by: NBM343

What should they build? Three words: Coyote Powered Pinto. Sure, you’ll die if you get rear-ended, but it’s not like anything could keep up with you!

Not stupid enough? Blackwing Vega. 5.3 Cimarron. Hurricane-powered Dart.

If there’s no NHTSA to enforce anything, let’s get bonafide American made death machines on the menu.

Oh, I’m sorry, what was that? Your government has regulators? Sorry, I couldn’t hear you over all this freedom.

Submitted by: Mustang2Matt

Can I just get thinner A pillars please? It’s been frustrating driving for the past ~two decades and virtually having to deal with a solid foot of peripheral vision obstructed due to a half foot diameter A pillar. I’ll take a carpeted roll bar or anything that gets the A pillar back to 1980s level.

Consider: A non-carpeted roll bar. Just a tube chassis you can put on the road. That’s the kind of regulatory apparatus we’re talking about here.

Submitted by: 2ndgear

So just to get this straight, we can’t have Chinese cars in the US due to a national safety risk, but we sure can remove all the safety out of our own cars to bring the costs down to a competitive level?

I think the real concern with Americans is that Chinese cars may be stealing their data — not their lives. This is of course in contract to other companies, who would never gather your data.

Submitted by: BlackCoffee

The reality will just be that they keep building the same stuff they currently do, but they’ll cut more corners. Expect a lot more Tesla-style “fixes” on the assembly line.

“Hey, we ran out of mounting brackets for the rest of this week’s cars!”

“Just hack up some shipping pallets and ziptie the strips in place.”

This is really the most likely option: Every product gets worse for a while until things get better. It’s not ideal, but it’s the world we’re now living in.

Submitted by: Garland - Last Top Comment on Splinter