Were cars better in the past?
06/04/2020
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Over 40 years ago, the writers at "auto motor und sport" asked themselves whether the cars were earlier. And they got down to business and compared the pre-war Kadett with the Kadett C. The result? And the result?
Sobering, at least that's how Klaus Westrup felt (in AMS 11/1976) after the comparison drive with the 1939 and 1976 Kadett. His final words were:
"The brakes, for example, confirmed what the comparison of two generations of cars revealed in practically every respect: The new car is not only clearly superior to the veteran, but several times superior. And this also answers the general question of whether the old cars offered more. They were certainly more attractive, and they certainly had more character. But they were not better."
In fact, the "modern" Kadett C from 1976 outclassed the old one from the pre-war era in every discipline, whether acceleration, smoothness, handling or braking. Anything else would have surprised any reader.
Unfortunately, Westrup was not interested in one criterion at the time, namely durability and ease of repair, i.e. the suitability of the car for a long service life. And that, of course, would have interested us classic car enthusiasts just as much.
This comparison should actually be repeated. You could compare an Opel Kadett C with a modern Astra, or a Golf 1 with a Golf 8. In terms of the classic test criteria, the difference would probably be at least as great, but in terms of suitability for becoming a classic car, opinions could differ ...
P.S. Of course you can find the report from 1976 in our Zwischengas archive ...
