Assalamualaikum.
Well, well, well... It has been more than 3 months since i've posted my last update. BZZ la kut... Butta more to solving other people's car problem.
Many of my frenz have cars from the basic kancil to the advanced german cars... My on-off workshop partner (off when i'm involved with other things,on when got customer that have problems with their cars), currently he caters malaysian & japanese cars, & sometimes korean cars & german cars (bmw, merc & audi). But Italian cars???
Some of the spareparts shop that're regular to us would say...Aiya! Wah! U all "terer" (can do easily) repair the Italian cars ah... Wah! Italian cars the hardest to repair mah...
Most of the mechnics in KL are experts when dealing with popular Japanese cars such as the VTEC of Honda, the VVT & supercharger of Toyota, the turbos of Nissan & Evo converted Protons, & the simple turbo of kancils. More workshops are also beginning to mastered the german cars. But not many has the interest to deal with cars from France & Italy.
The truth is, I love Italy & France. They are rich in culture & their people are sporting. They have good soccer players & clubs. Many of the clubs have & still produces superstars that worth millions of dollar. When it comes to cars, Italians produced the most beautiful car & super-hypercar on the planet with multiple world championship credits in motorsport. The French also has rough & robust car that won multiple rally races around the world. And Italians too produced the best superbikes in the world..namely Ducati, Aprillia, Benelli, Agusta, Moto Guzzi, Bimota & many more.
But why we have the impression that they produced lousy cars & bikes? Want to know why?
For me the answer is very simple. The people who brought the Italians & French vehicle to Malaysia has the ability to sell them here...but they sell them without the strong spareparts package. If they have the package, still people will scratch their heads upon hearing the sky-rocket price tag. The silly questions of why the spareparts are expensive, will be answered by even sillier answers... oh because it's Italians/French..hard to find spares one... oh euro expensive one... oh govt tax mah.. and so and so... on with the possible answers imaginable.
Why a new OEM (original equipment mfr) parts such as master brake pump of a proton (perdana) cost from RM100+, the japs car around RM300+ & the european (continental) cars starts from RM800? Why the oem spareparts maker didn't have the interest to produce continental car parts but preferred producing local & japs car? Simple, they have more market & saleable too compared to conti cars. But why it has to be like this?
Again the simple answer is the japs are cheaper than the conti and too much protection from the government on the local made cars. But is it worth the protection? I do not think so. If the protection is there, the local car will definitely be the 1st choice of consumer becoz it's the cheapest car. The more it were sold the richer the car manufacture and the more R&D with advancement technology implemented on to their product. If we look at Volkswagen (pronounce as Volks-va-gen), they started as the people's car (the exact translation of its name). They sell the beetle very cheap, over & over again till they become the largest automaker in europe. Then they bought the Audi & uses their technologies to produce even higher quality cars. Porsche also is in the volks family as the main shareholder. And now they even owned the Lamborghini & Bugati car that produced the most expensive & the fastest super-hypercar in the world. That's the german...
Fiat also started with small car, the Fiat 500 (Malaysian called it Katak or Frog). Over time they bought over lancia & produced even better cars & then owned the cream of supercar, the Ferrari. That's how the autoworld works. Does it work with proton? Noep, not at all..still the same after more than 25years...they never learn but still excellent in hiding their under-quality products behind political protection...and they r best in power struggle of the top company post. All they brag about is their cars are tuned by lotus engineering... As far as I know, the lotus guys replaced the old anti-roll bar with tick & stiffer ones. We can get the after market bars that performs greater than the "lotus' touch".
I'm not against malaysian cars as i've once owned & driven them b4. The majority of my customers owned proton cars. But why they produced under-quality car that was hard to be accepted by other european countries. Some of my frenz prefer buying a used 5-years old japs car than a brand new proton car. They should have listen to public complaint & act quickly like the japs to improved their products... noep, never happens. The japs carmaker produces superb cars to their local market, much-much better than their export models. Why? They rely on the reactions of their local market first than the foreign market, and the local market is still their biggest market.
Proton has to grow up & focus on ways to become at least like the koreans that begun their automotive industries about 10-years earlier. They got to work 120% harder & catch-up the koreans quickly or being left behind by the chinese & indian car maker.
GONG XI FA CHAI
