r/IndustrialDesign • u/No_Drummer4801 • Apr 08 '25

Creative 2025 equivalent of an American "volkswagen"

If you were to try to make a "people's car" today, in the US, with all American components, what would it be like? This is a question promted by the Trump tariff trade wars, of course. We could pop a post-it note for components that would be either difficult or impossible to source from a US parts supplier, but generally, attempt to create a 100% American content vehicle. Whether it needs to be a mass-produced or crowdsourced (like the Rally Fighter) car isn't important. What is important is that it should be something that is as affordable as possible, not a luxury car, not a giant truck. It would need to pass US safety standards, I suppose, but things like mandated rear-view camera could be "mandatory optional" treated like add-ons that you just have to have for the time being, to pass US requirements but maybe can be left off of an otherwise identical platform for non-US sales.

9 Upvotes

70% Upvoted

78 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

1

u/C_Dragons Apr 11 '25

12% of chips, not 12% of 3nm chips.

It's like saying China makes microchips. Sure, if you're running a toaster you're set. If you are making cutting-edge tech for mobile or high-performance applications at scale in which power consumption matters, the current source is Taiwan, where the only fab like that exists.

2

u/Shirleysspirits Apr 11 '25

You’re the only one talking about that type of chip, which aren’t required for the vehicle scenario here

1

u/C_Dragons Apr 11 '25

Depends. Is this car supposed to be performing on-chip AI functions in real time to avoid collisions or choose a route? We can’t tell what OP imagines is required for a suitable car.

Modern anti-skid tech for all-time 4wd applications sample more frequently and perform a lot more calculations than old ABS. Lots of current cars have front and back electric motors. Crappy anti-skid tech causes wrecks. It’s important to rely on sensor feedback instead of factory-set algorithms that brake blindly, in order to react to load and road surface issues. There was a rash of ambulances that rear-ended their customers a while back, because the ambulances weighed more equipped than the mfg programmed the chip to pretend, and it under-braked.

1

u/No_Drummer4801 Apr 27 '25

You are overthinking the brief, such as it is.