Vehicle designing going to the dogs

focus-grouping.
When the final product arrives at your local dealerships, it will be vetted more times than a presidential candidate.
That said, with all that effort, one then wonders why after such hard work do we get ugly cars on our roads.
In Harare there is quite a number of monstrosities on four wheels powered by petrol which when they drive past you, many of the car fanatics out there want to take a picture and post it on Facebook and caption it the shocker of the day.
If you are an auto enthusiast like yours truly — you marvel at a total package not part thereof — which means the machine has to have both exterior appeal and power under the hood.
For this issue I thought let’s have fun and list a few cars which over the years have been a laughing stock in the industry because of their not so attractive looks.
The Toyota Tercel wagon, 1983-87
This was primarily made for the American market.
Since Americans like their vehicles big and compact, I guess it worked for them.
Boxy hatchbacks are not inherently ugly, but when you add odd angles to it and a rearmost window that looks like it dropped out of a home plan, things start to get weird.
With such a car any joker can be forgiven if they slap an ATM sticker on the back of your car.
That’s how bad this car still is.
Another car that has become quite a spectacle on our roads because it looks like it came straight from a building blocks kit, is the Funcargo.
All boxy like an elongated rectangle, I doubt there is anything fun in that ride.
A vehicle which is a legend for being an iconic design is the Ford Mustang SVO, 1984-86.
How do you take an automotive icon and make it ugly? Hire the designer of the Ford Circa 1984. That is when the automaker issued a performance variant of the Mustang called SVO.
Already burdened with the econo-hatchback design of other Mustangs, it added a two-tiered spoiler and a uniquely awful grille.
The hood scoop looked like an after market add-on. This vehicle ended up looking very cheap.
The BMW 5 Series GT, 2010 is another shining example.
The 5 Series GT makes us long for the days when BMW had a proper mid-size wagon in its line-up for folks who wanted a little more utility.
You might think the sacrifices the GT makes in cargo versatility would lead to better looks, but the opposite is true.
Why BMW?
With the Xs in production, I wonder why they had to make the GT, which is very hard to find on our streets.
Over the last few months I have only seen one GT in Harare, which means that it has been a seller.
Personally if I had money, I would opt for the 5 series sedan: better performance and greater value.
Locally, there has been so much flooding of imported vehicles of various shapes and sizes.
I always think that if we were to have an award ceremony where we honour the failures in design there may actually be very stiff competition.
There are two vehicle manufacturers who I have personally dubbed as the gurus at manufacturing ugly vehicles.
These are Mahindra and Tata.
All from the India, they haven’t made anything, which I have enjoyed looking at let alone drive.
I guess their motto is to just make what’s practical but goodness . . . they are way short in the looks department.
However, I must point out that the Tata Indica was almost cute, I could have actually owned one at some point.
Out of most of their vehicles, this is the one and only vehicle that is appealing, the rest are as practical as ever, nothing close to attractive.
The reason why I have written this article is to prove that there are always beauties and beasts everywhere, even when we are talking of cars or even houses.
Workmanship and design is not always on point and when it comes to looks, there are vehicles out there which can put you off because they are almost scary to look at.
But that said everyone has a preference and even the funny and ugly ones have buyers waiting to buy them.
So till next week, don’t get bruised, have a laugh . . .
It’s good for you. Ciao.

l Fact D. Jeke is a motoring enthusiast who has attended auto shows, rallies and has written for various publications in the region for the last decade. She can be contacted via email on: [email protected], or Facebook page: Torque with Fact Jeke for more information.