Walter P. Chrysler was an engineer who before Chrysler worked on developing locomotive engines until he was enticed into automotive engineering working initially for General Motors (eventually heading up Buick Division) and later going to Willeys-Overland. An unsuccessful bid to gain control of the company resulted in taking the controlling interest of ailing Maxwell Motor Company, dissolving Maxwell by renaming the carmaker as Chrysler Corporation in 1925. Chrysler added the lines of Plymouth, Desoto and later Dodge. Walter P. Chrysler passed away in 1940 at the age of sixty-five. Chrysler did make good cars up to the early 1970’s, but something happened and then the automotive company came to make many missteps in quality issues. Chrysler dropped out of the Desoto line in 1961, later Chrysler buried Plymouth in 2001 - retaining its namesake as well Dodge and Dodge Trucks. The quality and reliability of Chrysler cars started its decline as mentioned in the early seventies with cars like Aspen and Volare which were behind the times and quality. It got so desperate that both the models of Dodge and Plymouth shared the same mechanics - only the front snouts and rear ends had a slight difference. Granted other car companies were starting to use this concept to contain costs as well. By the late seventies and early eighties, Chrysler was on the verge of insolvency - the product line had aged and the mechanics flimsy - as a last ditch effort, Chrysler brought Ford’s now dethroned President Lee Iacocca to take over as Chrysler’s CEO and his name was enough to secure bailout loans from the federal government. Lee brought in his posse from Ford and set to work in turning the company around. First, he dumped many of Chrysler’s product line from its namesake to its Dodge and Plymouth divisions. He was forced to trim a lot of jobs and with not much money had to bring a new model online - that was the famed K-Car which looked a lot like a Ford Fairmount that Ford was making. The car’s basic underpinnings were used for the different divisions and models from Chryslers down through Dodge and Plymouth. Next Iacocca brought online its minivans and the Dodge Omni’s and Plymouth Horizon’s which looked like Volkswagen Rabbit rip-off’s. Then Iacocca took over the ailing AMC lineup whose only diamond was the Jeep line the company acquired from Willey’s Overland to create the SUV market. Finally Lee was a great ’pitchman’ talent who went on the air and print ads telling people ’if you can find a better car, buy it!” Maybe people should have taken Lee’s advice to heart. Lee retired as CEO at the end of 1992, by then the public began to realize Chrysler cars were not as great as Chrysler made them out to be - decline soon followed. Chrysler eventually found itself in the hands of Daimler famed for its Mercedes Benz line and the world felt Chrysler was once again on the road of success. When Daimler realized that Chrysler was an albatross on its neck, it was tossed to a holding company called Cerebus who just ran the day-to-day operation without any innovation and it showed. By 2009, Chrysler was in the midst of bankruptcy looking for a lifesaver from another federal government bailout. Chrysler found itself in the hands of a new consortium of the United Auto Workers (UAW), Fiat and for awhile, the Federal Government. Fiat had not offered a car to the US market in quite some time and the Italian car company felt Chrysler could get it back on North American shores. The strength of both companies looks like a good fit - Fiat for subcompacts and compacts, Chrysler for midsize and larger cars. Its going to take some time for the company to shake off its irksome past. Current Chairman and CEO Sergio Marchionne has his work cut out for him both at Fiat and Chrysler. His introduction of the Fiat 500 is gaining some positive traction in car reviews as is the new Dodge Dart as is the better-than-average rating for the Chrysler 300 model. However, the same cannot be said for Jeep whose model line of SUV’s has not wowed the critics nor buyers who find themselves in dealer repair shops with their bolder bashers getting expensive band-aids. Fiat simply has not had time to take on the redesign of its complete car lines - as seen in the example of the Jeep line of SUV’s. What will greatly hurt the Jeep line is its ‘voluntary’ recall of 1.57 down from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration request of recalling 2.7 million vehicles which include the 1993 - 1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee models as well the 2002 thru 2007 Jeep Liberty SUV’s due to a defect of design which has caused deadly fires caused when the Jeep models are rear-ended in accidents. Initially, NHTSA wanted 1999-2004 Jeep Cherokee’s recalled as well - however, Chrysler refused. So how will Chrysler fix its Jeep rear-end problems - nope, no expensive high tech device - instead, all recalled Jeeps will be retrofitted with a trailer hitch - yep, that’s it, an inexpensive trailer
Posted on: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 05:11:56 +0000
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