Name: 汽車是如何從箱形變成曲線的 (How cars went from boxy to curvy)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T06:41:44.000Z
Duration: 4 min 1 s
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If you look at cars from the 1970s and cars from the 1990s, there’s really one big difference

The ones from the 70s are boxy, and the ones from the 90s are curvy.

For some car models, you can even tell the exact year when that change happened.

Just look at this commercial for the Buick LeSabre, showing the 1991 model — and then

Since then, cars have become curvier and curvier.

When manufacturers started making curvy cars in the 90s, it wasn’t a totally new concept.

Back in the 1930s, streamliners like this Chrysler Airflow used this sleek design to reduce wind

But as the 50s and 60s rolled around, American streamliners stopped selling well — they

Gas prices were on fairly steady decline at this point, so streamlining for fuel efficiency

Well into the 1970s, just about every car made in America had sharp edges and very few

They were basically designed as a series of three boxes — the hood, the cabin, and the

That model worked really well in the US market.

But in Europe, fuel was always more expensive.

In the 60s, a gallon of gas in France cost a whopping 73.1 cents while it was just 31

So European designers started experimenting with more aerodynamic designs to help cars

move more easily so they’d waste less gas.

Automakers like Porsche, BMW, Audi, Mercedes-Benz — they all started rolling out car models

Eventually American automakers started to copy the European aerodynamic look to try

In Europe, a designer named Uwe Bahnsen was the first person to push for a curved design

for the average driver, and he did that with the 1982 Ford Sierra.

It was curvier than any car in its class at the time.

But critics just laughed at it. And it didn't sell very well at first.

It was nicknamed the “jelly mould” because of how much it looked like the kind of circular

But one of the designers from that European Ford design team — this guy, Jack Telnack

— took over the US design team in 1980.

American gas prices at this point were skyrocketing due to conflict in the middle east.

So Telnack brought wind tunnel testing into the design process.

He first did that with the 1983 Ford Thunderbird.

But the real breakthrough came a few years later:

"The result was the groundbreaking 1986 Ford Taurus."

It might not look that groundbreaking now, but this style was revolutionary

It was a mass market car with curvy edges — and people liked it.

Now a North American car with a shape and a feel we’ve never seen before…

They used it in RoboCop as the car of the future.

The sales basically saved Ford, which had really been struggling at the time, and it inspired

And streamlining became even more popular because manufacturers were facing new fuel

Starting in 1978, the average fuel efficiency of each manufacturer’s passenger cars had

According to one Ford designer, aerodynamic design was a much more affordable way to boost

efficiency than doing engineering work under the hood.

The rise of computer modelling in the 80s also made it easier for car makers to design

All these years later, the influence on today’s cars is pretty clear.

Even the models that we criticize for being ridiculously boxy these days — like the

And if our modern day sci fi movies have anything to say about it, that won’t be changing

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汽車是如何從箱形變成曲線的 (How cars went from boxy to curvy)

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