Need for Speed Racing Games

After seeing all the recent Cadillac TV commercials saying Ferrari employs their MagneRide technology, I looked into this a bit because I often hear Brits on race game forums wax on about how Americans don't know how to make cars, esp regarding their handling. I have to admit I was a bit skeptical whether Americans actually designed it.

Well, turns out the first generation of it actually was designed by Delphi of Troy Michigan. Problem is, if you look at what followed in GM's chapter 11 problems, they apparently sold off their global suspension and brakes business as one of many divisions they scaled back overhead on, which includes of course MagneRide.

This is why MagneRide is now actually owned by Beijing World Industries Group. So while those commercials may be giving Americans new hope in buying domestic, they seem to hide a sad, sad truth about the state of our economy and the reality of just how long it will take to truly recover. Even with the Tsunami in Japan and flooding in Thailand, US auto sales haven't increased to be anywhere near what they were before the recession.

What I find odd, is that Delphi, according to Wiki, rationalized the sale of their global suspension and brakes business, which of course includes MagneRide, by viewing it as one of the "facilities and business lines that do not support the company’s future strategic framework", yet here we have big names like Ferrari interested in MagneRide, but now the Chinese are the ones profiting off it.

After looking into this I came away thinking it's not the way Americans design cars that's the problem, it's the way they manage their business. So while it sounds all good at first when you hear Lawrence Fishburne making it clear that Ferrari is copying Cadillac's suspension, and not the other way around, what he doesn't tell you is that financially he's really being a spokesperson for the Chinese. Any thoughts?

I agree with your conclusion about how Americans, or more accurately North Americans, handle the automotive industry. They seem incapable of making a profitable company unless the company is in dire straits. Everytime GM or Ford or Chrysler is in trouble they start to actually do intelligent things. It makes no sense. Especially as North America comes out with some really impressive advancements in the industry that heavily effect performance vehicles.

Ford has a process that coats aluminum water jackets in steel and iron that makes them more capable of handling higher temperatures at those pesky higher speeds than Nikasil coatings. The TVS supercharger was developed by Americans and is the first positive pressure charger that doesn't need to run at high speeds making for a quieter system. They developed magneto-rheological suspension (MagneRide) and AirRide before that. Interestingly enough, Ferrari used a version of AirRide before the magnetic suspension called SkyHook which was refined by Maserati.

I've always been entertained by European sports car companies snubbing the technologies they use that are developed by other companies.

Well, as long as Cadillac keeps making the CTS-V series, it's all good. Which reminds me, why haven't we seen a CTS-V in a Need for Speed game?

Who knows? Not sure how they come up with their car lists...

I don't know about EA but my selection process is very complicated. I make up a recreation of the cool wall and blindly throw darts at it.

Speaking of Ferraris with American tech, have you guys heard about the speed record set at Bonneville? It was done in a 288 GTO rebody with a US made big block (rules required it for the class raced in).