23 MAY 2025 WorldWide Drilling Resource® It was Crude, but it Worked by Britt Storkson Owner, P2FlowLLC Have you ever looked under the hood of a 1950s or earlier car? You will notice most everything under the hood was big and heavy, which required a big, heavy car to haul it around. The components aren’t very “refined” and is crude by today’s standards. They were crude, but they worked. Most of the metal parts on the engine were iron castings instead of much lighter aluminum. Iron was used because they didn’t have the advanced metal casting technologies we have today, which reduced the amount of metal needed for a certain product - and metals were relatively cheap back then. It was crude but it worked. While lots of iron made for a durable product, the extra weight resulted in poor fuel mileage. Back then, people weren’t so concerned about that because gasoline was relatively cheap. Sure, it wasn’t that great, but there was nothing much better at the time. It was crude, but it worked. Back then, things like car generators and ignition systems were mechanical, not electronic. Mechanical commutators were used instead of diodes to make the direct current for battery charging and running lights. Voltage regulators were mechanical too. Ignition systems consisted of a set of “points” driven by a shaft and a coil to create a spark at the right time. While it worked, it could be a problem under damp conditions. All it took was a little moisture in the wrong area to completely shut down the ignition until things dried out. It was crude, but it worked. Fast forward to today, where due to technological advances, things are much more refined. Semiconductors doing most of the electrical and software instead of hardware is what is controlling almost every automotive function . . . functions that were unknown in the 1950s. Like the saying goes: We’ve come a long way, baby. Or have we? I’m not sure we have - at least in this area. I don’t know if anybody has done a study on automotive breakdown causes, but I would suspect software errors would be at least in the top ten if not number one. That’s what we’re often told when something goes wrong with the car, and “software errors” have been the object of numerous recalls over many years. Unlike the mechanical ignition system moisture which can be remedied with a little rubbing alcohol, we can’t fix the software. And some would argue the companies that build these cars can’t fix the software either. Would I go back to the good old days of mechanical everything? Of course not. Modern technology is clearly superior to the old way of doing things as we have learned a lot over the years, but I think we can definitely make this technology much less complex and more beneficial to the end user. One could start by eliminating the unnecessary bells and whistles as well as gadgets that do nothing but increase costs and give us one more thing to go wrong and - sometimes - shut everything down. Then the unique nature of the “world cars” most of us are driving now requires us to order the part from Denmark with a ten-week lead time. Then there’s the cost. We pay $2000 for a computer that costs the company who made it about $50. Another approach would be greater standardization of parts. There’s no reason why one ignition system couldn’t work for all four-cylinder engines, another for all six-cylinder engines, and yet another for all eight-cylinder engines. In fact, modern computer software makes it easy to adapt the part to the car it’s going into simply by using software settings. And it’s cheap too. So I would advocate for the best of both worlds. Use simple, reliable, and standardized components and only the minimum to operate the basic car functions. Instead of “crude, but it worked” I would go with “simple, reliable, and interchangeable” and use the technology to reduce - and not increase - the complexity and cost. Britt Britt Storkson may be contacted via e-mail to michele@worldwidedrillingresource.com
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