TractionControlOff

I think there are a lot of modern cars that are potential collector items. Think from a Corvette perspective. Look at how the 1996 Grand Sport has held its value in recent years. The 2003 Anniversary Red special and 2004 Commemorative Editions are on their way to becoming collector cars and I think the 2013 60th anniversary 427 will be someday as well.

There are a lot of exotics that I think will appreciate in value over time as well. The Ferrari Enzo already has, and I think the 360 Challenge Stradale, 430 Scuderia and 599 GTO will as well. The Murcielago SV might too.

BlueOx

I certainly never said it would be cheap. GM licenses things frequently like the MSRC tech to Ferrari.

Maybe the bigger question is will the company survive long enough to license this tech to aftermarket suppliers and who would those suppliers be?

torquetube

Possibly.

I have to say though that the public's current fascination with 3D printers seems excessive and very late-in-coming. I remember getting excited about stereolithography when I first encountered it, too... in the late 1980s!

Why wasn't there similar public excitement about CNC milling machines? Bolt down a billet, download some G-code, hit go, and boom - a gleaming metal part and a bunch of chips.

People are being invited to think of a 3D printer like the Replicator from Star Trek, which it isn't.

1985 Corvette

Definitely agree with you there. Guys love tweaking the C4s but seems like just recently there has been a surge in it. Not too long ago if someone was asking about advice for an LS motor swap into a C4, they were discouraged and told to just buy a C5/6. Now it's all the rave. Guess chalk a lot of that up to so many people doing it and now there are plenty of products and solutions to drop those engines in hassle free.

ArcticC7

The after market will always be there to produce reproduction parts and electronics. HOWEVER 40-50 years from now EVERYTHING on the road will be electric powered so the fuel will be more of a worry than a control board somewhere.

ArcticC7

You will be lucky 40 years from now if you will be able to buy the proper fuel for a C7 at all. Electric propulsion once main stream the US government has the power with the stroke of a pen to banish all internal combustion cars from ever being driven again and don't think that wont happen. The hand writing or should I dare say key strokes are already on the wall. Bye Bye Borla/Corsa The truly modern Corvette sound will be a Hummmmmm.

Daekwan06

Completely agreed. Not only will gas be like $50 a gallon as the world has sucked dry current supplies.. but emission laws will also be incredibly strict. If you want to know what the future will be like 40-50 years from now.. just look back 40-50 years ago and realize how much things have changed since then.

How much was gas then?
What was the carbon footprint of vehicles then?

speedlink

Fuel is not, and will not be a problem. We have an abundance of fuel here in America. If we would get government off our backs, we have the resources and ability for thousands of years. Don't need a drop of import.

stevelischynsky

It's not whether fuel is available. It is the distrubution system will not be available since no one but historical vehicles will need fuel. If you wanted to get a truck load of coal,,where would you go today...50 yrs ago that was no problem. Coal is still available but there is no distrubtion system in place.

Steve l.

JerriVette

I had a good laugh as 40 years from now I'll be dust.

There will always be something better to take it's place and I'm sure people who want to drive these cars will have a way to make them work

stevelischynsky

I suspect that the engines will come out and electrics installed in front of the tranny.
Steve L.

ArcticC7

You and me both babe

B747VET

Collecting is usually about how many were made and how many of those have survived at any given point in time.

Then you mix into the equation how desirable the car was when new and how desirable it is at any point down the road.

Older Ferraris, which were rarely made in huge numbers, have to have a lot of replacement parts manufactured from scratch because there are no factory replacement parts.

In the future it is likely that replacing or duplicating a complex electronic box will be much easier than designing a hand tooled mechanical component for a 60 year old Ferrari or a 70 year old Rolls.

Bill Dearborn

GM owns the IP for the programming of the technology but they don't own the technology itself. The modules are owned by the suppliers (like Bosch, Denso, Delphi, etc) that build them from whatever technology is available at the time. That base technology is owned by the large semiconductor makers who tell their Customers when the technology will be obsoleted. All it takes is for one of the many highly integrated semiconductor components in a module to become obsolete and the module has to be redesigned and the IP remapped into the new technology and design. This takes lots of money to buy the new components, redesign circuit boards, map the IP and finally test it all to see if it will work when put in a car. The investment can cost millions and the only organization stupid enough to do it is the US Government with its military equipment. That is how we get 50 year old B52s being flown by the great grandchildren of the people who originally flew them.

Bill

JustinStrife

I don't see it happening. IIRC Delphi was involved in the system and have since lost the plans necessary to re-make the modules. We are SOL.

torquetube

Consider the Tektronix 24xx oscilloscopes. They were great pieces of equipment and Tek built tens of thousands of them. After a few years the horizontal amplifiers started going bad. They were special hybrid parts, and somewhere along the line Tek sold off the production facility. So after the stock of spares was used up they just quit fixing them, extended warranty owners be damned.

Nowadays most of these units are boat anchors for want of one unobtainable part.

SCM_Crash

Simple. Emulators.

It won't be hard (especially 40 years from now) to make aftermarket electronics.

torquetube

It's not hard to make electronics now. It's hard to figure out exactly what they're supposed to do. If we were in possession of a complete annotated functional spec of each module with timing diagrams and the whole shebang, then we'd be cooking with gas.

Reverse-engineered emulated hardware running copied firmware runs into numerous dumb legal problems. Perhaps in 40 years things will have become so intractable they'll have reformed the system.

SCM_Crash

Quite the opposite now... Before the hardware was run by firmware burnt on a PROM and a board that managed hardware control via an IC. Today we're using computers similar to what we're using on our desktops that control the hardware. If there's one out there that works, it can be copied. Honestly, reverse engineering this stuff will get easier as time goes on.

40 years from now, the computers in the C7 will be childs play.

Guibo

A lot of old cars run much more reliably with modern electronic conversions (Pertronix/MSD ignition, Megasquirt EFI). As for the ECU, GM has done basically all of the hard work, in terms of input/output channels and algorithms and how they work with the other subsystems. Remember when Nissan said the GT-R's proprietary programming would be all but impossible to crack? That lasted all of what, one month. If you tell programmers and hackers they can't do something, odds are good that they will try to find a way around it and if it supplements their income, that's all the better.
The question is, is today's ECU for a Corvette with the full suite of electronics (PTM, launch control, active handling, magnetic shocks, etc) much more expensive than it is for, say, a C4? With BMWs, a V8 M3 ECU is actually less expensive than for an old 4-banger M3. Part of this may be due to volume, which gets into the next point.

It will be interesting to see if today's Ferraris are collectible like they were before. I suspect there are simply too many built, outside of the once in a decade hypercars. And they are built much better, last longer, and it's almost pointless to find cars with ultra low miles because people are driving them more and more, because they are more reliable (and easier to drive with automated transmissions). There's a paradox among collectors for old cars: A pristine, low mileage car might fetch a lot of money, but a car needs to be exercised to keeps seals fresh, parts from oxidizing or seizing up. That pristine car might cost a small fortune to put right.
Will the youth of tomorrow really covet them like today's collectors? Very hard to say. While emerging markets like China and the Middle East have fueled an increase in Ferrari production, it remains to be seen that audiences that buy new cars for the bling and flash factor will really care about heritage or exclusivity.