The original WWII Willys Jeep was as simple as it gets, no airbags, no seatbelts, no electronics just steel and guts.
It was a light and tough 4x4, easy to work on and you could fix almost anything with basic tools. You could tear the whole Jeep down in less than 5 minutes.
If someone tried to build one today, same size, same style, could it actually pass modern safety and emissions standards?
Or would the rules make a true “modern Willys” impossible?
Curious what engineers, mechanics, and everyone else thinks. It would save people so much money.
Would it though? The reason there’s an SUV/Truck arms race is mostly related to a tariff bypass for “light duty” vehicles. Basically, it’s cheaper and more profitable to convince Americans to love SUVs and Trucks because of some fucking chicken tax 80 years ago.
That’s why there aren’t competitors in “light” trucks. And why we don’t have nice small ones anymore either. But the size race has largely been about a combination of manliness and thinking they’re safer in a bigger car (which to some extent is true, but at the cost of everything else in its path)