Safety regs will certainly have a part to play but more than anything I suspect the manufacturers consider the market would be small. Maybe we should be looking forwards. The Rover 75 was an attempt to produce a car with styling cues back to the past, to me it was all wrong, not what the market wanted in the run-up to the turn of the Century.

You mean like MINI, New Beetle, Fiat 500 ?

Kit car manufacturers do make old-style cars that resemble MG TF and a few others.

I guess not many people want an old-fashioned car.

What prevents manufacturers making modern cars which look like old classics like 1960s Rolls Royce, Dusenberg, Jaguar E type etc.

Is there no market for such looking cars or there is technical difficulty with all the mandated safety requirement nowadays?

I'd love a retro look - sorry not getting the SUV thing these days. I think history will put the SUV fad up there with 1970's flares - probably just me!

Edited by Big John on 23/07/2021 at 23:16

What prevents manufacturers making modern cars which look like old classics like 1960s Rolls Royce, Dusenberg, Jaguar E type etc.

Such upmarket attempts never sold well - look what flops the re-incarnated Rover 75 and Jaguar S type were - even in this country, let alone elsewhere. Mass market attempts were successful in many countries - e.g. Beetle, Mini, Fiat 500.

Is there no market for such looking cars or there is technical difficulty with all the mandated safety requirement nowadays?

There is a market, but it is small, reflecting the tiny proportion of eccentric enthusiasts in the general population, e.g. Morgan buyers; the Eagle car company.

What prevents manufacturers making modern cars which look like old classics like 1960s Rolls Royce, Dusenberg, Jaguar E type etc.

Is there no market for such looking cars or there is technical difficulty with all the mandated safety requirement nowadays?

As others have said, exact copies of old cars with modern underpinnings are difficult in the extreme to get at a reasonable cost and that passes the latest safety tests with at least reasonable scores. There is a small-scale indie firm building replica E-Type Jags - at a cost of several £000ks each, so I'm sure if buyers have the money and there's sufficient demans, it can be done.

Original minis and tiny Fiats, no - not just on cost grounds, but because they are so small, safety would be terrible. Even modern micro cars have a difficult time score well on NCAP and I regularly read in the papers of fatal accidents where one of them is hit by other cars, just because the difference in size/weight.

I think there nearest anyone's going to get for a mass-market manufacturer are the latest (not so small) Minis, Fiat 500s and Nu VW Beetle (no longer in production).

Perhaps if and when new-fangled 'smart' 'nano-materials' are used to build vehicle, then we might start to get some old-style flair back in car external design, assuming such materials can save a big chunk of weight whilst maintaining or improving safety to offset perhaps some less aerodynic shapes (but which look nicer).

Would chrome bumpers be allowed?

If they still made them, then they wouldn't be.