All that is true, but there are multiple crisis afoot that will sharply compress all the timelines, in my opinion. Energy, space race, safety, war, and a fundamental shift in the world's manufacturing structure. EVERY domestic OEM was absolutely convinced there was no way to bring a new car model into production in less than three years. When the Japanese did it faster, they were forced to tighten up their timeline. The war is pushing the Army to innovate as quickly as possible. It will take longer than many would think, but they have a lot more than market share to motivate them and as was pointed out, they have some money to do it.
NASA has committed to landing on the Moon in eight years. In many ways 'production' has begun on the vehicle that will enable that mission to succeed. I don't know how customized the IVT is for the Harrier, but the Lunar Rover transmission was AT the stockholders meeting. One poster who was there seemed to overlook it because it was so small. The size of two fists. Exotic parts? Not really, simple gears arranged in a not so simple way, basically. Same with the IVT. It's simple, it's tested, it's ready to be not only prototyped, but retrofitted to what you are driving.
Yes, it would be nice to know what Nissan is planning to do. Who would tell the world that sort of info? Do racing teams walk around pit row bragging about their latest engineering trick? 'See that right there' that's why we run faster lap times than you. Would Nissan jump in with both feet if they really thought China was going to buy the Iso-Torque and make their GM clones racing opponents? I don't know, but I would assume ANY OEM would have tighter control on manufacturing problems than Torvec had with the custome order they placed locally.
Too bad mayor Duffy has to deal with the $50 debacle Johnson left him. He might have been tempted to fund the $4 million to get a couple of school buses modified with Torvec IVTs, in some city warehouse in an enterprise zone. Comparing how slow a bemouth like Xerox is or how screwed up some City of Rochester pipe dreams were, isn't a fair yardstick about the viability of putting Torvec into production.
I think a better measure is the unconventional companies that will lead the conventional OEMs. Conventional thinking and timelines get you Ford on the edge of bankruptcy, Chrysler for sale for a dollar and GM staying in business because of their offshore subsidiaries. In a very real way Torvec could be worth more than all those combined. Conventional thinking and timelines should have convinced Panoz he had no chance of building a car, let alone one that would dominate it's racing class year after year. Conventional thinking stopped everybody else in Sweden from thinking about building a supercar. Yet ONE 22 year old was brash enough to take on the BEST Volvo and Ford could offer and blow right past them with not only a faster car, but a more advanced and better engineered car. Same story with Lotus, TVR and Confederate motorcycles.
The status quo can find a million reasons why things have to be done the way there are, then they get kicked aside. Innovations from just in time supply to robots to new methods and hardware, rip up assembly lines and board rooms all the time. Traditional OEMs are in a dead zone if they think they can survive with lawyers and lobbyists instead of balls out (as Jay Leno explains, the term is from steam engines and has nothing to do with male anatomy) engineering and efficient manufacturing. China understands that. They have a plan that goes beyond the current CEO's retirement, they have money and they aren't afraid to think big, different and new. Conventional thinkers never thought they could do what they've done in the past 10 years, and they wake up to see entire assembly plants shipped lock, stock and barrel to a new city devoted to making that product, in China. Tell them about how long it takes to make something. They aren't working to your rules and they have the results to show for it. EOM
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