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5 of the Greatest Car Conspiracy Theories in the World

Conspiracy theories are always floating around about pretty much everything in life. Some of the car related ones are pure gold as well as making you question everything. A lot of these theories have been shared on Reddit, so we have put together a list of the top five conspiracy theories going around.

5. Governments Keep Roads in Bad Condition to Aid Car Sales

One user commented on Reddit with a theory that’s maybe not the most sensible… But it’s nice to have a moan about the quality of the roads in your country while also slamming the government a bit. They wrote:

“That governments and car manufacturers are conspiring together to sell more SUVs by keeping streets sh**ty so normal cars would have terrible rides and blow their tyres so often because of the goddamn potholes. And thus SUVs being the only types of vehicles able to survive this sh**ty a*s streets.” (Sorry about the asterisks…)

According to Urban.org the US government spent $203 billion on highways and roads in 2019:

“In 2019, state and local governments spent $203 billion, or 6 percent of direct general spending, on highways and roads. As a share of state and local direct general expenditures, highways and roads were the fifth-largest expenditure in 2019.”

Car sales in the United States currently sits at $1.53 trillion as of 2021… interesting. Unfortunately, taxes on new vehicles only come to $15.8 billion, and used vehicles generated only $9.9 billion. That’s way less than what the country spends so, maybe not?

4. Ford Was More to Blame for the Ford Explorer Crashes Than You Think

Moving on to some more serious examples, another Reddit user wrote about Ford’s SUV, the Explorer, which was first produced in 1990. They wrote:

“When the Ford Explorer was first released, they suffered from an unusual number of rollover crashes. The tires were de-laminating (the tread separating from the rest of the tire) and inducing instability that most drivers couldn’t compensate for, resulting in a single-car accident. The blame for the crashes was ultimately laid at the feet of the Firestone tire company.

“In a long since deleted TSB, Ford ordered service techs to deflate the tires to 24 PSI when customers complained of poor ride quality.”

Low tyre pressure can definitely cause delamination of the rubber. Maybe Ford should have invested more into the suspension development of the car instead of a shortcut like this? We’ll never know for sure, but this sounds very real.

3. The Saleen S7 was Actually Supposed to be Jaguar’s Successor to the XJ220

Another touched on the Saleen S7, which is an American hand-built sports car known by many to be one of the greatest supercars to hit the market.

“That the Saleen S7 was really supposed to be Jaguars successor to the XJ220”

The S7 was the first fully patented car produced by Saleen and was America’s sixth production mid-engined sports car. It was in production between 2000 and 2009. Obviously, the designers of the car received a huge amount of inspiration from the powerful Jaguar supercar, but to be honest, this doesn’t quite hold up. Really, the only similarities come in the shape of its design, and the fact that when both cars were built, they were the fastest in the world.

2. Oil Companies and the Government Closed Down the GM EV1

The next theory stems from General Motors ending the EV1 towards the end of 2002. At the time, the company said that they could not sell enough of the cars to make the EV1 profitable. The Reddit user wrote:

“That GM killed the EV1 because of influence from big oil and the U.S. government”

The EV1 was an electric car that was produced and leased by General Motors between 1996 and 1999. It was the first mass-produced and purpose-designed modern electric vehicle to come from a major car manufacturer. The EV1 was discontinued in 2002 and all of the models on the road were called back by the company. The cars had only been available on lease agreements so they company claimed the cars back under those agreements without giving the users the option to purchase the vehicle.

The end of the EV1 received a huge amount of backlash from electric car enthusiasts and environmentalists.

1. The Delorean DMC-12 Was Supposed to be Mid-Engined

The last one on the list is over the engine placement in the iconic DMC-12, made famous from the Back To The Future film franchise. It has been widely reported that Delorean had many issues with the production of the DMC-12 when the company that was meant to be producing the engine went bust. They ended up deciding to go for a 2.8 litre Peugeot V6, but that was too big to continue with the mid-engined design so was instead put behind the rear wheels.

One Reddit user wrote:

“During the development of the DMC-12, Lotus who was in charge of designing the vehicle, proposed a mid engine layout of the car, but Delorean decided to go with rear engine design. Later Toyota approached Lotus to use their mid engine design for their future W10 MR2”

Another user commented on the post in agreement, saying:

“The DMC-12 was supposed to be a mid engined car with a rotary. Something fell through late in the project with the rotary, so they were left scrambling to find an engine. Since no sports car engine is going to fit in the space designed for a rotary, they had to mount the PRV V6 in the back.”

Know any more weird but wonderful conspiracy theories, let us know in the comments below!

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