CRI (Cooper Racing Inc.)

[gt1cooper]

Cooper Sr & Jr: Alright guys, we will give this a shot. Seems like everyone is doing this but us, so while we cannot post as often, we will do my best.

CRi was created in 1953 as the brainchild of Cooper Sr. and Cooper Jr.; they felt that they had something to give that the rest of the marketplace didn't. They felt that the marketplace lacked a brand with true identity, a brand where when you bought a car from it, you knew you would get specific values; thus, with their company, they would try to make one that stuck to certain values at all costs. Thus, the company was born and named.

In 1953, they released the first CRI Kite. Data to follow in the next post.

[Jakgoe]

Will this be run by Cooper Jr. or Cooper Sr.?

[gt1cooper]

The story will continue and you will see . We talked about this a while ago in an online match.
Alright, so: The CRI Kite.
This little car may seem like a strange car to start a company with. When you start a company in an established marketplace, you want to come in with a bang! Look at Tesla with the Roadster and Pagani with the Zonda! However, the Coopers decided to come in with an all around great car; it did not exceed at any one thing though.
Thus, while it was evidentially better than the competition in the mid-size coupe range, being priced at only $1,200, far cheaper than a Ford Mainline or a Pontiac Chieftain, and nearly twice as fast to 60 mph as those cars. CRI sent the car to all of the relevant presses, and the car received stellar reviews; though they all came with the same warning which hurt sales: "Beware of buying from a brand new brand." This warning had an even more profound affect as the car was being sold to a fairly low price market; one which was wary of buying a car without a proven reliability record or even knowing whether they would stay afloat.
The impact of CRi's anonymity before this point where they tried to release a mainstream car was that, while they did sell a good deal of cars, they were not very profitable. CRi stayed afloat; these weren't exactly hard times, but they weren't the big success they had hoped for.





P.S. Please tell us if we built this car correctly for this time period and market! Is it too expensive for this market, and does it look right for the date? I have very few frames of reference.
Thanks for reading; do tell your thoughts!

[Pleb]

The car looks brilliant! Especially for a car of that era. The front end is the best .

[gt1cooper]

The car looks brilliant! Especially for a car of that era. The front end is the best .

Thank you We've been quite busy, but we had to find some time to sit down and finally work together on this. Glad you liked it! We weren't sure that it fit very well with the time frame though, without more things to compare it to.

[Pleb]

I think it's the headlights that make me like the car so much.

[Frankschtaldt]

The Kite looks fantastic!
Those head lights are awesome.
Though, the front blinkers would have been difficult to make in the 50's. Not impossible, but pretty difficult I reckon.
The engine looks pretty good too, though maybe a little peaky for what the market at the time would have liked. Americans have always been about the low end grunt =)

[TheTom]

I like the looks of the Kite a lot! The front end is beautiful and the back is kinda classic Cadillac or so, i like it! And i agree with Frankschtaldt, the engine could use a bit more low-end torque, you could try using a lower cam profile.

[NyanCatx3]

wow , that's a beauty! it's minimalistic and just wow. you guys are really talented at designing old cars! good job

[SeriousSimon]

That is a well thoughtout car, with an impressive engine for a reasonable price. I like it!

[FrBosquet]

Brilliant design, front, back, sidelook... everything is nice. Lots of personality. Good job!

[gt1cooper]

Sorry that we haven't brought out the next car! We've got the story, we've got the engine, we know what to do with the tuning, but we just cannot make ourselves happy with the design! Nothing seems to fit just the way we want it to.

[Pleb]

I'll have high expectations after your first creation .

[gt1cooper]

Here is the next creation from CRi, the Kite EC. The EC in this name stands for Executive Coupe, and this car most certainly fits that classification. This updated Kite has much more power than the previous one, and based off of some complaints from customers wanting more low end grunt, we completely changed the engine from the bottom end up. This new 302 is much bigger, more responsive, and efficient, perfect for this class of car.

Tameness: 34
Sportiness: 10
Comfort: 34
Prestige: 34
Safety: 10

The suspension has been retuned for more comfort. The styling has been redone. In every way, this is an improvement on the original. The car sells reasonably well, enough to be called a success, and the company is in the black

Now, for internal politics. The company, while doing well, is experiencing some internal strife, coming from it's two leaders, Cooper Sr. and Cooper Jr., who have two very different mindsets, and these are centered around the engines.

Cooper Sr. wants engines with the torque peaks lower. Not necessarily much lower power numbers, but earlier power. The benefits for this are obvious, (Drivability, pulling power out of corners, etc.) and thus he thinks this is the better option.

Cooper Jr. wants engines with the peak power higher. Not necessarily much higher power numbers, but slightly later power. The benefits of this are obvious, (Perhaps more linear power, higher ultimate power numbers, and what he wants, the ability to just keep spinning an engine faster and get more power) and thus he thinks this is the better option.

What does this mean for the company? We will have to wait and see.

[gt1cooper]

I realize the error with how I did this post! There was no need to do the spot reserved thing; in fact, it hurt me because of how edits do not change the symbol from yellow to blue. Noted, and will not happen again