From "How to Repair Your Foreign Car", by Dick O'kane, (c)1968:

You see, every nationality has its own philosophy of car building. To the British, everthing is a sporting proposition and the removal of a starter motor is really a game to see who is more clever--you, trying to figure out how to get it off, or the designer who figured out how to get it on. When the thing finally comes loose and lands on your nose, you've won. Polite applause.

On the other hand, the Germans would rather you didn't fool around with the mechanicals at all. Who are you, with your crude tools and your pittance of knowledge, defiling an object that took teams of Germany's finest technical minds to conceive? Besides, it can't break. When it does, though, you're supposed to take it to a high priest from the factory who has the specialized tools, the patience and, above all, the training to fix it correctly. Said hight priest, by the way, asks and gets up to seven dollars an hour for his services, so, bearing that in mind, go ahead and defile.

The Swedes build strapping good, strong cars that'll go over, around, under and through anything. And as long as it starts in the morning and keeps running, you won't mind if there are American, Whitworth and metric fittings all on the same car, now will you?

The French? Ahh, the French. Who can begin to understand the French?