Why Are Cars Disposable while Bicycles Can Last a Lifetime?

 I bought a 1997 F-250 to haul stuff for our farm. It was only $1500. I spent another $2800 on repairs so it runs reliably. I planned all along to fix it up to cut my teeth on auto repair and improvement, and I'm finally delving into that.

This iteration of Ford trucks rusts out in the cab corner because they used some spray foam noise deadening stuff in there that holds moisture. It's like leaving a sponge on a piece of steel out in the elements. Eventually the sponge will burn right through the steel. Water, salt, and Oxygen eventually destroy metal objects.

By the time my truck was built, Ford had produced millions of trucks, and had invested many human-lifetimes in engineering and research, but their trucks are basically disposable items. Strangely, a truck or a car is probably more disposable than a bicycle.

Some people only keep a car or truck for 5 years or so, even though it's one of the most expensive items they own. There's some logic to that, because most of the expensive problems start showing up in cars or trucks after that time and the consumer economy has trained people to finance everything so they focus on monthly payments of something they finance as a cost of ownership, rather than large one time repair bills on an asset they own.

People who own and ride bicycles a lot can keep them basically indefinitely, even with lots of use and abuse, mainly because the materials used to make the bicycle, like aluminum, carbon fiber, and titanium aren't affected by rust.

If you're a cyclist and maintain your own equipment, what actually happens is the "bicycle" that you ride turns into a collection of components that evolves over time as they're damaged or upgraded. I suppose the same thing could happen with a car or truck, but the tools and infrastructure required for that is more expensive and takes up more space.

Anyway, do these industries evolve in response to their customer's needs, or do they shape the customers behavior? Truck makers focus on styling and features to sell trucks, rather than durability and simplicity, probably not so much because of the "market", but because of how the companies are financed, and how the employees make a living.