The global shortage of semiconductor chips is having a devastating impact on the motor manufacturing industry, with big car brands having to get inventive to fulfill orders.
Now one of the biggest car groups, Stellantis, which has Peugeot, Chrysler, Citroen, Jeep and Fiat under their portfolio has announced a short-term measure to continue the factory lines.
Many factories have had to take desperate measures to deal with the crisis, with Nissan announcing this week that they have had to furlough hundreds of staff at their Sunderland plant.
But while temporary halts to production have hit production levels around the world, Peugeot have got around the crisis by reverting to old fashioned methods, they will replace the digital speedometers in their vehicles with more traditional analogue ones.
“It’s a nifty and agile way of getting around a real hurdle for car production, until the ‘chips’ crisis ends,” a spokesman for Stellantis told Reuters.
Peugeot will only revert to the old style speedometers on the 308, saving their chips for digital dashboards in their more popular models.
The global shortage in semiconductor chips is a by-product of the high demand for electronics such as computers during the pandemic lockdown as more and more people worked from home. This led to a shortage in the semiconductor chips which help digital displays and computers within cars.
It is expected that the old school Peugeots will start appearing on the market by the end of May, for a very short run as the 308 is due to be phased out later in the year. It is expected that there will be some discount on the adapted vehicles, though Stellantis have refused to comment.