Bottle up the Japanese?
In their struggle against foreign imports, which captured a record 29.2% of U.S. auto sales last month, American carmakers have an unlikely ally. He is Walter Avrea, 56, a Tempe, Ariz., inventor who is waging his own war with Japan's manufacturers.
The crusty Avrea, who frets that inventors are treated as "second-class citizens," holds a 1970 patent for a "coolant recovery system" that includes a small plastic bottle attached to the radiator by tubing. Before Avrea's invention, hot radiators sometimes spilled frothy fluid onto the road through a pressure-relief valve, lowering efficiency and forcing drivers to check the coolant...
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