Lamps don't last forever; in a car, they are subject to constant shock in driving as well as normal wear and tear from being used. it is best to change all lamps at the same time rather than as they go; the latter gives the idea they are always blowing, but in fact lamps have a limited life. Some last longer than others for any number of reasons.

If, on the other hand the lamps are excessively short living, have your alternator voltage checked. Over-voltage will reduce their life, and your battery life and you may also see the results of that around the terminals.

Too many globes also fail from poor soldering.

The quality of all globes is not the same and dearer isn't necessarily better. OEM will give supposedly the best results as these should be tested to quality assurance (if the dealer is actually selling you original equipment globes.) But in my experience some of the better globes, better than OEM, came from the then Soviet block; Czechoslovakia, for example.

I wonder why there is so much emphasis today on car "sound systems." One wonders who is concentrating on their driving and who is not. Sometimes it is obvious as they pretend to be drummers, guitarists, or just beserk music friends pretending they are in a loungeroom space capsule, often expecting us to also appreciate their "musical" maelstrom.

There would not be a quality Eurpopean car made which does not have a well-engineered sound system.

The one great thing about car radios (when valves and transistors were around) was there was a tunable RF stage; an extra stage of amplification at the incoming signal end. They performed far better than almost all domestic radios under poor conditions.

Having said that, some radios are built for 'overseas' use. For an example, some Dutch radios built for use in Indonesia. I also had a tuned RF amplifier stage to assist in poor reception areas, or to get European stations on the broadcast band with a good antenna system.

Once upon a time, houses used a long wire antenna, quite becomingly and proudly, to get broadcast reception. It's quite refreshing and evocative to see an old English home with its old antenna still strung across the roof (many were inside it) or across to a tree, very neatly.

Today, with vastly more stations around and FM repeaters, I doubt the quality of engineering is as high. Radios are essentially common modules of commercial 'integrated circuits' in different cans with different buttons, with more attention paid to the audio amplification end because of the incidence of CD and cassette use (as opposed to quality sound via radio).

I know that piece of 'useless' information will be soundly appreciated.

Cheers.

That doesn't sound like too bad of problems comparing what I have ran into with Volkswagen, Nissan, and Honda.