This is a moment too powerful to be taken lightly, too special to be considered ironically, too vital to examine with any pretense of journalistic impartiality. I am seated behind the wheel of an absolutely perfect, fully-loaded, brand-new Porsche GT2, unwinding the wheel at the exit of Nelson Ledges Road Course’s Carousel turn. Next to me, the car’s owner, entrepreneur and bon vivant David Kim, has planted himself squarely into the GT2’s fixed-back passenger-side bucket, rigid with anticipation. There is traffic ahead, several cars varying from Improved Touring racers to tuned-up street Hondas. It’s time to accelerate, so I press the right pedal into the carpet.
Last night, I watched a Flood Automotive Group TV ad touting “Cash for Clunkers.” The message was simple: Uncle Sam’s got $1 billion for clunkers. Come get $4500 for your clunker. Not a single word about which vehicles qualify for the money. It didn’t even refer viewers to a website for details—like this ad for C4C “designated” dealer Phil Fitts Ford. A quick ring ’round twenty dealers nationwide shows a definite “reluctance” to discuss the particulars of the CARS program over the phone. “I’m sure your vehicle will qualify,” a Chrysler dealer told me re: my theoretical 2005 Chrysler 300. “Bring it down and we’ll have a look.”
How many of you would pay $400 a month for a Ford Ranger? How about $600 and change? Not you? I didn’t think so. But you would be surprised how many actually do. As a remarketing rep for Capital One, it was my job to deal with the failures—over 10,000 per year. Good people. Bad people. Mediocre people. It didn’t really matter in the end because none of them could make the sub-prime car payments. It’s a vicious cycle at the auctions. Retail cars are sold to wholesale buyers. These cars are then sold with cheap credit and inflated prices to an ever clueless public. Here’s today’s question: “What’s the alternative?”
Up until 2007, rural freeways in the Northern Territory, Australia had no speed limit. Claiming that speed limits were essential to saving lives, the state government imposed a 130km/h (80 MPH) limit on the Stuart, Arnhem, Victoria and Barkly highways and a 110km/h (68 MPH) speed limit on all other roads, unless otherwise marked lower. Despite the best of intentions, however, the number of road deaths actually increased 70 percent after the change — despite worldwide drop in traffic levels (view chart).
While I understand that recommended tire pressure is located on the door jamb in a car, what happens when the factory tires are replaced, upgraded, down graded, replaced with used or even recaps where available (are re-treads even available?), different tread and wear and heat ratings?
What I am trying to ask is: are the manufacturer’s recommendations applicable only to the factory tires, or to non- original brand replacements as well?
Today GM marketing announced another $1,000 rebate on old invoice units. To check eligibility the dealer enters the VIN into a website. A dealer who has properly managed his inventory will not have any units in stock that qualify, and is thereby less competitive and penalized. Dealer trades become difficult at best and the customer is confused when told that the car they want is more than the identical car sitting next to it that they don’t want.
GM claims to be calibrated to break even at a Seasonally Adjusted Annual sales Rate (SAAR) of 10m sales. Which assumes that GM’s portion of those sales will remain steady. As we’ve learned today, that’s not likely. GM’s market share is being pummelled by bad news, bailout backlash, and (according to the Merrill Lynch report) poor product replacement rates. While GM talks up the Volt, discusses a Prius fighter and touts an American-made compact, its major product push has been centered around a single dying brand (Buick) and its single new product, the LaCrosse. Yes there’s a new Equinox, but has anyone noticed? Camaro may be the choice of bold, audacious lemmings everywhere, but for how long? It’s gut check time . . .
Bank Of America-Merrill Lynch have released their annual “Car Wars” report, and it predicts slumping sales for GM and Chrysler. GM’s market share of 22 percent last year is seen shrinking to a mere 15 percent, which is significantly lower than the 18 percent number that GM admits to. The real butt-clencher? Merrill Lynch based its calculations on a 14m unit SAAR, which is much higher than the 10m SAAR that we’ve been seeing through the first half of the year. Which means GM’s losses could be even worse if we don’t see a return to those sales numbers soon. Even at a 14m SAAR though, the three percent discrepancy between GM’s numbers and Merrill’s would amount to GM selling half a million fewer autos than expected. The report places blame on weakness in GM’s new-product pipeline for the projected drops. GM’s Tom Wilkinson fires back at the Freep, arguing “we understand that analysts get paid to try to predict the future… but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are going to be right.” Gosh, can’t anyone just trust GM?
America’s traditional method for clunker-culling was to load old cars onto a truck and ship them to market in Mexico. That changed last year when Mexico banned the importation of vehicles built before 1998. Now, Mexico’s president Felipe Calderon has announced a scrappage scheme for his country, in hopes of jumping on the car sales bump bandwagon. According to El Universal [in Spanish, Hat Tip: Gato Negro], the program
“will grant 15,000 mexican pesos [about $1,000] towards the purchase of a new car. The clunker must be 10 years old at minumum. Initial budget will be 500 million pesos, expandable to 1,000 million. The cost of the new car should not exceed 160,000 pesos. Also: The car must be assembled in Mexico [or another NAFTA country] or imported by one of the seven brands that have a car factory in Mexican territory.”
Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal quotes analysis which shows that Europe’s 6.8m oversupply for 2009 will grow to 7.2m in 2010, because “scrappage schemes are significantly distorting the dynamics of the European market.”
A UK court threw out a pair speed camera citations yesterday after a retired veteran police officer admitted on the stand that he falsified official documents used as proof that the tickets were mailed within statutory deadlines. The Southampton Crown Court concluded that it was an abuse of process for a Hampshire and Isle of Wight speed camera partnership employee to backdate documents. The employee said he was acting on direct orders from his superiors.
America and Canada have spent tens of billions in taxpayer money “saving” Chrysler and GM. During this Year of Living Parasitically, Toyota hasn’t said boo to a proverbial goose. This despite the fact that a non-governmental ChryCo Old GM Chapter 11/7 would have eliminated most of the North American market’s production over-capacity, setting the stage for a more rapid recovery. Politics, doncha know. Anyway, yesterday, sitting in a Volt prototype at a Toronto GM Chevrolet dealership, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty made an announcement. After July 10, 2010, customers plunking for plug-in hybrid and battery electric vehicles would be eligible for a $10,000 rebate. The car most likely to be so blessed: the Chevy Volt. But that’s not what really got Toyota’s goat. As the Leader-Post reports, “Mr. McGuinty said he wants one out of every 20 vehicles in Ontario to be electrically powered by 2020.”
TTAC Commentator and sometime author Niky Tamayo gives us insight into New GM’s new Carmaro’s tranny probs, thanks to this technical bulletin (first published on Camaro5.com).
And here I was giving people crap for complaining about weak Camaro gearboxes suggesting, in all likelihood, hoonery was the cause of failure. But when GM itself cites the torque handling capabilities of the Camaro transmission as being a gnat’s hair higher than the engine’s peak torque. Then you can’t help but wonder how many more will blow before the uprate the transmission. While GM is in no way obligated to build indestructible transmissions for street cars that it has to warranty, you’d think they’d either allow themselves a little more leeway in transmission strength, given the fact that anyone buying a V8 Camaro isn’t likely to NOT hoon the hell out of it, or program the traction control or launch control to limit torque on hard launches . . . y’know . . . just in case.
I’ve got a 2004 Honda Odyssey with approximately 96k miles on it. It has developed a condition where the steering wheel mounted radio controls do not act as expected (i.e. Volume up changes the track, Volume down makes the volume go up, etc., sometimes). The dealer tells me that it’s not grounded well deep in the steering column, and thanks to the Odyssey Club, I have found the TSB that covers this problem.
The dealer would like about $280 of my hard earned money to go in and fix it. American Honda won’t cover it through goodwill due to the mileage.
Car manufacturers are toast! At least, that’s what members of the Electric Vehicle (EV) religion believe. A car maker’s core business is engines—but engines are over, they say. It’s 1910 all over again, and internal-combustion cars are going the way of the horse-drawn carriage. But I say: Wrong! The electric Twingo I drove proves that there is more to making a good drive than just getting the propulsion stuff right.
As previously reported, the Th!ink EV was a disappointment: feckless, lightweight-feeling, stiff-legged, wobbly. A real let-down when you consider that it was specifically designed for the requirements of electric power. So it was with some skepticism that I took the helm of a Renault Twingo that MES-DEA (a Swiss company) had turned into an EV.
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