BMWs are my weakness. My first car was a 1974 2002 burgundy over tan five-speed with a sunroof. At the time, it was twelve years shy of being a new model and cost all of $1000 bucks. Yet ask any high school girl what kind of car I drove and they all knew three letters. They were clueless to the many stranded push starts I experienced. Since the carburetors needed rebuilding, I’d kill the battery before it would run. Girls were also impervious to the rust and completely unable to fathom 140,000 miles on the clock. All this taught me one thing, park on a hill and find a good mechanic.
The E85 industry has a problem. Well, a bunch of problems: corn prices, water supplies, environmental impact, flagging political support for subsidies, limited access to the marketplace and profitability. Yes, there is that. Or, more precisely, there isn’t that. If only the feds could find a way to force the country to use the corn juice . . . I’ll see your mandatory E10 and raise however hell as much as I can get away with. The thing of it is: when there’s a choice, people aren’t buying E85. What’s left of the ethanol industry post-gas price drop has convinced itself that it suffers from a near-lethal perception gap. (Remember: no one ever died defending a corn field.) As we recently reported, the Department of Energy is spending $2 million of federal funds to help you discover that E85 isn’t really cheaper when you factor-in the mpg drop. Anyway, Evolution Fuels has announced that it wants some of that taxpayer loot.
As part of today’s wander through hyperspace, GM attempts to answer a riddle that would have vexed a Theban: “What makes a Chevy a Chevy?” To which the only possible answer is “everything to everyone.” GMC receives the same treatment, in which we learn that the Professional Grade Brand “has a great opportunity to get away from where Chevy is.” (Whatever is is.) But when a Fastlane commenter asked GM Senior Creative Designer Dave Smidebush “why should we order a Terrain over the Equinox?” his answer was an enigma wrapped in a puzzle lost in a Vortec.
Dave Smidebush: Thank you. THey’re [sic] both great vehicles. Buy the one that appeals best to you but I’m a little partial to the Terrain!
If that doesn’t scream “differentiation,” what does?
Eagle-eyed, infinitely patient TTAC editor Jeff Puthuff spotted this story in the LA Times: “Less than two years ago, [porn star Savannah] Stern earned close to $150,000 annually, sometimes turned down work and drove a Mercedes-Benz CLK 350. Now she’s aggressively reaching out for jobs and making closer to $50,000 a year. As for that Mercedes? She’s replacing it with a used Chevy Trailblazer — from her parents. ‘The opportunities in this industry really are disappearing,’ Stern said. ‘It’s extremely stressful.'” Hey! I know a really good way to relieve stress! Anyway, it seems the Internet is doing to Silicone—I mean San Fernando Valley’s porn industry what Silicon Valley did to Armonk, New York’s computer industry. And you’ve got to give Ms. Stern credit for tightening her belt. So to speak. If only the feds could appreciate the benefits of austerity. * cough Gulstream jets cough *
GM announced today that it expects the Volt to receive the first-ever triple-digit EPA rating (including 230 city MPG). GM’s John Lauckner goes into a little more detail at a Fastlane livechat:
Guest: Can you please explain the 230 mpg rating. I must say I balked at your gamble on EREV instead of full hybrid like toyota, but this validates your gamble.
Jon Lauckner: Yes, having a vehicle that achieves triple digit fuel economy is a game changer. The 230 mpg refers to the city fuel economy, but we also expect to have a triple digit combined fuel economy value. These preliminary numbers are based on Volt development testing with our pre-production vehicles and the draft federal fuel economy methodology developed by EPA for EREV vehicles like the Volt.
But, as usual, everything is not what it seems . . .
My dad waxed this thing almost every month. However, those layers and layers of wax have now turn greyish. I have tried to remove it with rubbing compound and this filthy grey coloured crap eventually comes off. However, it does come off to an adequate extent and it is VERY time consuming. I’d love to hear some tips on sloughing this crap off more quickly.
Some the plastic in the cabin is a bit faded. Can it be redyed or should I look for NOS parts (yes, I know, good luck with that)?
A California judge last week began throwing out red light camera citations issued in Santa Ana. Orange County Superior Court Commissioner Kenneth Schwartz declared the city’s program void because it had ignored several provisions of state law. Local attorneys Mark D. Sutherland and R. Allen Baylis had challenged the city for its failure to provide the required thirty-day warning period before beginning the program and its use of a prohibited per-ticket “cost neutral” compensation scheme.
One of our Best and Brightest (Dave) got a sneak peek at Caddy’s new ad campaign at one of those focus group thingies that marketing mavens love so much (when they’re not in Aruba):
The spot starts off in a control room with engineers hooked up to headsets and the soundtrack is like mission control getting ready to launch a . . . Saturn V? A garage door opens with dust and smoke explosions and the CTS comes out from the cloud blasting across a desert scene. The voice over says something like launch stage 1 ignition. Cue the next explosion over the car and the sport wagon emerges from the dust cloud to the voice over “stage 2 ignition” and so on for the crossover and coupe and stages 3 and 4. The spot ends with a shot of a Caddy grill and badge with the voiceover re-invented, re-launched, re-born (or something similar) all three words start with re-. The survey then asks a bunch of questions about whether this spot influenced your opinion of caddy, would you recommend, etc. Couple of thoughts – These are the same old cars, how is this a re launch? The “new GM” is still hawking the same old cars, how is that different? I gave the spot very low marks. To me it’s just more about brand image and not the cars.
Want more proof that Car And Driver Editor-in-Chief Eddie Alterman will believe anything?
Currently floating through the executive offices in Torino is a plan to fit the Dodge [Viper] with a V-10 version of the next-generation corporate V-8. This 90-degree engine would be modular top to bottom as well as by cylinder, with a flat-plane crank for the Ferrari V-8, a conventional cross-plane crank for the Maserati V-8, and pushrod-actuated valves for the balance-shafted Viper V-10.
Select media, Twitterati and fanboys are taking in the very best of GM hype today at a “tweet-but-don’t-photograph” event. But 140-character messages of hope, renewal and awesome are a bit thin to draw real conclusions from. Not that such semantics stop the faithful from trying. Apparently GM has an ATS concept, based on the mythical Alpha RWD platform. Because GM needs a “real” 3 series fighter in addition to an Epsilon II Buick fighter. Speaking of which, the Epsi II-based Riviera Concept is being teased, as is a Malibu refresh. Between the new concepts and Bob Lutz’s admission that GM’s interiors once resembled “solidified lava,” the twits become downright effusive. “I am bathing in future,” tweets one. But it’s the future of car shows, not showrooms (with the exception of some drooling over the Malibu refresh and it’s allegedly touch-friendly interior). And we already knew that GM can make pretty concepts.
Ford made $2.1 billion or whatever last quarter and they’re still wanting more concessions, more concessions.
UAW Local 249 President Jeff Wright to Fox 4 News Kansas City. By “whatever,” he actually meant “a $424 million pre-tax operating loss and $1 billion of cash burn, with $2.3 billion net income thanks only to one-time ‘special items.’” Or whatever. But Bloomberg reports that the UAW has “concession fatigue” and wants Ford to accept less favorable terms than GM and Chrysler. Hey, UAW, remember “bailout fatigue?” Taxpayers were told to shut up and keep the largesse flowing. Try following the example.
Toyota President has renounced his firm’s 2002 goal of attaining 15 percent global market share by around 2010. “Our president doesn’t feel comfortable upholding figures as our vision,” an anonymous Toyota source tells Automotive News [sub]. “It is not the Toyota way to aim for 15 percent or 10 percent.” Which makes sense, considering Toyota is predicting a nearly 13 percent drop in global sales in the fiscal year ending March 31. Indeed, AN’s source blames the market share goal for Toyota’s current overcapacity struggles. Which indicates that the big T may have recognized the role of number-chasing in GM’s demise. If nothing else, its executives certainly understand the importance of emerging markets in driving sales. Perhaps because Volkswagen is creeping up on Toyota’s market share on the back of its Chinese and Brazilian business. You gotta dance when the floor keeps getting hotter.
Until now, owning an Oldsmobile dealership was kind of like Ford’s logo-and-all, pre-meltdown mortgage: at the time it seemed bad, but history proved that the alternative was worse. After all, the Olds wind-down paid dealers up to $4 million to go away. Only now, several Oldsmobile dealers are getting a little taste of what GM’s less fortunate, bankruptcy-culled dealers have been put through. The Detroit News reports that “a handful” of Olds dealers are still owed annuity payments from the brandicide, and GM is filing those claims as “unsecured” debts of old, bad GM. Nobody likes being shorted in the neighborhood of $20K, but at least Olds dealers got something, right? Shouldn’t they count themselves lucky to be free of GM with any compensation at all? Not according to their lawyer . . .
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