G. David Felt

Seems not all companies in China shut down during the Covid-19 pandemic there. Byton auto company resumed after sterilizing the plant and putting in place social distancing to allow work to continue as they started pre-production models of the M-Byte EV CUV. The company confirmed they are on track to begin sales in China this fall and US sales early next year. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1127812_byton-m-byte-ramping-up-at-china-plant-still-on-track-for-2021-us-arrival

Disagree, while I DO NOT and NEVER HAVE Ride shared with strangers, Uber and Lyft give a variety of auto choices compared to the nasty smelly yellow cabs that can die for all I care. The only time I ever need one is when I go to attend Dell Technology World or what we call DTW. Sadly Covid-19 has delayed this to a virtual trade show in October. Hopefully a benefit of Covid-19 will be to shutdown businesses that were barely staying afloat check by check and we end up with a cleaner transit system. Nice as to how clean the grocery stores have become with sterilized carts.

@oldshurst442 @balthazar Seems Birmingham has started Covid-19 ride sharing. ? Seems some companies are already looking at ways to isolate in pods in ride share auto's. Wonder if some people will get sick from the spin motion. ?

Butterfly ?

Cat ? To eat your ?

News today, GM has officially filed the Hummer by GMC new logo with the Trademark office. https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=88784232&caseSearchType=US_APPLICATION&caseType=DEFAULT&searchType=documentSearch The old logo was a bulky very much expected logo, the new logo would not be wrong on an auto found in the game Halo on a futuristic world. https://gmauthority.com/blog/2020/04/general-motors-trademarks-new-logo-for-gmc-hummer-ev-as-expected/ Nice update to the old fat logo: Course if your wanting to remember why GM killed Hummer the first time, here is a recap story on that. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/13/gm-killed-the-hummer-then-suv-sales-surged.html Never knew there was a Hummer bike that sold so well that it was counterfeited. The bike is still a high demand heavy duty off road bike and the counterfeits are still made. https://www.montaguebikes.com/folding-bikes-blog/2014/09/montague-bikes-how-to-spot-a-counterfeit Interesting read on how the GM Ultima battery beats Tesla Battery. This should be a good battle of auto companies. https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/04/business/gm-electric-car-battery-400-miles-of-range/index.html Detroit free press did an update on the upcoming 11 EVs from GM. https://www.freep.com/story/money/cars/general-motors/2020/03/04/gm-unveils-10-future-evs-new-batteries-and-its-plan-beat-tesla/4905906002/

CRATE MOTORS EV in a Box Yup a full sentence, but very cool when you consider the future of Crate Motors. https://www.carmagazine.co.uk/car-news/tech/gm-electric-crate-engine/

Friend finally flew back from Chicago to San Francisco as he had just before the lock down, went to visit his family in Chicago for 2 weeks that ended up being 2 months as this was early to mid February. Jose told me that you had a full flight crew and no one in first class, but a total of 3 people in coach on the flight. 3 stewardesses for 3 people. each was spread out across the flight and the stewardesses also had to sit in the coach section for take off and landing to balance the plane for the 6 of them. He said it was the weirdest flight ever, but service was amazing. Flight cost was still normal prices, so they might be moving freight as the plane took a while to fill up the belly with the freight but clearly no real discounts yet. I doubt there will be as once travel starts up, I doubt there will be much. Heard from many companies that are doing decent in sales with no travel and even my company has informed the global sales staff that future travel will be very restricted since we clearly are not needing the face to face like we used too. Only face to face is the engineers who are going on site to data centers to fix hardware. This is the start of a major transition in how we do business and interact with others.

This was accepted Herd Mentality of the 40's.

Beach wins versus 2 fords and a Tractor: https://www.thedrive.com/news/32989/not-one-not-two-but-three-vehicles-beached-trying-to-recover-sunken-police-cruiser This is just stupid that during a pandemic, teens feel the need to go to the beach and then a police officer makes the mistake of going on the wet sand and gets stuck and then more to follow of the 3 stooges show. ? Very cool 300 car barn find filled with everyone's dream car just about even a Ford Pinto. LOL https://www.thedrive.com/news/32985/this-enormous-300-car-barn-find-has-everything-from-classic-muscle-to-rare-supercars

DeepGreen mining seems to have found that polymetallic nodules on the ocean floor have enough nickel, cobalt and manganese in just the area between Mexico and Hawaii to build enough batteries to convert the global autos to EV with no child labor, no tallings and the need for settlement ponds. There are two videos that are very cool to watch and see how this could remove the need for the child labor markets in Africa for the rare earth metals when we have trillions of tons laying on the sea bed. https://chargedevs.com/newswire/critical-battery-metals-could-be-mined-from-polymetallic-nodules-found-on-the-ocean-floor/ More info can be found here at Deep.Green web site: https://deep.green/

Out standing read about the Myths that Formula E racing shatters: First Myth is that EVs have higher lifecycle carbon emissions than gas or diesel. False, EVs are 95% cleaner than ICE over their life. Second Myth, EVs are slow. Considering the amount of EVs that go from 0 to 60 in under 3 seconds and Formula E nocking on the 2 second mark, ICE is much harder to match this. Third Myth is cost. While EVs currently carry a premium cost upfront even with Government incentives, the cost of Maintenance over the auto lifetime is much lower than ICE. VW has posted a comparison of the Golf Hatch to the ID.3 EV and the cost of ownership as with lifetime maintenance is expected to be significantly lower. Fourth Myth is lack of range and charging infastructure. Most auto's have on average 200 mile range in EVs today, as such, this is more than adequite for daily use especially since the bulk of owners charge at home so they start every day with a full battery pack. Fifth and final Myth, batteries won't last long enough. Tesla and VW have now stated they expect the battery pack to last the life of the auto and back this up with 10yrs and 150,000 miles now. That is far longer than most people hold onto an auto. As such, the battery packs once they do diminish holding capacity are then move to being used in stationary power storage such as Tesla The Wall or other kinds of home solar storage system. Over all a good read here:https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1127784_formula-e-electric-car-racing-busts-5-persisting-ev-myths Plus the following video is a good watch: Another very cool tech story is a an auto cover that can be brought out while the auto sits and retracks back into it's storage system using flexible solar cells to recharge the EV. Very cool way to gain miles on your EV each day as it sit's at work or home outside in the daylight. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1127787_retractable-car-cover-claimed-to-gain-miles-of-ev-range-each-day

Funny point is as you and everyone know, I being 6'6" tall can with no problem Handle the ceiling. I did not realize, my 5'8" son is about 6 inches shy from getting up to the ceiling so I had to come along behind him and mud the top 6 inches or so down since he could not. At least I did not have to bend over as he did all the low stuff. FYI, the wall that you see him with the Hot water tank, from the water tank down to the end is going to be one massive floor to ceiling shoe rack. My son loves his shoes and matching them with his outfits. Never seen a guy with so many shoes. Will post updated pics once we are finished mudding and painted, then once the shoe wall is built. 2nd phase is a overhead storage system at the end of the garage along with his work bench and tool storage system.

as he is learning, taping went fast, but mudding takes time. About 75% done over the weekend.

Spent Saturday working on getting the garden area ready for planting, planted two fig trees in the yard for the wife, Sunday, hosed off the pollen and drove over to my son's house to help him tap and mud his garage. He has a detailed plan on how he wants to set his new garage up. Then came home to a family dinner of Candied spiral cut ham, Green Bean casserole with crunchy onions on top, Buttery mashed potatoes and fresh dropped biscuits with strawberry compote, fresh cut strawberries and whip cream on top. Kids went home, wife and I crashed to watch "The Blacklist" awesome series on Netflix. We are in season 4.

Hosed off the yellow pollen and then went to my son's to help him tape and mud his garage as he gets it clean and finished, then shelves will go up, work bench, etc.

RamJet As in the ultimate crate motor, RamJet 502

Crazy, still sorry to hear ya had to deal with this. Was the person drunk as playing pinball auto usually means medical or drunk / high unless they truly were too much into their phone and not driving. Hopefully ticketed for this too.

Gardening

WOW, So sorry to have this happen, It sucks when people do not pay attention to their only job, driving. WOW, So the front Ram tire broke off after it hit your van? ? @2QuickZ's

Tesla Y tear down much like was done on the Tesla 3 shows Tesla is learning and chaning to enhance long distance driving. The change from an electric AC unit to a Heat pump is one such example of making the auto better and finding a way to increase the long range driving of the auto. Good informative video about the heat pump and benefits. Interesting to learn in this story that the Tesla 3 wheel well is 9 individual pieces compared to the Chevrolet Bolt wheel well which is a single piece. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1127747_here-s-the-heat-pump-that-will-likely-boost-tesla-model-y-range-on-long-drives Good Details on the new modular EV platform from Mercedes-Benz that will allow the EQS, EQE and Electric G-Wagon to share and use the same parts as well as have performance greater than ICE versions. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1127722_mercedes-amg-eqs-electric-fastback-could-challenge-tesla-model-s-plaid-porsche-taycan

As YOU HAVE STATED, China is going to led the world towards EVs. V8's are Dead and you have even stated that as your favorite brand will focus on Turbo 4 and 6 engines. As such, there is NO NEED to waste R&D dollars on a V8 anymore. They can clearly build Turbo 4 and 6 engines and bring in hybrid and evs now and grow from there. In time they will rival everyone else. They have done so much in the last 20 to 30 years compared to 100 plus for everyone else just about. Livery was XTS never CT6 and the age differences between XTS and CT6 buyers is big for such a small pool of car people since the bulk of everyone has gone to CUVs where Cadillac has led the industry in sales at high ATPs. Now Genesis, this is a valid need for them. Before they do an update to the 70 or 90 car, they need to make sure they have the 70,80 and 90 CUV out first and then as I have stated earlier, use the Palisade and make a uber luxury full size SUV out of it, or at least a 90's luxury version from it. No different than any other auto company out there in using the same platform with underneath identical parts, but the interior and exterior look light years different.

Well Said @balthazar @trinacriabob I will back up the statement about Starbucks. Here many Burger Kings went out over the last 20 to 30 years where as McDonalds, Wendy's and now Five Guys and The Habit Burger Grill are still growing and strong. The Burger King locations seem to have been snapped up by Starbucks and the drive through are crazy busy.

Your example is like a Teen boy in the locker room comparing dick size. The bulk of society DOES NOT care about who has the biggest engine. They look at much more and that is proven in many various ways of which sales, product mix and many other things make up parts of the brand. Everyone has to start some place. Originally Genesis was a sub-brand under Hyundai and sold very well which them made the company decide to make it a separate division as their luxury line. They did what any common sense business man would have done. Made it a separate division, moved the existing models into that division and started work on superior upgrades that can and do compete. Taking this into account, lets look at your beloved MB sales history. Full info can be looked at here: https://carsalesbase.com/us-mercedes-benz/ Based on this, the first sale in 1948 was a lone car, 2 were sold the next year and it took till 1967, the year I was born to finally break 20,000 cars sold. Took 19 years to get to 20,000 plus sales. Now lets look at Genesis: https://carsalesbase.com/us-genesis/ As we can see, 2015 was a year of bringing out genesis models under Hyundai and into 2016 where they then flipped to a stand alone Genesis division. As we all know it takes 3 to 5 years to get new auto's to market. In that time, Genesis did well as they sold gussied up Hyundai's under a Genesis label. 2018 they killed off models having a lack of available product as they clearly wanted to have separation between the past and what is now the new Luxury models coming out. I would say for a 3 1/2 year old division it is doing very well. Genesis reaches 20,000 plus sales of auto's in 3 1/2 years versus 19 years of a competitor to reach that same milestone. Genesis for the win! @smk4565 Drop the MB crap here, focus on Genesis, If you cannot tell many are tired of your Daimler Koolaid focus and we are here to talk about Genesis. Genesis has a solid competitor. Engines are on par with competition. Exterior is subjective to each person as is the interior. Yet I will say the interior I think beats many of the luxury products out there.

Stilts