G. David Felt

Yes, but the whole idea was to have a plant in Europe to supply battery packs to their European assembly operation. I feel this will allow the Chinese who get unlimited backing from the gov to get a strong foothold in Europe and will delay Ford from being competitive after this slowdown is over. I get it that many auto companies are delaying building plants now, but Korea is not delaying or GM for battery plants. It is easy to delay starting to build an EV by a few months like GM has done to get supplies inline to ensure plenty of inventory for the dealers, but delaying or right out killing a battery plant as Ford has done will really delay their ability to compete as it takes about 2 years to get a battery plant online and at this point, even with a 1yr slow down in economy and folks buying new EVs, this plant still would not be online till 2026 which the economy will be robust again I feel and Ford will then be a couple years behind the competition. Ford seems to be not looking long term in the game but only short term and at this point with the UAW members declining the new pay package, Ford should move to more automation and reduce the need for humans on the assembly line. Get ahead and not delay which will cause them to fall behind. I feel Ford has many obstacles now to long term growth and as such, this is just another hindrance rather than a plan for the future. Could Ford be gone by 2030, no I do not think so, but they could have to merge with another stronger auto company to survive. Just my thoughts on this imho.

OUCH, this does not bode well for Ford. Scrapping plants and not looking long term is how your competition will beat you. Ford is behind GM and will killing a battery plant for European sales, this will put them behind everyone else as the Chinese have entered the market and are not slowing down nor is the German companies. LG Energy Solution, Ford Scrap Plans for Joint Battery Plant - The Chosun Ilbo (English Edition): Daily News from Korea - Business > Business

While from March 2023, I have to say I agree with the writer on why my next auto will be an EV. 4 Reasons to Buy an Electric Car That Have Nothing to Do With Going Green (businessinsider.com)

@oldshurst442 You making fun of my Personal Jesus? Then there is only one answer to that! Just Kidding Love is love!!! DM History!!!

I am such a Depeche Head, Loved them since my first concert with them in Japan. Depeche Mode Music for the Masses Tour 1987 to 1988, Japan Leg. This is memory lane of an amazing time in my life. Depeche Mode "Music For The Masses Tour" 1987-1988 (depmode.com)

Are those the pictures he sent ya? WOW that is very sharp indeed.

Congratulations, becoming a parent is an amazing journey and I wish you and your wife all the best for what a rewarding and challenging journey of parenthood will be. Names while many will say go common and US based can still be a beautiful thing to also think of places or trips you and your wife did. I remember a friend who played trumpet with me in jazz band and until now have not thought of her as we drifted apart once our careers took off and we got married, but I will never forget her as her parents named her after a garden they always went to and where he proposed to his wife, the garden was a Rose Garden here in the UW botanical garden. As such Rose grew up to be a great trumpet player and eventually went to college and works in the medical field. Names can mean many things, so do not feel you have to stay mainstream if it is an important meaning to you and your wife.

It is interesting to see how names from TV shows are popular in naming babies. I wonder how AI will deal with pronunciation of strange forward looking names as you posted. ? How does one say Ae37-XD or Gzhn??????? Can you imagine the bullying they will get?

Becoming a grandparent in March 2024, it has been interesting listening to my son and daughter in-law talk about names for the coming grandson. Names are interesting and parents need to take into consideration the name but also pronunciation. My wife being Korean, English as a second language has a really hard time with R's, L's due to the lack of use in her native language. So as it has come up, some names are harder for my wife to say than others. Typing this I draw a blank on the half a dozen names they told us they are considering, but they did rule out strange names such as how some famous folks have called their kid Apple. Doing a bing search on top 2023 baby names, the Bing search engine returned the following: According to Parade, some of the most unusual baby names for 2023 include: Aero Alaska Ari Ashlynn Aspen Astrid Azure Bear Beckett Birdie Bode Brynlee Cadence Cami Case Caspian Charlize Cheyenne Cora Crew Cyrus Dagon Dahlia Damon Daphne Darra Daxton Dawson You can find more unusual baby names for boys and girls in Parade’s article 1. Another source, The Mummy Bubble, reports that some of the new arrivals to the top 100 most popular baby names include Blake, Brody, Kai, Rupert, Tobias, and Nathan 2. Mumsnet has also compiled a list of 200 unusual and unique baby names for both boys and girls 3. Finally, Fatherly has predicted that the following 20 unusual baby names could dominate 2023: Luxury Aurelia Maeve Eloise Alice Aurora Isla Luna Ophelia Iris Aria Nova Eden Freya Luna Arlo Atticus Theodore Jasper Levi You can read more about these predictions in Fatherly’s article 4.

Interesting is all the auto companies that have stated they would also go NACS but are not on the list like Genesis, Lexus, Infinity and Acura. I am thinking that since they are divisions, they went with the core company as Chevrolet, GMC, Buick and Cadillac are not listed since they are all under GM. The reason I bring this up is because consumers are not as aware of who owns what brands. Would be nice if Reuters had listed parent company and brands underneath that parent company label.

Latest news on NACS More automakers plug into Tesla's EV charging network | Reuters

Happy Birthday Drew!!!

Actually if you follow the threads in their recall, Toyota has reduced the size of the original 12V battery and now their battery cradel does not hold it in place. If you use 3rd party 12V batteries, most are still traditional size from your auto parts store, but looking at a new RAV4 the battery is much smaller than it used to which is my understanding. Leaves are just now changing here in Seattle and dropping. City does not suck them up, you have to bag them and put them out for pickup.

OUCH, this sucks for Toyota and all these RAV4's Almost 2 million recalled. Toyota Recalls Certain 2013-2018 Toyota RAV4 Models - Toyota USA Newsroom

WOW, I figure that was state set emission tests, etc. even here in Washington state, emission testing is gone, but every county or city does have their own taxes, but that just comes on the registration renewal so I find it very weird that your license plate would state what county you live in. Responding to you made me wonder and I did a search and while there is plenty of responses on various social media platforms, I did find Wikipedia to make the most sense. United States license plate designs and serial formats - Wikipedia To me, it would seem to be out of date and just laziness of politicians to not update and modernize and they are stuck in the past for those states that have stuck with 2 digit codes and county names on the plates. I do see that a few states have stopped it to streamline and reduce cost of plate manufacturing. Interesting.

Wonder why, is there a reason behind telling folks which county you are living in?

Agree there are some states that represent their area of North America very well and others that totally blow at it. I will say that the Northwest Territories is a very cool plate in the shape of a Bear.

Cool, production to still start at the end of this year. Chevy Equinox EV Production To Start This Year In Mexico (gmauthority.com)

Weird, I cannot seem to find any post where I stated it would start under $30k

Interesting https://electrek.co/2023/11/01/ev-sales-still-rising-at-22-3-in-ca-tesla-cedes-lead-back-to-toyota/ Very interesting to see: Stellantis ousts Tesla in Q3 in Europe as Jeep, Ram EVs coming to US (freep.com)

Seems BMW is talking back at Tesla about Batteries. “Tesla Needs To Close The Gap With Us," Says BMW On New Cylindrical Battery Cells (insideevs.com)

Moving on to This is Muse, Awesome music!!!

Today has been a Black sort of day, especially music wise as I have been listening to this multiple times today.

As one that has been in both and driven both when your 6'6" tall, 300lbs. You then have a right to call a CX-9 cramped when it is and your legs are pressed into the dash as a passenger cause the seats do not use the space efficiently, but then in a Bolt, I have inches in front of my knees. So yes, my experience of living with a CX-9 for 2 weeks on a family vacation does give me the right to call it cramped. You all are more average size for North America and forget to put yourself in the shoes of those that do not fit the general population. When a subcompact gives more room for a big person in the front and back over a medium sized SUV, then the subcompact is roomier. This is not me being blindly GM supporting, but actually calling out poor packaging of a mid-size SUV by Mazda compared to a much smaller auto from GM. Sadly, most Japanese autos are built around much smaller people due to the country and average size of the people.

I do not blindly back GM. I am more than willing to call them out for their BS. You and another are hung up on a generalized term of About and the $30,000 compared to the competition that stated starts at. Big differences in those two terms. Any company is in their right to use general terms and put in statements as GM did at the Equinox announcement in January 2022 CES show that it would start around $30,000 MSRP is subject to change. GM clearly knew they were playing the marketing card to get attention and till just now did not state actual starting prices. They also did not realize how popular the Chevrolet BOLT would become and demand for it. As such, adjusting for room in the growing EV family is understandable. At least GM did not pull a Tesla in price, offer and then give weak ass excuses for killing it after a couple months or like Rivian, try to increase prices after taking deposits with set pricing that changed to reflect inflation. Those upset about this, appear to be fixated on $30,000 price point and not the actual product. Yes, ICE Equionox are priced cheaper, but even the LT1 Equionox EV has more content than the base ICE version. Inflation has made all things more expensive and consumers have demanded more content which makes things also more expensive. As such, things will be more costly and we will not be living in the 90's when gas averaged $1.34 per gallon and the average price of a new auto was $16,950. Average Cost of Car & Gas Prices (idrivesafely.com)