G. David Felt

OUCH This is hard to see and stupid, not sure why the guy would not let his wheels roll.

@ocnblu Thought you would like this. The rules passed by Obama actual help trucks and SUV's not hurt them. So since it looks to be more and more that the changes at EPA with Courts challenges will not happen, you can be happy in knowing you get your trucks / SUV/CUVs. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1116104_why-trucks-arent-a-cafe-problem-for-carmakers-despite-their-lobbying-claims Good read at the above link the but quote the story: "The original CAFE standards, passed in 1975, separated cars from trucks. Automakers had to hit the same average fuel economy target, divided by every vehicle they sold. The standards starting in 2012, however, divide cars and trucks into different sizes, known as "footprints" (the area bounded by the four wheels)—and it set lower targets for larger vehicles. As automakers sell more trucks (or more larger cars), the fuel economy they must deliver drops. Cars and trucks are still separated, but trucks have to meet lower standards than cars, and don't have to do it as soon. When the regulations were developed in 2012, automakers received extra time to develop fuel-saving technologies for trucks. The New York Times suggested automakers now worry Pruitt will go overboard and freeze, roll back, or even dispense altogether with the "unnecessary" emission rules—giving them a black eye when the public largely supports stronger environmental standards."

Original Tesla Founder creates new Startup with Chinese Company SF5 In the beginning you had Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning, both had founded and sold an eBook reader company. Their passion was in auto's and they started Tesla. Both left the company in 2008 but they kept their hands in the EV auto business by starting up new company's. Eberhard went to focus on density of batteries with his new company. Chinese auto company Sokon Motors bought InEVit, Eberhard's battery company and with it also bought up the old Hummer Factory in South Bend, Indiana with SF Motors headquarters in Silicon Valley. Based on a Skateboard chassis platform, you have what was introduced in March as the SF5 and SF7. SF7 SF Motors has two plants, one here in the US and one in Chongqing China. Pre-Production will begin in the start of calendar Q3 2018 with Sales across the US and China in Spring of 2019 and deliveries to begin immediately then in Q2 2019. SF Motors CEO John Zang has stated even in a growing crowded field of auto companies, his will stand out as they are almost complete bringing their two auto assembly plants online and will go through a proper pre-production run of SF5 and SF7 auto's before full production for 2019 which is based at only 200,000 cars for the first full calendar year. That is 150,000 for the China Market and 50,000 for the US market. Zhang has stated that unlike so many other EV companies that do not have productions sites ready yet, his will do what even Tesla has struggled at which is to have a fully functional assembly system in place to build their two EV auto's before selling to the public. SF Motors Web Site SF Motors Video According to their latest press announcement held at their headquarters, they confirmed that they would have 2wd and 2wd versions of both the SF5 and SF7 and that the top of the line model would be a 4 motor version producing 1,000 HP with a 0 to 60 time of less than 3 seconds and a minimum driving range of 300 US miles as based on the InEVit powertrain & Battery pack from that Acquisition. No further information was provided nor was any internal views of the auto's shown. Assumptions made by the press is that the SF5 which is smaller than the SF7 also denotes the number of people in the auto, 5 passenger SF5 and 7 passenger SF7 CUVs. Green Car Report story Auto News Story

https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1116176_epa-does-not-set-fuel-economy-limits-get-this-right-journalists So I like so many thought the EPA did it all but according to this story, EPA sets Emissions, NHTSA is responsible for MPG or corporate average fuel economy rules. To Quote the story: "The confusion comes because the EPA began to regulate vehicular emissions of the climate-change gas carbon dioxide in 2012, requiring the two agencies had to align those two sets of standards for the first time. Previously, the EPA regulated "criteria emissions" (carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, and hydrocarbons), which it could do without directly affecting the fuel consumption of the vehicles. Following a legal battle that went all the way to the Supreme Court, the EPA was required to regulate CO2 emissions starting in 2012—and those emissions are directly proportional to the amount of fuel burned by the vehicle. That meant that the EPA and the NHTSA had to develop standards that "matched," so automakers weren't trying to meet fuel-economy rules that let them emit more CO2 than the EPA would allow. In partnership with automakers and the powerful California Air Resources Board, the two agencies did exactly that in 2010 for 2012-2017 vehicles. They repeated the process in 2012 for vehicles in model years 2018 through 2025, with a mandatory "midterm review" to look at the 2022-2025 standards before finalizing them." Interesting is that the Fed rules for changes must be based on scientific analyses and the 38 page rationale for tossing the rules now in force are primarily industry complaints especially from the oil companies and are devoid of any rigorous scientific analysis and modeling required by law. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1116107_pruitts-epa-decision-38-page-intention-vs-1217-pages-of-analysis Interesting read of the 38pg intention versus the 1,217 page analysis that showed the auto companies had in July 2016 met the standards required and at a much lower cost than they predicted almost 4 yrs ahead of schedule for the 2020 year. This also came to show that they could meet the later standards also. Looks like based on reviews from external independent groups that his rollback will fail when challenged in court due to the lack of any scientific proof. https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1116165_pruitts-epa-emission-rollback-reasoning-may-well-fail-in-court

Interesting story at Autoblog says that in 2015 GM trademarked the name "Enspire" and that this is the Existing BEV Auto listed in Mary Barra EV plans she laid out in November as an Unbadged Crossover for non-US market till Global EV Platform 2 is released on new models globally for 2020. https://www.autoblog.com/2018/04/09/buick-electric-ev-crossover-suv-china/ Totally makes sense to build a Buick based EV for China off the Bolt Platform as they work on version 2 that is to under pin the bulk of all global EV auto's for GM.

But it is not a Jeep! Nor is it Green!

Interesting and Exciting times we live in for a possible true Full Size SUV from Jag! And a Hybrid at that!

I am excited about this!

WOW, talk about a mess. Thank you

I get sporting, but at least around here the few ads for Alfa have been about Luxury and you hear nothing about Maserati. Really left the US in the 90's? Wonder where all the terrible dealerships have been hiding as I saw none on the west coast. Washington they folded up in the late 70's and were gone.

After Looking at the Motortrend link, I think the RS looks better than the Roman Soldier helmet look that I HATED on the Chevy Full Size trucks. This is just sucky!

I will be honest that I do not follow the Camaro or any pony car that close, as such, I thought the two above were the same model year, just different packages. So your saying the one above is the 2017 and the below is the 2018 model? I am highly concerned that Jeep will get screwed up with the Alfa crap platform garbage and that the Wagoneer / Grand Wagoneer will never happen till a new CEO or Owner comes in and realizes the need to clean house and shut down some brands.

http://www.theblock.com/?article=968f871f-254a-4c82-b52a-c3000644a0df#news The build story of the C10 pickup with detailed pictures of doors, etc getting the treatment is awesome. Check it out!

Had no idea till this morning when I saw this email from GM Performance that this year is 100 years of Chevy Trucks!

Interior shot alone shuts shouts mash up of miss matched design.Thin side of center floor stack to thick side on passenger side. Glove box door clearly off on left sunk in compared to right side. Center vents of dash rectangle to circle on the outsides, just a mess. I see nothing here that says luxury let alone quality. The continuation of problems with the auto nav system would this far into the launch of the auto when you have to restart the auto to get it to work screams incompetence to me. Just as Alfa left in a flaming mess in the 70's, it came back in that same mess and still is garbage. I see nothing to validate any of the reviews that this is worth $72K let alone $42K. This is what I would call a Kia Competitor from Kia's Early days and I very much doubt it will get better unlike Kia that has a quality product much better than this car.

Did the rain and snow cause it to give way?

Guess I was born a Sin, since I love everyone!

No at least for me it does not. Good solid wiper fluid to use. I like using it in addition to the RainX applied fluid to the whole windshield. I have crystal clear vision with it even on the passes with all the salt solution they use.

I am willing to bet that they will push a detuned V12 on the Maybach and have a better performing turbo V8 with Electric assist that they will point at in justifying sales numbers and killing the V12 for the Maybach also. Just a matter of making it look bad on each and every line of auto. No different than any other auto company.

Washington state is one of the states that fully adopted California emissions and last update this state posted was that there are 17 states now that fully follow the CARB emissions standard. 13 fully enforce it on the auto makers. This puts much more weight behind clean air. Known as "Section 177" states, those 13 are: Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington

CVT sucks, people know that, ugly refresh, GM seems to be focused on moving everyone whether they like it or not to CUV/SUV/Trucks as they kill off cars. Yet that just seems narrow thinking in my business book. Why can the American auto companies not figure out how to keep a couple good looking, selling auto's around and still also supply what the bulk of the public has moved too.

Come on, you love a good love fest! Enough love to go around, Greek, Italian, American, German, Asian, Love the world over!

If they do it will be the death of Dodge as Fiat/Alfa cannot build quality stuff at all.

If I was to get back into bike riding, it would have to be like this yamaha bike. Nothing Else has really interested me except maybe this since it is an EV!. Or this Or this which is the only Harvey Davidson I would ever consider riding. This new EV startup looks comfy!

Agree that I also do not like the Big Mouth Billy bass look and wonder about why they are not using the 9 spd tranny and are going to a CVT?