oldshurst442

I...beg to differ

Several reasons for that. Ideal economies of scale have not been reached yet with this vehicle. Remember, this vehicle came out in 2020. Its one of the first EVs to come out on the MEB platform. Its a tad higher than the Tiguan, yes, but amortization costs are higher on this model because it is one of the first models to come out... Another reason is that the ID 4 is a tad more upscale model than the Tiguan. Why? To bring in more money to finance electrification... The ID 7 comes 3 years later after the launch of the ID 4. VW is the #1 EV sales leader in Europe. The Tiguan starts @ 28 000 and ends @ 38 000. The ID 4 starts @ 38 000. The mid level ID 4s are @ 43 000-48 000. Ends @ 51 000 The Arteon starts @ 44 000 and ends at 51 000. IMO, the ID 7 will comfortably start at 45 000 and the mid level offerings will probably be @ 55 000 and more. The Atlas, a way bigger CUV starts @ 38 000 but...the price swells to 53 000. The Atlas acts like the Passat in that VW uses it to sell it to the masses as a cheap alternative to mid level luxury for people that think they are getting mid level luxury and for the people that want to fully exercise their mid level luxury offering could option the Atlas out to 53 000. However with all that, I think that is as close to price parity as we could get if the ID 7 starts the way I said it will. And there is no reason to doubt. VW has achieved economies of scale with their EVs. VW is NOT Tesla... I didnt mention Ford for that exact reason. But, Ford's Lightning is optioned like an equivalent ICE F150. Problem is that Ford FORCES you to buy the Lightning with those options with that price tag so Ford could recoup the EV development dollars. Ford as of yet hasnt got any other models on any other platforms to help with economies of scale. The Mach-E is on one platform and no other EV is made on it yet and the F150 Lightning is on another platform and no other model is used on it yet. I dont know how Rivian is implicated with the F150 Lightning. If Rivian is actually implicated at all. GM is methodically releasing vehicles on Ultium. GM is also selling these EVs in China. GM is achieving economies of scale. GM WILL release the Equinox EV @ 30 000. No reason to believe they wont. GM also said that the Corvette C8 will be released BELOW 60 000 and the C8 WAS released BELOW 60 000 and for 2 years the MSRP for the C8 STAYED below 60 000. This year, the starting price for the C8 went slightly above... There is no reason to doubt GM and their stating of a starting price of around 30 000 for the Equinox EV. Ive said this 3-4 years ago. When Tesla was tooting an affordable EV and they didnt deliver, I said the ONLY OEMS that COULD achieve that WOULD be VW, GM, Toyota and perhaps Ford. This is what I said and this is what I will continue to say. IF Toyota gets serious about EVs and Ford STOPS their quality control problems. But VW and GM have got this in the bag. No problem!

There are several things that peaked my interest with this car 1. 435 mile range 2. sedan to rival Tesla Model 3 and Model S. Especially the sedan part. 3. 116.9 inch wheelbase with an overall length of 195 inches. 4. GLOBAL car. American market. European market. Chinese and probably elsewhere in the Asian market. Economies of scale on a global level. 5. MEB platform based. Several EVs are built on this platform already. Economies of scale on a platform level. 6. Reasons #3 & #4 makes me assume that the ID 7 will be more or less in the same price range as an equivalent ICE car. a mid level offering and there is no reason to believe that it will be more expensive to buy than what a current Passat (sans rebates because Passat was going away) or Arteon. But everything to believe that it WILL cost as much as ICE equivalents. The idea of EVs being expensive holds no longer any truth. Lets not forget that Chevrolet's Equinox EV per Chevrolet's website will be about 30 000 for the 1LT. With 300 mile range. The ICE Equinox 1LT is 29 000. Price parity between ICE and EV for VW, GM and even perhaps Stellantis (in Europe) is 99% achieved for 2023.

PSA Group has been serious about electrification for quite some time it seems, and its paying off right about now. PSA Group and Dodge SRT engineering, when SRT engineering was announced that will help to engineer to electrify Chryco and Dodge and we in North America feared that meant that SRT engineering was disbanded... Well...as I assumed back then, SRT engineering went to work IMMEDIATELY to electrify the RAM and NOBODY know a thing about it and when Stellantis announces an EV RAM, we in North America are all in shock. But we shouldnt be. PSA Group has been on the electrification program for quite some time and its paying off dividends right now.

I dont know anything about Stellantis EVs. I dont think Stellantis EVs could be THAT bad since in Europe, Stellantis EVs have surpassed Tesla sales. I read the report over the summer. https://insideevs.com/news/602158/stellantis-overtakes-tesla-europe-ev-sales-targets-top-spot/ Now, I know that sales do NOT equal quality, but...I DO know that Tesla has had a feverish, zombie-like cult following, here AND in Europe and to have former PSA Group automobiles (Peugeot and Citroen mainly) pass Tesla and ALSO give VW EVs a run for their money for the top sales...may not mean that Stellantis has THE best EVs, but they couldnt be THAT bad either. Stellantis EVs at most, we could say, are competitive with what is out there. One thing is 100% certain. Is that in Europe, there is a very very greater amount of EV offerings than what we have here in North America... I was googling...and I find it very very...VERY interesting that in 2018, PSA Group was already announcing that PSA Group would have just 2 platforms for EVs going forward... https://www.carlist.my/news/psa-group-to-have-only-two-platforms-fully-electrified-product-range-by-2025-64646/64646/

The Ford GT does NOT have to be mass produced year after year, decade after decade to spawn consecutive gebnerations. Ford has found THE successful formula for a Ford GT to live on in our hearts and our minds and for the car to be successful financially for FoMoCo and BE a HALO car for the brand of Ford. The Ford GT is to be revisisted every 8-12 years. To be thrown a very high amount of engineering dollars at it to be engineered as best as FoMoCo could, to be designed as elegant and as beautiful as a Ford GT40 ever was. It could go racing or it doesnt. Marketing could take care of that. IF the engineering underneath the skin is race credible, and FoMoCo doesnt give up racing all together, the cred will abays be there for the Ford GT. IF the skin visually is as pleasing as the original GT40, marketing and our hearts do the rest. And THAT is the formula it seems for the Ford GT to be succesful and THAT is ALL what is needed for a Ford GT. A Ford GT is NOT a Corvette. It shouldnt follow a Corvette formula. The Veyron made VAG lose 6 million dollars per car... Mercedes has acknowledged that ITS hypercars also follow a Ford GT type of business model. And THAT is great for Mercedes to follow. The original SL was a race car. Its road going version was sold as a GT car, but with the racing technology intact in the car intact. And it had GREAT success. It was and continues to BE a HALO car the original Gullwing for Mercedes. But Mercedes realized quite quickly that for money to be made, the SL HAD to go a different route. And Mercedes found success THAT way for the SL going forward. Mercedes quickly found out that pet projects such as the SLR and SLS and the current AMG-ONE could be and ARE a financial success because their history has cred and marketing takes care of the rest and us as enthusiasts keep that close to our hearts and make those projects a success for Mercedes. Although the SLR failed to sell what Mercedes originally thought it could sell. And...the SLS's platform was rumoured to have been engineered by Dodge and when the merger between Mercedes and Chryco ended, Mercedes just took the platform away from Dodge and THAT is how Mercedes brought out the SLS... Some black marks there for Mercedes... So for @smk4565 to wax poetic about Cadillac doing a super expensive hypercar above Corvette seems kinda foolish when he ignores the failures of even Mercedes to achieve such a thing. Cadillac does NOT have ANY racecar cred. Although Cadillac does racing now in 2022...today... THAT means NOTHING as even Toyota 'races' its Camry... The connections I have made should be it. I have nothing else to say about this matter. Lets get back to the Z06 C8... But one more thing...Veyron made VAG LOSE 6 million per car... Let that sink in for awhile to see how absurd that is and then just look at FoMoCo and how they handled the same endeavour with two different generations of GT Fords within the same time frame... ESPECIALLY with the CURRENT Ford GT...

Shelby Cobra comes and goes. Dodge Viper comes and goes. At least with the Viper, it spawned 3 generations. (I know Dodge likes to say that the Viper is 5 generations, and technically you could say it is 5 generations but technically you could also say its 3 generations too) The Acura NSX comes and goes. Its helped to be tuned by a race car driver, it goes away after 1 generation and a decade long production run. When the C3 and C4 had that kind of production run, Euro and Japanese badge snobs shat on that.... The NSX comes back a decade later but is feared to go away again... The McLaren F1 comes along. Goes away. The company then does another successor somewhat a decade later. Expands to 1- 2-3 other models. But the company now as we speak is feared to go bankrupt... Since 2020. Serious at the beginning of 2022, securing financing here and there during the course of the year including selling off some classic cars in their museums but becoming more in danger as then year closes to 2023... Audi brings out the R8 15 years ago. Shares many things with Lamborghini and their Gallardo or Huracan or whatever. Both companies spawn a new entry to be Corvette/Ferrari 458 and successors/Porsche 911 competitors. The Gallardo succesfully goes unto become the Huracana and the Huracan will live on to another successor. The R8 gets another generation but there might NOT BE a 3rd gen DESPITE its corporate brother being succesful... The 911, was ALMOST replaced in the 1970s. It was NOT a successful sports car in the market place. It had a cult following IN the 1970s, but it was NOT enough. The replacement was supposed to be the 928. It WAS a Corvette formula car. BECAUSE the 911 had a cult following, Porsche stuck around with it selling BOTH the 911 and the 928 side by side. The saviour of the 911 WAS the 959 that injected new technologies into the car invigorating new interest into the 911 AWAY from such new entries as an NSX or Viper or F355 and Testarossa and even the McLaren F1. Porsche also done 911 GT2s in the mid-1990s that carried the torch fromm the 959 link to the 911... But the company Porsche was in dire need of a bread and butter car. Long story short, the 928 went away. A decade later, Porsche tries its hand in yet another Corvette business type of venture in the Boxster/Cayman. It succeeds with that BECAUSE Porsche also does SUVs... The Corvette at this time was looong in the tooth with the C4. The ZR1 was NOT a succesful car. But it survived somehow. Even if Corvette went unto a C5, BECAUSE the C4 held unto soooo long, the C5 was in danger of being laughed at out of existance. It held on. It spwaned a C6. Eurobadge snobs laughed at the C6 as much as they laughed at the C5. They had no reason to. But they did. Corvette nearly died again but a C7 saw the light... At THIS point in time, Corvette was no longer at the cusp of being a supercar, the other brands had HYPERCARS... The C7 was a supercar, but Eurosnobs snubbed it for NOT being a hypercar... The C8 comes along and the same Eurosnobs try to screw with it but they really cant. The C8 really has no faults to discredit it. There are no Malibu steering wheels to laugh at. No composite reverse leaf springs to denounce. its even got a flat plane crank V8 producing the MOST horsepower of ANY NATURALLY ASPIRATED V8 before it. besting Mercedes, Ferrari, Ford, Chrysler, Audi, BMW and every other V8 manufacturer... Some Eurosnobs cant fathom that and say its a Ferarri copy cat. Some say that because Corvette went that-a-way, that it means that Corvette faithfull are hypocrites because they have defended GM and Corvette to stay pushrod... RIGHT, SMK???!!! Yet a pushrod V8 Corvette is STILL offered and is STILL a beast of a machine ALL for JUST 60 000 dollars. Hot Rodders make THAT pushrodded Corvette into a hypercar killer anyway... The Corvette is a testament, despite on the brink of being canceled SEVERAL times in its existence itself, on how difficult it is to be a sports car and live. The Corvette is 70 years old. Will a C9 be available? I could say with 100% CERTAINTY that a C9 WILL be available to us. BECAUSE the C8 is a success in the market place today. Right now. But will a C10 be a thing? Im not so sure... We are not there yet to know. Its a fragile niche... Cadillac to spawn a car above a Corvette will just fail. Because it does not have the cred to have such a car. Lexus failed. Acura failed. Corvette IS such a car to begin with. Nothing else needs to be said.

There will always BE a price point regarding the Corvette. Corvette is model within the Chevrolet brand within the GM corporate umbrella. Corvette will ALWAYS be fighting for engineering dollars because its a model amongst the hundreds of models within GM. THAT is why Corvette is engineered to a price point. Its business model was defined this way when GM decided to greenlight this project 70 years ago. THAT is why Corvette sometimes uses Chevrolet Malibu steering wheels... Looking at the C6 Corvette with the same year Malibu of that time. But there are plenty of other examples across 70 years to make my point. The Corvette's platform is NOT shared with ANY other GM umbrella vehicle to amortize the engineering costs. But Chevrolet engineers dont skimp on that part. They dont skimp on the engine engineering either. But at least the engine is amortized through being offered in many other ways to other Chevrolet/GM vehicles and licensed to be used in other race cars across the planet, in kit cars, in crate engines offered by Chevrolet, in the boating industry etc. Corvette/Chevrolet engineers cleverly used other methods to make the car handle such as those reverse composite leaf springs that Corvette used from the C4-C7. It was a cheaper way to do it, it was a great way and a succesful one at that to achieve what Chevrolet needed to achieve but Euro badge snobs shat on that engineering effort... (This is the kind of things I want to see Ferrari, Porsche, Mercedes and all others try to achieve when I say what kind of cars these other car makers could produce when making a world class sports car to an engineering price point...) Engineering an AMG-ONE with sky's the limit budget and tacking on a million dollar price tag to the machine after its built is a relative easy thing to do. McLaren done exactly THAT with the F1 in the 1990s. But they didnt sell too many. Lexus done THAT with the LFA but didnt sell their 500 units. To this DAY, the LFA has 2-3 models still unsold. The Corvette project learned THAT lesson as well in 1953. They learned that lesson with the C2. The C3 and C4. The C5. The C6 AND the C8. Corvette was nearly canceled AFTER the C1. AFTER the C3. AFTER the C4. AFTER the C6. THAT is why Chevrolet and Corvette have adopted this business model FOR the Corvette. Its a unique niche that Corvette holds. That Corvette has perfected through 70 years of continuously being sold with the minor execption of missing 1 year. 1983. Half a year technically. 1 model year more precisely. This is why it does NOT matter what brand Corvette is sold under. This dilemna will always exist for Corvette UNLESS Corvette becomes its own brand and sells bread and butter SUVs that are bespoke to Corvette but could help finance some of the engineering costs to share and help with corporate GM. Kinda like how Porsche is doing it with VAG. Porsche is part of VAG, but kinda is not. But Porsche solely building 911s, even if 911s became boutique cars and rather expensive but cleverly got owners to fork over MORE money to buy the various variants, the 911 alone was not enough to sustain Porsche. And THAT problem for Porsche existed in the 1970s. It wasnt until Porsche went with an SUV in the late 1990s/early 2000s that Porsche became sustainable all by itself. Dont forget, the 911 ALSO shared parts with VAG. Lamborghini, which is part of VAG, shares parts with Audi... But its only Corvette that gets shat on because it shares parts with other Chevrolets. The deal is that Corvette is a freakin' Chevrolet to begin with... THAT wouyld be a...CORVETTE. Cadillac could do OTHER things. Cadillac does not need a sports car. Cadillac, Corvette and Oldsmobile were the engineering branches for General Motors. Now that Oldsmobile is no longer around and the brands do not hold as much independancy as they once did, Cadillac AND Corvette showcase what GM could do. YOU have to understand that. Its time for you to put what you say aside. Mercedes is NOT what Cadillac is. Cadillac is NOT what Mercedes is. Mercedes is more akin to General Motors in 2023, since the 1970s actually. Mercedes was Cadillac and Cadillac Mercedes BEFORE WW2. Cadillac was under the GM umbrella but was independant from GM and other GM brands. Mercedes and Cadillac were both the ultimate luxury brands in the same realm as Rolls Royce, Bentley, Maybach, Duesenberg and Packard. During the depression and economic crisis of 1929 and just before the war, some of those brands went away. After the war, 'twas only Cadillac that truly was the ultimate in luxury. Rolls, Bentley and Mercedes had to start all over. This is where Mercedes became General Motors. Mercedes went DOWNMARKET. Mercedes now no longer boutiqued their cars but offered plebiean mass produced econo boxes. Cadillac lost its independance from GM when GM decided that ALL GM brands no longer function as independant car brands. When none of the GM engineer their own engines etc.... THAT happened in the 1970s. No they dont. THAT would be YOUR Euro badge snobbery. Porsche had HORRID build quality ALL THE WAY until the 2000s. WORSE than Chevrolet even. But when Porsche REALLY went high end, this is when Porsche started to engineer quality into their cars. Like I said, THAT heppened in the 2000s. Now that Cadillac is FINALLY serious in going high end, for real, their cars too, have great build quality. The C8 also reflects this. nothing concrete there... The Ford GT is a race car. Since Ford never took the road version to test it, we shall never know how fast it really is on ANY race track. BUT...the Ford GT DID win at 24 HRs at Lemans in its class in 2016 over Porsche, Ferrari, Aston Martin, BMW AND Corvette. But that is just noise. ANY track times is just noise. Success of a race car/road car sold to the public is not just credibility on how fast it is, but if its succesful in the court of public opinion AND in the market place. And the Ford GT hits on all those. The AMG-ONE is NOT a race car. But...we know its fast. Mercedes tested it on the Nurburgring and shattered the record. And since Mercedes has a very very long and storied racing history, the AMG-One does not NEED to be a race car to have race cred. Marketing takes care of that. Engineering says its Formula One engineered and marketing takes care of the rest. The AMG-One gets slapped with a 2.72 million dollar price tag and Mercedes sells every single unit. THAT is a succesful car. Lexus with the LFA tries to do the same a decade earlier but fails on MOST of those criteria. McLaren too with the F1. The F1 actuallu GOES racing and wins Lemans in its class. But is a failure in the market place... On a business side of things, there are many ways to engineer a sports car. If a succesful formula is found by a manufacturer, then it was a great engineering and business venture. And THAT is how we should view things. NOT this what you are saying here. THAT is complete and utter bullshyte what you are saying down below. The Veyron was an engineering success in that the car was a great performer, but it nearly cost VW its reputation in that engineering such a car and losing money on every car sold lead to VW to cheat in their diesels. They cheated and got caught and got fined and lost millions more. NOT a good thing. A properly engineered car, and a succesful one IN the market place where the car brings IN money for the company and does not BLEED it to death to make crappy decisions later on ELEVATES the company. The Veyron made VW make questionable decisions. From the VW Phaeton, to dieselgate to the back and forth struggles of who is to be head of VAG, Porsche or VW. In-fighting is NOT a good look either... But Eurosnobbery just looks past that!!! Right, SMK???!!! The Chiron finally makes money becsause the platform is 20 years old and Buggatti finally got to sell enough Veyrons/Chirons to finally pay for the engineering. 20 years LATER... But...I got to say, the engineering on the Veyron WAS almost 20 years ahead of its time. So there is that too. But VAG stuck to it. Its a German thing to stick to failure. Down with the ship and phoque the rest and maybe we will turn it around before the ship sinks and with the Veyron, the ship didnt sink, luckily. Americans cut their losses right away... Imagine of GM had kept the Fiero for a 2nd generation and finally done it right? GM actually did it for the Corvette and look where the Corvette is now? They were close to canceling the Corvette in the very beginning... Kinda like what Mercedes does with their exotic-hyper cars, non? The Ford GT will return in 10 years from now. Just like when the AMG-One production run will end in the next year or two. Mercedes will return to that formula 6-7-8, 10 years later with another pet project. In the mean time, Porsche, Ferrari, Corvette, and the new comers in McLaren (if they dont go bankrupt) will continue to refine their SF90s, 911s, C8s and unto the new and next generation to continue the bloodline. Porsche and Ferrari will continue on as well with their other offerings...

Its a harder engineering exercise to engineer a sports car like the Corvette and a trim like the Z06 to a price point, to mass produce and to sell at a relative affrodable price than it is to engineer a hypercar when the budget of such a thing is sky's the limit. As much resources as the company in question has to throw at it. General Motors has a BIGGER budget than Ferrari does. Chevrolet in turn has a BIGGER budget than Ferrari has. Problem is...GM has Cadillac and Buick to think about and their models. It be great for Chevroler though, if it could use ALL that monies to spend JUST engineering the Corvette. Unfortunately for the Corvette, the Corvette needs to share ITS engineering/marketing budget with the OTHER Chevrolet models. To pitch Corvette unto another brand is just switching the budget dilemna around unto the other brand. It makes no difference to the Corvette budget who's brand the Corvette will be sold as. If General Motors allocates a certain amount for the next generation Corvette, it will be the same amount ANYWHERE in the GM family regardless of what brand the Corvette gets sold under... But...GM/Chevrolet engineers, as you know, do a fantastic job in creating what the Corvette has AWAYS been. Especially vis-a-vis its competition from other makes from other countries. Ive said this before. Id like to see what kind of sports car the other manufactures could do with the same engineering and budgetary constraints the Corvette has to be mass produced, to be sold at the same price levels as the Corvette and to see how they will fare in the quality department, the technology department and the constistancy of performance that the Corvette does model after model, year after year, generation after generation. We could see. Porsche has tried that formula SEVERAL times. It has FAILED several times. The 914. The 944. The 964. The 928. Porsche did succeed with the Boxter/Cayman. Both it terms of quality, price and performance. Its mass produced and on price, its the SAME as a Corvette. Problem is, the Corvette performance wise is more of a 911 competitor. In other words, the Corvette kicks the Cayman's ass. The 911, will sometimes beat the Corvette, but sometimes will lose to a Corvette... But the Cayman will ALWAYS lose to the Corvette but they cost the same to buy... Ferrari just does NOT do Corvette price points. Thety dont have to. But Id like to see what kind of car ferrari could produce with the Corvette's contraints. Not so easy... And this is what I was getting at... But...there is one American car that the Corvette has NOT beaten. (Not a Tesla) Not yet at least. Not until the ZR1 comes out. The Ford GT This one... But... The Ford GT is a half a million dollar affair. The ZR1 will be a 120 000 dollar affair. Not ALL hypercars are from Europe... The Ford GT is a hypercar. It was a race car that a handful were built for the road to allow it to race. Then 40 years later it was built as a ROAD car and it was NEVER raced, but it was built to LOOK like the original race car. Then 15-20 years later, Ford built a race car again Only to use that race car as a road car effectively making that race car turned road car into a hypercar. But there are others... But...the Corvette hot rodders turn the Corvette INTO a hypercar when they hot rod it. This particular lady twin turboed her Z06 C8... Mind you, the Z06 is really NOT a drag car, I hope she didnt phoque with the Z06's suspension track capabilites... Hopin' she aint phoquin' her LT6 engine either by doing this, but...hot rodders ALWAYS turn their Corvettes into European hypercar killers. And a hot rodded Corvette will ALWAYS remain a CORVETTE... It dont matter if its factory or hot rodded, a Corvette is a Corvette. Part of the 70 year legendary history...

Weight savings will probably BE in the cards for the ZR1. More power etc... But...the damned thing will have a trunk in the back to fit those damned golf bags and a frunk in the front to carry anything else a Corvette owner would want to carry and thus, the ZR1 will be a GT car again. NOT a bad thing. A VERY VERY good thing. But like you said, 90% of what @ccap41 and I are saying will be. We want 100% of what we are saying. A Corvette that is just NOT a GT car. A Corvette variant to forego a freakin trunk and frunk so it could be less livable, to be NOT a GT car, and to be a MORE visceral speed machine. To actually compete with the less comfy variants of the very same Porsche and Ferrari GT cars that Porsche and Ferrari have made into PURE track machines that Corvettes competes with as a GT, but now, Corvette ALSO has a very very UNCOMFORTABLE track variant too... And a hypercar with NO radio, NO heated and cool seats, no frunk and trunk. And another hypercar variant WITH a radio and heated and cooled seats and the hypercar that is a shytty daily driver because its a machine, it would cost MORE to buy with LESS equipment because THAT is EXACTLY what Porsche does. And Porsche succeeds with!!! THAT is what I want from Corvette!!! But you and I know, that will never happen. I dont think the Corvette brand thing is going to happen as well. But...even Corvette staying the course the way it has been doing for the last 70 years, its still good enough for me!!! its a helluva machine this C8. Im happy to let the hot rodders do what I want Chevrolet to do with the Corvette. To me, its the same thing!!!

A Corvette VARIANT like what we are saying and wanting, doesn and t even NEED to start as low as 100K. it could even start at 150 000 and with all kinds of boutique personalizations through the Celestiq program type of deal where GM whould have already set-up the network, a Corvette variant of hypercar magnitude could even end at 200 000. Even kiss and be just shy of 250 000. A carbon fibre platform OF the C8 aluminum platform to save THAT much MORE weight....THAT kind of thing does NOT need to be mass produced and only a handfull could be produced. In fact, Corvette HAS done something like THAT in the recent past when aluminum frames were a common thing for supercars but carbon fibre frames were still prohibitive and only the most expesive supercars were using that. Lets not forget that the Ferrari F40 was carbon fibre...anyway... The C6 Stingray was a STEEL frame but when Chevrolet introduced the Z06, the Z06 went aluminum. GM had the frame built by a third party manufacturer. The ZR1 C6 used aluminum frame as well. https://www.motortrend.com/features/corvette-chassis-dave-hills-superior-evolutionary-c6/#:~:text=The Z06 frame is 50,Corvette Bowling Green assembly plant. When the C7 arrived, all C7 variants went aluminum. So Chevrolet has done what Im proposing before. And by shorting the body just a tad to eliminate the golf bag trunk in the back, and the built-in aero that comes with that, then Corvette goes hypercar with a Corvette type price tag. Sure, it wont be a Corvette that costs 60 000, but its a Corvette hypercar that only costs 150 000 or so...

THAT exactly is what I want too. What I eluded to when I said this: yes. exactly. Yes. it is the finish line...but... What @ccap41 said And with that kind of Corvette, the price does NOT have to be hypercar priced , but Corvette priced and compete with LaFerraris and Porsche 918s and Ford GTs and be EXACTLY like those cars...

Why would they do that? THE Corvette could be THAT hyper car. The many versions of it that Im proposing. What you are proposing is a death knell to EITHER the Corvette OR GM's next level hypercar that will NOT be called Corvette. Talk about waste of resources. The resources (money and time) of engineering such a hyper car remain the same whether a new hyper car adorns a Corvette badge or not, but the 70 years of Corvette branding goes to shyte by doing this. Creating a new name, new marketing, new sales angles for both the new hyper car NOT named Corvette and THE Corvette itself could be better put to use on other projects since Corvette has a 70 year built-in name recognition as THE sports car FROM GM. Better still, the Corvtette is WORLD known as AMERICA's sports car... If resources (time and money) are going to be spent on hyper cars, and new marketing and sales angles are to be established for a new hyper car, might as well use that 70 year history of Corvette, but SPIN off Corvette on being its OWN brand and creating a hyper car FOR the NEW Corvette brand. Then to secure bread and butter sales, create a fast as phoque SUV for the new Corvette brand. The Corvette logo and JAKE with Corvette Racing have plenty of brand recognition to pull of a Corvette brand with Corvettes in the GT realm, track realm, hyper car realm and in the fast as phoque SUV realm. Mercedes SL has gone down the route you are proposing. The SL was a race car and a GT car only to become a very expensive Ford Thunderbird. The modern Mercedes exotic/hyper cars only last a couple of years of production only selling a couple of thousand. That works for Mercedes as Mercedes NEVER worked hard enough to put ANY brand recognition on a long production run sports car like a Ferrari Dino/ 308/328/348/F355/360/F430/458/488/F8/SF90 The SF90 you are talking about... has its lineage IN the 488 Pista you dumb aZZ... Its a continuation of... Its a succesor to Dino/ 308/328/348/F355/360/F430/458/488/F8 Ferrari has many itenerations of those models each being a tad different from each other specializing in different areas of sports driving. Different weight savings, different suspensions and suspension tunings and the like for track work or for grand turismo driving. Porsche does the same thing for the 911. The 911 has different eras too. But with Porsche, Porsche has kept the 911 name but chose different chassis designation numbers to differentiate the new successors. Same for Corvette with C1 and C2 and C4 and C8 but with Chevrolet, only one model does double duty for GT and race track versions. When a track version comes along, Corvette keeps the GT part of the car IN the track car. But...Porsche and Ferrari ALSO produce a LINEAGE of hypercars. Porsche started out its first hypercar in the mid-80s based on the 911. Added turbo and AWD which then became a 911 turbo staple. But the 959 was born which became the Carrera GT. 959/Carerra GT/918 Ferrari though, has a LONG history of mid-engined hypercars and V12 front engined GT cars... Road cars to sell to finance racing. succesors upon succesors upon succesors. Lamborghini ALSO falls in to this category. Funny you mention McLaren because McLaren ALSO has been following IN the footsteps of Ferrari and Porsche and Lamborghini. McLaren has branched out from the F1 in the 1990s and kept lineages and create succesors year after year after year after decade after decade. Mercedes is the ONLY one to stop lineages to create new names. Only the SL has continued on but the SL today is just a fancy, expensive personal coupe Thunderbird convertible... that is NOT what I want Corvette to become... NOT a Mercedes competitor but an ALL Ferrari/Porsche competitor. A Ford GT competitor. Nothing from Mercedes because Mercedes hypercars just become garage queens.

Nothing crazy in the Montreal area. Other than a few flights canceled and people being stranded at Trudeau Airport. Pearson International being even worse than we. But that is Toronto. And quite honestly, who gives a shyte about 'Toranna' ???!!! Winter has settled in nicely up here. Nothing too crazy. Just the norm. We got another couple of inches of snow yesterday making the roads a tad slicker than what they were before. Temps are not too crazy cold. About in and around 21 F. The usual shyte this time of year. It is said that the next couple of days the temp will rise to just above freezing but dip to 5 F right after and for a good week and stay that way. But that is just the norm.

Downtown. He had parked his car south of Ste-Catherine on Mackay Street. He was visiting a mutual friend's of ours' restaurant at the time on Ste-Catherine between Mackay and Bishop. It was like a Monday or Tuesday night. Like at around 9:00 or 10:00. He just wanted to pop in and say hi. He stayed barely an hour. Put money in the meter for an hour was there for like 45-50 minutes. Real quick. Police never found the car. We thought that the cops will find the car without the engine as at that point in time, Integra GS-Rs and Type Rs were stolen for their engines that were swapped into lesser Civics. But the car was never found. We later believed that it was probably stolen and shipped to another continent. Yup!!! To this day, cars are stolen in suburban areas in peoples drive-ways all the time!!! In and around the Montreal region. To be fair to Montreal-Nord, Montreal, ANYWHERE in and around Montreal, is THE car theft capital of Canada. In fact, many of North America's stolen cars end up in Montreal because the port of Montreal was and continues to be corrupt that the many organized crime...organizations like the Italian Mafia of NYC and Montreal and Chicago etc, and the Biker gangs like the Hells Angels that partake in car thefts ALL OVER North America, have the ins at the Port of Montreal and ship all kinds of stolen cars ALL over the world. A real racket. I think vancouver takes care of the Asian continents part of the shipping of the stolen cars and Montreal takes care of Europe, Africa and Russia. A world racket. Funny you mention Montreal-Nord as that mutual friend of ours married a girl who grew up in Montreal-Nord. The friend is a couple of years younger than us and his wife while the girl's older sister is a year older than us. I hung around the sister a lot. We went to the same high school. Her parents were childhood friends of my moms and my uncles. They grew up in the same island just a couple of villages down. Maybe 3 miles away from each other. The island is Kephalonia. Pastra is the village that my mom grew up in and Agia Irini (Saint Irene) is the island of my mom's childhood friends. I have many many friends like this to which my mom and her childhood friends' kids have become my and my cousin's friends. Kephalonia would be right acorss the middle of the boot in Italian terms. LOL. yes. I think the CRV continues to be Montreal's most stolen car. I wouldnt drive one either. #2 I think is the Ford F150. The Accord and Toyota RAV4 are next if Im not mistaken. I think its also because in the north, all the manufacturing industry is at and the south is more farmland and the negative connotations that come with farmers and farming. Also also, the upscale and rich areas are also more in the middle and north while the poorer is to the south. Greeks are not as divided it seems. The Greek folk that come from the North or the mountains are called "vlahi" meaning highlander but it has a negative connotation meaning uncouth. The thing with Greeks though, we all hate on each other equally, we make fun of each other's regions amongst ourselves and we wreak havoc with each other internally but when it comes to Greece as a whole, we stick together. We WILL screw each other financially ANY chance we get, but THAT has NOTHING to do with what regions we come from. A Greek from the SAME region will try to defraud his literal and REAL definition of 'paisan' but we WILL defend each other when a foreigner comes between us. I take it that Italians will be the opposite of that. Literal/REAL Italian paisanos WILL take care of each other and try to boost each other's economical welfare by helping each other out and not screw with each other but Italians of different regions will not help each other out so easily. With the exception of the Italian Mafia which started out as to help each other out, in Sicily long ago, ended up hurting each other bothn inn Sicily and in America. And of course the rival factions in Calabria that did the same kind of damage. And both being in the South... which does no favours in the looking down part of the Northern Italians to the Southerners like you mentioned. The bolded parts. Both parts. Top and bottom. Do I have that right? Thank-You! You made me tear up quite honestly. Everybody here always wishes each other with well wishes regarding either birthdays or holidays, and I LOVE that we as a CheersandGears community we continue to do that, but when you connect with me on a European level, when we both connect with each other on our Greek and Italian roots respectively, I get choked up. I feel like we would be the bestest of friends outside of this computer screen we share. Καλα Χριστουγεννα In English it would be spelled Kala Christougenna.

I clicked on the site to which I had an advert. It says: "Thinking of you in Tahiti". if Tourism Tahiti only knew how I loooooooong to be right there right now!!! To all at CheersandGears and all visiters to this site that have to endure this latest winter blast in all parts of North America right now. Enjoy the paradise! If only in pictures. Penser à vous à Tahiti. Ad Ce sentiment quand vous savez que c'est le début de quelque chose de spécial. Tahiti Tourisme Ouvrir

Ford never took the GT to the Nurburgring. I wonder what times the Carbon Series would do on that track? Ford GT MKIV with 800HP as a final send-off would probably be a fast lapper. I keep on saying it, I want Corvette to have SEVERAL trims to SPECIALIZE and COMPETE with ALL supercars. The latest C8 Z06 is a road car. Its a track beast but it retains TOO much daily driving weight to it and is TOO much of a road going car. The Z06 NEEDS a road legal, but less forgiving daily driver version to be able to beat cars like the Ford GT, or Ferrari 458 Pista and Porsche 911 GT3 RS.

Happy Birthday. Your are one day younger than my cousin. To which the next photo links you and my cousin That I assume is @David's driveway. But that there in the distance is an Acura CL coupe. My cousin had one of those back in the day. He bought a 1995 Acura Integra coupe in 1995, he traded it in for a 1999 Integra GS-R. It got stolen in 2001 and with the insurance money, he got himself a 2001 red CL Type-S. The black CL in the picture also looks to be a Type S as well...

Not much of a blizzard and storm in my parts of Montreal. So that is a good thing. In other parts in and around my neck of the woods is as bad as the news says it was going to be. But not as bad as other parts of Ontario, in the Toronto region. Very windy though here right now. @David Ice sucks. I thought that in my area, we would have ice problems too, but that never happened. Thursday night to Friday morning, we had a about 6 inches of snow. The news said that we were going to get hit hard. A foot of snow was announced, but it never happened. Then Friday morning, our temperatures rose above freezing and was raining a good part of the day. Again the news said that the temps were going to dip just below freezing and the rain will turn to freezing rain and sleet and by the afternoon, then to snow and another storm to hit. Well, the rain just remained rain and the snow never happened. All to say that I closed the store early yesterday as to prevent any unnecessary headaches. Usually, we are open Christmas Eve until 5:00 PM, but I decided to keep the restaurant closed. There was no reason to keep the restaurant closed, and there is some houses without power in my area due to the high winds, to which I was probably going to be busy today, but my staff is tired, Im tired, my manager is tired... We are all going to enjoy Christmas and Christmas Eve with our loved ones early. We all deserve the rest. I am paying my staff today as if they were working. Another small little XMAS bonus for them. The only thing I do care about though is that my restaurant does have power, some households do not. I hope the community was not relying on my restaurant to have food... There are several fast food joints that are actually closed as well... I dont know if they have power or not, or lack of staff, but not many restaurants are open today... I went to the restaurant this morning to see about the heating. No electricity equals no power which equals no heat which equals frozen water pipes which equals busted pipes which equals a mess to which I witnessed all 3 McDonald's in my area closed and other fast food joints as well...

None of these going away really suprises me and consequently, none of them will be missed by me. The Buick Encore nameplate is going away, but Im sure an EV equivalent with a different name will appear. And that would be my guess as to why its going away. It was a Buick compromise between and Opel and a Chevy as stated before. Opel was never a luxury car. It was always a European Chevy. Most of the time, Opel was even BELOW a Chevy but in the 1990s, Opel became a brand that was in between Chevy and Pontiac in terms of quality and trim. Waaaay below an Oldsmobile and even further below a Buick. Sure, GM watered down Oldsmobile and Buick in the 1980s & 1990s, and the result being that Oldsmobile is no longer around... and Buick in North America coming dangerously close in joining Oldsmobile. If Oldsmobile had been around, maybe an Oldsmobile branded Encore would have made much more sense and a better pseudo luxury branded model in a Encore/Mokka. A Pontiac branded Encore would have most probably failed badly. This was a big problem for GM in the 1990s especially when GM acquired SAAB. They didnt know how to differentiate their North American brands with their European ones. They diluted their identities. Pontiac was fast becoming a bland brand in some cases cheaper than a Chevy and less sporty too. Oldsmobile and Buick had too many non-luxury/econobox cars that had no business being Oldsmobiles and Buicks. The cross-over platforms from Opel to become SAABs and Chevys and Oldsmobiles and then unto Saturn killed SAAB, Oldsmobile AND Saturn. The cross-over of Opel to then become Buicks lead to the same results as Oldsmobile. I dont know what GM did to Opel in Europe, but Opel was bleeding money in Europe for decades. We like to blame Opel and Germany for that, but it seems that Groupe PSA have since solved Opel's misery... Hmmmmmm..... Maybe 'twas GM management that sucked???!!!

The SL has its place in the automotive landscape. Its clearly an original product being the first of its kind after WW2. Its been copied since its conception as a GT car meant for, like how I said it, a trophy wife's car/gold digger plenty of times. But that was me trolling SMK when I call it a trophy wife/gold digger car. I aint wrong though viewing the SL that way. You would also be correct in your position of it. Cadillac twice has tried to copy the formula, BMW as well. BMW three times to be exact. (if not more) The BMW 507, The BMW 8 Series and the Z8. It has been the benchmark for decades. But I took offence with this statement. Knowing how he wasted time and energy derailing that Corvette thread about a rumour of a Corvette SUV and Corvette being its own brand. A RUMOUR started by a rag mag that was written 2-3 years ago. NOTHING coming out of GM/Chevrolet has hinted any of that to be true. It HAS come out FROM GM that the CAMARO would be going down THAT road. IN China though... Smuggily, SMK is glad that the SL is 'still' a roadster and while true, and that Mercedes didnt make it into an SUV, while technically also true, Mercedes has changed the role of the SL looooong ago and has turned it into a rich soccer mom's/trophy wife/gold digger's ride since the mid 1960s waaaaaay before there was even such a thing. Escalades, Range Rovers, and all those fancy pancy soccer mom SUVs are just the equivalent of the SL's mission SINCE the mid-1960s. When Corvettes and 911s and Lamborghini Miuras and Ferraris were pumping out race cars IN those mid 1960s and well INTO today, the SL has loooong ditched THAT formula and the SL CREATED that exotic supercar formula when it was first introduced. SMK LOVES to talk a BIIIIIIG game denouncing a Corvette, but he says he likes the Corvette, but he denounces it every chance he gets, but the Corvette hasnt strayed from the formula it was first created in. The SL is nowhere NEAR the supercar it once was. It CREATED THAT niche only to abandon it not even a decade later. Only for Mercedes to revisit it and retro it, but never calling it the SL. Just called it the Gullwing. And then creates another supercar in the AMG GT, makes it look like an SL, past and modern, to compete in the realm of a Porsche 911, AND a Corvette since the AMG GT is a BIG V8 front mid-engined, RWD sports car, EXACTLY like a Corvette, but leaves the SL just as a trophy wife car... I like the SL. I call it a trophy wife car. But I wouldnt mind owning one for myself. Several model years in its history as well. Starting with this one I LOVE this era of SL And this one. LOVE this one. And this one is the quintessential trophy car/gold digger model this one too. Its a GREAT SL. Great looking car. Great performer for its time. And the last SL that I love. Its very effiminate. The other quintessential trophy wife/gold digger SL. But I love it. But lets make this real again. If SMK is permitted to spew bullshyte about how GM is possibly screwing with the Corvette, a RUMOUR but in reality, not a bad idea if executed properly, I could screw with the SL as Mercedes DID screw with the SL formula and DID succeed with it. Mercedes went BACK to the ORIGINAL SL formula, but with a DIFFERENT name. They left the SL alone AS a trophy wife/gold digger car SL went Mercedes re-invented it niot even a decade later after Mercedes created the FIRST LEGIT modern supercar with the FIRST SL... SMK shoudnt try to hide THAT fact...