regfootball

having driven a few lambdas and a few odysseys i can say that the lambda is a better road vehicle. it lacks a little utility in comparison with the odyssey, but the AWD, nicer interior, and better isolation give it the win. the odyssey is too raw. its not carlike enough to offset its typical honda noisyness. the ride is too hard and the steering feels loose and cheap and you feel too much of the road. the lambdas feel a bit too big and heavy and trucky and high centered. would they have tried an ecoboost flex?

did she say that at Avis or Enterprise or Dollar? How many Charger sales were fleet?

i think fiber cement is ideal of all the choices, it costs a bit more, and you have to caulk it and paint it occassionally. occassionally on the paint being many years. You can get it prefinished. if cost is an issue, buy the top quality vinyl. why vinyl got popular, cheap, and anyone can install it. the important thing with vinyl is flashings at water intrusion points. and the drainage plane. vinyl can be dressed up to fool folks into looking more expensive if you design the exterior to incorporate some trim pieces and also using more than one color. look at nova-brik. its a stacking concrete block that nails to your walls and in some cases is not a bad siding replacement. got any pictures of your house, blu? maybe this out of work architect can offer you some ideas. avoid metal siding like the plague. could you do real stucco?

a crosshairs grille on a galant would have looked entirely the part. the galant shape and design would have been 100% believable with a dodge badge as well. the charger and avenger designs were less mainstream. a galant as either an intrepid or stratus replacement to fill the fwd void in dodge's lineup would have helped to keep chrysler from imploding. we all think rwd was what kept chrysler afloat for awhile. really what it was was the 300c's style, and the hemi's popularity in a time of cheap gas. the charger's styling was never universally approved like the 300's was. had chrysler introduced the charger and not the 300 at all, you probably would have seen the whole line be a lot less successful....especially when you consider that many of the folks who bought the 300's either had no idea which wheels were the drive wheels, or simply were buying the 300 for its penis extender / hood styling.

chrysler never should have bet the farm entirely on the rwd cars to carry the family segments. they bet that the sebring and avenger could compete in mainstream segments to back that up and that bet failed. the galant had an eerily similar look to a little of the dodge design elements and chysler had a partnership with one time with mits. it would have benefit both mits and chrysler to do a joint galant / intrepid to cover mainstream and leave the charger etc. to be a top end entry. then the intrepid / charger would have been a nice 1/2 punch. as it was, the charger failed as a successor to the intrepid, going it alone. the avenger was a market stillbirth and covered neither the loss of the stratus or the intrepid.

what gripes me, our economy and corporations are full of drains, positions of which suck the resources away from doing the technical work and manual labor. by the time you pay the managers, HR folk, marketing and 'communications' folks, lawyers, and the whole other line of stuff, there is no money left in ones business to do the very thing you were supposedly getting paid for. THAT is why no one wants to build anything or make anything in America. When it comes time to cost cut, its too easy to take the China route. Chinese lights breaking? We'll just add more folks to the 'customer service' department!

i really am fine with GM delaying the next consumer Zeta until 2012 or whatever until the supposed future refinements are taken care of. that being, a little less weight, continuing to upgrade the engines and trannies, I would even like to see some interior refinement and North Americanization (i.e. silly window switches on the console instead of the doors, poor cupholder integration, cheap center stack with useless display up top, etc.). AWD would also be on my wish list as I would also think many of the dealers would scream out loud for it as an option. in the meantime, those that REALLY badly want a caprice will find a way to get one. and there is likely going to be a few used g8's to pick from as well.

why are people making such a big deal about this? its because all the fans loving the scandal in this, want to see a famous person become fallible. thing is half the married folk have probably cheated and a fair portion of the married folk get it on the side as well. do you eat the same thing for dinner seven days a week? Even if you eat the best beef tenderloin, you're still human and its all too tempting to have some shrimp or a pork sandwich as well. No one should be casting any stones at this, because its an issue we've all either dealt with or is tempting us every damn day. it falls under the category of human weakness and temptation. we decided it was a good idea to have monogamous relationships to preserve our family units and the well being of our offspring. Yet our biological urges tell us otherwise. What I hope is that Tiger and his wife can take the time to decide if that now this has happened, to see what's left to preserve. To be honest, I really hope they stick it out and that he cools it with the babe hunting while his kids are growing up. If he get divorced all that will happen is it will free him up to go out and skank on more women, it just will cost him BIG BUCKS. Maybe will all the money Elin might get from him, she can buy some GM stock.

nice galant greenhouse. galant, the car dodge should have rebadged as a stratus.

like a remelted rwd version of early decade bonneville.......the greenhouse is improved but i am not a fan of the blunt grille, long hood, or long deck. i suspect the flabby haunches will remain too. saw a nice 300m the other day. why can't chrysler make a good looking car like that again?

plymouth horizon tc3?

the LaCrosse is for the older set and the Lexus bangers. the Regal is for those who might intend a German car. Makes sense since its a German car. that is my anology with this Buick compact. It should compete vs. the VW Golf / Jetta line. which is WHY it needs ALL the body styles. Regal needs it too.

an 09.5 G6 with a 6 speed auto would be a good buy with those incentives. you'd probably get a 2500 dealer discount along with the 4500 off, you'd probably be in the 16-17 range. in my case another 2500 GM card. maybe i should see if there are any with the 6 speed, usb/bluetooth and a sunroof. that would be a nice commuter car.

i forgot the Lexus, its easy to forget. However, as a luxury device, the Lexus is indeed top tier. It just has no emotion. I think the reason Porsche did the Panamera was to elevate the status of an aspirational one from Luxury + sport to Sport + luxury. To be honest, I don't think you will see folks getting chauffered in the Panamera. THose folks will be driving it. Caddy needs to have a good enough entry here to be included with those cars you mentioned and have it seem legit. They already pulled off comparison with the G8 to the BMW and the corvette plays that role all the time. SO GM CAN DO IT!....my biggest fear is that they ALWAYS SKIMP IN INTERIOR QUALITY and this is the prime selling point of the S Class. If you think of the CTS interior its not even half way to where it should be in an S Class, and the CTS interior is a definite step in the right direction. THe LaCrosse interior however still has big issues on plastics and leather quality, fit and finish and panel gaps and assembly. Also textures and gloss all over. GM STILL MAKES SHINY GLOSSY SLOPPY INTERIORS!

cadillac needs to duplicate the chassis of the S class. the S class is the target for everything except price. the 7 series is bloated and ugly. the A8 is a misfit. the jaguar is nice but the interior is strange. other makes are wannabees. what did princess diana die in? an S class. the only other thing caddy could aspire to be a version of is rolls or bentley. the S class is THE target. and really when it comes down to it, the thing that makes the S class what it is is impeccable interior luxury. has anyone ever sat in one recently? the eerie quiet. the amazing material and finish quality. the room and space. the SOUND of the door when it closes. and then imagine how it drives. the genesis is a korean sort of knockoff attempt at duplicating some of that and they have a ways to go. The CTS is a nice job at aspirational luxury. BUt its not hard core luxury like the S Class. Perhaps the maserati is another one could consider a real luxury ride. cadillac needs to keep the price down though to move in volume and still draw its customary older buyers. Any caddy S class competitor should carry a DOHC v8 option with 6-8 speed tranny and AWD option (or sheet just make it standard) as well. Perhaps it should even have a v12 option although a twin turbo v8 would work just as well.

these bistro mugs really rock! 3 bucks! get em while you can! i only got 2, should have got like 6 of em.

the more and more i see of the sedan and the more pics i see of the hatch, i'll be really upset if we don't get the hatch. the sedan looks tidy enough, but it simply doesn't look very upscale. it looks like a fancier elantra. the hatch has an interesting rear that is nicer than the golf and has a style all its own. i don't want the sedan, i want the hatch. there is no excuse to not make this a full line offering and bring the hatches too. sedan, hatches, wagon. i can even get an elantra wagon. so this should not be difficult.

if you look at the images on the 2010 opel astra group on FB....there is even a nice hypothesis of the astra wagon. if buick is shooting at vw like they are with the regal, then the buick compact line should echo the golf/jetta....hb, wagons, etc, sedans.....including a full range of engines and trannies...including manuals.....

yet you read long term tests on the new Jag in the buff books and they say it has more than its share of problems.

parts have been getting dumped on. Where I live, we got like 3". The wind and cold is a beeoch, but 2/3 of my driveway was bare. The insane thing is, they called off school today. Right now I am at mcdonalds letting the kids burn off steam so she won't drive me crazy. I think the school staff wanted a day off.

i had continental extreme contacts on my 99 SHO for awile and they were good for snow actually, but i am not sure how much different those were from the touring contacts. the touring contacts are a popular tire.

sounds like the tires you have on it, are actually decent tires, but the weight distribution might be making it tougher. FWIW in this discussion, my neighbor across the street, reps for Dodge. When i asked him about getting a magnum he said be sure to get an AWD one. He said even with the electronics and such the Magnums were absolute skates in bad weather, lots of trouble with any incline other than perfectly level. You can't flame war this guy, he is probably a bigger cut nut and better driver than 99% of the people on this site...the SSR in his garage is just his 'extra ride'. I know he has considered trying to find a Viper to own.

if you study the reasons why snow tires work, a lot of it is the siping, and all the extra outside edges on the tire biting away. also the ability to shed away microscoping amounts of moisture, snow, and water...some of which ice or snow turning into water from the heat of the tire. the tire needs to shed that moisture just like it does normally in the rain. edges that are not present on a typical high perf all season or summer tire, that provide the extra bite. the snow tires rubber compound doesn't turn stiff a super low temps either, so the rubber is flexible and remains grippy. the original blizzaks i recall advertised all the microscopic pores in the tread that allowed it to have so much more biting edge. if i were filthy rich i would get snow tires for my AWD vehicles for winter. I was out in the storm tonight in the taurus x bustin it up, but i am guessing it would have been a sherman tank virtually unstoppable with some HAKKAPELITAS

hell the first 6-10 vehicles i drove were all rwd. vegas, vettes, pickups, buicks, etc. the only one aside from the vegas that were enjoyable in winter was the 77 century coupe (regal with a different grille). the reason it was good for winter....it had the 231 v6 in it, no weight on the front and no horsepower to get into trouble with. the 77 electra coupe on the other hand was a complete disaster in snow and bad weather. very nose heavy car.

bingo. exactly. a little more conventional, most of the benefits of the smart. smart, spark, any coincidence the names are similar sounding?