regfootball

followed a soul today. said to the wife, 'what do you think'? she didnt care for it....... forte is ok. cheap interior. parked next to a fetching new elantra today while filling up. white/tan interior. so it actually looked nice. its passable. still think the sheet metal etc.. is cheap but the elantra has lots of space and value for the dough. much better than a corolla. rode in a buddy's civic last week. what a barf bag of a car. more space than i imagined or maybe it was just the goofball windshield. the civic dash is stupid and atrocious. kia and hyundai are taking advantage of honda and toyotas gaffes definitely.

you mean PLOOD anyone ever see the brady bunch movie. the part where mike brady says ' i designed every last piece of formica'.

white is a nice color for this car. hate that 1998 shifter. otherwise, the interior has promise but the gauge faces and swtichgear look GM cheap. also, some more color contrast inside would help. big improvement over the current lacrosse though. the exterior is more problematic then the interior. its just kinda awkward in some ways. the PLOOD has to go.

that's a nice looking truck.

no shocker. GM got crucified for decades for various paint and rust issues and over time have pretty much all the know how down to cover their ass so they don't get sued big time for things like paint. i doubt hyundai has been down that road yet where their products have been slandered in the press as such. most hyundais and kias i look over have thin sheet metal, touchy paint, cheesy seams etc. slap the thing together, get it on the boat, and collect the check.

well, BMW will have to make sure they can sustain their wheel of fortune prices with those 3 and 4 pots then, and hopefully they can move away from their rather tedious styling rut soon. every 3 series is as common and dull as a late 90's grand am was at the time, and cars like the x6 and the 5 series Maxx don't really bode well for maintaning a healthy ralph lauren image.

regarding the ecoboost. some reviews of various ecoboost cars are showing 25+ mpg on their testing. the 15.9 is anomoly from what i have seen. the epa numbers certainly show equal or greater mpg and give all the added hp. regarding rwd and fwd mpg. it is true a camaro has better mpg than say a malibu ltz v6. but keep in mind, chevy is selling the v6 malibu as an option, and low volume. if you compare base car to base car which represents most sales volume, chevy would rather sell the 4 cylinder fwd malibu with its 33 mpg than say the g8 v6 with its lower mpg. the theory being a few things. one, if 80% of the cars sold have the 33mpg as opposed to 26 mpg or 29 or whatever, it helps cafe. two, people need a car no matter what and their pocketbooks will determine what they spend. if chevy can extort 25 grand for a 4 cylinder with fwd which is much cheaper to make than a rwd v6, they will profit more. the ideal for meeting cafe and profits is to convince the public to max their car payment on the 4 cylinder fwd cheap to build vehicle instead of say an 8 cylinder camaro. but if you want say a G8 GXP, then they must charge you for it since it costs them more to make and gets about 1/2 the fuel economy. they want to move it to a scenario where they force 95% of the public to buy the 4 popper commuters and still extort maximum dollars from their pocketbook.. And if you want to be the 5% that protests loudly they will stick it to you greater than ever before for that extra horsepower and refinement you really want. its like organic foods. if you are steafast about needing the organic foods thing, then you will pay dearly.

the first half of this decade produced a lot of spectacular vehicles. and now all of that is getting shut down. if the 70's were the glory days of the US auto industry, the early part of this decade was likely such for all the companies here in the US.

considering all the other consumption to make a car, which is composed of metal, rubber, PLASTIC, etc. then why even drive a car? Myself, I tend to think anyone who is into 'the environment' but still owns a car at all then is seemingly conflicting. I'd be more than happy to torch any wood house so as to discourage the use of wood to build any of our shelter then. Mud huts anyone? Wood is renewable. The little bit that populates trim on a car is meager and inconsequential. They probably poison the environment more by making the fake stuff out of plastic and toxic chemicals more than wood. The beautiful thing about wood is, you cut it down, you can plant a new tree. And trees give back. Win win. I don't think some wood trim in the LaCrosse will melt the polar ice caps. At least not for 4 billion years.....if ever.

oh, and BMWs are great and all but word is they are planning to attack the market with a bunch of 3 and 4 cylinder cars. So much for those wonderful RWD discerning driver cars.

sounds like chevy feels the next impala must be a volume car. i still think an impala that sells 50k a year with more sales diverted to a malibu that has a broad range of offerings would work. i don't get why they simply couldn't make a 2010 model run of the g8. if the park avenue is really the solution they could load a bunch of them on the boat right now and send them over. of course, GM is inept and cannot react fast enough to do that. and even then, the park avenue is the longer version, and it does not have the manual option. it really is a different car.

its in its honeymoon period. they will be forced to comply like acura audi bmw mercedes cadillac infiniti lexus dodge and chrysler etc. because the market wants the rwd, the dealers do. people prefer the security and convenience of the awd compared to rwd in snow climes. which is why they all do it. most people don't want to uck with snow tires. most of the dorks who buy lexus have no idea snow tires exist. so hyundai will be forced to do it also.

gotta try and get the engine code for the tranny some day this week hopefully. brakes. maybe at 115k or something i will look at options, the brembos are good advice. sounds like the drums in the rear are inherently making it hard to count on any big braking performance upgrades.

wow. someone who is sensitive. if you go back and actually read, you'll see my response was to sami. he said i was taking a jab at you. um, no, i was clearing that up with him that in fact it was in no way a jab at anyone. i was merely stating that a lot of trannies especially to my knowledge, chrysler trannies of a particular vintage you are lucky to get 100k out of them. kind of like the engine sludge issues chrylser had too. i find it hard to believe that anything in there was some sort of personal rant on anyone. wow. living life to the fullest. dodgefan, you really need to stop being the sensitivity police around here. give a guy a badge.......and its only monday. every car maker ends up with issues. hell ford taurus trannies and the 3.8 litre was a nightmare. so was the pushrod GM engines and coolant leaks.

supposedly the tranny flush at 100 was a full flush and drop with a new filter. supposedly. the chyrsler jab was not a jab, i've had friends and rellies with multiple dodge vans with imploding trannies and a relative who buys cars wholesale at auctions for a living and sells cars specifically has mentioned that for many years many dodge models were good for about 60-75k out of their trannies and often multiple blowups.

if i recall, i did have the brakes flushed and bled when i did the brakes at 70k.

buick needs to lose the plood. if all we get is an epsilon for 35k they could at least put real wood in there.

the genesis is pretty well done. however, it does not even have an all wheel drive option. and its styling is nice, but certainly not at all original. run through the rest of hyundais lineup and its mid pack. if we want to make a direct size comparo, we should compare the astra to the elantra and kia forte and since i have driven the forte and the CURRENT gen astra, (ridden in an elantra) I can confirm the astra current is much more of a refined rig than the forte. the elantra is pleasant inside and spacious. but certainly korea has not yet built a compact on par with the best from the european designs.

the astra has the front quarter windows. that should be the truest giveaway. to me, the cruze will be = kia forte. nice enough car. but a throwaway. and in no way should a buick be a throwaway.

if you had read up on the next gen astra, you would know that they share basic suspension components but its modular in the way it allows the astra to have enhanced design, componentry, capabilities and refinement. plus, the astra is better looking than the cruze. inside and out. third, the astra was tuned by german engineers. not the korean contingent.

the vw is really porky though. with cafe, gm can anot afford to roid it up like VW does.

the new nox 17's look ok. better than the hubcaps on a malibu. 17's look much better on the equinox than they do on the ford edge.

dammit NOS, that is hot indeed. can you add some legroom to that ride? how about more of a camaroesque grille?

i am betting the interior is still not up to snuff. but i will wait until i sit in one. i am gonna be one pissed off puppy if new or old gm or penske motors, if none of them sells the next gen ASTRA here in the US. Just like the g8, or chinese park avenue and SLS......GM north america's main mission is to create vehicles they subsequently don't want to allow the US public to buy.

peruse the site, i am def not a hater of GM. the lacrosse is a nice car, i just think they will have a tough time selling them in the price range they are intending to, which is prb why they added the four popper / loss leader version with hubcaps.