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smk4565

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Everything posted by smk4565

  1. smk4565
    I agree and I think that Cadillac could offer an SUV above the Escalade that starts at $150k and goes up to $200k. And Grand Cherokee Hellcat, and Audi SQ7/SQ8, Range Rover SVR, and G63 (perhaps a GLS73) and Alfa Romeo is doing a 7 seat SUV that will have at least a 500 hp version, maybe the 600 hp hybrid shows up there too. Plus the Rolls Royce Cullinan and Ferrari is doing an SUV. This isn't so much a niche as it is fast growing segment. That is what the Omega platform should be for, there should be an SUV version of the CT6-V.
  2. smk4565
    But who cares if it can't handle at all. No Escalade driver is going to a track or even doing spirited driving on a back road, much like they aren't going off road. Drop a big supercharged V8 in there and it will go fast in a straight line and horsepower and exclusivity equals bragging rights. That is all they need to sell enough of them with a big sticker to make profit.
  3. smk4565
    The XT5 is priced like an X3 and the XT4 is priced like an X2 so Cadillac has gone right into that same area that BMW has gone. Even the XT6 could cost less than the X5, I don't know how Cadillac will price an Enclave rebadge at $60-100k. The Audi Q7 starts at $49,900, I see Cadillac making that their target for the XT6. Cadillac's job is to make profit, so you have to go where the money is. I would rather see Cadillac go up the ladder rather than below the XT4, but I would also rather see the XT6 built on Omega platform with a 550 hp 4.2 liter TT V8 and 10 speed automatic. I'd like to see XT5 move to the CT5 platform with the same engine and the 3.0TT V6 with 400 hp as a midrange option but I know none of that will happen. And if Cadillac doesn't want to go up, they have to find the volume going down. Correct but they won't do any of that because 3 of those vehicles are on the wrong platform, and they haven't done an Escalade V-series yet, so I don't see them doing it now. Even though the Escalade is an overweight truck, I would make a V-series version of it anyway. There is an AMG G-wagen which makes no sense and people buy it, so why not put a CTS-V engine in an Escalade and sell it for $175k. They'll find 1,000 people a year to buy it and that has to be like a $50k profit kind of car.
  4. smk4565
    You can have 10 factories, people have to want to buy a Ram over a Ford or Chevy/GMC. Now if Mexico allows them to build the truck cheaper (although GM builds trucks there too) and they can undercut on price, maybe they win sales. But at that point, why not lobby to get the chicken tax removed and have these made in China and have $20,000 Ram trucks to undercut the F150 by $10,000. Then you'll see Ram rise up the sales chart.
  5. smk4565
    The X5 (2019 model base price $61k) is a price level above the XT5, so with XT4 and XT5 competing vs X2 and X3, what % of Cadillac SUV is the lower end of their line up? The same holds true for all these luxury brands. Also remember this is the final year of the current generation X5 and they are probably winding production down on those, there is a new generation X5 for 2019.
  6. smk4565
    Elon Musk just did a double middle finger and Stone Cold Stunner to the naysayers.
  7. smk4565
    XT5 has no inner showroom competition. The X3 is up with the X2 being added. I think XT5 sales will drop when XT4 is added. If the XT5 is really strong then sales should rise even with XT4 selling a few thousand units a month and then XT6 later being added to that.
  8. smk4565
    And yet BMW X3 sales are up 30% this year, X1 is up 6% and the X2 as a new entrant has added 11,000 more units. They have gone from about 53,000 units to 75,000 units from last year to this year for the first 3 quarters. It would seem demand is quite high for the smaller BMW SUVs.
  9. smk4565
    Those young female professionals want a BMW. And interior space won't really have any bearing on how well the XT4 sells because there are tons of small vehicles that sell, the Kia Soul is small, they sell bunches of those, Hyundai Kona is a foot and a half shorter than an XT4, Mazda CX-3 is a foot shorter and they sell those. Audi Q3 is smaller and they have a Q1 in other markets. Encore as mentioned has sold well and is much smaller than XT4. I'd almost be shocked if Cadillac doesn't make an XT3 in the future.
  10. smk4565
    Eventually they will hybrid all things.
  11. smk4565
    I would think who cares if it idles high, that is to be expected when you get an F1 engine, you aren't buying this car for NVH, they'll sell you a Maybach if you want that. I would have thought maybe they could get some sort of emissions exemption for how low volume this will be. They will figure it out though, and I applaud the commitment of spending all the time and money on a low volume pet project in which they are just trying to prove they can put an F1 engine into a road car. No one else has the guts to do something like that, and this is an unreal level of performance.
  12. smk4565
    Isn't the 2.7 liter made for rear drive applications? My guess is they just dial up the boost on the 2.0 turbo, especially with the displacement tax in China over 2 liters. Some sort of electrification would be the way to go, but I feel like that will get killed buy the bean counters due to cost, even though it is freaking Cadillac and they shouldn't be worried about cost. These are the people that thought $5 for a CT6 door handle was too much cost. And they better bring more than 310 hp if they want to compete with the Germans, more like 400 hp. Nope.
  13. smk4565
    They are pretty forgettable vehicles, not surprising that the public forgot to buy them.
  14. smk4565
    I will for sure see full self drive in my lifetime. There will be level 4 cars in the 2020s.
  15. smk4565
    Tesla should have a class action lawsuit against the and they should refund that $8,000 to people that bought that option. This was just a scam to get an extra $8,000 profit per car thinking they could do a software update in a couple years and make it self driving. It doesn't work like that. Mercedes has said the 2021 S-class will have Level 3 autonomous driving, and Level 5 is full self driving. The S-class been a technology leader for decades, and if they are at a Level 3 in 2021, I don't see how Tesla thinks they can get to Level 5 in the next few years. Maybe 2030 we get fully self driving cars.
  16. smk4565
    If these Germans can get out EVs that rival Tesla on price, but actually deliver it in a timely manner and not 6 months after you put a $1,000 deposit down, then I think Tesla could be in trouble.
  17. smk4565
    The V12 will probably be a $50,000 option.
  18. smk4565
    More people are willing to spend $90k on an SUV than are on a sports car.
  19. smk4565
    Benz will have a strong response and the GLS is supposed to get a Maybach trim. And we know the GLS63 will have 603 hp, they trademarked GLS73 for something above that. So I imagine BMW will have to do an 600 hp X7 M. Horsepower wars are on!
  20. smk4565
    I have to say the interior of this looks top notch. I saw some photos of the beige and blue interior and that looked quite good. The pricing is quite good too, BMW came to play here, gauntlet thrown, we'll see how Mercedes responds with the 2020 GLS.
  21. smk4565
    Dynamic Handling Package indeed. This is a vehicle they need, they have to have a big 3 row SUV, especially for the American market.
  22. smk4565
    Nah, E-class, especially the E53.
  23. smk4565
    Technically it is a re-badged Nissan Navara, which is a new truck. The Frontier we have in the USA is the 2004-2014 Navara. And the X-class was never designed for the US market, it was made for Europe, Africa and Australia. If they wanted to do an American version, I imagine there would be interior upgrades, more sound deadening, different engines, and suspension changes. And you wouldn't need a G-class platform for any of that, but they could pull suspension and differential bits from it to put on the X-class. From a CNBC article a few days ago: Mercedes-Benz, a luxury car company founded in 1926, makes an average $339 profit every second. This amounts to an average $20,310 every minute, $1,218,656 every hour and $29,247,743 every 24 hours, according to Staveley Head, a U.K.-based car insurance provider.
  24. smk4565
    I was thinking more the rear of the car, with the shape of it. And we are talking about 45 years in between designs.
  25. smk4565
    Full size truck is too big for Europe, they are becoming too big for the USA. Canyon or Colorado could work in Europe, assuming they had the dealer network, but they don’t. FCA could sell a Wrangler pick up there I bet. As far as the X-class, I think that is putting their toe in the water. If it does well they can do a mid cycle refresh and give it a new interior and make it ready for the US market. The Mercedes turbo 4 has as much torque as the V6 Colorado or Tacoma and the in-line six blows away any mid-size truck on sale here. Americans love pick ups and the money spent on them is pretty high, it is a tempting play for Mercedes to go into that market. Daimler has a lot of truck parts in the empire to pull from if needed and I imagine an X-class with the G-wagon’s suspension, locking diffs and 4-wheel drive would make an awesome off roader.
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