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smk4565

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Everything posted by smk4565

  1. smk4565
    Neither is good. They should use names, as evidence by their #1 most successful product of the past 20 years and the icon of the brand has a word name. And the alphabet soup models seem to have about a 10 year life span before getting the axe. Escalade was around before CTS, STS, DTS, XTS, SRX, XLR and ATS, and it will be here when all 7 of those name plates are dead. I'd go with the names. They got like 50 years out of Deville and Seville, they don't necessarily have to use those 2 names, but anything is better than "CT5"
  2. smk4565
    Inline six needs no balance shaft. Plus an inline 4 and an inline 6 can share about 75% of the parts which helps in manufacturing. This engine will be an all star until the day that an electric powertrain replaces it. The face looks like it was done by whoever designed the 2013 SL, that car was also ugly as could be until they redid it last year. From the side of back the CLS looks fine, the front is a train wreck. They would be better off putting the 2004 front end on this car and it would look better. I imagine the E-class coupe will outsell the CLS, it looks way better, and is probably cheaper. But this instead people:
  3. smk4565
    I like real names, I am surprised they didn’t use Aviator here and come up with something new like Nautilus if they do an SUV in between MKX and Navigator. But I applaud the dumping of MK-whatever names.
  4. smk4565
    The face looks a bit droopy, he rest of the car looks good, need to see it all, I imagine the inside is E-class coupe, no reason to change anything. The big news is the inline six and how soon they can get that to the other cars.
  5. smk4565
    Variable compression ratio is a novel concept, but is it just a gimmick? The horsepower and torque outputs are inline with other turbo 4's out there. The gas mileage looks good at 26 mpg combined, an X3 is 25 mpg and a GLC300 is 24 mpg combined. Maybe the variable compression gets it there, maybe it is the CVT.
  6. smk4565
    SRX because it is a Cadillac vs a Buick, and the SRX has a V6 vs a turbo 4. And even though the SRX has some terrible FWD proportions, I still think Cadillac's styling language looks better than Buick's.
  7. smk4565
    The pricing has been announced: $150,000 for a 300 mile range truck and $180,000 for a 500 mile range truck. That is quite good because I looked up a Freightliner Cascadia and they sell for $140-155,000 for most models, unless you get a stripped down base model for $120,000. So a slight premium for the Tesla, but it should make that up in operating costs rather easily.
  8. smk4565
    GM and Ford make profit because the annual sales rate is 17 million cars, there are forecasts that post 2030 the annual sales rate could be 6 million cars, that is well below the 2009 levels than drove GM to bankruptcy. Airborne drones will replace cars at some point, might be 10 years, might be 30, but at some point car sales will go into decline and never rebound. The value in Tesla is the charging network, Solar City, solar roof, batteries, autonomous tech, etc all of which can be applied to a flying drone just as easily as it is to a car.
  9. smk4565
    GM doesn’t have the money to buy Tesla. No automaker does. Toyota maybe has enough cash with a stock swap to make it work. Toyota has $50 billion in cash, with a $188 billion value, they are the only one that could buy, and then Musk can refuse to sell too, which he would. I think Musk will raise the money to keep Tesla going, he will find more investors because there is a chance that Tesla is Amazon and GM, Ford and Toyota are JC Penny, KMart and Macy’s just waiting to fall.
  10. smk4565
    Not true, you can still order a Model 3 for $35,000. Not sure when it will be built, but you can order one on their website. I think he could issue more stock to raise money, he is still a wall street darling, because the Model 3 can stabilize the losses, if he gets the Semi truck he could change shipping and make a lot of money.
  11. smk4565
    Musk is worth $20 billion, if even 10% of that is cash and cash equivalents then he could have enough to buy time if he had to do it personally. He did make $300,000 selling Boring company hats. The cash flow issue is solved once the Model 3 is producing 5,000 cars a week, he just has to get it to that point and Tesla will be fine.
  12. smk4565
    Question is how much cash does Elon Musk have? He might actually have $2 billion in cash to put into the company to keep it afloat until the Model 3 is at full production and the 2nd SUV hits the market since it will just be a tall Model 3
  13. smk4565
    Maybe, maybe not we don’t know too much about long term reliably of the Hyundai twin turbo V6, but Kia scores well in reliability ratings. The Kia will depreciate twice as fast as a BMW though, a five year old 3-Series will probably sell for $10,000 more than a five year old Stinger. Case in point, a 2015 Kia K900 V8 was $59,000 new, they sell certified used for $27,000 now, that is a hell of a drop.
  14. smk4565
    I am glad Kia made a rear drive car, I wish there were more of them out there. But imagine Chevy trying to sell a sedan smaller than the Malibu for $40-50k, when they tried a full size car with a V8 for $45k that didn't work. The Stinger is a better deal than the Regal, but there are Camaro, Mustang, Challenger, Charger, 300 for less money. I think if they priced it like and targeted Mustang and Camaro (performance with a back seat and awd) then Kia could get a lot of sales. If they try to be a value play to the Germans it won't work.
  15. smk4565
    In a way it is competitively priced in another way I think they are a little high. I see this car's real competitors as Camaro and Mustang, but the Stinger has 4 doors. You can get a Mustang premium for $30k and a Mustang GT for $35k, and I haven't looked feature by feature, but I imagine a lot of the equipment is similar on both cars. And to that point a V8 Dodge Charger is $35k, a V8 Chrysler 300 is $39k, and they always have big discounts at FCA dealerships. The version that Car and Driver drove was $50,000, that is just too much for a Kia. $29,900 base and $37,000 for the V6 would have looked more competitive. The problem I suspect is Kia will see BMW or Alfa Romeo as their competition, which it isn't.
  16. smk4565
    Rav4 and Highlander hybrid are where it is at. The Prius serves a mission for being an affordable hybrid, huge mpg for the commuter types that do 95% of their driving alone. But for families that want crossovers, the answer is already there with their hybrid crossovers, just advertise them more and make them better. They are selling 4,000+ Rav4 hybrids a month and I feel like they don't even advertise that they have it.
  17. smk4565
    Trax is too small, Equinox size is better. GM needs a crossover in between Equinox and Traverse too, that is a good place to put an EV.
  18. smk4565
    If he could sell 10,000 Model 3's it would be a $500 million infusion into the company. Musk is genius in how he gets all these interest free short term loans from people, but if they had cars to sell, they wouldn't have cashflow problems.
  19. smk4565
    Tesla does want to lay the smack down to the gas engine. If batteries and electric motors get cheap enough it will happen fast. With the new Roadster where price isn't an concern, it can just lay waste to anything with a gas car. The real challenge though is to make an $25,000 EV that doesn't suck. If some billionaires speed around in Tesla Roadsters it doesn't really change anything, the world changes when the electric drivetrain is more common than the gas in an average family sedan. Think of this, the Tesla Roadster has as much torque as ten Mercedes-AMG S65's! If Tesla can pull all this stuff off, the future will be awesome.
  20. smk4565
    I think this truck is awesome it re-writes the rules and could change the way shipping is done. Diesel semi's have basically seen not a whole lot of advancement in 20-30 years, sure they got an extra mpg here or there, a little more acceleration, but this would be a breakthrough. The fact that you could have trucks that aren't god awful slow, or polluting like crazy or making a ton of noise would be epic. I am actually quite excited for this. That being said, they actually have to build it. Tesla has a new idea every year, but they can't actually produce the ideas they come up with and get them in people's hands.
  21. smk4565
    I like the looks on the small crossover. I wouldn't buy a crossover, but given the proportions designers have to work with on compact crossovers, I think that one looks pretty good. These batteries will come down in price. Probably by 2026 the batteries will be $60 per kilowatt hour.
  22. smk4565
    I think Mercedes considered a GLS coupe and ruled it out because it isn't really possible to do a sloping roofline 3 row vehicle. BMW should forget the X8 and do an X9 4-row Crossover, with rear facing seats in the second row like a Maybach limo.
  23. smk4565
    Just 8? We demand 18 new crossovers!
  24. smk4565
    The GX is hopelessly dated, it had a V8 making 302 hp or some level that modern 4 cylinders can make. 3 row RX means they can kill GX or move it to some new chassis and push up the price.
  25. smk4565
    I am pretty sure an 80s Ford LTD could tow over 12,000 lbs as proven by their marketing materials of a parked car hooked to a trailer with a 40 foot boat.
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