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smk4565

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Everything posted by smk4565

  1. smk4565
    Took Mercedes decades to build volume in the US, but they were a premier luxury car in Europe since the 1900s. Genesis is new every where and yes it takes a long time to build a brand. But to build a brand and come into a crowded market you need a product that can steal sales. Even if Infiniti folds with a recession that market share will get divided up.
  2. smk4565
    I am not saying Genesis has to outsell everyone. I am saying if they want to win, they need SUV's obviously, and to build a better car. Mercedes built the best car, that is why they took over the luxury market. I like the G80's new look, the interior is nice too. But is it better than the competition? I don't think better, so is the $5k price discount enough to overcome that? Genesis is basically doing what Cadillac did 6-7 years ago, with ATS, CTS and CT6, that is what G70, G80, and G90 are in size and price, they are almost identical. This G80 is nicer than the CTS, and G90 is nicer than CT6 was, but they probably don't have the chassis dynamics, so that could be a trade off. And those Cadillac sedans didn't find success 5 years ago, now the sedan segment is even less, how does Genesis succeed where Cadillac failed?
  3. smk4565
    But the US has never been Mercedes key market, it is their #3 market. And from that chart sales were a pretty steady rise and even more so in the 80s and 90s as they added more models. Also Mercedes came in way higher in price than Genesis is at. Maybe Genesis will add more models and grow, but in a declining auto market I don't see who they are stealing gobs of market share off of.
  4. smk4565
    Here's the thing about Genesis: the model line up, the dealer network, the inventory, those are all things they control. Any miscue with those is self inflicted. Things their management screwed up. If they can't get basics like dealer network and inventory right, I don't know how they get to building vehicles considered among the best in the world. More power isn't going to save the Stinger, the car is priced wrong. SUVs have crushed sedan sales because buyers needed more room, more cargo space, wanted AWD, etc. Coupes are almost disappearing from the market, because buyers want more space, back seats, etc. The Toyota Camry's drop in volume is mostly because of the RAV4. That is where the sales went. Today's RAV4 segment is the mid-size sedan segment of 15 years ago. Today's sedan market is the coupe market of 20 years ago. Kia should have gone after buyers that wanted a sports car like a Camaro/Mustang/BRZ but need 4 doors and all wheel drive. They marketed the car to the wrong people, on top of pricing it wrong. My comparison with Telluride is only that the Telluride has a nice interior, the Stinger doesn't and they come from the same company. Telluride is best in class interior, the Stinger is probably the worst interior you can get for a car of that price point.
  5. smk4565
    6 years of powertrain warranty, but only 1 year of bumper to bumper. Something that doesn't matter to a lease customer, which is the majority of the luxury market. That extra warranty may help, selling cars at 80% the cost of rivals I am sure helps, but Genesis still has really low sales figures. So clearly what they have done isn't enough. The Nurburgring is more about the engineering that went into the car. Is this Genesis a fancy Hyundai, or does it have Porsche or Mercedes level engineering? I know Genesis has it's own rear drive platform, but do they have engineers at Genesis that can make a G80 perform on par with a mid-engine super car, because the Germans have engineers that can.
  6. smk4565
    By bad dealer network I didn't mean the dealerships themselves were bad, but that the network was too small. Now if they are back to 318 dealerships, that is about what Lexus has, BMW and Mercedes have about 350-360. So Genesis isn't that out numbered and yet their sales volume is very low. Mostly that low volume is no crossovers, but crossovers have been on the rise for 10 years. Why on earth did they launch a brand with 3 sedans first, before making a crossover? That is totally incompetent management. Genesis has better reliability than Jaguar, but warranty didn't help Jaguar, and it isn't helping Genesis either. Unless by not offering a 5 year warranty, their sales would drop even more. Genesis is trying to make an argument that they have the more reliable car with the best warranty, but Lexus already has that reliability title built over decades. The Stinger is larger than a 3-series sure, but Kia positioned that car as premium sports sedan and some of the German sedan names were thrown around. When really no one wants a $50,000 Kia, even if it has 365 hp. You can get a 400 hp Mustang for $40k and the interior is about the same. Even within Kia, the Telluride has a better interior than the Stinger and the Telluride is a 3 row SUV with AWD that should cost more than a 2 wheel drive mid-size sedan. Stinger was the wrong car because of where they priced it in the market. I could also argue that a performance SUV might have sold, in a sea of FWD crossovers like Edge, Blazer, Passport, etc, if the Stringer was a 365 hp rear drive SUV priced int he $30-40k range with that bunch it could have been a success. So the big problem with Hyundai/Kia/Genesis is timing. These guys do what the Germans did 10 years ago, because by the time they copy the idea, design the car, get the budget, build the models, wind tunnel it, track test it, crash test it, etc then get it to production, they are a generation behind where the market is.
  7. smk4565
    Kia Stinger is rumored to die after just one generation. Genesis has a bad dealer network but that is their fault, and own mismanagement of the brand launch. In 2018 they had more dealers than Lexus before the closed half of them. Still they have about 2/3rd the dealers of other luxury marques. But what use is this warranty if they don’t have dealerships to service the cars. Jaguar offers 5/60,000 bumper to bumper warranty with 5 years complimentary maintenance and 5 years roadside assistance. Hasn’t helped sales any, they are still terrible. Genesis offers 3 years complimentary maintenance.
  8. smk4565
    And yet their cars don't sell, even when under cutting competitors by $5k on G70 and G80 and offering a longer warranty. What else they got? I think they might gain a bit more traction in crossovers where Acura and Infiniti have dated product, the XT4, XT5 are nothing remarkable, Lincoln Nautilus is pretty average. But Lexus and the Germans are pretty strong there too, we'll have to see how the GV70 looks when it hits as that is the key segment.
  9. smk4565
    I don’t think an extra year of warranty is going to sway any buyers on a luxury car.
  10. smk4565
    G80 is supposed to start just under $50k, and the press car photos are no doubt more like $70k, so pretty close to German car money, G80 starts about $5k lower than E-class or 5-series. The G80 doesn't have more performance, it doesn't have a hybrid, it doesn't have any tech that isn't already on the competition. Likewise with the GV80. They haven't done anything better than what is already offered for roughly the same money. So what's the appeal here? Yes it is better than the Lexus GS which dies after 2020 model year, better than an Acura RLX or Lincoln Continental, both of which will probably be dead in a year or two, but aside from that, where are they finding buyers in a shrinking sedan segment? Are they going to pull people out of SUVs into a G80? Are they hoping Sonata drivers spend double the money and upgrade to G80? I think this car will be a sales dud much like I predicted the Kia Stinger would flop and it has. The Stinger should have been priced dollar to dollar even with a Mustang and been marketed as Mustang/Camaro with 4 doors that can fit a family. Instead they tried to spin it as a 3-series competitor and that was huge miss.
  11. smk4565
    After seeing the new G80 launch and Q&A on Motortrend, the car is nice. The interior looks good, the materials look good, but I don't know that is any nicer than an E-class or 5-series, at best it is on par with them. And it doesn't have the power or performance of them, doesn't have any pedigree either. G80 is a good effort, but not going to beat the big boys.
  12. smk4565
    My original point about those other really fast high end cars is most are all wheel drive. When you go to these crazy power levels you need to send it to all 4 wheels, otherwise it doesn't really matter if you put 2,000 hp in a car, it won't get to the ground.
  13. smk4565
    I am just saying there are dozens of fast cars out there. The Tesla Model S can do 0-60 in 2.3 seconds, a Chiron can top 260 mph, there are full size sedans that can do 207 mph, the 911 GT2 RS can do the Nurburgring in 6:47, etc. Heck there are SUV's that go over 200 mph now. There is a lot of performance out there, and more than anyone that isn't a pro driver can even use on a track let alone the street. So you need other differentiators that just performance. They are all fast, so what gets someone to pick a 911 over an AMG GT or a F8 over a Huracan? In most cases it is brand image. The the car sells on the brand name more than the performance. If a Chevrolet is better than any Cadillac, why is Cadillac still here?
  14. smk4565
    GM's halo product should not be a Chevrolet, their value brand. Cadillac as the top brand, should have the halo product.
  15. smk4565
    That's a performance per dollar argument. 90% the performance at 50% the price, but some people want that last 10%. And Zora will give that to them. So i am glad GM is going up after that high performance level. This also has a higher top speed than a C8: So why can't there be a Cadillac whether it be a mid-engine coupe, front engine coupe or a full size sedan with C8 performance. Bentley made a car the size and weight of an Escalade do 207 mph, why can't Cadillac? And same goes for Mercedes, Brabus tuned an S-class to go 217 mph, but I feel like AMG should be able to take the next gen S73 to 217 mph to beat Bentley.
  16. smk4565
    That is why I have long said Cadillac should have a car above the Corvette. If you want an interior nicer than an Escalade and you want a sports car, you have to buy something European. The Corvette can't play in that level, nor should it, the Corvette works because it isn't crazy expensive. But clearly there are people that think $300k is cheap for a new car, that is why they walk right past the Rolls Royce Ghost and buy a Phantom.
  17. smk4565
    The AMG GT costs too much to qualify for Car and Driver's 10 best list. The AMG GT R is faster around the Nurburgring than any Corvette ever made. As far as sales volume goes, the Corvette costs E-class money, if the Corvette were double the price that volume would be gone. The Corvette is outstanding performance per dollar, perhaps the best performance per dollar in the world, but that doesn't make it better than other cars. Better value maybe, but not a better car.
  18. smk4565
    The SLS AMG and that C63 are over 10 years old. The E63 runs an 11.0 second 1/4 mile and a GT63 4-door a 10.9, those would beat that ZR1 easily but Car and Driver did clock a 2019 ZR1 at 10.8 seconds. The GT coupe is not all wheel drive, that is why it has a 11.4 second 1/4 mile. The next gen GT is going to be all wheel drive, they will get their straight line specs. Although keep in mind an AMG GT with 577 hp beats a 755 hp ZR1 around the Nurburgring. AMG has the chassis, brakes, handing, steering, and suspension already there, when they add all wheel drive they can add power. Corvette is fast but doesn't have a nice interior, I'd like to see the Corvette have a 2021 Escalade level interior and Super Cruise so that is is more on par with interiors you get from other high end sports cars.
  19. smk4565
    All wheel drive 911 weighs less than a C8. On the 911, awd adds 139 lbs, it isn’t that big a penalty. They can cut weight from the Corvette if they want to spend money, build it out of carbon fiber if they are worried about weight. The AMG One is 1,000 lbs lighter than a C8, so weight can always be removed for a price.
  20. smk4565
    The 911 Turbo S probably beats all them because it is all wheel drive. Even the 2020 Ferrari F8 which replaces the 488 and has 710 hp, has the same 0-60 time as a 443 hp 911. And look at lap times on tracks, the 911 and Huracan are among the best out there with all wheel drive.
  21. smk4565
    They should offer AWD on every Corvette. Lambo and Porsche offer it on every model, AMG is moving to it on every car, the AMG GT is the last of their RWD only cars and it is at the end of the life cycle. McLaren is going to have all wheel drive, Ferrari has it on some models, etc. I think AWD would expand that appeal of the Corvette being the everyday, every man's sports car, if you can use it all winter long in the snow belt.
  22. smk4565
    Chevy is going to build a high revving, flat plane, turbo DOHC V8, which is something out of a Ferrari playbook, and you expect low maintenance? And maybe it will, but we won't know until they have been on the road 5 years. Still need all wheel drive for the ZR1 and Zora, Lamborghinis are all wheel drive for a reason. Would be good to have all wheel drive on the Z06 also. And I mean all wheel drive from the V8 not just from the electric motors up front. Because without AWD, that ZR1 will bet beat in 0-60 and 1/4 mile runs all day long by less powerful Porsches. A 911 Carrera 4S does 0-60 in 2.8 seconds and that's with 443 hp and 390 lb-ft of torque. That's giving up 100 lb-ft to the C8 and it is still quicker and the C8's 2.95 seconds.
  23. smk4565
    This engine won't be like an LS/LT engine, they are building an engine more like the Panamera Turbo Hybrid or the 2021 AMG GT73 hybrid. Maybe those cars aren't expensive to maintain, but I would guess they don't have NA V8 ownership costs.
  24. smk4565
    True but the Blackwing V8, which is closest to the LT6/LT7, makes 131 hp per liter. Now they are going to 155 hp per liter, so that is extra boost. Now there are 200 hp/liter engines out there, so I don't think it should be an issue, but I don't think these are going to have LS1 maintenance costs. The issue is really getting the power on the ground, they need an all wheel drive system that can handle 825 lb-ft.
  25. smk4565
    GM currently doesn’t make a turbo LS/LT engine, nor do they make a V8 hybrid. So they are going into new territory. Also Ferrari engines need a ton of maintenance, if the LT7 does also, I see no problem with that as long as they disclose it up front.
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