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smk4565

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Everything posted by smk4565

  1. smk4565
    Pricing is what I am waiting for. And will they price it at a point where a lot of current Corvette buyers are not going to pay? And that is key because Corvette isn't going to conquest Italian sports cars. Even contesting Porsche will be hard. This seems like an NSX but for what the NSX actually should cost, because the NSX pricing is a joke, that car is $50k overpriced. I am also curious on all performance specs when they come out.
  2. smk4565
    Another monotone charcoal interior from GM. Fans of the C7 should like the looks, I think the C7 is ugly through, the C6 and C5 were both better designs. Interior ergonomics look a mess with that long strip of buttons. Appears like it will be fast though, I bet the performance is good with the mid-engine design. A base C8 will probably perform with or better than a C7 Z06.
  3. smk4565
    Toyota could spend Ford under a table if they wanted to. Toyota made over $17 billion in profit last year, over 20 billion the year before and sits on about a $50 billion pile of cash and short term investments. Why on earth they haven't taken that full size truck segment head on is beyond me.
  4. smk4565
    True to that. I think Tundra could outsell F150 if Toyota got on it. But F-series does have a big line that get lumped into there. And I don't see Toyota doing medium duty trucks and such.
  5. smk4565
    Beat me to it. I get this is a low volume thing, but it looks too like a Ferrari 458 and 1 lap around the Nurburgring will deplete the battery. The 130 people that buy it probably don't care about any of that, but most people don't even know Lotus is still around, and they don't really have any product that people want. Sports cars as a segment are dying, and that is all these guys have, and they are expensive, it isn' like they are in Mustang or Supra level pricing where they might be able to get a little volume.
  6. smk4565
    No suck luck the BMW X8 is a go, and it probably won't cost any more to build than an X7, yet it will sell for $130,000 and the BMW bored will be like as they count their profits IF Toyota got their act together on the Tundra. The current Tundra is a joke, it is dated as can be, has been on market for 12 years, has a 5.7 liter engine making 3 liter V6 power. Toyota has 10s of billions of dollars in cash on hand. If they launched a Tundra that was class leading in ride, handling, towing, hauling, fuel economy, refinement, and reliability (which they have the money to do), THEN they can do a Lexus version. But in their current state of affairs no, their full size truck entrant is a joke, and there is no excuse for it, they aren't on an FCA shoestring budget, they are the richest car company in the world. I actually think if Toyota set a goal and made a 20 year commitment that they could get the Tundra to outsell the F150. The Camry only needed about 15 years to be the #1 selling car, the RAV4 needed about 15 years to be #1 selling SUV.
  7. smk4565
    I think it is great that they are killing the X-class (and SLC also). I think they should kill the S-class convertible, to make more room for the SL. I don't think the CLS serves any purpose, they can kill that too. I'd like to see C and E-class convertibles stay since they are killing SLC and S-class convertible. They can kill the C-class wagon too. Cut the fat, make a Maybach G-wagon instead. I could see a Maybach E580, which would be pretty bad ass. And that is easy stuff to do, just load up existing models that are already paid for. Heck that has kept FCA in business for the past 10 years.
  8. smk4565
    I never thought a Mercedes pick up was a good idea to begin with, and I certainly wouldn't use any thing from Nissan/Renault as a platform. That is why I didn't think it would work here. If it worked overseas they could have done a gen 2 on their own platform and brought it to the USA. Doing it the way they did was a way to put their toe in the water with little R&D expense, I think it is a smart move to dump the pick up and focus on sedans and SUVs which is where they make their money. And imagine Cadillac or Lincoln making a pickup without using the Silverado or F150 chassis. And see how the business case for that would work. GM can't even make a business case for a Camaro that rides on an existing platform. And it is every carmaker, they see crossovers as profit, and that is where the money will go, and the Detroit 3 have full size trucks also which works here, not outside of the USA, thus they have to put all their other money in crossovers or whatever China demands or regulates.
  9. smk4565
    It isn't about percentage it is about price point. Why do Cadillac and Lincoln not have pickup trucks? Both tried and failed, Lincoln tried twice and failed. Lexus and Infiniti never tried. Mercedes can't find enough volume for a truck on their own, it would have to platform share with another vehicle, which is what they tried with the X-class and it didn't work. They could try to convert a GLS into a unibody pick up, but a GLS is expensive, and how many trucks would they sell at that price point? I don't see that as being a smart business move. Toyota if they got their act together on the Tundra I think could make a Lexus truck because even if they sold 20,000 a year, it wouldn't matter because the Tundra is eating up all the R&D cost.
  10. smk4565
    Ford, Chevy Ram have sold trucks because no one really put a competitive entrant in there. If Toyota went all in on the Tundra and made it superior to the domestic trucks they would start to take market share, just the way the Camry shut down the domestic sedan market. The Camry did that because it was good, the Tundra is not competitive, thus hasn't. And if Mercedes, Lexus, BMW, Tesla or whoever wanted to go into a luxury pick up market they would steal some sales. Problem is what % of F150's are that top trim vs the 100,000s of work truck trims sold? When you have a huge quantity to suck up most of the engineering, it is easy to do a top trim level and sell a few of them. Just like BMW can do an M5 because 528i's exist. It isn't that Daimler with all their truck knowledge couldn't build the best pick up out there, but how much volume would they get on a Mercedes truck that was $70,000 base? If Ford made the F150 start at $70,000 then sales would drop from 700,000 a year to about 25,000 a year, and there would be no business case for it.
  11. smk4565
    Daimler is the largest truck maker in the world. That is the most “real” truck company there is. Useless but people pay a premium for them. 4 door coupes are useless too but every keeps making them.
  12. smk4565
    The problem with the X-class is Mercedes owners aren’t going to buy a truck made by Nissan and Nissan owners aren’t going to pay Mercedes pricing.
  13. smk4565
    I think the money is being diverted to EV’s. They have to bet on the future.
  14. smk4565
    It is. But they were never in the American pick up market. It is hard to enter too. I was never a big fan of the Mercedes pickup idea. I think it better left dead. If anything I would say Daimler could do a Freightliner pickup that could mop the floor with the F-super duty and Silverado HD.
  15. smk4565
    With that low of a volume, plus needing the Renault-Nissan alliance to make the truck work, it makes sense to cut it. If they wanted to get into the truck market again they could do that, but they would have to be in the American market where trucks are big and not try to base it in Europe. Better for them to focus on their core products though if the market starts to shrink. Plus they need to put money in EV and autonomous because that is what investors want to see. The Tacoma is the #4 selling truck in the USA and the super old Nissan Frontier outsells the Ranger and Colorado/Canyon. I do think if Mercedes wanted to do a truck the MRH platform that is under the GLE/GLS is the platform to use. That platform is only used on 2 vehicles (3 if you count GLE coupe) and it is made in the USA
  16. smk4565
    If you took a current Fusion, added a 1 inch lift kit and called it the Fusion Cross sales would go up 1100%
  17. smk4565
    Last Friday on my way home from work I saw a Lamborghini Aventator, 1960s Mercedes SL Pagoda, Lotus Evora and Audi R8 in about a 10 minute span.
  18. smk4565
    So an A8, 7-series or E-class or S-class which all have adjustable height suspension is the answer.
  19. smk4565
    I love the genius of Ford management, the Fusion is their #3 seller and up 10% for the year while the brand overall is down. But kill the Fusion. Once you leave a segment it is almost impossible to go back in. I think someone at Ford read the Rick Wagoner "cut your way to profitability" playbook and thought it was a good idea.
  20. smk4565
    Why can't you get a CT6 in your driveway? Oh never mind I read about the low scraping. Probably the CT6 should have height adjustable suspension.
  21. smk4565
    "The largest tech add is Lincoln Co-Pilot360 which includes, auto high-beam headlamps, blind spot detection, lane-keeping system with driver alert, pre-collision assist with automatic emergency braking, dynamic brake support, forward collision warning, pedestrian detection, and rear-view camera washer. " That stuff wasn't standard before? Also why isn't the back up camera retractable so it only comes out in reverse, thus isn't an eye sore when not in reverse and also can't get dirty, thus doesn't need water sprayed over it and the back of the vehicle leaving a washer fluid trail running down the bumper. Side note, I think the Black Label Navigator should be a 4 seater with lay flat seats, refrigerator, folding tables, power shades over all rear windows and a full glass roof with electrochromatic dimming and a blackout power retract suede headliner .
  22. smk4565
    And of those new buyers about 25% will buy another Navigator and the rest will be one and done and go elsewhere. Attracting new buyers is only good if you retain your base too. Lincoln has done a good job the past couple years, going to real names, stepping up the interiors, rear drive platform Aviator, ecoboost engines, etc. 5 years ago I didn't think they'd still be around past 2020, so it is a nice resurgence they have had, but they still have a long way to go.
  23. smk4565
    According to Car Max data, Lincoln is #19 in brand loyalty there, vs Lexus #1, Mercedes #2 and Cadillac #4. Edmunds did a report on brand retention for 2018, among luxury brands Lexus was #1, Cadillac #7, Lincoln #9, Volvo, Jaguar, Infiniti were the bottom 3. I don't know if 9th out of 12 is something to write home about.
  24. smk4565
    And yet Navigator sales were down 13% in Q2, and down 3% for the year, and that is without facing the new GLS yet, just the X7 is doing that to them. The Navigator has a bigger drop in sales last quarter than the MKZ, and lower volume too (granted way different prices). So there is no huge influx of new buyers.
  25. smk4565
    So only 34% of Navigator buyers are from Lincoln owners. Seems like a lot of Lincoln owners are leaving for other brands then.
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