2QuickZ's

I think it would be great if BMW snapped up Saab. I'm betting they could turn them around. It's not like Saab has a bad reputation. BMW would get a known brand that still has loyal followers and buyers. With a little patience and a lot of money, I think Saab could be brought back from the dead. GM bought them and let them wither on the vine for a while before making a half assed attempt to give them some new poduct. They never had a chance under GM ownership.

Chrysler's sales are actually pretty amazing this month when you consider the Caliber is dead and wasn't a great seller even when it was alive and the Dart hasn't even launched yet. I'm not saying the Dart is going to do Toyota Crapola sales numbers right out of the gate, or even Cruze numbers for that matter, but it still ought to give Chrysler a big sales boost. I hope they can keep up the momentum.

I'm not exactly sure what you are seeing here. The pictures seem to pretty clearly show the piece between the console and instrument panel is the same material as the console. The thing under the HVAC controls is an open storage bin an another picture shows the pockets on the sides at the front of the console are also storage bins.

Maybe I should have worded it differently. They needed to either move the MSRP down to the level of the product or move the product up to the level of the MSRP. You won't sell many cars on "quirkiness" alone and besides that, the later models weren't really that quirky. In the end, they just did not offer a competitive product at the MSRP they were at. Even I, as somewhat of a Saabophile, would much rather have a Cadillac CTS at $40-50K than a 9-5. That doesn't mean I don't love the new 9-5, it just means I think the Cadillac is a better value at that price. And that is just within the GM family. Never mind once the average consumer pulls in Audi, BMW, Lexus, etc.

I agree with the statement that they should have moved downmarket. They are good cars and fun to drive (I've had 3 if you include a Saabaru) but are at the wrong price point. Had I bought my 9-5 new, I would have felt screwed by how fast it depreciated. Of course, under GM they would lay $6-8k on the hood during model year clearance. That was because most people leased Saabs (making them a better deal because the lease payments were pretty competitive) but after a certain point in the model year, they cut off the leases and the dealers actually had to SELL what was left. No way that was going to happen at full price. When leasing died in '08, Saab died with it because the MSRP's were too high for purchases. Leasing has come back but Saab hasn't followed suit due to all the economic uncertainty. Very sad.

Every one of these I read makes me sad. I really like my Saab 9-5. It is my third Saab and even I wouldn't buy a new one right now with all the uncertainty. It's a shame, too, because the new 9-5 is a really nice car and I actually like the looks of the 9-4X better than the Caddy.

I had only seen two coupes prior to that one, one at a dealership and one on the road and both were N/A. That was the first GXP coupe I had seen. I'm surprised the N/A coupes are rarer.

For some reason I was thinking it was a TD V6. Not sure why. 320 hp and 520 ft-lbs estimated. That would have been nice! From June 2010 article:

I thought GM already had a light duty 4.5L V6 turbo diesel pretty much fully developed and ready to go but they killed the program shortly before or during their bankruptcy? Hopefully it gets resurrected for the next generation pickup.

I wish I was able to snap a better pic of this beauty but this is the best I could do. You can't tell from the picture but it is a GXP. I'd imagine it is quite rare as I've only seen a couple coupe GXP's in person. I wonder what percentage of the already small coupe build these made up?

I love these articles! The changes were in the works long before Fiat got involved. It amazes me people think all this happens in 6 months.

What the heck is responsible for Escape sales? It's not a bad vehicle but isn't the new Escape (Kuga?) coming out in another year? Maybe it's just people downsizing from full size SUV's? If that is the case, it doesn't explain why Explorer sales are so high.

Look no further than Compass sales to see what styling can do for a vehicle. Chrysler re-skins it, raises the price quite a bit and still manages to sell 3 times as many as before. I'm just curious why that is? The new Durango and GC are quite nice. The refreshed Charger/300 which will have the ZF 8 speed trans in MY12 on the V6 cars, I think is pretty nice, too. Plus, they are a volume RWD car, a segment Chrysler alone owns. While Chrysler certainly isn't all the way back yet, they have made some awfully big strides in only a short amount of time. I personally think that bodes well for their future. We almost bought a Town & Country but instead bought a Ford Flex. I like the Flex but I almost wish we had bought the T&C.

Need a three row vehicle and have been thinking about getting a Town & Country. It will be interesting to see if Chrysler raises their incentives this month. If only I could get them to give me better trade in money. The local Ford dealer will give me $1k-2k more trade-in than the two Chrysler dealers we've taken it two and we get A-plan at Ford and only Friends & Family at Chrysler. Even though I'm routing for Chrysler, I'm not sure the minivan is worth $3k more than we could get a Ford Flex for. On a side note, I never would have even considered a minivan until we rented a '11 Grand Caravan for a week a couple of weeks ago. It was much, much better than the '10 model I had rented only 6 months before. It honestly totally changed my perception of the thing.

Did they discontinue the Borrego or is that all fuel price related?

I'd guess they went to Grand Cherokee and Durango!

That's not a bad looking little car! I think the "concept" version translated to production pretty well. I, much like others, don't really understand the benefit of having two engine offerings that are so close together in hp/tq ratings. I guess all we can hope for is a GMPP stage kit that will bump the turbo to at least 150 hp and 170 ft-lbs. I wonder if the drivetrain can handle that? That would give me a little more reason to look into one. It still bothers me that GM likes to change the names of many of their vehicles with every redesigned version. Is it really necessary? Were the Cobalt and Aveo names really that tarnished?

Perhaps I'm a little slow around here but did someone purposely make the XD emoticon = x D so that it pops up every time someone mentions that wonderful vehicle? That is hilarious and wholly appropriate! Good to see Toyota doing so well!

Are these officially out yet? I bet i've seen at least 6 of them on the road in the last 3 days. None of them had manufacturer plates on them either.

Thanks! I actually came super, super close to buying a a certified '09 Cobalt SS TC sedan w/ 5k miles on it instead of the Saab. I was on my way to the dealership to buy it that night (Asking $17,900, guessing I could have had it for $16,500) and I made the mistake of calling the insurance company to check the rates. It was going to be significantly more to insure than even my Z28!!!! In fact, IIRC, it was almost double what my Saab is per year. If it had even been close, that would be in my driveway instead of the Saab. That's a good list. Maybe add an Audi A4/S4 to it? Preferably an Avant?

I'd do what I just did and buy a 2007 Saab 9-5 Aero. It's fully loaded, performs pretty well though the suspension is a little harsh, gets very good gas mileage and still has 1.5 years of factory warranty on it (2.5 yrs of powertrain) assuming Saab survives that long. So far I'm very happy with my purchase. Of course, I wanted a practical, fun to drive family car that will work well during Michigan winters. Without those requirements, I would have bought something else. I would have preferred a G8 but prices on those (even the 6 cyl models) are actually higher than what I could have bought a brand new one for a year ago.

Ironically enough, I just saw a white Regal on the road today when I went to the store after my last post. Since they aren't on the market yet, I expected to see an "M" plate on it but it didn't have one. I'm not sure why. Anyway, it looked pretty darn good!

Hey... I resemble that remark! I've owned two Saturn's. An '07 Aura and an '08 VUE. I really didn't think of it as a nerd brand at all. I guess I reserve that for the cars with a ton of new tech that draws in the tech crowd. Saturn definitely didn't have a lot of tech which was probably part of their downfall. As for the stage kits, hell yeah they better offer them!

I just read a couple of reviews of the new Buick Regal. Apparently GM invited journalists over to the Nurburgring to test drive it. There are some very, very positive comments on it that really have my hopes up for this car. For the full stories, click here: Motor Trend and here: Automobile Magazine Examples from Motor Trend: Examples from Automobile magazine: I really liked both our Saab 9-3 and our Saturn Aura and since this car is basically a mix of the two, it make sense that I really like it. I just hope GM launches this thing with a higher level of quality than they usually do.

I like it! That Fusionesque grille really translates well to this SUV.