Trimnell1

Josh: When C&G had the first spy shots of the turbocharged Ecotec engine awhile ago on the old forums, you mentioned that the GXP would have both auto and manual transmissions. Do you know if they are the same trannies as in the base model or is one or both of them upgraded over the 5-speeds? Maybe the GXP will have 6-speed auto and manual trannies?

Sorry to say this, but evok has stated that the GMC GMT-162 sub-theta program has been cancelled, perhaps with some or even all of the other sub-thetas. They've been sent back to the drawing boards because of cost overruns. This comes from that "other " forum where some of our insiders post on occassion.

Yeah, we shouldn't take what other people say as gospel, but the fact that these analysts and media people who often look down on GM said that they were mightily impressed by GM's future lineup did give me a lot of optimism. You and I will have to wait to see the vehicles before we make our final opinions, but it's also retarded to keep bashing Lutz because we haven't seen a lot of his 100% developed vehicles yet. OK, maybe I'm a little harsh on the Zarella cars because I do really like the Cadillac lineup, the Corvette, the GMT-360s, the SSR, and some others. The problem is that the rest of GM's lineup is sadly lacking against the competition, and I'm looking forward to seeing what Lutz can bring to GM as Josh and AH-HA have already seen.

Again, everyone is entitled to their opinions about what is good design and what is not. My opinion is that most all Zarella vehicles sucked ass and I don't give a damn whether anyone else agrees with me or not. We've all heard the line "Wait till you see what's coming down the road" about new GM vehicles before, but this was from GM people. To hear about the new Lutz cars that were shown to the media and analysts and to see such positive press about them speaks volumes about how good they must be. And these are the same people who are always so down and critical of GM. So whether you or I like or dislike these new vehicles matters little because they're coming soon presumably as shown, and I'll be in the market for them whether anyone here likes them or not. I say the sooner these Zarella cars are gone off the market the better. BTW, Zarella started off as head of marketing but was later named as president of North America where he and V.P. Tom Davis of product development worked closely together to create vehicles for N.A. So almost the entire current lineup was as a matter of fact created under his direction. <_<

Obviously, everyone is entitled to their opinion as this is a discussion forum about primarily GM vehicles. But I find it kind of strange that AH-HA said that he never owned a domestic car before and when he went to the GM future car preview he was extremely impressed by what he saw; he would even strongly consider buying several of them if he was in their respective markets. I thought that most of the members here are (supposedly) GM fans, and to hear all this negativity towards camoed vehicles made to look ugly and to confuse people as to their true designs makes me laugh. :lol: That an import buyer like AH-HA would consider buying a future GM vehicle says to me that the future Lutz lineup must be very impressive. No, I haven't been drinking any GM kool-aid but I have been a GM fan longer than some of you have been alive; and I've seen too much dull, boring, lame-ass GM crap over the years that when someone like Lutz who has a proven track record of shepherding hot designs to market was put in charge of GM vehicle development, then I felt a lot better about GM's future. Though the GMT-800s and several other vehicles have indeed been huge succeses, there is no denying the fact that GM's market share slump is the result of all these Zarella brand-managed vehicles not selling on their merits but on huge discounts. I'm not trying to start a fight or anything, this is just MY opinion.

Hey, let's get rid of Lutz and all his staff and bring back Zarella and his brand management minions because we all know that these hot, distinctively-styled, and high-tech Zarella vehicles were going to take GM's market share above 30%!!! Oh wait, I guess that these Zarella cars were so great that somehow the buying public didn't notice and GM's share is in the low 20s because the employee pricing has ended, and for some strange reason they don't want to buy most Zarella cars without a huge discount. Like AH-HA said, let's continue to bash all these Lutz vehicles without even seeing them in official pictures. Lame.

http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do/Featu...icleId=107890#4 I know that the official pics and info will be available at 12:01 AM Thursday, Nov. 10 but these are by far the best spy photos of the new Escalade till then. I think that it looks really hot and I'm glad that GM put some more money and effort into differentiating the Escalade from the Tahoe/Yukon. That small pic in the other Escalade thread doesn't do it any justice at all.

http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0.../C01-363980.htm No pics yet, but the new name for the Buick crossover is near the middle of the article.

Michigan State Spartans sports teams which are located in East Lansing, MI is near the Delta Township Lambda plant. University of Oklahoma Sooners sports teams are located in Norman, OK which is near the Oklahoma City GMT-370 plant. So it appears that Lambdas will also be going to Oklahoma City to meet up with the crossover demand, as well as for the upcoming minivans.

I really like the looks of this GMC and the Outlook, from what you can see beyond the camo. I'll be in the market next year for a vehicle and these new Lambdas are sounding impressive as hell. Like I said in another thread, I'm glad that the Lambdas ride high like a regular SUV and not like the Chrysler Pacifica and Ford Freestyle which look like station wagons.

http://media.gm.com/servlet/GatewayServlet...n=2&docid=20019 Wow, I'm going to miss Dave and all that he did to take the Corvette to world-class status. I've read the book All Corvettes Are Red many times and it amazed me what he had to go through to get the C5 out under the old GM product development system. It's cool that Tom Wallace gets the Kappa cars in addition to the Y-cars as his new job, so maybe this means that future Kappas will get even hotter than what is already coming next year. Lori Queen gets small and midsize trucks, but who is going to take over her old job for small cars?

Thanks dutch, I was looking at some of my Centieme photos and it rides off the ground higher than the Pacifica, which is great. I also remember an episode of Motorweek that I taped awhile ago that showed the Centieme in motion and it looked terrific. The front end is a little too round but I'm sure glad that the front end of the production version is more masculine and squared-off.

dutch: How is the stance of the Buick Lambda? Does it sit high off the ground like the Saturn Outlook spy photos that we've seen or does it sit low to the ground like the Chrysler Pacifica? I hope that it's not like the Pacifica because it looks too much like a station wagon courtesy of its low stance.

http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do/Featu...rticleId=107544 I believe this is the first time that we've seen an extended cab GMT-900 pickup, all the other spy shots have been the crew cab. The front end does look different from the Yukon, adding to what insiders have said about the pickups looking much different from the SUVs.

Like Turbo said, I think that maybe GM is seriously considering moving the TB to the Lambda platform and then cancelling the Envoy because the Acadia is already coming. That would be an interesting idea because I'm certain the Lambda SUVs can do what almost every single TB buyer wants it to do, and for those that really need to tow or haul heavy loads they can buy a GMT-900. The problem is do we need four Lambda SUVs on the market, differentiated as they may be? Or is GM going to give the GMT-360s new interiors, updated mechanicals, and a revised exterior like the Caddy DTS? We all know that the DTS isn't going to be around for a lot longer so GM didn't spend a ton of money revising it - maybe this way like the DTS, the TB and Envoy can last awhile longer and then fade away into the sunset.

It looks to me like it has Saturn/Opel styling cues, so it has to be the new Ion. Also, the new Ion is an '08 model while AH-HA said earlier that the new Malibu will be an '09 model, so another clue that it's not the Malibu.

On the saturnfans.com board, there was a discussion on what the V-8 engine option on the Lambdas would be and AH-HA said, "Forget the 5.3 L, these sophisticated new SUVs deserve and will get something better." And on the GMI boards there was a thread about the Buick Lambda and he replied, "Oh, and forget about the 5.3L OHV stuff, not happening. Such fine rides as these deserve a smoother V8." Since he was at the actual sneak preview in June, I'd say that there will most definitely not be a small-block V-8 underhood. So it must be a Northstar engine that is the V-8 option unless GM has something else that we don't know about.

AH-HA says that the new Envoy won't look anything like that photo and that it's nothing but a bad photochop of the Toyota FJ Cruiser. He also said that current Envoy fans will love the new Envoy's styling and that it has a truly spectacular interior. On the other hand, evok thinks that the photo was taken at the GM Design Center and that this may be an early design proposal for the GMC sub-Theta model. Whatever it is, the styling is exactly like the FJ Cruiser with some modified bits and that makes me think that it is nothing more than a photochop.