Robert Hall

HaHa...btw, have you put an Avis sticker on your W-body POS?

Can't really tell from the pics it's a Honda/Acura...looks generic... the front is almost Mazda-ish.

I think I've seen that W123 diesel coupe around a few times, there can't be very many gold diesel coupes like that in the metro area.. The early '90s C124-platform 300CEs are sweet cars...my sister loves her '91...bright red, black leather interior. Only has 115k miles, compared to the 175k miles of her V126 '84 500SEL.

At least they could have pretended to make an effort and made the 50th anniv. model a special edition of the V8 SS...lame.

My dream car garage, 2008 edition: Supercar: Ford GT Sportscar: Porsche 911 C4S Sports Sedan (modern): E39 BMW M5 Sports Sedan (old school): '04 Mercury Marauder Sports Coupe: (modern): '08 BMW M3 Sports Coupe: (old school): '08 Mustang Bullitt Convertible: '08 Mustang Shelby GT500 Luxury convertible: '08 Jag XKR Luxury sedan: (modern): so many choices...for a domestic, I'd go with a loaded '08 CTS or for an import, maybe a Merc CLS 550. Luxury sedan: (old school): '08 Lincoln Town Car Luxury coupe: Aston Martin DB9 Family Vehicle: n/a Just for Fun: late model Ford Crown Victoria P71 Police Interceptor upgraded with 500hp Shelby engine Just for Fun, take 2: Ariel Atom Truck: n/a SUV: '08 Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland CRD Economy: '08 Mini Cooper S Oldies: '69 and '70 Mustang Mach 1s, '69 Ford XL conv, '71 Ford LTD 2dt ht, '71 Buick Riviera, '72 Chevy Impala sport coupe

Driving back from Boulder this afternoon, I thought of you, '68...I saw a sharp gold late '70s-early '80s Merc CE turbodiesel 2dr ht..don't see those very often.

That is one car I really, really want to see in person...if my vacation plans for '08 go as planned, I will be in France sometime this year...hopefully, I'll see some C6s..

Whatevah..just round down to 54 mpg.

I saw the new TV ad the other night w/ this slogan..the ad was cool, showed the Solstice, G6 GXP, G8, etc.

It would have been interesting to see how things would have gone this decade w/ Gore in office..much, much better, I think. Bush is a subliterate moron surrounded by corrupt henchmen, IMHO.

Sounds exhausting.

Kind of Toyota's R-class style vehicle, looks like...Lexus will probably get a variant. Looks like it's a 4 seater w/ buckets all around. The videos are interesting on the Mark X Zio site... 4 40-something guys out stargazing with a snippet of music that sounds a bit like Oasis..

Delivering Chinese? I thought you worked at UPS, 68..

Cool....maybe Citroen and Fiat are planning to return to the Canadian market (they aren't there currently AFAIK)..

I can see the beginning of a new movement---Go Gay to Save the World!

I've long thought Tesla was just a smoke-and-mirrors scam...here's an interesting new article..sounds like more delays, more talk.. SJ Mercury News article on Tesla Tesla ousts 3 top executives By Matt Nauman Mercury News Article Launched: 01/10/2008 07:27:22 PM PST Three senior executives and more than a dozen other employees have been ousted by Tesla Motors as the Silicon Valley electric-car company struggles to get its much-delayed roadster to market. Two manufacturing vice presidents already are gone from the San Carlos start-up. The last day for the third, Mike Harrigan, a senior executive and former vice president of customer service and support, is Friday. Tesla isn't doing layoffs, said Darryl Siry, Tesla's vice president of sales, marketing and services. In fact, it lists 39 job openings on its Web site. "This is about accountability," said Siry. "If you don't get the job done, there are consequences. We haven't had that before." That directive comes from Ze'ev Drori, the high-tech executive named Tesla's chief executive officer in December, Siry said. Drori's arrival coincided with the departure of Martin Eberhard, Tesla's co-founder and ex-CEO who had been replaced on an interim basis earlier in the year. On his new Web site late Thursday, www.teslafounders.com, Eberhard named 16 people who have left the company in recent days. He call it "a bloodbath," and says Tesla's new management team has made cuts to its top executives, many engineers, its service organization and its firmware team. Contacted late Thursday, Siry confirmed that at least 16 people have been let go. "I don't know what the total number is," he said. "It's really about Advertisement performance management." Originally scheduled for delivery early in 2007, the first production Tesla roadster has yet to be built. Delays, most related to the car's transmission, mean the first customers won't get their $100,000 cars for at least a few more months, and that car will be getting what Tesla calls an "interim" transmission. Siry wouldn't say how many cars will be assembled in calendar 2008. "We don't know that," Siry said. "It depends on two things - one is exactly when we start, and the other is how aggressively we can ramp up production." The Tesla roadster will be made at a Lotus factory in England. Full production capacity, once reached, is "upward of 120 to 150 cars a month," Siry said. Drori continues to restructure Tesla's management. "Tesla as an organization was very top heavy," Siry said. All of Tesla's engineering staff now answers to J.B. Straubel, the company's chief technical officer and one of its first employees. Tesla, which promises a series of zero-emission cars starting with its two-seater roadster, remains a poster child of the Valley's shift toward green technology. Tesla executives continue to speak at conferences, often bringing a prototype model to display. But the launch of the first car continues to be problematic, mostly related to the high-tech transmission - an essential component that puts the power from the car's electric motor and huge battery pack to the wheels. The company says the Tesla roadster will be able to travel from 0 to 60 mph in about four seconds, but a recent revision of that performance claim speaks to Tesla's problems. In December, Drori and Tesla Chairman (and single largest investor) Elon Musk held a virtual town-hall meeting with some of the 600 people who have put large deposit checks down for a roadster. In a letter posted on the www.teslamotors.com Web site, Drori wrote that two suppliers have failed to provide a durable transmission for the roadster. "Now we have the appropriate level of internal resources combined with external expertise to get it right this time," he wrote. Two other companies are both working to engineer a transmission for Tesla. Until that happens, Drori wrote, an "interim" transmission will be installed in the first production models. This simpler design will produce a 0-to-60 mph time that's slower - 5.7 seconds instead of four - than originally promised. A few days later, Musk blogged on the company's current situation. He emphasized that production will begin this spring, but with the interim transmission. Customers will be able to an upgraded transmission installed for free, once it's available, he wrote. Teslas will be built "in limited qualities throughout the first half of 2008," Musk wrote. In that blog, Musk also revealed that Tesla is considering a somewhat controversial move - offering pure electric models as well as so-called "range-extended electric vehicles." It's a concept being researched by General Motors for its forthcoming Chevy Volt, where a small gasoline engine can be used to charge the battery on longer trips, although the car would only use its electric powerplant on short trips. Harrigan, a two-year Tesla employee who first headed marketing efforts as the company revealed itself in 2006, would only confirm his departure, saying it was "not voluntarily." He wouldn't talk otherwise about Tesla's future. "All of us feel a lot of allegiance to Tesla and the people still there," he said.

I tend to be middle to left on most things...socially liberal, fiscal moderate. There are just too many groups I strongly dislike for me to ever vote or identify with the Republican party..

Global Motors? Nissan + Renault + Chrysler

I'm looking forward to seeing it in person... I've always thought the previous Skyline GT-Rs were cool..

Makes the dull tedium of corporate America more tolerable..

Yeah...why couldn't it have been a train load of Grand Prixs going to Avis?

I'm looking forward to seeing one..the G8 didn't make it to my local auto show last year, so I have yet to see one.

Or the Nano Naan.

Definitely..it is Indian, and I like spicy Indian cuisine, so why not spice up the car a bit? Let's see the Nano Vindaloo...

Umm, well, I'm 37...I remember the '80s quite well, and I've read a lot of car magazines over the years (esp. Collectible Automobile which is great for historical articles). And I'm a Jeep owner and fan..