hyperv6

I did not mark you down but I have a good idea why they did. It was a really bad idea. The Zeta is old heavy and done. No need to bring it back as we have much better and efficient platforms that available right now. Chrysler is making the old LX as Sergio is screwing them and not investing as he should have been. They are to the point now that when they do a comparison with the Camaro and Mustang the magazines pass over their product. To get attention they had to resort to the Hellcat that has a big number but no way to use all the power other than to move mass. Modest profits. Well modest is how you go chapter 11 as they should be doing better than modest. I feel for the staff at Chrysler as they are being starved out when cars like the Alpha are getting the money they should be getting from the Jeep profits. The Zeta has had a long and good service for GM and it is time to move on. Note my inlaws bought a 300 at the price of a Malibu. Not much meat on those old bones at the price. It is really sad as you should be selling them for closer to $50K vs 30K. That is a real troubling sign. Thanx for the answer Hyper. And...because I read your posts often, I knew exactly where the LX cars and Sergio and the Zeta platform fit in in 2016 before I made that post. You always keep me informed. But...I did say crazy idea, bad idea or not....it was meant all in good fun. With a touch of fantasy...my fantasy... Why? The Oshawa plant I think is being closed down....thousands of Canadian jobs are gonna be lost.... I did not mention this, nor did I elude to it...because its a fait accompli... Now...my biggest pet peeve, is this down voting without rebuttal, because there is no discussion being made....so... We both are having this discussion and you are finding out why I made this bad idea, yet you are NOT the one to down vote me... I would have NOT lost my marbles had this person just typed what you did....but at least I would know why and he would know why... Technically, its still a mystery to me... (So...my post being more of a fantasy thing rather than a serious thing...does it still deserve a down vote? I mean, it wasnt a trolly remark, nor a hate remark...bad idea or not...it was not meant to be taken seriously...hence the warning in the very beginning...crazy idea) I at least got your point of view....which we chearsandgear folk all know where you stand on the LX cars as you keep on STRESSING the problems with the LX cars...and now Ill agree with your take on the modest profits opinion as well.... And now you folk understand why this "bad idea fantasy" post was made.... Yet...the down voter is still at large and we are all in the dark as to why he/she would do such a thing with out a decent rebuttal. You see, I cant judge to rebuttal so I could repay the favour back .... I up voted you Hyper, for having the decency and the cohones to actually have a discussion...and...its not as if we havent had any love/hate discussions in the past... You took a chance on this response not knowing my reaction back to you... You can say crazy but too many people take things seriously on the web and stuff like this just opens so many even more craxy thing. Lets face it there are still some that can not accept or understand Pontiac is dead and not coming back anytime soon. There is a future at Oshawa but it is in the hands of the CAW. If they want to make competitive bids to build cars there vs the other plants they will win the work. The plants getting work now are ones who make competitive contracts and they are rewarded. GM has more plants than needed and some UAW unions get it finally and are learning that to make their future they have to work with GM not dictate what they have to have. It takes no cohones to to reply just an honest opinion and answers. I am not young enough to care about votes or followers. Things like votes can only hurt you if you really care. I don't. The fact is be honest with your thought and measured with what you think. Sometimes you are right sometimes you are wrong but believe in what you believe. This stuff about voting up down or logging followers on Face book are all useless games. They only hold meaning if you allocate meaning to them. The down voter only hold power if you grant it. Suck it up and just don't give a damn and you will be fine. You get to a point in life you learn all that popularity and focus we craved we were young was just wasted time. Chrysler is in bad shape right now and just in the last few months Sergio has had to change gears. His plans to build Alfa and Maserati have failed miserably. FCA needs a lot of volume and Chrysler Dodge is the prime unit to do it just as Jeep has shown. The real question now is who will they partner with and is there still enough time to get Chrysler into the game as they are about 5 years behind where they should be now. Chrysler is stuck with old LX cars that are not bringing in money as they once did and the 200 and Dart failed miserably. While better than what they had they still lagged behind the market with the poor Fiat corp underpinnings. Now we need to hope they let Chrysler do their own cars or do them with a good partner like Mazda. Then let them do their own RWD and stop thinking Alfa. They also need to find a way to keep the V8 even in low numbers as word has been they were going to kill the V8. I am ok with a turbo v6 but they still need to keep an 8 for some models. Finally they need the money to deal with the quality issues they have had. New product and better investing into these models will fix this but will they learn? While I am not a Chrysler fan I hope they can pull this out as it pained me to see the loss of Plymouth and the down grade of Chrysler from what it was and could be. I pray Mazda comes in and fixes their smaller cars. I really thing if Mazda cam in and ran the show it would fix a lot of things for both brands as Mazda need volume to make the profits they need. Sales for them are good but not enough to pay development cost that are just so high anymore. But in the end back to Zeta. It is time to put it to rest. It has done it's job and then some and really can not be improved much more than they already have. You have two world class platforms now that are more flexible than the Zeta could have ever been now is the time to make use of them in as many ways possible.

I did not mark you down but I have a good idea why they did. It was a really bad idea. The Zeta is old heavy and done. No need to bring it back as we have much better and efficient platforms that available right now. Chrysler is making the old LX as Sergio is screwing them and not investing as he should have been. They are to the point now that when they do a comparison with the Camaro and Mustang the magazines pass over their product. To get attention they had to resort to the Hellcat that has a big number but no way to use all the power other than to move mass. Modest profits. Well modest is how you go chapter 11 as they should be doing better than modest. I feel for the staff at Chrysler as they are being starved out when cars like the Alpha are getting the money they should be getting from the Jeep profits. The Zeta has had a long and good service for GM and it is time to move on. Note my inlaws bought a 300 at the price of a Malibu. Not much meat on those old bones at the price. It is really sad as you should be selling them for closer to $50K vs 30K. That is a real troubling sign.

This would be just another Fiat 500 that would struggle in the market. Now bring over the larger three door hatch with the turbo engine and offer it in the OPC trim along with standard trim and you would have a good sporty GTI and Mini competitor. Americans are not fans of these small cars at this point and the segment still needs to find it's place. Many Fiat dealers are in trouble or are regretting they even picked up the brand. FYI Pontiac is dead and will still remain dead. Adding a small useless FWD car designed and built for someone else is what killed them in the first place.

Well here is my take I have had for a good while. GM has to update the Alpha. It was done fast well but when it was done things that were not important then are now important like bring lighter and more global with RHD. GM will revamp the Alpha when doing the refresh on the ATS and CTS when they move to the CT branding. This will open the door to the Camaro going to a RHD. This in turn will provide an Lengthen Camaro platform to be built with its own sheet metal with a Camaro suspension that will become the Impala and Impala SS. GM needed to move the Malibu up in size a bit. They did that with the present Impala Styling. GM was killing the Zeta in 2017. That is still planned. The present Impala needs to move on as the platform it is on is going away. Knowing the Zeta was going to die and the Impala was going to change they did bring the SS here in small volumes as they had said they would. They said from the start they would do 2500 or more depending on the call for the car but it was made clear that volumes would be very low. It has been. Now they named the SS a SS sport sedan. Odd for GM to call it an SS as they never named a car SS only in the past as it always was attached to the model it was based on. Well it was not an impala or Malibu so what do you call it and do you put an Impala name on it when it really is not an impala? My gut is they had planned on a move to make an 4 and 6 cylinder RWD impala once the Bu was redone. Their plan is to put an 8 in a Impala SS and sell it as a sedan that will not look like a Camaro but will drive like one. This would give the Malibu more space. It would help Chevy have a RWD sedan worth the extra money they would have to ask and it would still leverage out the Alpha even more. Al How will the SS and Cadillac be different. Well Cadillac will start to get their own engines soon. We also will see much more technology in the Cadillac too. There will be a marked difference between Chevy and Cadillac in all areas unlike so much of the recent past. I think the Buick has some surprises coming that may make some forget the Avista. They just trademarked a new name and there has been hints they have a new coupe and or convertible coming. Velectra has just been registered so we will have to see what this brings. But what ever they do it will be different than the Chevy and Cadillac and really make up that middle ground. I have met Al Oppenheiser and gotten to speak with him on new products. He is a no BS kind of guy and if he says something it is something that is being done. Now it can change later but as of now I would take what he says here to heart. Nothing is certain till it hits the show room but the odds are good we will see the new SS and more with it.

I have always read where it has been recommended to stay away from Consumer Reports in all years. I have seen too often where their coverage of reliability is only based on owners who are subscribers replies. This generally is not the most scientific or accurate way to document real world results. #1 most owners are not subscribers. #2 most happy owners never take the time to post on the web or review damn I got a good car. Now if they have had issued you can be sure they will complain. I am not a guy that will be buying an electric car soon but I have learned to accept them as while they are not for me that does not make them bad or evil. Like wise do not tell me a Tesla and Musk can cure cancer either. There is a lot of distortion on both sides. As for first year cars that used to be true but not as much anymore with many models. Since most imports are released overseas a year before we get them the bugs are worked out there and even many of the new GM cars released overseas the bugs are worked out in China before they come here. It is not like it used to be. I always loved how Consumer reports or even other reviews using readers will take a vehicle like a Chevy truck or GMC truck or even a recently I saw a Nox and Terrain and some idiot will claim the GMC is a better built vehicle. Yet in the case of the Terrain it was just some trim that made it different and nothing else. It was built on the same platform with mostly the same parts and by the same people in the same plant but yet some are ignorent to the fact they bought the same car. To me that was good marketing if you can fool someone like that. This just did come up on another web site recently.

I think you really need to only look to GMC to find how to sell vehicles today. Kelly Blue Book has it where people say GMC is one of the most refined high quality vehicles on the road. The truth is they really are not any different than Chevy. GMC adds some chrome. Rocker lights, or projection headlamps and build their vehicles on the same platform in the same plant with the same tools by the same people yet they are seen as better. That is a attribute of good styling mixed with good marketing. Controlling what people perceive is what sells cars. Case in point. the German cars were well known for orange peel on their paint. Many customers saw it and perceived it as being higher quality because they thought it meant more paint was on the car. Ford did clinics on this and even went to add Orange peel to some of their own cars to give the impression of better paint. The truth is it was a bad paint job and most consumers had no idea it really was bad. GMC with their added trim and some minor features has really impressed a lot of people for things that really amount to very little. Case in point I saw on another web site a Terrain owner praise his Terrain for better panel gaps and higher quality vs. the Nox. The truth is even the Denali only offers some extra plastic chrome, lighted rockers, some struts that most customers never notice on the front and some stitching and fake wood inside. None of this is really a major improvement but most see it as that. That is a win for GMC. Even on the Colorado and Canyon they are the same. But some small details like the lighter colors offered inside vs the Chevy and the addition of fake carbon fiber or plastic wood make the same interior much more rich looking over the dark Chevy interiors. Cadillac needs to work on the perceived qualities of their cars more than anything. That is where much of the image is built or lost today. As for who is buying sure some buy the German cars that are not collage grads but most are. Even some of them can not afford them. The other thing is most of the non professional factory workers who did buy Cadillac are now buying trucks for $60K. They have no use to impress with the car at the club as they do not go to the club. It is a smaller market today as there are so many options today, Benz has seen this and will do a truck soon, How well it works we will soon know.

I was at work and that is all I could find in a pinch. It had a classic listed and show that a classic model as being available. It may have been a Cavalier. It was broken out. My point is they so show them separate. I do not collect them but I have seen them posted. So many numbers are reported and some are separated and come are merged so it can vary. In the past I have seen models listed on Autoblog reports with the old and new models show independently. Now one thing I have found is Canadian is often done separately in all areas. Even their historical services for their lines is separate. I had to do my Pontiac in Canada since it was first shipped there and they had the info. But the fact is GM has all sorts of listing for so many reason.

I would contact the brand manger of the line. They are the ones I have gotten the best info from. Some are willing to share freely and some are not. It may come down to who you are or if they know you or you know someone they know. Once I got an in with one it opened it up to the others. Ask to see if you can get saturation numbers as this gives you a really great breakdown on models, options and colors as well as total numbers. It can be fun trying to find just how many of some combinations are made. I wish GM made these more public even a few years later.

https://web.archive.org/web/20090221044821/http://media.gm.com:80/servlet/GatewayServlet?target=http://image.emerald.gm.com/gmnews/viewpressreldetail.do?domain=2&docid=51161 Here is one from GM Media Online that list the Classic separate. Here is the deal. Many public listings will lump things together but GM counts cars 5 ways to Sunday and if you see the reports they not only have reports that show the classic and new model as separate but also break downs on models from more than one plants such in the case of the Malibu. Then they have what is called Saturation reports that I have been given by a couple brand manager when trying to find out not only total production but they break it out down to each option and even color. So trust me they know just what they are selling and while the month end deal may show total for old model and new the real numbers are there if you know who to ask or where to look. I have printed off the HHR numbers when some were trying to find out how rare different combinations were and I could give them how many half panels in blue were built with the LSD diff. So I do not doubt you have seen them counted together but the fact is those are often just general reports that do not give much detail and just make for good simple public numbers. I did not save them but I have seen in the past the limited or classic models listed separately from the new models. Generally these classic models are fleet sales in the past and are kept track of on their own. I have seen some sheets that are really crazy on the break down of models. I wish many of these reports were able to be found online as it would really be of interest to Camaro and Corvette owners wanting to know how special or normal their cars really are. It is neat to see the real take rates on options and it is surprising just how common most cars are today with the way the options are offered. I saw the numbers on the Cobal SS sedan and that is one there was so few of in the last year of production. Note I just went on gmmedia.com and it is now under construction. Often info can be found here too.

they were buying used ones most likely... No they were bought new. I knew these people and knew their incomes and circumstances. One man had a 60's Cadillac and put it up for limited driving. He bought it new and by the 70's it had less than 10K miles. Yet he lived in a run down house and drove a used 225 daily that was not even safe for the road. Worse yet I had another customer with a 65 Riv GS that had around 5K miles with the duel quad. he passed away and the son drove and crashed the car. It remains in a yard rotting today and he will not sell it. Even my mother In Law wants a Cadillac for the image even though she is not Cadillac material. She is a left over of this thinking of the past. It was very prevalent in the mid west and in the south to where you were judged often by what you drove and they wanted to appear to be affluent than they were. It was very common. Hell back in the 70's the dealer selling the most Rolls Royce was in Charleston WV back then. Working in a tough neighborhood really opened my eyes to the way of life of many that I never saw. Same for a lot of the time I have spent in California. Even now just with dealing with people globally on my job I have see the many differences in culture. the bottom line still is Cadillac was in slow decline for many years and it accelerated as time went on. they did not just fail with the 8-6-4. Like stated before just what did Cadillac offer in technology and innovation in the 60's, 70's? A crude FI system for a little while that was about it. Part quality were declining. The Market was moving on to other models from Europe that offered more technology and intrigue. The wheels really came off when they down sized and tried technology that was not ready for use like the 8-6-4. While Cadillac may hold some romance you your look back you must yet still focus on the fact they were not the car they used to be and the rest of the cars offered pretty much anything they did. Again it was not just Cadillac but Lincoln and Imperial too.

From the saturation sheets I have seen it was always separate in how they were counted in the past. There are several sources for data and it may vary.

My examples were just growing trends and yes I did see hair dressers buy Cadillac's back then. They did not buy them because they made a lot of money they bought them because of the image and they because they were more accessible. As I pointed out before being more accessible is not a way to grow a brand that is to have the top image. You know as well as I do that Cadillac's decline began long ago and did not happen over night. The 60's were not as good as the 50's and the 70's declined from the 60's. The 80's things began to really show badly. By then others had taken their place as well as the Lincoln and Imperial.

Note to be fair all the American brands declined. Lincoln really lost their edge and the Chrysler Imperial become a cheap imitation of itself. Cadillac held on a little longer but as like the car in the photo above there really was nothing really special there. You paid more but what did you really get? Also the people who bought the cars were not the same. Before leaders in business and politics were only seen in Cadillac's. By the 50's and 60's you could see a hair dresser or factory worker in one. It was once the car of the movers and shakers and then it became the car of the common man. The one thing that made Cadillac special was that it was not the car of just anyone. Then it became the car of just anyone. Not good for image.

Yes, but those things bolded above didn't happen @ Cadillac in the '60s. The only tangible thing I lament is Cadillac dropping real wood after '66; a mistake, but a very minor one. I cannot whitewash Cadillac as "declining" because of merely that. No but that is where the decline started. Note they did share the X frames of other GM cars. But my point is you never got cars close to the Cadillac Barritz in the 60's as it was the last of the real efforts for the exclusive ultimate approach. Switch gear and other details were becoming more shared with other divisions. This progressed over time and then to the engines in the 70's as in the Olds engines X body based Seville. The truth is the decline of GM is like a Drug addict. It starts with something simple and over time can built to things that absolutely destroy you. GM started to lose the little things in the 60's and then moved to full dependency as time moved on. Platform sharing really came to light in the 50's with frames and suspension. Then with the Corvair with the Buick and Olds models just being converted Front Engine units. The Pontiac Polaris was to have nothing but a rebody till someone woke {I assume John D} and went to the Rope drive shaft to drive the trans axle shared with Corvair. 215 Engines were shared also in the early 60's. This is where much of the decline started. Like I said GM did not fail in the last few years but over decades. It was really a death by a thousand paper cuts. Cadillac in the 60's just did not have the content and attention to detail as they once had. On one hand they were not as exclusive as they once were and all the while the other brands at GM also improved. Chevy marketed the 57 Chevy as having features Cadillac had at much lower prices. The Buick 225 started to take sales as it was as good of a car and offered basically what Cadillac had at a little lower price. Also some folks hated the fins and went to Buick in the 60's. Cadillac was pretty innovative over the years with leading technology. The 60's offered little other than the FWD Eldo. Their engines were stale and got staler as time went on. While the Euro cars offered many advanced or technical features Cadillac offered a Failed Air Bag suspension. The Grand Canyon was created over time and at first it was just a little erosion but we know where it ended up. You are correct my mistake. Even more reason for Benz to try to increase volume of their auto lines since they have nothing else to fall back on.

Guys the need for the smaller cheaper Benz is simple they need to add volume to help control development cost of all their models. These cost are high and this is what is driving companies like GM to make a Buick, Opel, Holden or sharing cost of a transmission with Ford. Even the deal with Honda on Hydrogen is just another example. With Benz they have their main line of cars. Seat in Spain and the Smart car. Also they hold some truck lines but that is about it. The low volume high priced Benz line is sustainable but hard to grow profits. They are working on these cheaper and smaller cars to increase that volume. Now it is not without risk as this is just how you can cheapen you image and brand. Porsche did this in the 80's with the 924-944-968. They went cheap for volume and pretty much started to kill their image as Collage kids and even some high school kids showed up in a 924. They did it in the name of volume and they paid the price in the Camaro price range. They killed these cheaper cars and moved to the Boxster for the volume at a more Corvette price and little lower volume. It has not harmed the image as much but their resale sucks. AMF tried the same thing with cheaper Harley models in the 70's and paid the price in image till they nearly went bankrupt. The other factor is all these companies need to find a way to sell cheaper and more efficient cars for many countries. The Liter taxation and the fact fuel is not cheap everywhere is important to many globally. Regulations will only continue to increase so they need to find a way to sell smaller and more efficient cars to keep volumes up globally. While Benz may look like they are in a good place their challenges are as tough as anyone else. They are larger than the niche companies like Aston and Ferrari so they need to do things much like a GM but they have less models to do it in. VW is doing it buy volume with many brands. They bought up all they could to spread out the cost. While they share platforms they still run the risk of badge engineering with so many models like GM did. It is a temptation that may be stronger now with the Diesel cost becoming a factor. I hope they do not short cut the models but the risk is increased with the scandal. They may even lose Bentley and Lambo over this if they have to pay for more than expected. The fact is in this market and escalating cost it is damn hard to make cars and make a profit. The prices of the cars are too high as it is and will continue to climb with the weak economy and increased regulation and technology. Even Toyota, Honda and GM will partner projects with more companies to spread out the cost. In a way Sergio was correct that MFG need to control cost. His idea was spot on to do what you really need it to do but competition negates it. It is one of those cases that while he may be right it just would not work. You can argue models and brands all day but this is a big picture development cost issue no matter how you twist it and it affects everyone.

I can see you get what I am getting at. Yes the 40's, 50's and 60's showed a slow decline from what they were in the 30's. I use the 60's as the cut off as by this point this is where Benz got their post war footing and the 70's BWM and then the 80's Audi. The 60's were the tipping point where the others were taking up the space left from Cadillac and where Cadillac has not yet returned to. GM as a whole started to focus more on trying to do too much and to do it cheaper and they started to pay a price for it in the 70's as a whole. Lowering quality, more badge engineering and the lack of true divisional engines etc made it a mess for all of GM not just Cadillac. Just as the rebuilding of Cadillac today is not an over night or even a 5-10 year deal the decline likewise was not an over night drop from the top. I have been able to work on most decades of Cadillac and this is where you really see what made each one special and how thing began to go missing over time. Also the level of Cadillac was seen in their owner base. There was a time you really had to be someone of means to own one but then it got to where just anyone could own one.

I hope they separate out the sales numbers They will as they are not considered the same vehicle. In the past the Classic and limited models were always counted separately. I would love to see the new Acadia in the Midnight trim that they just showed the Terrain in. It really changed the tone of the vehicle. It makes the Denali look as tacky as it really is with this years added random chrome.

Well while the drop at Cadillac may not have appeared large the cars started their decline in the 60's with a more mass market volume approach. To see it you need to step back and compare where they were in the 30's to what you got in the 60's. They were no were near the kind of car they once were. Now in 75 the decline accelerated with more parts sharing and the lack of refinement. In the Era of the gas crunch GM did little to invest in the brand as they once did. In the 30's to 50's it really meant something to own a Cadillac but 60's and later it meant less and less to own one. Hell in the late 70'd we were drove a 77 model to school regularly. The only car with much image was the FWD Eldo of the late 60's and it never progressed as it should have. Cadillac did not fail in 1 year or just 10 years it was like GM a slow decline over decades and it accelerated in the 80's.

From what I have heard production on the Cruze is started. I have not see any shipped yet. As to what year they call them I am not sure, I also have not seen any of the old cars shipped anymore.

Took Cadillac from the early 60's to the 80's. The down sized FWD Cadillac's were just the last nail in the coffin not the first. What many forget it can take a while to earn that image back too. One model and a couple years just will not do it.

CLA is Germany for Buick!

People need to learn the difference between production ready and engineered show cars and pure styling show cars. In years past show cars were pure styling and little production or even engineered. Case in point most of the cars at Motorama over the years. Few of those cars made production but elements used on many were applied to the production cars. Later in the 90's and later many cars were basically production cars that were customized to become show cars that later were relieved to be production cars. The intent was clear as so many of them were drivers that did not have to be babied. Case in point the Intimdator Monte Carlo from 2000. I was in that car and while it featured many costume things and a built up engine it really was based on the coming production car and could really be drive. I know because I have been in that one as well several other GM show cars of that era. The case here is the Avista was a car that a styling group did and just plopped it on a Camaro platform as it was close to what they needed. There is no real world engineering here. It would not do anything in a crash test, It would high side on some drive entrances. It has brakes that cost a ton of money in wheels that would never work on the street properly. It has an interior that was printed. I would wager the car is very limited in mobility and a large hole in the road would crack the body that is molded. The work and time to make this car into production would be a investment. Then the other issue is the sales of coupes today. As much as we here like them they account for a very small amount of sales to justify investment outside of a Camaro. At least with the ATS the higher price can help cover some of the cost but lets face it how many ATS coupes do you see in a week? Sure they could put it on a Alpha. But how many would you have to sell to make it profitable. Could or would Opel want it or not. As of now the Alpha is not RHD so Australia the natural choice is out. You may sell 50K units at a price around the ATS but then you can't go there till Cadillac get the revamp on the ATS to move it up as soon as they can move the CTS up. The bottom line here is the Styling department has shown what they can do. GM saw the reaction and is not forgetting it but they are just not going to fling a car out there till all the ducks are in a row here. They do not want another SSR on their hands or another XLR. Even the last Camaro had compromises because of the show car things they carried over and did not fix till now. We will see some cool Buicks once they get the global thing sorted with the new product. As of now China is supporting them and other things that are much more important and profitable need to be done and other brands and models need to be moved to create space to work. GM no longer is a house that will work against it's self like in the past. Changes slowing the Cadillac transition and the Opel Buick and now Holden melding has changed their plans and they are now being attended to. If only say just build it was the only thing needed to be be considered that would be grand but building cars and positioning models is not that easy or fast. Especially with GM coming off an era where they had a lot to fix and deal with. When I saw the Avisa I slapped my forehead and said there is no way in hell they could build this as it is and I can already hear the bitching that they changed the car from what the show car was. Again you have to look a these cars with a a reality of was this a show car or a custom production car? Even the 53 Vette really kind of sucked being a show car that went production. If they had not made the changes they would have had a short run with no crank up windows and the inline six automatic.

My question who is doing the bulk of the work on the transmission? It this a deal like the BMW GM automatic where GM built it and BMW just offered their tuning spec and paid for the development cost? Lets face it GM has been one of the best automatic transmission builders in the world for decades. Accept for the mid 80's were they cut back on testing and paid the price in warranties. I am curious if they are doing most of the work since the first Ford trucks to be testing it were at the GM proving grounds. I know we sell tons of kits to races to put GM transmissions in Mustangs. Anything from a Power-glide to a Turbo 400.

This may make the Hell Cat irrelevant. While it post a big HP number it has little else. The less weight and the added features and refinement may make this car as fast in the 1/4 and we already know it will destroy it on any road track. This is how you do performance right.

The real key to this car is I expect it to be a more complete package than the last ZL1. Keep in mind the old ZL1 was done when GM was going broke and it was put on the shelf as they say at GM till it was resurrected. It originally was the Z/28 and even the fascia has the branding on it to prove inside. When GM brought it back they were in a place they could make this a ZL1 and revisit making the Z/28 like the original a real track tuned car. Now with this car it appears they have taken the best of the old ZL1 and the old Z/28 and molded them into a complete refined package. In other words this is not a track car but I expect it will nearly match the Z/28 in track performance and more than beat anything the Zl1 could do. Both were good cars in the last gen but both were modified old Zeta cars. This car is a Alpha that was developed with their tunes in mind from the start. That makes a big difference. This car is a GT350R competitior. The SS with the 1LE was really just an SS option. We will find it on the other cars at some point. I am excited to think we may see it even on the turbo car. As for the GT500 killer we may see it in a Z/28 but I am not sure what that could really mean. They have exceeded my expectations here already. The problem for the Mustang is they have on car on their platform and it has to carry the load for all the development and refinement. The Camaro has the Alpha with all the time and money Cadillac has spent added to what Chevy has spent. In other words Chevy has a world class platform to start with and then they can spend their money on the refinement for what they want. I would think Ford would consider a new platform with Lincoln in mind and then dumb it down for the Mustang as Chevy has for the Camaro. If they do not do that it will be an expensive road to follow to compete with GM here. Even at Mustang production number that is just not enough to justify the needed spending to compete. They really need more volume with a Lincoln Sedan and coupe. The problem for Ford is the Alpha has a big lead and will only expand that lead with more investment. Just look how far the Zeta came over the years and we should see the same here. The 3300 pounds of the 4 cylinder should send a signal to all of us where this could go. I can see smaller lighter engines in the future but with tons of power. That could lead to some really crazy performance.