Dsuupr

It seems like GM is trademarking new things all the time. Using Mercedes / BMW like markings does make sense. In theory Cadillac has the C & S series now. The other companies change the designation after the the first letter / number often without issue. Cadillac should be able to do the same fairly easily.

toyota has never been big on their list. honda on the other hand . . .

My concern on the hotels is staying in a dangerous area, or being miles away from the show.

I think this is just par for the course with the xd just like it was the xa.

For the first time in my life, I will be flying out to see the show. I will be coming in early for a chance to check out the Ren Center and other Detroit sights. Any chance you guys have time to show me & a friend around? Any decent low cost suggestions for a hotel (or a location of town to get one).

Sometimes the recalls are done with only 1 issue coming up, because the manufacture knows of the defect and that others will be affected over time.

I thought the last generation Vibe looked better than the matrix as well. Since GM is not allowed to make a lot of cars out of that plant, I still expect the matrix to be the better seller.

And we are to be impressed with a group that thinks the honda fit is a top 10?

Every car and truck GM introduces lately just seems to get top reviews. Nice change.

It would seem to be better for the environment to do it that way.

Having driven one I can understand why people are snatching them up. I've got the HHR for sale in hopes . . .

We have one of those Scenic Cruisers for sale by our house. It has alot of character.

toyota building crap continues. Now that toyota is no longer seen as the builder of cars with no mechanical flaws, all the other details of the bad cars they build are starting to come out.

So I get a call from my wife yesterday. She says, "You shouldn't leave me home alone unsupervised". With that my mind wonders thinking maybe she caught the house on fire, broke something, etc. I then ask her why, She says that while looking at the vehicles for sale from the State of Oregon she saw a 2000 Camaro Z28 with an LS1 for sale that used to be a police vehicle. It only had 15 minutes left until the end of the auction and she couldn't get ahold of me so . . . as you could have guessed she bought it. At $3750, it was a steal. It didn't make me mad, it made me want her to full fill her duties as a wife. :AH-HA_wink: You can check it out the car at; 2000 Camaro Z28

http://www.levelfieldinstitute.org/ They have all the info you could want and then some.

Everytime I start to think about trading in the HHR I revert back to thinking about the Volt. I should just wait, but then again two+ years is a long time to wait for a new car.

I was impressed by the ratings Ford got in the latest issue of cr. Someone at Ford must of found out who to pay off and how. Now it's GMs turn to find out who to pay off. They seemed to be all over the board. Oddley enough, there were a few GM cars that did great in JD Power but not so good with cr. I guess that goes back to my first statement. I did notice that the acura tl got a near perfect rating and the HHR did not. Funny, our experience is the complete opposite. Add to that, our Cobalt got a worst rating than our HHR. Not that either was bad, but our Cobalt actually was put together better in the end. With all the hoopla of cr not recommending the camry, cr made sure to group the V-6 and 4-cyl together so at a glance it still looks like they give it their seal of approval. The turda really did get a below average rating.

Automobile. The Ann Arbor-based released its 2008 All-Stars winners list. The winners are: Volkswagen GTI, BMW 3-series, Infiniti G37/G35, Volvo C30 (well, maybe not so much this one), Mazda CX-9, Chevrolet Malibu, Mercedes-Benz S-class, Lotus Elise, Porsche Boxster/Cayman and the Chevrolet Corvette.

I tell my kids, "Tough crap". My wife has made a VERY strong point of making sure our daughters know the value of the dollar. They don't often ask for stuff and more than once have brought up ideas on how we can save money. How did we teach our kids this? Open and honest about the realities of our budget. Does that mean they know what we make? No It does mean they know how much we have to spend when we go grocery shopping and they go with us. Some things we do / did; 1. They are each given $5 a week for lunch purchase and told to pick out their own stuff. 2. They both have a $20 credit line. When earning their allowance (they must work for it), they are forced to pay a percentage of it towards any outstanding bills. The credit line is increased for special purchases, but a pre-approval is needed PRIOR to leaving the home for the store. 3. Our kids do not have $75 video games or $120 shoes. If they want to waste money on those items, they must earn it. Both girls would rather play outside with friends than spend time in front of the television. 4. We did just recently buy a Wii (mostly for me, golfing :AH-HA_wink: ). The girls were allowed $25 each for a game. If any of you have a Wii you know that they would have to pull their money together for 1 game, or get 2 used games, or ?? They did pull their money together and share the game. The girls know we will not buy more games, nor will they expect any for their birthday or Christmas. 5. My wife puts a $50 budget on each kid for Christmas. I know many people spend more than that on 1 of 15 presents for their kids. We refuse to believe Christmas is about giving crap away. We go with the, Christ in Christmas is about Christ. 6. Our children are not given an open budget for school clothes. They are required to get 5 out fits and not go over a budgeted amount for those outfits. They never have. 7. When on family vacations a budget is created and the children know what it is. With that, they don't ask to buy crap because they know we don't budget for it. 8. If something in our house isn’t used we get rid of it. Our house isn’t full of things that aren’t enjoyed for the sake of having more than the neighbors. Though my daughters like to keep their art work, they don’t keep stuff they don’t “use”. 9. We don’t buy things because our neighbors have one. Our kids recognize this as a positive thing and for the most part do the same when it comes to their friends. 10. Even though our income allows us to buy more crap than we can use, we don't. Doing this has taught our kids to do the same. 11. We make a point to buy things within our budget. A budget we have created, not one a creditor gives us. Two great examples of our family making sure we stay within budget a. in 2005 we showed up at the Chevrolet dealer to buy a new car. We had determined out budget and told the salesperson what we could afford. She assumed our credit and / or income dictated it. After getting our information and running our credit she came back and politely told us that we would be approved for a new Suburban if we wanted one, to which my wife answered, no thank you our budget doesn't allow for a payment that high. In the end we bought a base Cobalt. When my income increased we upgraded to the HHR 2LT, but again had the income, as far as banks had been concerned, to buy a Suburban and Silverado. b. A few years ago we went looking to purchase what is now our current home. We got pre-approved and without asking how much we got approved for we went house shopping. The first homes we picked were in the lower price range of the market. The housing market was VERY hot at the time and we got out bid twice. We noticed our current home for sale, but my wife was convinced we wouldn’t qualify and the payment would not fit our budget. I called our mortgage person only to find out that we not only qualified for the home, we qualified for one with an additional 500 sq ft that cost $30,000 more. Knowing that the smaller home would fit our needs fine, and the mortgage would be less we picked the smaller one. Once again, not going above our income or our needs. Our kids knew the options and agreed that a smaller home with a lower mortgage is better than a bigger home with space we don’t need. Point is; make a budget, stick to it, and teach your children about it.

Have any of you done an E85 conversion? If so, was there any issues? Any after market group that is better than another? Costs? The proposed car; 1995 Caprice 9C1 (LT1 engine). I know there will be alot of people apposed to it and I do want to know why. Please note it's not about the cost, but rather the reduction of oil use. My wife really wants the car and the only way I can justify it is by not using SO much gasoline (environment and national deficit).

This might sound mean, but I've said for years that the younger generations (Y and down), need a good depression. Maybe it will give them appreciation for all the CRAP they have. Each generation has had to deal with bad times. Even the X Generation had poor employment opportunity and a falling economy in the early 90s. It's tough times that teach us and help us grow. Hopefully this will also get a generation to be less self involved. Interesting that was back when the Father of the idiot, I mean President, was around.

Maybe GM is taking a page from it's foreign competitors in making sure they only introduce vehicles that are ready for production, rather than introducing them a year early. With all the hype around the Malibu, introducing a "hot" new vehicle right now might not be the right thing to do.

Is it me, or does there seem to be little to no fan fare coming out of GM for this years LA auto show at this time. It seemed like the weekend before the auto show last year we knew atleast a little bit of what was going ot happen. Anybody care to speculate what will show up at this years show?

1. CTS 2. Enclave Honorable Mentions 1. CTS 2. GMT-900s (how can we forget these so fast)

Thanks for the pictures. It looks great. Our local sales people are want the 1LT & 2LT ordered in bulk. They all fell in love with it and think they will sell like hotcakes.