ShadowDog

It would be easier for the government to ban the use of NOx altogether. Oh Noes! Now, all the rice-burners will be left with is stock hamster power?! Perish the thought! Meh, I never really cared for 'bottle' fueled cars.

Ha! That's no surprise. My sister's friend came out from Calgary last week and they drove throughout the Okanagan area (vineyards, secondary roads and city streets). She and her husband doesn't have a clue how to read maps, so they entrusted ever turn and every stop with their navigation system. At one point they had an argument because they needed to make a variety of turns through a small town and the system told them to turn on a road that wasn't named the same as the road sign indicated. Now, common sense would tell me that it was merely a misnamed street in the system and not a case of the 'sign being wrong'. They still sat and argued about whether to move up and down the road to look for the correctly named road sign even though the direction arrow was showing the whole way.

Cool, the topic. Something to finally read. So, in your opinion, would this car be worth bringing in to compete and still manage to sell enough to profit by? To me, that's all that is important. Anything else is just for the benefit of market-share. How big is this market anyway?

As far as I'm concerned, FWD, RWD, AWD, 4WD... all have the same potential to end up in the ditch, depending upon the driver. FWD and good tires vs. RWD and 'meh' tires - I'd go with the tires and to hell with which wheels are driving me. Of course, don't brake on corners. That's just unreasonably dumb. Most people just have that instinctual habit to want to immediately stop at the first sign of wheel slide, so naturally the brakes are their answer to the problem. Obviously, they're not, so ABS can provide SOME benefit to prevent the natural outcome of these bad habits. In the straight, I have no issue with ABS. Sometimes it annoys me; however, for those moments when I know I'm just not going to come to a stop before hitting something, ABS is nice just to give me the ability of control to steer around what other people are hypnotized into hitting. In my experience, with plenty of incidents witnessed and dealt with first-hand, the RWD truck spun itself into a lovely circle of doom when the gas was applied in a poor spot of ice. The FWD made like a swimmer doing the butterfly stroke and spun its tires, dragging its way from harm. The 4WD doesn't count here because it had a massive plow up front and a huge sanding spreader on the flat deck. That thing could stop itself AND the car in front of it with a chain attached. I love that truck, but I hate getting it stuck... too heavy, it always gets stuck. There's everything out there on the road when it comes to drive wheels. The only thing that matters is that one is no better than the other. To say one is better is to say that one can be driven more aggressively and manage to avoid getting into trouble better. Where's the logic in that?

Actually, I would be interested in this system. The only drawback being how to tell the remote battery is actually dead. The only way I can figure is to attempt to start the vehicle without the FOB present. If it starts, then I guess the FOB battery is dead... that or just change the battery every couple of years.

Smart and very child friendly. We had them when I was young. The only thing I hated about them was when I was running and the damned things would come up behind me, run alongside and body-check my legs into each other with its instinctual desire to herd sheep. Oh, how many flippin' face-plants I had because of those dogs.

I have two good friends who have gone into the medical profession. One is a pharmacist and the other is an animal scientist. One is a social-moron, meaning he doesn't quite know how to relate with people in a 'normal' sense. Never had a girl friend but keeps talking about the time over ten years ago when a girl sat in his lap at a volleyball tournament party. He drinks because drinking is fun and seems to think I'm interested in his stories about how he can out-drink some annoying, know-it-all engineers. (We have a thing against some engineers out there) The other is married with one child, outgoing quality and extremely funny. He played in a band as their lead singer and always enjoys a good time out. He doesn't go wild but he knows where the limit to a good time is and can stay there all night long. I think anyone can develop personality traits and not be restricted to the type of person they are at the time. A co-manager at one of my last jobs became a pharmacist after flying commercial jets! At the same time, he went from being a strict and stiff urbanite to riding mountain bikes and kayaking every moment he gets. The only time he ever left the country was in the cockpit of a plane. Now he goes on vacation just to ride his bike across Italy. Quite a turnaround.

Brought up, I imagine, because it is a great car that didn't see sales success. Understood, the potential may have been there and we'll never know for sure. Still, would it have succeeded and put its competitors outside looking in? I'm not so sure. By no means is that the fault of the car, but more like just bad timing (removing GMs decision to axe Pontiac from the equation and just thinking about today's economy). When things improve and GM has redeveloped its credibility in the marketplace, not to mention a much needed perception of quality and refinement, then GM (Chevy) can start looking at those higher price-point models. The point is that I don't believe GM needs that model right now. I don't think they are alienating a market that isn't quite a big as it used to be, for the moment anyway.

You said it already there, GM did things the W-Body way. Ford is suddenly on the path not unlike Hyundai with regard to improving public perception. I'm wide awake too early in the morning so my thoughts may not all seem too easy to capture at the moment... but I'll try. Making anything noteworthy from a single platform to compete against offerings from Ford, such as the SHO, simply has to be something more than flashy wheels, a few badges, seat embroidery and adding the words 'sport-tuned' to its suspension offering (thicker rollbar, yay!). You refer to technology-sharing over the spectrum of Ford's offerings. That makes sense. Building a car just to compete with one offering from Ford in a category where stealing 50% of all interested buyers means getting that one consumer of the total two is no business case. Sadly, people who seem to think GM should do something like this are people who cheer from the sidewalk just to see the eye-candy roll past. The idea that 'build it and they will come' is old-school thinking. What some people 'think' GM should build because it appeals to them doesn't mean it will appeal to a greater number of others. Why this simple fact of common sense goes unnoticed at the speed of slow, overhead of so many people is just bewildering. Talk is cheap, fans are over-rated and good reviews don't pay the bills. The G8 is a fine example of that. So yeah, why doesn't GM have a car to compete with the likes of the SHO? I don't think it's stupidity or a lack of foresight on the part of GM. I think it is simply a different direction of their business. Toyota didn't get to where they are by satisfying the bold, brash and loud with cars made to look bold, brash and loud. Sure, we've seen them make a lot of boring cars; however, I guess a whole lot more people just don't mind as much.

If there is a large enough market to capture, sure; however taking even half of the interested consumers at that price-point and niche model won't amount to much.

I'm confused about the whole Made in North America argument, since this car isn't made anywhere near North America. Then I'm confused about the fact that a fan-base of whom supports a model isn't somewhat happy that it will still exist somewhere in the world. Then I'm confused about the fact that people are angry at a car company that doesn't even own the car anymore. Frankly, I don't read this as a slap in the face. Australia was building the cars in the first place, so why not exhaust the parts supply for their own market. What sense wouldn't that make? Where does anger and jealousy get anyone these days?

Teh intraweb. It hates you.

...and yet, a surprisingly common occurrence!

Perception and perspective is interesting once you get both sides of the story. It would make sense for someone to say that 'Keith' was living life, having an accident but doing what he loved to do. Then you read a response from his wife: Makes sense.

But all MPG ratings are based on consumption and not cost. The only true comparison would have to be with a kW rating which is easy for people to determine cost since it's right on their electricity bill. It's already the same for fuel, since cost varies from location to location. If I owned the Volt, based on my usual trips, I'd likely use little-to-no fuel on a single trip. I would rarely have to make more than one trip per day, so there isn't much extra driving involved. Depending upon the charge times, it's highly conceivable that I could go a whole day on electricity, which is $0.07463 / kWh CDN. To determine how much it will cost me to use a Volt, I just need one of those tags as seen on a kitchen appliance to tell me.

HA! Straight out of James May's mouth, my wife laughs at me when I say this by imitating his voice. Of course, do this in public around here and you get strange looks, but what do I care?

Appears to have pretty clean looking lines from the front anyway.

..then make the sign smaller and fit within the realm of the bylaw. Done? Done.

Funny to think that we've come so far in engine technology in the past ten years when a GM V6 put out just over 200 HP and the new engines, such as the 4 cylinder is this new Sonata puts out the same HP and likely better mileage. Of course, it's unlikely to have the same low-end grunt; however, it's sure to be sufficient to move the car well enough and not have to be a lightweight sub-compact with a 6,000 RPM max. HP rating to get anywhere. Hyundai has come a long way in such short time. I don't think there really has ever been a car company to turn from bottom of the barrel to nearly top of the heap. They're massive success in changing public perception and quality is, well, perplexing.

Ouch is right. I took the skin off the knuckle of my thumb doing that. Even worse was as a toddler when my brother closed the door on my shin as I was stepping out of the back seat of a coupe. I couldn't get out for over fifteen minutes because the pain was overwhelming.

Until this post, I've never even typed the word 'twitter', never mind utilized the service in any way.

Is it me or is TYT a show that just tries too hard to be anything but ridiculous. The girl is "um, like, um" hardly a news announcer and everyone else ever on the show adds more opinion than fact... or information for that matter. Why does this show exist? I'm actually asking. What's their purpose?

Where it mentioned a need to examine their business structure, it's just plain easy: Anyone wishing to have their product marketed at Walmart must make huge concessions to their average profit margins just to have their item on a Walmart shelf. How else do you think they keep their prices so low? Walmart continues on with healthy profit margins, typically the same as all the other retailers, by bullying and dictating their costs from suppliers. The undercutting of other retailers secures their marketplace and generates higher volume. As for employees? Though the profit margins are healthy, the wage-scale in comparison to their competitors is lack-lustre. Entry-level wages at the foods marketplace I managed was $9.00 per hour, as of this time last year. If you look at more than the money in the pocket, we offered three excellent graduated health benefits packages that was even offered to part-time staff, a pension plan second only to the government, annual 10% rebate on all regular priced products and a number of other company perks. Walmart continued to offer no more than minimum wage, $7.95 for their newly built store and their usual Christmas discount offering of 10% from three items purchased in the store. Sure, there were benefits offered to full-time staff; however, you actually had to be given enough hours to make full-time. Something many employees knew they would never see. Of course, you can't blame Walmart entirely. They succeed because people want to pay as little as possible for everything. They could be out of a job, bitching about the economy and the government, crying about how there's nobody hiring and just not looking at the big picture and how Walmart exploits the entire situation for their own benefit. A sad, sad tale. Incidentally, there's a small Walmart in Nelson, British Columbia which took over the retail store from old Wolco. They requested to purchase adjacent land from the city to build a newer, bigger store. Nelson is a city with heritage values, a huge small-business environment catering to entrepreneurs and has strict guidelines on what is and is not allowed within their city limits. Like the Lower Mainland and Greater Vancouver region, Nelson declined Walmart's request. Sadly, it seems the Lower Mainland is going to cave now.

That Camaro is drop-dead gorgeous in white. With deep contrasting tinted windows it would complete the look for me. I've always appreciated white most of all when there are contrasting bits and specialty looks. For example, when I bought my Monte Carlo, I was trying to figure out what color until I noticed that Chevrolet painted the five-spoke wheels of the Z34 white with he body color. Interestingly, it was the only color they did this with while the wheels were normally dark silver / gray. White was mine! Two pics: With the steel winter wheel covers and with the stock wheels.

I don't know what I drive... It's an American branded car sold in Canada. It was designed in Italy with its engine from Australia and a transmission designed in Germany. Altogether assembled in Korea. In the end, I guess it's more Korean than anything? I don't know, I've never seen a car made in China, aside from Matchbox Hot Wheels. I really couldn't tell you what I'd prefer.