buyacargetacheck

Why would anyone spend $32K on a plainly styled, low-esteemed branded car only to watch it rapidly depreciate before the last payment is made? A CTS is a better buy for the same money. The G8 will probably tank for these reasons and, therefore, it's doubtful we'll ever see a G8 Coupe. A Buick GNX makes even less sense.

Good idea but keep both Jeeps - it's obvious Jeep buyers appreciate the mpg compared to the 4 other hogs they sell. A Caliber sedan seems so obvious that you have to wonder what's holding them back (maybe available capital?). It's like low-hanging fruit. Shed about 500 pounds off the hatchback, tweak the gearing a bit and you have a low-cost, high mpg alternative to the Focus and Corolla (which has a porked out a bit itself). I'm guessing Belvidere has plenty of capacity to make it happen.

Sounds good until you factor in the higher cost of production in Europe, and then you're back at square one making no profit. If you produce it in the US or Mexico does the car retain its Swedishness? What is "Swedishness" anyway? Do enough car buyers even care? So what's the point? Saab will never make any great sums of profit nor will it make up for all the money lost over the years. Money pit. Money loser. Cut your losses GM.

What other car company sells 125,000 vehicles worldwide in the $30-40K range and makes a profit? I don't know of one. Take a few minutes to read one of the funniest car stories I've read. This is the great legend of Saab that GM is blowing wads of cash on every year in hopes of making a BMW. Fat chance. Enjoy. http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/hot_li..._opener_feature

Time to cut this loser loose. Maybe Ford can take it off GM's hands with some of its Tata money, combine it with Volvo Cars for economies of scale, and then sell Swedish Motors off to the next sucker. What a giant gd waste of money.

That would be a rare find. 1980s A-body coupes in general were kind of rare. Seems like buyers went with 4-doors or G-body/H body coupes instead.

Sorry, I haven't been able to find it.

Buick never did better than "Wouldn't You Really Rather Have a Buick?" It rolled off the tongue nicely and, more importantly, it defined Buick as an aspirational product. Like "Standard of the World" or "We Build Excitement," GM ad men couldn't get away with using it now with a straight face. It's hard to see how any car sold and serviced in the same outdated facilities where Savanna work vans and Vibes are sold is aspirational. Simply from a distribution standpoint Buick will never match Lexus ES/RX. If GM was serious it would have dualled Buick and Cadillac. But it obviously isn't.

Yeah, I liked it too. Especially the spot where they used "Sex Machine." Probably the best Pontiac commercial in 30 years.

New divisional slogans: Pontiac: "We build Chevrolets and Holdens that look just a little sportier but pretty much drive the same" GMC: "Chevrolet Trucks with different grills sold at different dealers" Buick: "Cushier Chevrolets" Saturn: "Rethink what was Oldsmobile - a Chevrolet or an Opel with prettier tail lights" Saab: "Born from Opels" Hummer: "Dressed up Chevys for imperial wannabes or rich MILFs in lousy marriages or dudes with small..." Chevrolet: "The Toyota brand of General Motors North America but with pushrods" Cadillac: "30 years of chasing the Germans. We're trying alright!? Give us a break!"

What makes more sense than a heavy V8 El Camino-type throwback (which will end up damaging G8 sedan sales at least a little for image reasons and is the wrong vehicle in these mpg-conscious times) is a Dodge Rampage/Plymouth Scamp/Volkswagen Rabbit Sportruck/Subaru BRAT-type truck based on a FWD platform like Delta. A Delta-based vehicle priced right would sell much better, keep Lordstown humming, and offer a better solution for the "landscapers and gardeners" that LaNeve refers to in this article: Car, Truck? Will GM ever decide? http://www.thecarconnection.com/blog/?p=985 This ST thing will not last more than a couple of years and will do damage to Pontiac's budding "car" positioning. The whole cheap V8 performance thing is a non-starter. The Challenger and Camaro will do well for a year or two before reality sets in. Fuel-efficient Delta makes more sense.

There's nothing wrong with "cheap" although I prefer the word "thrifty" And I'm with you on the yuppie thing. Just know that the whole showing off of labels and checklists of lifestyle material goods is rooted in a certain measure of insecurity. The problem is marketing Pontiac as the performance brand in a half-assed way over the last 30 years and expecting us to think otherwise. Do they think we're stupid!? I'd have more respect for GM if they positioned Pontiac for what it is and has been for a long time now: a restyled Chevy at a good price. Or, go all the way and ditch the economy cars and build a lineup that can't be outraced by "dad's" Camry.

Actually just speaking the truth. And I'm actually a Jeep owner. So unless you count Toledo, OH as "ferrin" territory then... The truth is buyers of automobiles the world over buy heavily for emotional reasons. So do you apparently. You want to be seen as patriotic and regular (though maybe you're not conscious of it). Nothing wrong with that, it's just the way we "killer apes" are wired in the head. And there's nothing inherently logical about buying American unless you can personally and empirically tie your economic well-being to buying a particular car, e.g., your father, son, etc works at the Spring Hill, TN factory, you get their Saturn family discount, it's important to you that they keep their jobs therefore you'll only buy an Ion. Otherwise it's just mindless flag waving. BTW, I buy store-brand coffee.

Not bad for an old looking car that can't outrun a Camry or Accord V6. The Boomers are getting older so they probably won't mind. They'll buy it for the memories anyway.

Yeah probably. On the other hand what does a V6 G8 buyer find attractive about it over other cars? Power-to-weight ratio? Not that impressive. Better fuel economy? No. Styling? Pretty good but not drop dead gorgeous or upscale like Avalon. Fun-to-drive? No manual tranny so G8 V6 prospects are the same as Avalon ones in that respect. Prestige? None. In fact, G8 buyers (especially on the coasts and down South) will constantly be apologizing to their neighbors about their choice. I can hear it now..."Pontiac huh? Yeah, I had a Grand Am once. What a POS. Good luck with it!" Toyota buyers never have to apologize. BTW, what kind of person goes "into a Pontiac showroom" nowadays?

Words and phrases like "athletic" or "driving machine" or "made for the driver" are meaningless in real-world driving, especially here in LA where you can easily spend more than half a commute in stop and go traffic and the rest dodging potholes (as you well know). But, buying decisions (as the ad men and PR mavens know) are based heavily on perception. "Athletic" is really about how you view yourself rather than the actual empirical abilities of the car. Psychology. Speaking of actual abilities, be prepared to get dusted at the 405 onramps by grandpa in his Avalon.

The EPA classifies both cars as "Large" and both have 107 cubic ft of interior space. The driveshaft tunnel in the rear seat is slightly more intrusive in the G8 than Avalon. As I wrote before, the G8 trunk is larger. While we're comparing the two I just have to say that owning a G8 will be a little more painful at tire replacement time. Even the all season tires found standard on the V6 are about twice as expensive as those on the Avalon (comparing OEM to OEM). And if you get the summer tire package you can expect to pay even more while getting less treadwear and more expense during the winter as you then have to buy snow tires. These performance tires lend little increase in driving enjoyment for 99% of daily driving while increasing headaches (literally w/noise!) 100%. I made this mistake with a BMW based on looks alone. I'll never do it again.

Malibu's 17/26 isn't exactly class-leading. Accord V6 is 19/29 and Camry V6 is 19/28. In terms of packaging (although not sportiness), a better comparison is Avalon 19/28 vs G8 V6 17/25. Avalon has 268hp and 3495 pounds. G8 has 256hp and weighs 3885 pounds. From a power-to-weight ratio basis the Avalon actually seems sportier on paper while getting better gas mileage and offering a cushier ride. How ironic. The G8 is cheaper and has a bigger trunk though.

A thought from the Autoblog comments section... Will having the ST and the G8 sedan in the same showroom negatively affect the sedan's "BMW fighter" image? Therefore, is it possible that the sedan will reach fewer buyers than it would have if the ST wasn't around?

I wonder what the sales expectations are for the ST? Motor Trend writes, "Target audience? The warm "smile states," people with motorcycles and wave runners and the like." I can tell you that Los Angeles is full of these types. In the suburbs, it's not uncommon to see 3-car garages attached to homes that are much smaller than you'd think. These garages are full of motorized toys (not necessarily sports cars) while the Crew Cab Ram, F-150, Tahoe or Escalade for towing these toys is parked in the driveway or on the street. These vehicles towing the motorcycles, jet skis, and ATVs are almost never regular cab trucks. Even though many of these people are DINKS (Dual Income No Kids) with lots of discretionary income (or at least a lot of credit) it's doubtful the 2-seat ST will be attractive to these people because of its lack of functionality for carrying friends, etc. At $29K this just seems like a budget Corvette alternative for people who don't mind the hick image. Probably not going to attract much attention in Southern California. BTW, I like the name "G8 Sprint."

Notice that this is merely a process that has been demostrated in a laboratory. Scalability to power even a small slice of the nation's fleet efficiently is another matter all together. Where does the bacteria come from? How is the "external jolt of electricity [that] helps generate hydrogen gas at the cathode" generated? How would it be generated on a large scale? Natural gas power plants? Coal power plants? Where is all this biomass going to come from? Would we need to actually grow the biomass on farms to get the kind of scale we need? Would this require diesel tractors and natural gas-based fertilizer inputs? How about petrochemical pesticides? The Energy Return on Investment (EROI) is too low. There is no such thing as free. Black gold is the closest and that took millions of years to develop. Sorry, there will be no hydrogen economy.

That's more rear wheel drive mythology. Ride quality has more to do with wheelbase length and suspension design than which wheels are driving. The DTS and Avalon are known for their plush rides and both are FWD. Not to get too deep into RWD vs FWD but...Even though a case for "better" handling at the limit could be made for RWD, it's mostly a perception thing in the real world. Fun-to-drive is more important from a ownership satisfaction standpoint. And fun to drive has very little to do with which wheels are driving the car. Personally I've owned both and I can tell you that my 115hp FWD Mini Cooper was way more fun than my RWD 230hp BMW 330CiC.

Hydrogen is not an energy source. It's simply a carrier of energy. There are 2 ways to "make" hydrogen: The first is through electrolysis which means separating the oxygen and hydrogen molecules in water using an electrical current. How is electricity generated? Fossil fuels mostly (natural gas, coal, oil). The second is by separating the hydrogen from carbon molecules in hydrocarbon fossil fuels like crude oil and natural gas using a "reformer." So you can see that fossil fuels are the key commodity required to make hydrogen (unless we build a buttload of nuclear power plants to generate electricity). Then, there's the hydrogen infrastructure costs and transporting problem. Sorry, there will be no hydrogen economy.

Because Toyota is succeeding and GM is not. Because Toyota can just about do in the US with 3 brands that GM needs with 8. Not that the question is relevant to what GM should do in the US.

Moving Cadillac upwards is probably not impossible. But it probably is improbable. To move Cadillac up would be the path of most resistance against much stronger competitors (Audi, BMW, Mercedes, Lexus). With V-8s on the way out and very little buzz on the DTS/STS replacement to arrive in just 3 years (will they even do it?) that just doesn't seem like the plan. Again, Cadillac would do well to capture some of the low-end Lexus business by absorbing the LaCrosse and Enclave. I know the buff mags and all the kids here that believe their gospel say front-drive doesn't belong at Cadillac. But Cadillac did it for years successfully (going back to '67) and Lexus is now doing the same. There's no reason why Cadillac's "premium" positioning can't have front-drive comfort on the low end and rear drive performance on the upper end all under the same luxury umbrella. Cadillac could probably sell more $27,000 LaCrosse CXSs (arguably the only kind of LaCrosse that should exist) at closer to $30,000 than Buick could just on the more prestigious name alone. Of course, the W won't work so this would have to wait for the EpII. Same with the Enclave - it slots neatly under the SRX price-wise. A rear-drive BRX would fit in just as well with CTS and Cadillac LaX as the Lexus IS does with the ES and GS.