siegen

Jack Carver > Jack Bauer

What a horrible month. GM seemed to have taken the worst of it, down nearly 51% DSR. What gets me is that the Aveo and Cobalt are both down 71%. Given they are the cheapest cars and volume sellers, they must really be aging poorly, or a factory burnt down somewhere. The money's going to run out quick with more months like that, I hope they can turn it around.

The Acura EL is the same thing as the CSX. It's similar to how they changed names on the Integra to RSX. New generation, new name, perhaps because it fits the naming strategy better. No, the Acura EL was Canada's rebadge of the last generation Civic. For the 8th generation Civic, Canada changed the name from EL to CSX. And yes, you have posted about the 8th Generation (CSX) before, which is why this is repetitive. They just gave the CSX the Power Plenum, which is why it's popping up in Canadian news again. The RL is a rebadge of the Legend available elsewhere, similar to how the TSX is a rebadge of the European Accord. However, the TL, RDX, and MDX are stand alone models designed in the US for the US. The TL shares a base platform with the Accord, that is all. Similar to how the Malibu shares a platform with the Aura. Except in the TL and Accord's case, they do not have the same engine options, meaning they share even less than the Epsilon platform cars do.

Deja vu? Seriously didn't we already all go over this before?

Thank you for clarifying. I don't see the a-pillar thing, but I may just be more used to this design language. I understand that it will be compared to the Prius excessively, and that many people will believe it is a copy of the Prius, despite what Honda and the auto magazines tell them. It's too bad but I will still try to set things straight as much as I can. ;-] As far as the upholstery, shrinking down the image in photoshop (and sharpening) gives the seats a weird pattern. The seats do have a sort of dotted/cross hatched pattern. The regular taupe/gray seats hide it better, and might be preferable for some. Honda likely isn't going to offer leather anytime in the near future, since that would be one more step towards making the HCH redundant. But if wanted, any Honda dealer will install leather seats (at a premium of course). They will even install leather on used cars. The price that the vehicle ends up at will set the bar for how high quality the interior materials need to be. Interior materials will likely be a step below the Civic hybrid, which is to be expected. If you take the IMA system out of this car and some of the electronic gismos, it would be essentially a Fit with different packaging and better aerodynamics.

Interesting. I really don't see what you're seeing at the A pillar. The 2nd gen Prius pays homage to many Honda design elements, and this new Insight pulls a lot from past Honda's. VW did do that style front grille before the Clarity, so it makes sense to get a VW vibe from the front. Not sure about your comment on the upholstery, why exactly is it commercial airline upholstery? Did you expect leather?

The new RX is bland and offensive both inside and out! Quite an achievement. I think that calls for at least one best-ever.

For a hybrid and a cheap hybrid at that, I think the styling of the Insight is excellent, especially the interior. It looks good in red. I haven't seen any pictures of it in black yet, I'm sure it will look better in black, everything usually does. ;-] The dash blows away the non-user-friendly and ungainly Prius dash, both new and current gen.

The original Insight ran its course. It wasn't a hit because it wasn't practical and wasn't marketed like the Prius (2nd gen) was. This new model is slightly larger than the Fit, and is based partially off the new Fit. I believe rear seat room may be slightly smaller than the Civic Hybrid, but cargo room is greater. The specifics are posted somewhere which give interior dimensions. The price of course is rumored to be between 18,500 to 19,999, but the only official word is that it will be the cheapest hybrid to date. We won't know official pricing for a while. And the mileage is rated at 40/43, except every mag and journalist that has tested it so far has exceeded 50 mpg under normal driving (no performance testing). The admin at TOV got 71 mpg in one loop, which rivals the original Insight in terms of hypermiling. There is rumor of a Fit hybrid coming, which would seem redundant. If the rumor turns out to be true, it won't be for the US market anyway.

The Genesis Coupe turned out to be such an ungainly vehicle. That render on page 1 of this thread looks downright hot, and might actually be a Hyundai I wouldn't be embarrassed to drive. Kudos to whoever rendered it, because it makes the real thing look like... .well a Hyundai, in comparison. The person who created that render should be hired immediately. This is the amazing pile of blob Hyundai ended up releasing:

Source........... like Wikipedia?

Why stop there, we should have one standard for all nations on the planet. It would certainly make it much easier on car makers who sell in multiple markets.

McCain is a little more wrinkly than the actor who plays Tye, but with some makeup, Hollywood magic and an eye patch I think they would look strikingly similar! I never watched the original BSG. I know the main character from it plays a supporting role in the new BSG, which is kind of cool. BSG is a pretty great sci-fi show, with more personal/social drama than most sci-fi shows. It can be really confusing however, if you aren't following it closely.

That's what she said. And...... That's what she said. /My contribution to this thread.

Well I'll be darned. Toyota is going to have to lay off workers and cut costs. I wonder if more recalls will follow in the next few years in response to cost cutting, presumably by Toyota using cheaper suppliers and applying more pressure to fewer workers to build the cars. Nobody is immune to this crysis, but to think Toyota did such poor planning for it shows how greedy they were becoming. Surprised they haven't pulled out of F1, there's a money hole that is providing no real benefit to them. I suppose the "F" Lexus cars would be a marketing blunder if they did pull out of F1 though. Way to dig a hole. The Tundra, which I assume is one of Toyota's highest profit vehicles, isn't doing so well, and they had so much riding on it (including a whole vehicle plant). That has to be a bit of a disappointment. And now Toyota is releasing a new Prius which will likely be substantially more expensive than the current, and possibly keeping a decontented version of the current around so that the Insight doesn't cannibalize the hybrid market at a far lower price.

So the thread doesn't dissolve into a political war and then get locked, let's talk about Battlestar Galactica. I don't really think Palin looks like the President from BSG, however in that photo they do look similar. The McCain similarity to one-eyed willy (colonel Tye) though is quite amusing!

It's about time. Now GM can get out of the media spotlight and focus on rebuilding the company. Just watch, every dip or issue Toyota runs into now will be blown out of proportion, because they are at the top.

Yeah, looks like someone was hunting for Toyota brownie points when they wrote that news item.

The car market in Japan is saturated and shrinking. GM should pull out now. .

What's with the paint job? The side profile looks like a bad rip off the current TL, and that's not a good place to start.

The lawsuit seems like someone just scratching for money. Complete BS. Great to know our tax money which is bailing out the auto company is ending up partially in the hands of some whiny plumber who is looking for a quick buck and in the hands of a lawyer who grossly exaggerates his case in order to win. "greatest car manufactured on the face of the earth" -- ok, lol. I'm not saying they are a bad vehicle, or that there are any that are better. But that line is obviously just designed to elicit an emotional reaction from the judge or whoever decides the case. I can almost picture the lawyer with a whiny voice shedding a tear as he tries to portray his client as the 'victim'. "But it's supposed to be the best vehicle on Earth, why is there a problem with it!? This has never happened before in the history of automobiles!! A problem!! omgzorz!!!"

Honda needs to offer a Civic Type R stat. S2000 2.2l engine would bring it to life. I think the GTI is one of the uglier of the group (in 4-door form), and does not have a very attractive interior (they relate it to an Audi interior, maybe a late 90's Audi interior at best). The Cobalt is a real pocket rocket, but is downright ugly in sedan form.

I'm brimming with excitement.

Contrary to popular belief, the new Insight is not derived from the Prius. The new Insight is very much a 5-door version of the original Insight, which came out 4-5 years before the current (2nd gen) Prius. The front end of the Insight also shares a strong family resemblance to the Clarity, which is purposeful. The rear end hatch glass was done by Honda well before Toyota as well, in the CR-X and original Insight.

FYI, the 50 MPG figure is a Toyota estimate and not an EPA rating, and it does not explicitly indicate whether that is a city figure or a combined figure, although they do compare it to the combined figures for the previous generation. The side profile looks like they took some pages out of the current Civic sedan book. And the head lights look like something Nissan would use. The design overall seems quite derivative, and not so much an evolution of the current Prius. The front end overall is ugly, and the interior is just as ugly and strange as the current. The Insight design eats this for lunch inside and out, and the initial test drives that are popping up indicate a considerably underrated mileage figure.