siegen

I read the article, why do I now need someone to tell me "what it means to me"? Is the average consumer so stupid as they cannot develop their own opinion of what they have just read, and they need the editor to tell them? Sorry don't mean to be off topic but it's a big peeve of mine whenever I see that in articles/reviews. And unfortunately it's rampant. As far as the article contents. I am not surprised at all. I figured the wheels, accents, and other "flare" was just for show, but it turns out the whole body may be a little different on the production model. It may have those RWD-eque proportions yet! lol

McCain's VP is quite attractive for a politician. I smell a scandal! lol

I am fairly sure the Fit being "Americanized" and released here had nothing to do with how well the Aveo was selling. The model had been on sale since 2001 in the rest of the world, and the US barely got any inventory to sell when it finally did get sold here. And as far as the '09 Fit goes, its release date was moved forward by over a month in response to selling out of '08 Fits. After seeing the USDM and JDM Fits, I like the slightly longer bumper of the USDM model better. The difference is slight though, but the JDM model looks slightly stubbier. I feel like a thread hijacker, sorry. But since Edmonds compared the Fit to the Prius recently, I suppose in some crazy round-about way it's slightly on topic.

Arrrhhghveneedmoelawz. absezlutly. Sorry that was my best attempt at Arnold-speak.

Hey, how the valves are opened is crucially important. It's like the most important part of the car. After all, only cavemen use pushrods to open their valves. Like poking at a door with a broom stick. Lol j/k. In all seriousness, the biggest cost difference between the M5 and CTS-V is likely the engine. If GM developed a high output variable lift DOHC V8 for the car, the price would likely inflate another $10,000. And it probably wouldn't really change the opinion of most buyers at all. GM probably made the right decision using a FI OHV engine. But how sweet would it be if there was a naturally-aspirated 6.0 liter DOHC V8 in there, with an 8000rpm redline and developing 600HP. Imagine the sound it would make as the engine climbs towards 8000rpms, power increasing steadily the whole way. It would be incredible.

Let's not get off topic here, but the Fit is an excellent looking vehicle for its class. If you can't get past the stubby hood or how far the windshield protrudes forward, then that is ok. It is odd styling to a lot of people, but in this class it is by far the best looking overall. I told myself I would never "downgrade" back to a Honda, but I am honestly considering the Fit. The idea of mid-30 MPG in the city and the large interior room is very tempting. The details are very important, and the Volt needs very good details. I don't like the silver parts though, I think they should be body colored. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't be well styled. I have a feeling they will be body colored on the production model anyway, and it will look good. The wheels will be a very important part of making the vehicle look more substantial than other hybrids. I doubt it will come with those giant 19-20inch rims seen in the photo, but as long as it has some solid looking 17 inch rims, it will do good.

Hard to tell from the steep angle, but it looks good so far. I assume the side mirrors, roof, and lower grille/inlets will be body colored on production models, and I think I will like it better that way. It will probably come with more normal-sized wheels too.

Lol. Thanks guys. I didn't even notice this thread until today. And I do not have a fart can or otherwise non-stock muffler.

AMD has the best integrated graphics at the moment, however for discrete graphics AMD and Nvidia are pretty much neck and neck.

All this talk about OHV's naturally having more low end power, or being able to use higher displacements, doesn't make any sense. The difference is in head design and how the valves are actuated. That is it really. There is no displacement limit inherent to an OHC engine that an OHV engine doesn't have. If someone made an OHC engine that had the same valve and port designs as an equivalent OHV engine, it would likely generate essentially the same torque curve. If you see two equal-displacement OHV and OHC engines, the OHC may generate less torque down low, but this would only be a result of the engine being tuned for a higher RPM powerband, which is common among OHC engines as manufacturers race for higher HP and better acceleration. In the marketplace, you will see more higher displacement OHV engines compared to OHC engines, mainly because OHV engines are used more often in full-size trucks and SUV's, while OHC engines are used more often in cars and crossovers. This is likely because truck and SUV engines only need torque down low, and customers don't expect them to rev very high or generate lots of high end power. OHV engines are cheaper so they are the natural choice in these applications. Well it could I suppose, there may even be OHV engines with 4 valves per cylinder. It is still limited in the head design though. Now you're talking. Stickers add performance, why else would race cars have so many on them? It makes sense! Well I don't think M5 owners really drive their cars too much. With that kind of money they probably have multiple cars. There may not even be any M5's that have hit 100k miles for all we know. In the late 80's, early 90's, many people blasted Honda's new vtec system saying it added too much complexity and would be prone to constant maintenance. It turned out that Honda's vtec engines were their most reliable, and are among the most reliable engines available still (fun fact: by 2002, every Honda/Acura sold in the USDM uses some form of vtec - which range from simple profile changes to shutting off cylinders and even variable displacement). If BMW did a good job on their Valvetronic, I don't see any reason why it won't last for the life of the engine. I know BMW's aren't known for their reliability, but I highly doubt we'll ever see BMW owners having their variable lift mechanisms breaking on them, lol.

OHC allows for more flexibility in head and valve design. There is less mass in the valvetrain in an OHC engine, and OHC engines can be designed to rev much higher than OHV engines. OHV engines can be more compact, lighter, and simpler in design, which also are advantages. Take two engines that generate the same amount of torque with completely flat torque curves, one at 2000 rpms and one at 4000 rpms. The higher revving one will do more work. If an engine can breathe sufficiently, it will continue to create more power the higher it revs.

Yay, another nerd thread, I love these. :] AMD Phenom X3 8450 @ 3013mhz (287x10.5) 1.28v. 2000mhz HT/NB (stock 1800) Gigabyte GA-MA770-DS3 "All-Solid Capacitor" eVGA GeForce 8800GT Superclock (at stock now until I get the balls to flash the BIOS) OCZ 2gb DDR2-1066 (running at 764mhz though because of a problem with my motherboard memory settings) Seasonic S12-430 430 watt PSU 250GB & 160GB HDD's Cooler Master C5, custom interior and HDD bays. full sound deadening and insulation I have a laptop too, but it's just a college laptop and nothing special. I don't even know exactly what's in it. Compaq something, Turion CPU, 1GB ram, bleh.

A few tweaks here and there could make this car look good, although it would still be quite generic and bland. I kind of like the little angle they got going from the bottom of the head lights inward. The head lights themselves are a pretty solid rip of the TSX. The tail lights are also a rip of the IS. I really don't like the sides. The side creases and the greenhouse really hold it back. Oh, and the rims are pretty nice. Thanks for posting those full pictures.

He failed to cite the differences in cost too.

"Engine" noise. :AH-HA_wink:

*Yawn* Not enough engine noise.

The CTS-V is a good car, I haven't said anything to the contrary. I prefer the styling of the M5, but I have already congratulated Cadillac in my first post for making a car that competes performance-wise at a lower cost, which is exactly what this car does. If it ends up really beating them performance-wise, then that's even better. That aside, many of my posts are misinterpreted, they are taken too literally or my meaning is bent. This isn't aimed at you but at everyone, and I am either failing to get my point across or nobody is trying to understand it enough. Also people like to toot their horn and jump at any opportunity to do so. I'm going to try and put this as partially as I can. Here we have two cars that use different methods to achieve the same result. One uses more displacement and forced induction, while the other uses a more complex valvetrain and engine design. Being a technical person it is obvious which one I prefer. While one may be a less expensive route to achieve the result now, it certainly doesn't advance engine technology for the future. That is all. I was never trying to argue HP/liter but perhaps my posts came off sounding that way. But to answer your question. This is the place I like to go for automotive news in general. I play the devil's advocate often because I like to balance the opinion. I have been very critical of many Honda products, but I save most of that for vtec.net, since there really is no point to post it here as Honda certainly doesn't read posts here.

It would be quite a feet if they made a 100HP/liter naturally-aspirated pushrod engine, and I don't think they could do it without sacrificing driveability in the low end or incorporating some sort of variable lift mechanism.

It's almost a certainty that the BMW V10 costs a lot more. I think you misinterpreted my post. Regardless, I'm not comparing external dimensions. Is that what you call everyone who tries to use reason to get a point across? Wait, why am I even responding to this? Back to my original point. I am responding to Autoblog's comment that the CTS-V leaves the "Germans thoroughly embarrassed and rebuilding for decades to come". Obviously this is a bit of sensationalism, but it is still a ridiculous notion. Then in response to "why pushrods don't suck" or the general sentiment of this comparison somehow making it seem as if pushrods are as good as the OHC design of the competition; The pushrod V8 defeated the high technology more complex and expensive OHV V10. But it required more displacement and forced induction to do so. What if we compared a 5.0L pushrod N/A GM V8 to a 6.2L supercharged BMW V10 (if one existed that is)? I guarantee everyone here would be complaining that it isn't a fair comparison. But it's ok the way it is.

I'm not the one splicing atoms here. I said that the difference is marginal, while Autoblog is making comments such as the one I have bolded above. If I wanted to argue with those numbers, I could. The vehicles were not tested back to back; all three vehicles had their times sourced from different reviews. They may or may not have used the same instrumentation to test each vehicle, I'm not going to bother reading each article. That is irrelevant, and I don't want to argue numbers. Nothing of the sort. What I said was merely in response to the "pushrods don't suck" comments. If GM made a 5.0L OHV pushrod V8 that developed 500 naturally aspirated horsepower, then we could all praise the smaller and cheaper OHV design and laugh at BMW for choosing the more expensive and complex OHC design.

So the CTS-V is marginally faster than the two German competitors, within the margin of error for a normal driver, and somehow it has those Germans thoroughly embarrassed and rebuilding for decades to come! Congratulations to Cadillac for making a car that performs on par with the Germans, likely at a cheaper price. But nobody is blowing away any of the others as the article seems to suggest. Reality check, people who want a BMW will still buy the M5. IMHO, the M5 is much nicer looking. More elegant and classy. How come nobody is griping about the CTS's hood bulge? It took GM 6.2 liters and a supercharger to best the output of the 5.0 liter naturally-aspirated BMW engine. The M5 and AMG times also come from Edmunds. Perhaps they are lower on R&T (which usually does produce the quickest times) as well, I haven't checked.

So it is essentially "The Fast and The Furious" with a different car selection?

My feeling are still mixed. It isn't bad overall, but it has details that scream cheap. And the front is a bit of a mess.

Uh. Nice two-door wagon, I suppose. I really hope it's just the photos making it look so fat, as this does not look sporty, muscular, or athletic whatsoever. It has two doors, but it really doesn't have coupe styling.

As long as it's RWD I think they will be ok. Saab is FWD is it not?