Car Heaven Canadian program. Emissions

[Bill in Houston]

GM Volt will never be sold, and certainly not in anything beyond a hybrid. It's more smoke and mirrors. THAT is what I'm talking about. GM spends huge amounts of money pretending to be interested in changing, while not really trying. It's okay, BP does the same thing. Companies (and their employees) just shouldn't be surprised when others see through it.

I think part of the pain is that when we were kids, we all had a certain GM that we thought would be super cool to own someday. A Corvette, Camaro, Firebird, Pickup, whatever. But now, most of have driven them as rentals and just have this feeling of "have the guys who built this EVER even SEEN the inside of an Accord?" And then we find that the wiper control is on the DASH, and is controlled by some giant rubber knob? And our neighbor across the street (or a family member) is still a true believer and continues to buy GM, and has their cars in the shop more often than a Jaguar...

[VetteOwner]

Originally Posted by Bill in Houston

Minic6 said that we need to give the American car makers some time to adjust to the Japanese onslaught. Here's the thing. Japanese cars have been coming to the US for 40+ years. The US makers have had plenty of time. Plenty of time to build a reliable product. Plenty of time to build a fuel efficient product. Plenty of time to build a desirable product. But they haven't.

Classic muscle cars are not junk. But I can't imagine trying to drive one to work every day. Maintenance would kill me, not to mention gas. US pickups are what they are. They have been relatively free from Japanese competition until the last 3 years or so. We'll see if US P/U engineers learned anything from watching the Japanese mop the floor with their car engineer buddies, or if they keep making the same product and get stomped by the Japanese too.

well if you were around in the 60's and 70's (not saying i was but ive researched cars and such for a logn time) the "economy" versions of cars were freaking huge compared to cars of today. my friend has a 1975 ford maverick and it was considered a midsize to economy car. it is relatively small compared to cars of that era but still huge compared to todays standards base engine was a 280 somehitng straight 6 engine but had an optional V8

its not that hard to mantain a carbed engine/car... some cars of that era came with its own do it yourself repair manual that explained things easily. i know of a few people who drive daily model A's still back then most people did do regular maintaince at home (backyard mechanics) unliek today when theres a tiny problem that can be fixed in 10 minutes people jsut assume to take it to the dealer every time a light bulb goes out!(exagturating but you get the point)

for the 30 or so of those 40 years you say they had time american car companies didnt think there would be oil crisises, and when one happened in the late 70's they answered, chevy chevette: low 30 mpg ford festiva/pinto (also high mpg) ford escort. etc and people bought them like crazy then when it kidna happened again in the early 90's they tried stuff like metros, still escort, etc but since more and more people prolly figured out from the first one that prices are gonna rise and they want the most MPG out of a car they prolly started looking more at imports for a larger small econo car variety so in reality no they really didnt have 40 years. they were holding back the import cars for a long time but the import companies started desiging more cars and trying to get the best they can out of em since well its all they used to have. the import comanies were used to building econo boxes and if youve been building them for 50 + years you better be damn good at it. GM ford and the like have only recently really trying to build econo cars and havent quite gotten the hang of it...

[Silveredwings]

I'm just getting back to this...

Originally Posted by minic6

I am not asking anyone to give GM a chance at anything! They are reaping what they sowed period!
I think we are in violent agreement.

What I wish people would see is that they also are not an enemy. Check your posts, GM is bashed more than any other of the big 3. It seems like everyone is mimicking the news. GM to them is all that is evil?
Well I may imply that I hate GM but that's not what I believe. I will try to be more positive. If I thought the upper execs cared one wit what I think, I'd tell them what makes me prefer other brands. I think upper mgmt could seem less evil if they focused more on making superior products and less on cutting costs and lobbying our government. I know Americans can out-engineer the Toyotas of the world, so I'm frustrated. I've worked for quite a few American companies with this short-term mindset. It's killing us.

Why they have to have something to talk about, and they are the biggest auto corp in the world. It was metioned about perceived quality, that is so true. Much of what people go by they have no REAL reason for why they like what they like.
I like well engineered products and I pay attention to details that not every car maker does, including fit & finish, reliability, ergonomics, precision, and performance. I know it's a tall order.

I have said this before and it's been said in this thread, recommending any new car is easy there are no Yogo's anymore, Lemons yes always will be, on a limited basis.

It also amazes me that no one has ever said anything about my comments as to Toyota's moving aggresivly into the truck and suv market, doesn't this make them as enviromentily evil as GM? Aren't they just as guilty of profit motivation instead of being green? The Prius only makes up 2% of US sales if not lower check into their trucks. Plus out selliing GM one month makes them KING?
I think Toyota is trying to make their image green because right now, that sells cars, and that endears Americans to a foreign company. I never forget that they're in it for the money. That's exactly why they sell SUVs here (how many car companies don't?). I think that as long as the margin in selling trucks is so much more than cars, every profiteer will see not making trucks as "money left on the table."

[Bill in Houston]

"I know Americans can out-engineer the Toyotas of the world, so I'm frustrated."

I agree completely. We have the most creative and ingenious people in the world... Sigh...