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The Current State of the US Auto Market
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I can say without hesitation that of six new cars I or my wife have ever owned, only one was UAW-made and it was absolutely the vehicle with the most initial problems due to assembly issues.
Just curious...
From things I've read over the years it seems to me at least that both the Pinto exploding gas tanks and the Explorer rollover SUV's were results that shouldn't have surprised the engineers and were maybe the results of cost cutting. IIRC, a slightly higher priced bracket would have alleviated much of the Pinto risk and the Explorer design was top heavy with perhaps too narrow of a track width. We owned one of those Explorer's before the issue arose and honestly that vehicle was kind of wobbly if you turned it abruptly. Throw in the cruise control fiasco that seemed to be downplayed at first, but then expanded and expanded while vehicles, and sometimes garages and houses burned, and I can't help but wonder about the corporate culture at Ford. I don't really trust the company anymore and have stayed away after several bad vehicles combined with these kind of incidents.
My Quest was assembled in Ohio by the UAW.
Good points. Judge for yourself:
My UAW-build car was a brand new 1994 Mercury Villager (built by Ford, but thankfully had a Nissan engine and transmission. We put over 225K miles on that vehicle, so it served us well). Upon initial delivery:
- Glovebox was quite crooked relative to the dash
- Map lights unit was not installed properly and had a corner hanging out
- Speedometer had electrical issue and would erratically move from current speed back and forth to zero
- Soundproofing sheet on engine hood was ripped pretty badly
None of my other new cars had any of those types of problems - in fact it was hard to find anything wrong at all. This car had *four* things wrong at delivery
Oh...I think I know.
Anyway, they have two '14 Malibus. I was underwhelmed with the changes.
Grille is different, but I don't know if it's an improvement. I'm neutral on it.
I know just looking inside a locked car won't tell you anything, but it was next to a '13 Malibu and I didn't notice any big difference in rear-seat legroom. I was expecting the rears of the Malibu's front seats to be 'hollowed out' to allow for knee room, but this was not the case in the '14. The '14 LS they had stickered at $23.2K, which seemed reasonable.
The '14 Camaro SS I had seen outside there a couple weeks back ($37.9K, yikes) was in the showroom with a sold tag on it.
Really, imports were a drop in the bucket back then.
I'd always crack my head getting into my buddy's collector '56 Packard Patrician with a rear door cut like that.
They couldn't get me in for another week, so I called the other nearby Chevy dealer and they said I could come right in. I was there about forty minutes and they washed the car..good because I'm going to wax it tomorrow.
I bought the fob on eBay. It's a GM fob, but the case is pink plastic and the buttons glow in the dark. At first I got the "Are you sure this is for this car?" and I said "yes; it's an LT so I knew it wouldn't be the one with remote start". It was the right one.
Being that I bought both the car and the fob from eBay, I thought $19.95 was reasonable; $40 (from the other dealer) far less so.
I also bought on eBay for my F-I-L in FL, two brand-new fobs for their '04 Lincoln Town Car....under $10 for both including shipping, and they included D-I-Y programming instructions. GM makes you have the dealer do it, but I paid $14.99 for a new fob on eBay.
All of the fobs I bought had brand-new batteries installed, included.
My new taillight cost only $73.00 installed. I'm stunned it was that cheap.
Within five minutes of leaving my house this morning, I was behind a second-generation Neon. It did have a hole in the area right behind the rear door and in front of the rear wheel opening, but wasn't spewing smoke or making any loud noises. What would the newest one of those be?
The price is just a few grand lower than real world C-class prices, but it will have a lot more style in the eyes of younger buyers. MB has recently become afraid of being upright and traditional - although some buyers prefer that in a sedan. Soon there will be an AMG version of the CLA, with a 4cyl engine putting out 360hp. That might be more tempting.
And these cars might be tangentially related to the thread, as the stylish and upmarket small car is something that US makers have stumbled around, and the US market might finally start adopting in numbers.
By Douglas A. McIntyre September 4, 2013 6:28 am EDT
Two weeks ago, General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) recalled nearly 293,000 Chevrolet Cruze models. In these, the power-assisted brakes can fail, which ought to make owners particularly nervous.
Since BMW has the same problem, one cannot assume greater quality with the more one pays, I guess.
The comments below the BMW recall posting in autoblog are amusing IMHO, although there is never a hint of balance in any posts, ever, after a recall post on that site! LOL
My neighbor and his family must've had 5 of them over the years. He commuted about 600 miles a week and passed them down every 2-3 years through his 4 kids. AFAIK, some of the cars went off to college and then came back.
There are 3 left in his driveway and only one of them is in rough shape. I think it might be the first one.
You'll get a kick out of this...on Saturday I was walking through a parking lot with a friend, who's currently car-less. He lives in DC and can get most places that he needs to on a bike. Anyway, he's also pretty clueless when it comes to cars. He was talking about wanting to get one, and asked what I thought of the Neon?!
At first I wondered what made him drag that name up, but then I noticed that there was one in the parking lot, that he spotted, and for some reason happened to fixate on. So, I had to clue him in that they haven't built a Neon since probably late 2004, early 2005 at the best. And that, to put it nicely, they're not very good cars.
I have a friend who had a second-gen Neon, and I don't think he had any real issues with it. But, someone sideswiped it while it was parked, and the damage was just enough to total it, because of the low book value.
Looked okay. Hood closed. No driver. No rust. Must have run out of gas.
Tonight filling up my car before midnight using my $1.00 Kroger discount, an early 20s guy was filling up a sparkling Neon. Toyota sand would be the name of the light tan color in my mind. But it was polished and glistened as did the nice wheels.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Strictly a guess on my part, based on people I know with trucks, but I bet 2WD outsells 4WD--at least here...and we get snowy winters here.
As for MPG. Uplander is correct. To many other factors. Plus the ratings among the leading trucks are close enough that it doesn't make a big difference.
I'm certain your correct, but I can't find anything to back that up. I just spent 10 minutes with google, yahoo, bing, and ask. No answers, just advertisements. Someone needs to come up with a new online search engine which will NOT feature advertisements. I'll bet it would be immensely popular, but then, how would they make money?
Having looked at new trucks recently, 3 Chevy dealers, 3 Ford Dealers, 2 Dodge dealers, 2 Toyota dealers, and 1 Nissan, I can tell you that they're stocking about four times as many 2wd as 4wd new trucks. Of course, this is in Houston, where it snows about as often as Haley's comet makes a fly by.
'17 Chevy Volt Premiere
It was a 1990 Ford F-150 XLT Lariat 2WD Nevada truck with just under 100k.
Last year was a bit higher than the norm, but we got 244 inches of snow. :-) I'm assuming the buyer didn't make a plow truck out of it, lol.
But here in southern ON, pick any NA dealer of fullsized p/ups, and the ratio is hugely in favour of 4WD. And not 'just' 4WD but extended/quad cab 'cars' in truck clothing. Just a couple weeks ago as a firsthand example but have many others in the past..I was looking at Rams, and there was only ONE 2WD! One 4x4 dually, 3 4WD 8' box, and I think I counted 11 4WD extended/quad cabs. And the majority of those had sunroofs...ugh...so trimmed very highend.
So when I see EPA and then in SMALL print at the bottom indicating 2WD on a vehicle which is OFTEN sold in much thirstier forms, I find it a bit misleading. Especially so if the high mileage champ falls from first place once 4x4 is spec'd.
When you see Ram TV ads, they brag about the having the BEST FE in the class with the Pentastar and 8 sp combo. What they fail to say though is that that combo is a substantial price upgrade from base powertrains with some combos still offering only 6 and even antiquated FOUR sp transmissions.
So...who needs 4WD? A lot more customers than many might initially think. And it's not just boat haulers that need grip on the fr axle on slippery ramps. It's also RV haulers who got tired of being stuck in wet grass trying to park their housetrailer in the the nice spot. Just take a random walk thru any trailer park within 200 miles in any direction around here and you will see very VERY few 2WD trucks towing a house trailer. And if you do spot one and ask, why the 2WD? the guy will say, "Mistake...never again". Occasionally you will find the obstinate personality that defends the 2WD to the death, but if you look at his camp sight, you will see that the trailer isn't really sitting on the high grd where he had tried for, and of course there is the mud 3/4 of the way up his sidewalls on the tires with a mess of spin marks on the site. lol..
My Uncle falls into that category...or at least used to. For years he bought 2WD and swore that's all anyone needs anytime he saw me with the 4x4 F150 paint disaster that I had at the time. But fast forward a couple decades and I saw him at the doctors office a couple months back and guess what? His brand new shiny Ram had both axles powered up. haha
Who else needs 4WD? Anyone who lives or drives regularly in hilly terrain in the snow or often not loaded. There are dirt driveways around here that go down into private driveways on the lakes, that even in the summer time, are so steep that if they have not been paved, you can't get out with 2WD unless you are loaded with 700 lb or more in the back.
Anyone who ever needs to plow snow too..
They're coming to geeeet you Bah-bra (er, I mean, Andres3) ;-P
I never once talked to an owner who said he wished he had the 4 wheel drive. I did talk to a number of owners who regretted buying a 4 wheel drive truck. When you have to go to the expense of flipping the axles to get the trailer high enough to clear the fenders on your jacked up 4 wheel drive truck, well
Perhaps we just do an entirely different kind of camping. I went to state parks, RV campgrounds, those kinds of places. Places where the sites were PAVED, the roads leading up to the sites were PAVED. You have heard of paved roads, right? Asphalt, concrete, etc, any of this sound familiar to you?
Emotorcons are back!
(Emotorcon buttons are still missing, at least for some of us, in replies, although you can hand code them in. )
Most people I know with pickups get them with 4wd. I'd guess the majority of 2wd truck sales are to fleets. And around here anyway, a 2wd truck will get hit hard on price at resale.
Ya? Well I'm going to have to take strong exception to the condescension of your post. As in:
Places where the sites were PAVED, the roads leading up to the sites were PAVED. You have heard of paved roads, right? Asphalt, concrete, etc, any of this sound familiar to you?
I already covered the PAVED road/lane exception. You must be hard up in wanting an argument to use that one. Well you ain't gonna get one here. If I'm going to debate something with someone, I make sure I have at least a somewhat credible/rational opponent. Consider this a favour to ya to even point out how outta line you are.
Plus, it would seem you totally ignored the 2WD to 4x4 ratio at local dealers in my area. Like I say, hard up for an argument. pfffftttttt..