General Motors discussions

jae5

And don't forget the stickers and the Monster Tach (that's not hooked up by the way) or the infinite number of A-pillar gauge pods - these items make you go fast too!! But it does have those neon lights; takes me back to the summer of 1990 when I stayed in California with my bro. Coming back to Chi-town I was so glad our roads were so crummy that the neon-light fad stayed out-west. I didn't even have a car then and I thought those lights were a joke!!

It's kind of sad that Pontiac is reverting back to it's spoilered and side-straked '90s ~ early 2000 image. Just when I thought that was out of there system :sick:

cooterbfd

But dead here for decades. Nobody wants these

Not true. There is actually a little buzz over this from El Camino fans. Besides, when you think of it, it's no different than what a 2 DOOR Honda Ridgeline would be.

jae5

How does this jive with their strategy of being the American BMW alternative?

I ask the same question, W-I-T-H does this vehicle have to do with the supposed strategy? I say supposed because of things like this and the previous beemer-alternative / muscle car / throwback Monaro/GTO. I don't think they are supplying a niche where there is a group of BMW & BMW-like owners that want a sporty two-seater that can haul light-loads, like an old Elky or Ranchero.

Their message is still not clear on what is the future of Pontiac other than it's being used to import Holdens here. I wuld rather see this here as an Elky than a G8 derivative.

gsemike

Not true. There is actually a little buzz over this from El Camino fans

I'm sure all 4 of them will make it a big success. Despite my affinity for My Name is Earl, I don't see much of a comeback.

btw: The Ridgeline is AWD and looks like a real truck with more car like drivability. This is something comletely different.

fezo

Of course time will tell, but I tell you I wouldn't be surprised if that G8 El Camino actually found a decent market niche.

It's not my cup of tea but it looks nice. It's a pretty clean design. I can't believe I'm saying this but I'll be watching how it does. It looks like a very different animal the the Chevy SSR which always struck me as cartoonish.

imidazol97

>Chevy SSR which always struck me

But it fit with the Chrysler PT Cruiser and then HHR later.

The El Camino 8 has a nice appearance. If that were put up with a Honda or Toyota lable on it the reaction would be lots different from some folk. If it's not perceived as over-priced, it will have a market.

62vetteefp

I just do not think there is much volume for a 2 door/2seat fake truck. Real trucks yes since all the contractors that want a cheap work truck will buy them.

Is Pontiac a better place than Chev? Not sure but since it is more of a performance vehicle at a mid premium price Pontiac is the place for it.

cooterbfd

The Ridgeline is AWD and looks like a real truck with more car like drivability. This is something comletely different.

It may "look" like a truck, but IIRC, it still rides on the Accord platform.

Seeing as how the G8 "ute" is on the G8 platform, it's not a big gamble to mfr. Even if they sold 20,000, or 10,000, that's still that many more vehicles sold that may not have been. It's not as if the "ute" will steal sales from the G8, just as the Ridgeline steals exactly ZERO sales from the Accord.

dieselone

IMHO, GM has been improving on the car end. Offering models (CTS/Malibu/G8) with looks and performance that would certainly make me consider purchasing if I was in the market for a car.

But, I'm not in the market for a car, I'm looking for a full-size SUV for family trips/towing our boat and camper. Maybe I'm not the target, but I don't see myself trading in my '00 Suburban on a new one. The 1/2 ton Suburban/Yukon XL pretty much sucks for towing. Why GM is still not offering the 6speed trans is beyond me. I'm not going to spend $50-60k to get a Denali or Escalade to have lower towing capability/ability than all of the competition. The Armada/Sequoia/Expedition all offer more towing capacity, mainly due to having engines that develop torque at lower rpm and having extra gearing.

A 5.4/6speed Expedition smokes a 5.3/4speed Suburban when towing. Trucktrend magazine compared a 1/2ton Suburban with 6L/4speed with 4.10 gears vs. an Expedition EL with 5.46speed. Non towing, the Suburban was nearly a second quicker 0-60, but towing 5000lbs, the Expedition was over a second quicker to 60 and much better towing upgrades due to having a torque peak at lower rpm and much better gearing.

I test drove a 2007 GMC Yukon XL 3/4 ton with 6L and was completely unimpressed. It's ride was horrible and the 6liter 4speed combo is weak. No power until well over 4000rpm. It felt slower than my 5.3 Suburban, until it woke up above 4krpm, not what you want for towing (not to mention fit and finish was terrible, weather stripping falling out of rear passenger side door and moldings on the passenger side doors were off by at least a 1/4 inch, way to go GM). GM is now offering the 6speed/6.0L combo in the 3/4 ton Suburban/Yukon Xl, but the ride is terrible. If I was towing all of the time, then I'd consider it, but since I don't the ride trade off isn't worth it.

So now I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't really care for the styling of the Sequoia, even though it has the best powertrain. The '08 Armada interior upgrades are impressive and it's a well documented towing machine. I test drove an '07 used Expedition with 30k miles on it and was impressed with how solid it felt. Not the fasted on the road, but I really liked how it drove, and felt like it would make a very solid towing platform and the pricing on used '07's is attractive.

I might decide to keep my Suburban another year, and see if GM offer a 6.0L/6speed in the 1/2 ton or maybe I'll find a used Denali.

bumpy

I just do not think there is much volume for a 2 door/2seat fake truck.

What's "fake" about it? It's RWD like a Silverado, has a real bed like a Silverado, has similar tow ratings for similar engines. The ground clearance is lower (for that particular version), which means regular humans can access the bed without a stepladder or rock-climbing gear. GM won't sell 100,000 of them, but everyone who bought a Silverado SS could have done just as well with this.

circlew

...they are warming up. I'd say they are thawing out but it's hours before you can cook yet!

Regards,
OW

lemko

In real life, something like that G8 "ute" would make sense for most casual truck users who need it for occasional trips to Home Depot and such. I think what hurts the "ute" is the unfair "redneck" image of the El Camino. Branch Davidian wacko David Koresh is probably most responsible for the El Camino's tarnished image.

gsemike

Seeing as how the G8 "ute" is on the G8 platform, it's not a big gamble to mfr

It's a big gamble to market it. The Pontiac strategy is to be the American BMW. BMW doesn't make a BMWamino. No BMW buyers are going to go in and check out the G8 GT as good as it is because it will be associated with that redneck monstrosity

bumpy

I doubt it. I didn't even know he had one. I figured he drove around in a Buick or something. :P

The 'tarnishing' of the El Camino was accomplished by its '70s garishness and the general dumpiness of the '80s version. People seem to have forgiven GM for both of those faults, so today's rednecks can continue tarnishing the Silverado while middle-aged office managers can relive their pot-smoking, beer-bonging, repaint-the-school-band-statue-as-KISS-characters youth.

xrunner2

As good as the new G8 sounds, it's a crying shame that they stuck with the some old Grand Am/GTO/G6 beak. Familiar styling is good, but how about an evolution.

Would agree. Somehow, those hood scoops are out of place and diminish the sophistication of the car. The other front end elements need tweaking.

Front end theme of this car leans toward hot rod rather than all-around performance sports/sporty car.

WIll be interesting if car mags or Edmunds does performance comparos against BMW 3 series (with V8) and G35. Understand that BMW is in higher price class. Would expect that G8 comes up short against these cars.

sls002

Automobile has already done a comparison with the 5-series and G8.

cooterbfd

I agree it should be marketed as a Chevy El Camino. However, with what I would see as a small market, it would be cheaper to make it as a Pontiac. IF (big if) it happens to show big demand, then maybe they may invest the money for a Chevrolet nose and sell a true El Camino. Either way, there is very little monitary investment to sell a few cars. True enough about not being a BMWtiac.

irnmdn

Coming back to Chi-town I was so glad our roads were so crummy that the neon-light fad stayed out-west. I didn't even have a car then and I thought those lights were a joke!!
Some people find flames and spoilers of pickup trucks childish too.

sls002

The base transmission in the Suburban is rated for a total weight of 7400 lbs. The 6L90 is rated for 15,000 GVW and 21,000 GCVW.

62vetteefp

Yes, GM should have our government pay for it. No wonder the Prius is so cheap.

And all of a sudden the very likable Jim Press becomes a liar after years of very respectable working. He is the most likable, honest guy around. No way he would make up a story like this.

http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080402/FREE/199919373/1024

In a BusinessWeek story published Thursday, March 24, Press said that when he was at Toyota, “The Japanese government paid for 100 percent of the development of the battery and hybrid system that went into the Toyota Prius.”

Toyota today denied the remark made by Press, who left Toyota last year after a long career at the Japanese automaker. His last position there was president of Toyota Motor North America Inc.

“I can say 100 percent that Toyota received absolutely no support--no money, no grants--from the Japanese government for the development of the Prius,” Toyota spokesman Paul Nolasco told The Associated Press today in Tokyo.

bumpy

Toyota topic is down the hall, cap'n.

Anyway, the sad part isn't that the Japanese government financed the development of Toyota's hybrid system; it's that Toyota used that money to develop a saleable product and created a market for it, while GM flushed a few billion US taxpayer dollars down the toilet on the EV-1 and ended up with squat on the showroom floor.

sls002

If GM can make the Volt concept into a saleable product, it will be much better than hybrid systems. Also, the EV-1 was a zero emissions vehicle, while the prius is not.

I am not quite sure what you mean that billions of taxpayer dollars were spent on the EV-1.

62vetteefp

Toyota topic is down the hall, cap'n.

This topic is what GM can do to improve it's profitability. As I said, seems like GM could follow the profitable Toyota corporation and allow our government to foot some of the research so that they can compete with other countries, I mean companies. This way they could offer product at reduced prices like Toyota did on the Prius.

Anyway, the sad part isn't that the Japanese government financed the development of Toyota's hybrid system; it's that Toyota used that money to develop a saleable product and created a market for it, while GM flushed a few billion US taxpayer dollars down the toilet on the EV-1 and ended up with squat on the showroom floor.

GM used it's own money to develop a product that was government mandated. Unfortunately the technology needed for a feasible/affordable electric car was unavailable back then as both GM and Toyota found out. They both had EV programs and both were "flushed" down the toilet.

Today technology is still not there for an affordable EV product. GM and Toyota are both competing to be first with products in 2010. This time however it is not really government mandated. It is customer demanded (and hopefully will still be by 2010, well actually I hope customers will no longer demand it because gas drops back to $2/gallon, but that is very doubtful).

Could you tell me where the billions of government money came from? Perhaps you are referring to the loss in tax revenue due to the huge loss in profits from GM's foray into the EV1? Perhaps you were implying that Japan also supported Toyota development of there EV program back then?

62vetteefp

As an aside, I think this might turn into something. Press went before congress in '07 and said Toyota did not take money from the government for the Prius program when he was at Toyota. Now he says they did. Very interesting.

stever

Volt battery testing is about to begin in earnest:

GM road-tests batteries for Volt electric car (CNN)

62vetteefp

Great, is our government paying for it

imidazol97

>As an aside, I think this might turn into something. Press went before congress in '07 and said Toyota did not take money from the government for the Prius program when he was at Toyota.

Thanks for making that point. Somehow deja vu of the cigarette execs and oil company execs testifying for congress's shows that they didn't know anything about nicotine addition and couldn't lower gas prices because they need the tax breaks along with their profits.

imidazol97

>Toyota topic is down the hall, cap'n

I can't understand why Toyota can't be discussed. :confuse: We have people posting about how wonderful the foreign companies are or have done things and how GM should have known this :P or that and should have done this or that because HoToy did, etc.

The new name for the discussion is fostering that approach to posting again even though at first read it sounds positive ; some people interpret it as soliciting negative posting :sick: .

circlew

Well, to me, the answer to this question depends on how well GM does with it's change efforts vs. Toyota, et al.

Regards,
OW

62vetteefp

"GM had the technology to do hybrids back when Toyota was launching the
first Prius, but we opted not to ask the board to approve a product
program that'd be destined to lose hundreds of millions of dollars,"
said Mr. Lutz, GM's product czar, in a blog post. "In the end, it cost
us much more than that; it cost us our reputation for technology
leadership and innovation."

Perhaps they should have just asked the US government for the money?

210delray

Everyone seems to be forgetting there were two government sponsored programs for the Detroit 3, one under Clinton and the other under Bush the Younger. These cost hundreds of millions, but apparently nothing came out of them. One was called a Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles. The other IIRC was supposed to result in a practical 80-mpg family car.

sls002

Early buyers of the prius got more than $3000 in tax credits - that is they could deduct more than $3000 off their taxes if they bought a prius.

210delray

True in theory about the tax credits, but if you were moderately prosperous and married, you didn't get ANY credit due to the reach of the Alternative Minimum Tax.

gsemike

There were tax credits available on all hybrids, not just Priuses.

Look at this list of least reliable cars:

Don't buy these cars

Notice how many GMs are on the list? This is going to take a long time to live down and win people back. The G6s presence on this list is especially troubling since it's the same basic underpinnings as the Aura and Malibu which are supposed to be turning points for the 'new GM'. They better do better than the G6.

62vetteefp

Every GM car on that list is out of production except the G6, Uplander and the small pick up trucks. And these vehicles were designed years ago and will be soon gone. In fact I believe only the G6 is getting replaced and it will be on an all new architecture. The #1 reason for the G6 being on that list is due to issues with the accordian roof debacle. No one else sells it and GM was taken to the cleaners by the source. It is not offered on the Aura or Malibu and no longer on the G6.

So thank you for the list. It shows that GM no longer has recently designed (5 years) vehicles in the "worst of the worst" list. (ok the minivans would qualify but they were just rebodied versions of the old one) They have improved as other quality measures have shown. Lets hope the word gets out.

What I also find interesting is that every vehicle is a truck/van/SUV except for the G6, a Mercedes and Jetta's.

What I find more disturbing is that GM has few vehicles on the "best of the best" list while other quality measures show that at least two divisions of GM (Buick and Cadillac) are at the top. You would think that at least a couple of their models would be on that list. But hey there is another forum out there for Consumer Reports relevance discussion.

lemko

BEST OF THE BEST

These are models that have performed well in CR road tests over the years, and have proved to have several or more years of better-than-average reliability. Listed alphabetically.

Acura Integra
Acura MDX
Acura RL
Acura RSX
Acura TL
Acura TSX
BMW M3
Buick LaCrosse
Honda Accord
...

I knew it!

fezo

Without getting into why this model is in and that model isn't I suspect the biggest factor in GM having so many on the don't buy and so few on the buy list is due to the fact that most of the most desirable vehicles in the GM stable are relatively new. Assuming the new products prove reliable I expect they'll start showing up there, too.

This makes sense when you see the La Crosse on the good list - it's been around long enough to have proven itself.

210delray

I just thought about that accordian roof and the "first ever G6" ads when the car debuted. What was the story with that? And what was the take rate on this presumably optional feature?

I suppose what reminded me was seeing a photo I'd taken of our G6 rental last year with the conventional sunroof open. Unlike most cars in its class, the sunroof rides outside the metal roof.

62vetteefp

Cost of sunroof opening to the outside or inside is the same. Major difference is headroom. GM, in their smaller cars (at least 5 years ago) was to go for more headroom. Even the LaCrosse went above the roof while the old Regal went inside.

Perhaps not a good trade off in your mind but there are lots of complaints about lack of headroom in sunroofed vehicles.

bumpy

The #1 reason for the G6 being on that list is due to issues with the accordian roof debacle. No one else sells it and GM was taken to the cleaners by the source. It is not offered on the Aura or Malibu and no longer on the G6

You mean this thing?
http://www.pontiac.com/g6convertible/index.jsp

62vetteefp

Do not know the penetration but do know that pretty much 100% rattled. And 100% complaint rate on any feature will really skew the numbers.

They do not say the number of complaints, only below average, but per other surveys the worst of the worst would maybe be 3 to 5 issues per car. So an averaged .25 hit would really hurt.

What perhaps is noticable is that the old Malibu, also on the same architecture, is not on the list. So most likey is that any new features on the G6, that were not on the Malibu, are causing the jump.

62vetteefp

GM's 3.6L and their truck Hybrid engines made the list!

http://wardsauto.com/reports/2008/tenbest/best_engines_focus/

The winners for 2008 (engine and tested vehicle):

Audi AG: FSI 2.0L turbocharged DOHC I-4 (Audi A3)
BMW AG: 3.0L turbocharged DOHC I-6 (335i Coupe)
Daimler AG: 3.0L DOHC V-6 Turbodiesel (Mercedes E320 CDI)
Ford Motor Co.: 4.6L SOHC V-8 (Mustang Shelby GT/Bullitt)
General Motors Corp.: 3.6L DOHC V-6 (Cadillac CTS)
General Motors Corp.: 6.0L OHV V-8 Hybrid (GMC Yukon Hybrid)
Honda Motor Co. Ltd.: 3.5L SOHC V-6 (Accord Coupe)
Mazda Motor Corp.: 2.3L DISI turbocharged DOHC I-4 (Mazdaspeed3)
Nissan Motor Co. Ltd.: 3.7L DOHC V-6 (Infiniti G37)
Toyota Motor Corp.: 3.5L DOHC V-6 (Lexus IS 350)

General Motors Corp. lands two first-time winners on the list for 2008.

The highly refined, high-output 3.6L DOHC V-6 that powers the Cadillac CTS is one of the industry's best all-around V-6 performers. Meanwhile, GM also earns an award with its highly anticipated Two-Mode hybrid-electric powertrain, based on a 6.0L variant of its legendary small-block V-8.

Pretty interesting that almost every high tech V6 used in the industry is on the list! All pretty equal.

cooterbfd

"Oh now c'mon!!!! THAT doesn't count, it's not Consumer Reports. Only THEY matter"

Love, import fanboy

wtd44

Taking this opportunity to refer to other aspects of the thread title, I have a suggestion for the General: Consider telling your offending dealers to cease and desist from the practice of upping every window sticker on the premises by almost $1000 for a plastic adhesive nose bra and a pin stripe down each side! The source of my irritation is my local SATURN dealer. I have decided to new-car shop elsewhere, and that will likely mean not buying a Saturn...

imidazol97

You don't say what area you're in, but in this midwestern area the GM dealers tend to have fewer auto addons like the pinstripes, mudflaps, new wheels, etc., packages. It's the foreign brands who pump up the price before the customer even gets to the negotiation desk. I certainly believe that GM dealers may do that in different markets.

wtd44

And the awful truth is, car sales are down 20% from last year here, and that was a down year as well. Is it just me, or does bumping the sticker up seem counter productive? :mad:

cooterbfd

Did you try to see if they could locate one nearby w/o all that crap?? I can see them having some ready to go like that, but all of them is pure BS!!! That's no way to do business.

wtd44

Ain't it the sad truth? I don't believe there is another Saturn alternative within a hundred miles that might be owned by a different company. Let me hasten to tell everyone that I have not gone into the dealership and inquired about this. There is a chance that they would remove the offending trim, or at least give it away for no cost. But I'm not sure I want to spend the time to find out!

cooterbfd

I remember 20-25 yrs ago when the local Buick dealers put "Presidential" packages on the Buicks. $1500 for the padded roof and gold emblems. A pretty package, but only enough were done to meet demand. You could still buy a regular on off the lot.

circlew

My wife's Yuokon was in the shop 2 months ago for the fourth time to upgrade OnStar from analog to digita...could the lemon law apply to a 2003? Anyway, this time we demanded a loaner and got an '07 G6. The car is everthing I would never buy after spending the day driving on local roads. Driving feel is numb, handling was unresponsive and very limited and brakes were average. Visibility was terrible.

This week, I traveled to LA and rented a 2008 G6 with 2,500 miles on it. This car was an improvement. The improvements were incremental but a better car. I still would not buy it. My wife's '86 Grand Am was better.

Please put the G6 out of it's misery.

Regards,
OW