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and nader had it in for the corvair too - big time. I think that was what got him all aped up.
The above is war if you are referring to me :P and I'm a OIF and OEF veteran so beware
All the honda odessey owners in the other forum who are lamenting the CU/CR red circle (can't forget the little white dot!) on their vehicles can thank themselves - and honda. There's your CR objectivity!
Sonic brake pads. yes it's a serious faux pax on GMs part. But a single missing brake pad is not going to seriously affect stopping performance - maybe a 5-10% reduction. There IS still friction going on, just not the kind that is conducive to longevity of the rest of that axle's brake system.
On the other hand, losing all power on the interstate is a horrifying experience and MUCH MORE DANGEROUS. You instantly loose power steering and you car is now a bumper car target at highway speeds. Thanks but I'll take the missing brake pad 100% of the time.
Starting in 1971 the big push was to reduce emissions, especially lead, so compression ratios dropped by 2 orders right away, proper methods of tuning carbuerators were essentially prevented (very few FI cars then and none electronically controlled).
The smaller imports had a natural advantage already with the smaller engines emitting less than the larder American engines.
So the car's got worse in terms or performance and driveability.
Then came the arab oil embargo at the end of 1973. 1974s were already in the market. There was a mad rush to improve fuel economy (1974 cars are generally the WORST for fuel economy by the way). This only made matters worse for the large American cars. Again the smaller imports had a natural advantage.
Now, the big 3 didn't help themselves by being slow off the mark, and their initial attempts were well, my momma said "if you can't say anything nice..." so I'll just be quiet here...
here: Vega, Pinto i can't even remember the chrysler products.
Then as many mfrs went to FWD, more issues with inadequate design and mfr methods (remember casting sand left over in chrysler FWD transmissions??), made things worse. Pretty much from 1973 thru 1991 there isn't a car i would want to drive / own and the only 71 or 72s i would consider are ElDorado Convertibles.
But GM got its FWD transmission issues sorted out by 1985-86, and the advent of on board microprocessors enabled the cars to make more power out of a smaller displacement and still reduce emissions. That's why there are 400HP engines out there that get better mileage than a big block big HP 1960s - early 70s car, and produce fewer emissions.
But the self inflicted wounds the big 3 made on themselves and their continued unwillingness to stand up to the auto worker unions have dogged them for over 35 years. All the cars are better built now (not necessarily all "better cars" IMO) but the big 3 have continued to trail the imports.
Yes I would like them to get better, In some ways they are equal to or better, but perception is still stuck in the 70s for many.
And if the above is "infantile" well, maybe that's because I started off as an Infantry Officer :P I have since "graduated" to Logistics...
But it takes a modicum of intelligence to actually use the sites. I think you are giving some folks too much credit.
I never noticed the "supporter" link if there even was one.
Maybe i have too many Cadillac photos on the HDD - that's got to be it! Thanks! You solved a six months long problem for me!!!
My apologies to anyone who saw my cousin vinny and recognizes the analogy.
Following on the heels of its Camaro stablemate, the smallest Chevrolet model has performed well on the National Highway Safety Administration's crash tests, earning a coveted five-star overall safety rating. Two months ago, the Camaro received the first perfect score awarded under NHTSA's revised testing regimen, while both the Sonic five-door and sedan scored five stars in each category except rollover, in which it earned four stars.
Performing well in a crash could also help those whose Sonics were recently recalled for missing brake pads. In all seriousness, we're always happy to see new models earn high scores in crash testing, because it means that they are safer. But it's even better news when small cars score well, as it helps to dispel the false notion that size is the only thing that matters in a collision.
Cadillac sales down again, Mike!
Regards,
OW
Cue up Saturday Night Live 'Debbie Downer' music (horns, 'wah-wah'!).
If Ralph had been coming of age in the 80s, he would made his name from Explorer rollovers. Chevy just got his attention first.
Have to admit, cars have gotten a lot safer and he influenced how fast that came about. Before the feds regulated seat belts and stuff, no one was willing to pay extra for safety options.
That data is incomplete.
Saab dropped 75% in December, Porsche dropped 29%. Those are the 2 big losers for the month.
He also omitted the fact that Jaguar was down 8% for the year.
Source: Automotive News December U.S. Sales Report (it's e-mailed).
Says the guy who thought Ralph Nader founded CU when he was 2 years old.
You're in no position to judge others like that.
That's totally wrong.
You lose power assist, you don't lose all steering control.
At highway speeds, you hardly need assist anyway. In fact, my buddy owned a Chevy Chevette without power steering and besides being heavy at parking lot speeds, it had more feel than many power assisted racks.
Early NA Miatas without power assist are actually sought after because there's more feel for the road.
No loss of control at speed, no bumper cars. Please. :lemon:
Eh, Nader's like William Frawley or Burt Mustin to me. He's ALWAYS been old! :P
Essentially the same thing in a Suburban or full-size truck. The GM trucks equipped with hyroboost used the power steering pump to boost the brakes, so you lose both steering and brake assist/boost at the same time. That would be freakin scary in a full size truck or SUV. I think the issue was recalled.
My Suburban had a minor power steering issue when it was cold. It would briefly lose assist and I tell ya, it was hard to turn when it happened. Generally it only happened when it was cold out and at slow speeds.
Sure, if your driving down the interstate and you lose steering assist you likely won't lose control, but if you're not expecting it and your trying to turn, you will likely hit something if the power steering decides to fail at the wrong time. You'll need popeye arms to negotiate anything more than a gradual curve.
Sure, a heavier/bigger car would be harder to stop and turn, but you'd hardly notice while driving straight on the highway. No instant loss of control.
I don't think the issue affects current gen trucks, I think the recall was in 04 or 05.
Also, Hydroboost is a Bendix product I believe and it used in other makes other than GM.
At one point he was a car salesman...I wonder what brand(s) he sold?
And yeah, William Frawley was on My Three Sons, but as he got older and his health declined, the studio couldn't get insurance for him, so he was phased out in favor of William Demarest. Frawley would continue to visit the set from time to time, but held a resentment against Demarest, so eventually he was banned from the set.
Because their market share is too small. The data in the original post was the market share point change in 2011 comparing to 2010. Each market share point equals to 1% of the total vehicles sold in the whole market. Because the number of Saab sold was so small, their market share point lose is too small too.
The data is very complete. I can post the market share changes of every automakers if you want to see.
The data was not the percentage change of sales volume over the previous year for a particular automaker, which does not show how relatively an automaker did comparing to the whole market because the reference point was its own sales volume of previous year. It also does not weight the same way across all automakers because the automakers' sales volumes varies dramatically. If one automaker sold 1 car in 2010 and 2 cars in 2011, that's a 100% increase! Does it mean anything?
The data I posted was the market share point change over the year. For example, Toyota's 2011 market share was 12.9%, and 2010 was 15.2%, so Toyota's market share change was -2.3 point.
The market share point change is referenced to the total market sales volume, so it can be compared across all auto makers. If it's positive, it means that automaker is gaining market share. If it's 0, it means that automaker is growing the same rate as the overall market. The market share point also weights equally to any automakers because it references the total sales volume of the market and 1 point is 1% of the total market volume for any automakers.
Toyota US sales were up from January to March, and then up in November in December.
What happened in the middle?
Supply disruption due to the tsunami.
Without that asterisk your data is totally meaningless.
A 15.2% share dropped 2.3 points, so they lost 15% of their market share.
BTW they already recovered most of it in Nov-Dec, but let's ignore that, since you have to wear blinders to digest xlu's data anyway.
http://www.autoblog.com/2012/01/05/70-of-japanese-vehicles-sold-in-america-are-b- uilt-here-too/
That article says ~70% of them are built here, and they maintained 85% of their market share.
If we look at the other 30%, they lost half of that. Tsunami/flooding hit hard for about 6 months.
6 months is half of the year. Voila.
That explains the drop entirely.
This is a GM thread, yet coincidentally, xlu picks on Toyota, again, always. He cherry picks the bad points and takes them out of context to look worse than they are.
Per Automotive News' preliminary sales totals, which did include some estimates, Toyota's share in December was already back up to 14.3%. Pretty quick recovery, if you ask me.
http://www.autoblog.com/2012/01/05/chevy-volt-will-receive-safety-enhancements-b- ut-dont-call-it-a/#continued
Not sure why, I guess they want to limit the bad press?
Good that they have a fix now, though.
Looks like a well engineered fix. A few hours to install, but the fix should be sturdy and durable.
I will say this - had that been a Toyota, NHTSA would have been all over their backs to force a recall.
GM is becoming a "joke."
Out of the 53 cars owned in my long life, 34 were GM models, however future plans do not include any new GM wheels..This political manufacturing company is full of "hype", and the resale value of used GM vehicles is sinking..
GM was an American icon, however in my perspective they don't offer much anymore...
GM and the "City of Detroit" make a perfect pair..Roger Smith started the downward spiral of GM and it finally slid of the cliff..Coleman Young pulled the plug on Detroit..
It ain't a pretty sight!!!!!
Just as there are standards for gas tanks, there should be for batteries. That Lexus met all those standards, but when a dumb grease monkey at Bob Baker Lexus puts a Toyota mat in a Lexus and all heck broke loose, all bets are off.
Plus it would help if they would picks mats for that actual car (duh).
The Saylor family settled with Toyota but they're still going after Baker Lexus, the dealer who provided that loaner car.
This is way off topic, but I'm sure you love taking a cheap shot at Toyota whenever you get the chance, eh?
As a few other people said, if you want a clear understanding of how much a company is changing from year-to-year you need to normalize gains in market-share. You would want to take the loss or gain and ratio it to the curent number, to present a %-change. Only then can you compare the amount of improvement between different size manufacturers. So it was rather amateurish and humorous that the author of that data puts out a story that misses a company disappearing! A fine author for an old newspaper like Pravda!
The only time the use of percent-of-total-market would make sense is if you are looking at a multi-year chart; say something like how GM went from 50% market-share to 20-percent over the last few decades.
The mat never interfered with making the car accelerate and stop, but the slipping was annoying.
Rank Automaker 2011 volume 2011 market share 2010 market share Market share change
1 General Motors Corp. 2,503,797 19.6% 19.1% 0.51%
2 Ford Motor Company 2,143,101 16.8% 16.7% 0.10%
3 Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc. 1,644,661 12.9% 15.2% -2.35%
4 Chrysler LLC 1,369,114 10.7% 9.4% 1.35%
5 American Honda Motor Co Inc. 1,147,285 9.0% 10.6% -1.64%
6 Nissan North America Inc. 1,042,534 8.2% 7.8% 0.32%
7 Hyundai Motor America 645,691 5.1% 4.6% 0.41%
8 Kia Motors America Inc. 485,492 3.8% 3.1% 0.73%
9 Volkswagen of America Inc. 324,400 2.5% 2.2% 0.32%
10 Subaru of America Inc. 263,820 2.1% 1.9% 0.20%
11 Mercedes-Benz 261,846 2.0% 1.9% 0.11%
12 Mazda Motor of America Inc. 250,426 2.0% 2.0% -0.02%
13 BMW of North America Inc. 248,073 1.9% 1.9% 0.04%
14 Audi of America Inc. 117,561 0.9% 0.9% 0.04%
15 Mitsubishi Motors N A, Inc. 79,020 0.6% 0.5% 0.14%
16 Volvo 67,240 0.5% 0.5% 0.06%
17 Mini * 57,500 0.4% 0.4% 0.06%
18 Land Rover ** 38,099 0.3% 0.3% 0.02%
19 Porsche Cars NA Inc. 29,023 0.2% 0.2% 0.01%
20 American Suzuki Motor Corp. 26,619 0.2% 0.2% 0.00%
21 Jaguar * 12,276 0.1% 0.1% -0.02%
22 Saab 5,575 0.0% 0.0% 0.00%
23 Maserati * 2,322 0.0% 0.0% 0.00%
24 Bentley * 1,877 0.0% 0.0% 0.00%
25 Ferrari * 1,701 0.0% 0.0% 0.00%
26 Rolls Royce * 362 0.0% 0.0% 0.00%
27 Maybach * 39 0.0% 0.0% 0.00%
Toyota's market share for the last 2 months of the year was around 14% and climbing.
Let's see if GM can sustain these gains, and more importantly, if the US can do 14-15M in sales in 2012.
It's interesting that someone just dismissed monthly data being worthless and now you say the FULL YEAR data is not the full picture....
It's like a NBA game; no matter what reasons (or excuses) one team had in that game and how much they surged in the 4th quarter, if they lost in the final score, they lost that game.
Let's close the chapter of 2011, and see how the automakers do in 2012. I won't pick a winner now.
Furthermore, with your statement that the government would have forced Toyota into a recall for what GM is doing, I might add that it has been widely reported that Toyota was known to stonewall and hide information on recall areas earlier in the 2000's, which later resulted in the big fine. There was a very distinct difference in behavior between Toyota and other companies in that regard.
And I know you didn't say it, but a fellow GM-basher here did...because one wants a domestic nameplate does not make them a racist. That has to win an award as dumbest comment of the year...no, millenium.
I don't see it as a zero sum game, so I think there wil be several winners for 2012.
The D3 should all have a successful 2012.
And here I thought the 2 bachelor uncles moved out to the Berkshires and opened up a B&B and organic produce stand.
Although it happened back in September, 2011, it appears many American taxpayers are unaware that General Motors struck a deal in Shanghai wherein the company has agreed to develop an electric vehicle (EV) platform with its longtime Chinese partner SAIC.
What else was included in this deal? GM has agreed to effectively move all future EV development to China. It could also mean that production of the vehicle itself will be moved overseas.
“The Chinese government is pushing electrics with a subsidy that amounts to about $19,000 per car — but only if the car is made in China. No imports allowed,” writes Chris Woodyard of USA Today. “There also are tariffs on cars imported to China, which lawmakers argue are unfair and may violate world trade rules.”
:sick:
I know many here consider fleet sales as a legitimate sale, but I believe they skew actual demand.
My wife gets a new company car ever few years. I don't see her buying a Ford or GM car if she were to pick a vehicle she actually wants.
Looking at 2010 car fleet data no trucks, (2011 is not out yet) Cadillac is 28% Fleet yikes. That really shows how badly they are getting outsold in the retail market. Lexus is only 2%.
Chevy cars were 42% fleet in 2010. Toyota was 17.1%. Ford was 35.8%. In MY2010 Toyota sold 684k cars retail vs 360k for Chevy and 355k for Ford. That's an [non-permissible content removed] kicking in the retail segment. Buick did sell 75k retail with a fleet percent of 17.
Heck Honda sold 603k cars to the retail market and had a fleet percent of 3.4%
Nissan sold 373k cars retail with a fleet percent of 19.8%.
I'm curios to see the 2011 results.
Looking at retail sales numbers outside of trucks and SUVs, the D3 still has a long way to go.
And we gleefully transfer technology in that direction and let them have virtually unrestricted access to our markets. Three cheers for "free trade"!
No imports allowed
Sounds like a few contributers we have here in this very thread...