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Comments
Hmmm, I wonder if one used the 5" bolt pattern and the other used the 4.75"? You'd think that something that was practically cloned, like an Astro/Safari, would use the same bolt pattern! And I've seen S-10's using the same sport rims as what I've seen on Monte Carlos and '81-83 Malibus, so I always presumed they were the same 4.75" bolt pattern. I know my '85 Silverado is on the 5" pattern, because we put its spare tire on my '69 Bonneville once, when I ran over a pitchfork my uncle had left in the yard.
I think that once everybody started to directly copy Chrysler's pattern for the minivan, they really started to improve. It was the earlier models, where everybody tried to go their own route, such as GM's and Ford's 3/4 scale conventional vans, the goofy dustbusters, or some of those Japanese imports that really seemed more patterned after the VW bus or the old 60's cabover-style vans. Or those flimsy raised wagons like the old Civic that had more body flex than a rusted-out '76 Electra 4-door hardtop.
Now I thought that the first Honda Odyssey was pretty cool. Instead of being just a pure minivan in the Chrysler mold, it seemed to have a bit more station wagon in its dna. And they seemed fairly sturdy by that time. Although too small for the typical minivan buyer, I guess.
What the heck is wrong with GM? Competitors have more powerful engines that consume less fuel without the silly cylinder shut off gimmick.
How one drives any car will affect the overall fuel consumption. EPA results are good for comparing similar vehicles but will not predict what your actual results will be.
-Loren
It's a similar result for turbocharging.
The basic reason is that aggressive driving requires using more power, which is what burns fuel. If you drive conservatively, the engine is using less fuel.
Accordingly, the benefits of conservative driving are greater with deactivation systems and turbo motors because the engine is well below its peak power in those modes (with half the engine shut down, or with the turbo off). In a normally aspirated engine, the motor is delivering more power at lower operating levels, and therefore consuming more energy, even if you are driving fairly gently.
For example, the old 944 turbos got better real world fuel economy than comparable Corvettes on the street, but used just as much fuel on the race track because the turbo was in constant use. During real world driving, the turbo is often not in use, so you get fuel savings as a result.
Rocky
Didn't they break down a lot, and the results weren't that great?
Yes. Computer technology has advanced quite a lot since the 1980s. Deactivation helps those who drive intelligently realize even greater performance from their vehicles.
Didn't they break down a lot, and the results weren't that great?
Hybrids don't seem to be that great either. Maybe 20% better mileage if you really know what you are doing (slow starts and stops in heavy traffic)and under ideal conditions.
2017 MB E400 , 2015 MB GLK350, 2014 MB C250
Seems like DOD is just about free-no increased weight, just a little more complicated electronics?
Don't know about GM's offerings (might be difficult to get direct comparisons for otherwise identical cars and engines).
I do know that the Honda Odyssey has models without DOD (the LX and EX) and models with DOD (the EX-L and Touring). The EX is EPA rated at 19/25 while the EX-L is rated at 20/28.
So, the EPA gives the DOD Odyssey a 12% boost in highway economy. As usual, YMMV
Not entirely 'free'. The valvetrain may be a bit more complicated. Also, the DOD engines may require some more sophisticated motor mounts and sound proofing to counter the 'odd' harmonics when the engine is running on only 1 bank. The Ody uses electronically controlled motor mounts to keep unwanted motor convulsions from reaching the cabin as well as Active Noise Cancelling (ANC) technology. Don't know what GM or DCX uses on their DOD engines.
Caught this shippet.
In addition, GM's "active fuel management" engine technology
on two models alone is forecast to reduce more greenhouse gas emissions
than all the hybrid vehicles sold in Canada in the same period.
It didn't work before in the 80's. Now it works, but doesn't help much. Unless you're driving slowly, on a totally flat road, with no wind. Then, you may realize some real difference. Most of your gas consumption equation comes from the variables of weight and drag. It takes so much energy to move 4,000 lbs at any speed. The faster you wanna move it, the more drag, the more gas used.
That's hard to get away from.
-Loren
Aluminum is very expensive. Plus it would be hard to save 500# unless you went with an all aluminum car. I think audi looked at that.
Almost every Nissan sedan will have CVT next model redsign.
Murano already has CVT with 240+hp.
What have you been smokin?
Just because GM's attempt with CVT has failed doesn't mean others did not succeed. Actually these are the golden days of CVT. All 2007 Nissans sedans will use them: versa, Sentra, Altima, Maxima. No multi-gear transmissions anymore.
Also on the Dodge Caliber, Jeep Compass and Patriot, CVT is the only automatic option, and CVT is sure able to handle the massive 367 lb-ft on the Lexus GS450h.
In googling the CVT it does look like many are going to use them. Seems like the Hybrid cars are the ones that go for them.
The Caliber is not catching on.
Nissan is losing sales now. Nissan tends to have more reliability problems than the big 2 Japanese. A move to CVT may not do much to overcome that.
case mfr. Syracuse NY are busting the move !
Rather than working for the new owners at 1/2 pay.
for Union busting Magna Intl. 193 employees have
accepted a $25k relocation allowance and are heading
to Belvidere Ill. to staff the new 3rd shift opening
at that plant..............
200 others are either leaving or retiring.........
Article at :
http://www.syracuse.com/business
Rocky
The Caliber is not catching on. "
yes I kind of exaggerated that. It's obvious, however, what's happening. Nissan used its first CVT in 2003 in the Murano and restricted it to one vehicle. The transmission must have been very reliable that Nissan is betting on it for all its future passenger cars, save the 350Z.
The story is the same for Toyota's all five hybrids. One of them even has more torque than the STS V8.
Chrysler is new to CVT though. Yet it's betting on CVT for three all new vehicles that share the same platform: The Caliber + 2 new small Jeeps. And since the platform is shared with the 2007 Sebring/stratus, you might see it there too.
By the way, The Caliber is a huge success for Chrysler - never have they sold this many small cars, not even the PT Cruiser sold this many.
Becuase all volume sellers- Altima/Sentra/Maxima are in ther final year of the model cycle.
Nissan tends to have more
reliability problems than the big 2 Japanese
Never heard of major tranmission problems with Nissan unlike Odyssey,Accord/TL or Camry/ES300.
I'll see everyone over at the Will 2007 Styling Save GM board.
Rocky
As for reliability, I still don't know what to think of Nissan. Sometimes things are looking up and then... well I don't know. I do know I liked the Datsun I owned. Since the Datsun years, it looks like one heck of a roller coaster ride for Nissan. I really liked the Altima when it came out. Still do like it. As for the Z, I really prefer the previous model.
-Loren
P.S. Almost forgot, the Fusion, Milan came out, as well as, the new Impala look (the accord era), which all have the possibility of taking sales away from Nissan. Getting tough!
What do you think about the new G35 ? The new CTS is going to have it's handful with this new ride from Infiniti.
*Gulp* :surprise:
Rocky
But, like a BMW, it's outta my price range.
Though, it's funny... Mercedes, BMW, Infiniti are all too expensive for me, but I could afford an Audi A3. But then again, I can buy the Audi A3 as a VW GTI and save about $3-5,000.
:P
-Loren
I posted a link for ya on another forum yesterday.
(can't remember the forum though) Neways edmunds done a preview of a road test on it and it appears to vey very awesome and sophisticated and yes features that RWD you love so much.
Rocky
-Loren
The VW Rabbit, the Chevette, the..... OK, just kidding. :P
I thought the Vega looked pretty good. Name is retired.
Nova name, sadly was re-used on an econo car. Please, next Nova should be a fine mid-sized RWD car.
-Loren
Take the back of a Cobalt coupe and the front off an Audi and.......... just kidding :surprise: :P
Yes, the G35 sure does look sharp. Like the coupe better than the 350Z. Still could lower those widow sills. Cars seem to all suffer too tall door syndrome these days. Other than that, the G35 is one really classy looking ride!
-Loren
I do like the race car fighter cockpit of the high window door sills you dislike. I also think it improves side impact safety because it keeps the upper torso out of thway of the glass window. That is a guess
The edmunds video has me salivating at the new G35 and I still like the old design very much, but didn't like the interior. Now infiniti has gotten all the dots dotted, and T's crossed.
Cadillac better pony up or be left behind. BMW better watch it's back because Infiniti does have the 3 series slayer with Acura not to far behind with the best FWD car on the market in TL Type-S trim IMO. :shades:
Rocky
I can give ya a few Nissan tranny stories, lest we start thinking that Nissan can do no wrong. My Mom & stepdad had a 1991 Stanza. Its transmission started to go around the 90,000 mile mark. They didn't get it fixed though, and were able to limp it to around 110-120,000 miles before selling it. And to be fair, whatever it was that was wrong with it seemed sporadic. My Mom & stepdad are so brainwashed by that CR brainwashing that today if you ask them, there was nothing wrong with that car! Isn't selective memory loss a great thing? :P
They also have a 1999 Altima, and it pooped its tranny at 35,000 miles. It was covered under warranty though, and as of Mother's Day this year, that thing had 200,000 miles on it, so it did at least redeem itself!
But as for Nissan tranny horror stories, that's all I've got. Now I can tell you about some people I knew who had problems with Stanza 2.4's and Maxima 3.0's back in the day. This was around the late 80's, early 90's timeframe. Even though the things had timing chains, they tended to eat them, and in the process, the valves. I also had a friend in high school and college whose parents had an '83 Stanza, which got passed down to him. It was total crap by late 1988, when they traded it on an '89 Escort. These people were cruel to cars, though. They also had a '72 Dart that they were able to kill around the 100,000 mile mark. Now for them to claim that feat, you KNOW there had to be something evil about them! :surprise:
I've spent the past couple days driving around in a 2006 Xterra, and I can tell ya that there are some things that Nissan does that to me, just don't seem right. This thing has a 5-speed automatic transmission, but I don't like it. It seems like it hunts through the gears too much. And it's not a good coaster. Get on a downhill grade and it'll downshift to slow you down. There's a hill on my street about a quarter mile up the road that, in any other car I've ever owned, I could let off the pedal at about 25 mph at the top, and drift all the way to my driveway. Not in this thing, though. Now it doesn't jerk you around when it downshifts and hunts through the gears, but it just seems to lack a certain sophistication, like it can't make up its mind.
And there are other minor issues, too. The shifter feels really loose and flimsy. The key doesn't go smoothly into the ignition, nor does it come out smoothly. It's almost like it's a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy. And the ignition switch just seems to have too much play in it as well, more like my worn out '68 Dart that has a '65 Barracuda ignition switch that loosens up occasionally than a new quality product from Japan.
Lessee, what else? Well, I'm guessing Fisher-Price wasn't getting enough business from doing GM's plastic, so now they've contracted with Nissan too? And there's so much orange peel in the paint that you're almost tempted to look for the "Grown with pride in Sunny Florida" sticker!
Now one thing I'll say for it...it feels fast when you need it to be. And it handles pretty well. Although it seems to wander an awful lot on the road, and you have to keep constantly making minor corrections to the steering to keep it in your lane. I think that might be the big tires on it, though. They're either 255 or 265 series. My '85 Silverado started doing that wandering act when I put 255's on it.
Still, despite all that griping I just did, I do kinda like the thing. But in the end, it's just a truck, and a pretty good little truck, but it's not perfect, nor infallible.
And I think that's the sad thing. I can find all those nitpicks about this Xterra, things that could be improved upon without too much rocket science. Yet this thing is considered about the best vehicle in its class! C'mon GM...how hard would it be to just buy one, tear it apart, see what makes it tick, and build a better one?
Battenburg: "Hey does anyone smell something cooking" ? Alan Dawes: " Oops I forgot to flip that book because it's burning"
Actual Report:
Carmaker will report results a week late to count buyouts; Delphi to restate '04 earnings.
General Motors Corp. has alerted investors that it will delay the release of its second-quarter results by a week to tally the responses to buyout offers that the automaker extended to all of its 113,000 U.S. workers.
"We want to allow enough time to finalize the numbers for the quarter, including the special attrition program," GM spokeswoman Gina Proia said. GM is now scheduled to report its second-quarter earnings on July 26.
Separately, the automaker said it planned to revise the terms of a $5.6 billion credit line due to expire in 2008 by extending it and offering assets as collateral.
Debt-rating agencies responded by driving GM's ratings further down into junk territory Tuesday, but analysts said the new terms would make it easier for the automaker to complete the sale of its GMAC finance arm.
GM's results are complicated this year by CEO Rick Wagoner's restructuring efforts entailing asset sales, cost-saving agreements with workers and pensioners, and support for GM's former subsidiary Delphi Corp., now in bankruptcy.
Also on Tuesday, Delphi said it would restate its 2004 earnings.
Investors tend to worry when companies need more time to crunch the numbers, but GM's latest announcement was less unsettling than its previous reporting delays and earnings restatements.
GM restated its full-year 2005 results in March, widening the annual loss by $2 billion to $10.6 billion after increasing charges to restructure its ailing North American operations and help Delphi.
GM also restated earnings for the five prior years after finding accounting errors. The automaker, the object of U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and Justice Department investigations into its accounts, says it has tightened its accounting procedures.
Last month, GM revised its first-quarter results from a preliminary loss of $323 million to a $445 million profit after coming to an agreement with the SEC about how to record its obligations as part of a health care deal struck last year with its workers.
GM's main problem has been an unrelenting slide in its U.S. market share. It plans to close 12 facilities by 2008 and eliminate up to 30,000 blue-collar jobs to bring its production facilities in line with its smaller market share.
In March, GM offered early retirements or buyouts to all of its 113,000 U.S. union workers to cut its work force. Employees have until June 23 to accept, and then seven days to back out.
GM also is subsidizing similar offers for workers at Delphi.
United Auto Workers President Ron Gettelfinger said last week that 25,000 U.S. union workers at GM had agreed to buyouts ranging from $35,000 to $140,000, and another 8,500 employees had accepted at Delphi.
On the financial front, GM was trying to secure a new source of capital after losing its investment-grade rating last year. In addition, it said in March that the earnings restatements might compromise its ability to draw on the loan.
On Tuesday, GM said most of its bank lenders had agreed to its proposal to revise the facility.
"The amended facility will further strengthen GM's strong liquidity profile and will reposition this source of capital from a standby facility to one that will be drawn on from time to time to fund working capital and other needs," GM treasurer Walter Borst said in a statement.
Rating agencies Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's cut GM's rating again. They said its decision to use collateral to secure the loan means bondholders risk recovering a smaller share of their investment if GM should file for bankruptcy.
But analyst David Healy at Burnham Securities said the new facility would give GM easier access to credit and help close the GMAC deal. "Getting a proper line of credit for GM was one of the conditions of a GMAC sale."
GM hopes to conclude the sale of 51 percent of GMAC to a group of investors in the fourth quarter.
According to Bloomberg News, Delphi said in an SEC filing that it would restate its 2004 results, widening the loss by $65 million to $4.82 billion to correct tax accounting.
The Troy-based supplier is restating earnings for the second time since June 2005, when it revised results for 2000 through 2003 as a result of an internal investigation that led to the ouster of five executives.
Delphi said the restatement will be made when it files its 2005 annual results on July 19 after receiving a filing extension from its creditors.
http://www.detroitnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060621/AUTO01/606210359/- 1148
Rocky :P
http://www.detroitnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060620/AUTO01/606200338/- 1148
My god how many extensions is one company going to get ? :surprise:
Rocky
Supplier will extend deals worth $35,000 to $140,000 to members of its second-biggest union.
http://www.detroitnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060619/AUTO01/606190335/- 1148/AUTO01
Rocky
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060617/BUSINESS01/606170320/10- 14
OMG the Detroit/Hamtramck plant could close. :surprise: This is like the best plant in the country. :sick:
Rocky
Rocky
The G6 convertible, Soltice, Sky, are all spoken for to the best of my knowledge
(high performance ones Redline/GXP anyways)
The Lucerne was a hit and the G6 coupe and sedan did fine.
I believe 2007' will be alot better and I wished GM would make me a car that I could sink my teeth in.
Rocky
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,