oldshurst442

Id say those days are over. Cadillac did that very same thing and it hasnt worked... Mercedes sells waaaay to many low level, low priced cars in North America that folks will not remember those high line cars that defined Mercedes Benz in the 1990s. And even then, in '90s, Mercedes also peddled waaaaay too many, low level cars in North America ... One could argue this one...but it was not very luxurious... It sold...BECAUSE it wasnt that expensive to buy. And at the start of the SUV/CUV craze...And this is when Mercedes was riding high on its so called luxury image. But not very luxurious... (look at those ugly grey plastic bumpers...) If Cadillac gets shat on for the 1st gen Escalade (nd for some hardcore GM haters for the 2nd gen) and GM gets shat on for the Hummer H1 and H2 for shoddy builds...then M-B should get shyte for that crap as well...

It did work. Chevy canceled the Avalanche. Not Cadillac. Chevy deemed the Avalanche too costly to produce...at a time when GM was going bankrupt. Let me remind you that the Avalanche and the Cadillac EXT was an SUV though...so your point is null and void... The Blackwood was just a poor attempt...for a Lincoln. But...Ford F150 higher trimmed packages that rival Mercedes E Class price tags are selling like hot cakes ever since the Blackwood was introduced and especially when it went away...and those F150s were soooooo much better at doing luxury than the Blackwood itself... So...like usual...you are going round and round in a circle saying nothing and accomplishing just as much. PS: Dodge Ram high priced and high trimmed pick-up trucks are also a hot commodity. I bet you Dodge sells more 50 000-70 000 dollar trucks than Mercedes Benz does SUVs/CUVs and sedans COMBINED It dont matter if you dont think pick-up trucks are not luxury vehicles. But what does it say about your Mercedes, a so called luxury brand...gets out sold by work oriented trucks with price tags that rival so called luxury vehicles by said luxury brand? Lowly Fords, Dodges and GMCs outsell Mercedes Benz's so called luxury vehicles... Your argument is soooooo outta whack...you yourself do not know what to say next... 1. Price is your argument... realizes that pick-up trucks are expensive as hell 2. Proceeds to say that price is not a factor. Performance is. 3. Realizes that pick-up trucks are quite capable in some areas as sporty cars but do other performance things that sports cars could never and will be able to do!!! 4. Proceeds to say trucks are utilitarian. 5. Proved that Mercedes Benz so called luxury car even in 2019 is utilitarian... 6. Proceeds to try to sway the bar that luxury trucks have failed....yet...does not realize that his first attempt to dismiss was that pick-up trucks are sold with luxury price tags...but not luxury...yet folk with money buy plebeian branded pickup trucks with Mercedes Benz price tags...realizes that that is not a good thing for Mercedes luxury perception... 7. Round and Round we go on the Merry Go Round... What is luxury? This? Or this?

Ahem... Yes I know...a couple of Astros and a Savannah...

Not happy with that definition. Id further define that to: The E Class after 2005 is 1950s and 1960s Oldsmobile/Buick luxury as even in the 1990s, the E Class was a Chevrolet Caprice equivalent in the Euro market. From cop car duty to taxi service. The C Class eventually took its place and that happened sometime in the 2000s. Id even peg the current E Class down to late 1950s Pontiac Bonneville levels. Even to Impala SS levels...So no...I dont think the E Class is all that luxurious... The C Class and equivalent before the mid 2000s was a compact econobox. The S Class and its predecessors were always luxo barges. But...from after the war and up until the late 1990s, the interiors were horrid. Especially up until the 1970s. Pre WW1 and WW2 Mercedes Benz cars were pure luxury. Nobody could deny that. After the WW2, Mercedes Benz had to build cars for the masses in war torn Europe in their home turf of Europe. Poverty and rationing was a way of life in Europe from 1945-1980. ESPECIALLY from 1945-1975. What they exported to the US and to oil rich Middle eastern countries after WW2, were the the efforts of luxury. "Efforts" is the key word here as there was no monies for R&D to be state of the art and for quality control. Sure, the 1950s Gullwing was a techno tour de force. But that car lasted 3-4 years as a supercar for the day. Another 20 years went by before Mercedes engineered another car for the market that was state of the art for the day. The late 1960s S Class predecessor, the 600 Pullman. And even then, no match for what Detroit was pumping out at the time. That car had a high high high price tag only to try to get people with money in the US to look at it. In reality, what SMK says about other car companies needing discounts to compete with Mercedes Benz cars today...well what he says is true for Mercedes and that car... Very few folk bought it. OK...Dictators bought it. Only because it wasnt their money they were wasting... They just wanted to flaunt and to lavishly spend...so they saw a car with a huge price tag and just bought it. Irony is that those people that were suppressed and oppressed by those dictators that drove the 600 Pullman always looked down on American cars and their excessiveness and the American way of life. Anyway...that is for another discussion on another day... The W123 Mercedes was built like a tank...for work and utility duties...for it being a workhorse. Yeah...kinda like pick-up trucks and that B-Body Chevrolet I posted... What R&D monies were available after WW2, it was all monies subsidized by the US and UK governments to rebuild West Germany...to shove it to those Commies. You know...Ich Bin Ein Berliner and the like...Cold War chess games. The ONLY reason why Mercedes, VW, and BMW exist today...IS because the US and the UK governments sunk money into West Germany... Nope. Nope its not.

Je me souviens... Therefore...I will never agree why anything below an S Class is deemed luxury from Mercedes Benz.

Right... Your argument flip flops between Silverado...a Chevrolet and then switch to Denali... Is this luxury? Starts at 50 000 or so... So does a Denali. Like I said you flip flop... And then you try to denounce a Denali... But a 54 000 dollar E Class interior is an equal to the Denali's... And THAT version gets no supercruise or any other luxury tech either...plus a V6. The Denali is a 420 or so horsepower V8... You know...YOUR kind of definition of luxury...V8... Oh...and you mentioned work and utility... And all these NEVER sold in numbers to be bragged out about... Like I said... J.R. types from the soap opera Dallas all had Stepford wives and these are the cars they bought for them to silence them because they were cheating on them... You know...Lexus sold a half-a-million dollar car not too long ago... There are STILL unsold examples of it... Your little word pollution discussion...of which I got a headache from...means very little...

Just price. I dont have the patience or strength to discuss with him that aspect. Ive done so, like you, in the past, discuss this with him... Im kinda burnt out with this ad nauseam discussion with him. That is why I had a trolly response to him in that post.

FALSE. Mercedes has a model or two in the 1980s that was above Cadillac in the 1980s...but in the 1970s...NADA. Cadillac was starting to fall from grace...sure...but even Oldsmobile was on a higher level than Mercedes was. Mercedes threw some high priced stuff our way in the 1970s, and 'twas mostly rich Stepford wives that bought them. Seemingly California Stepford wives. Im thinking it was a way for rich pricks to shut them up while they were cheating on them with younger versions of their trophy wives... I hardly think that qualifies as glamorous... Keep mind that those rich pricks all drove Cadillacs and Lincolns... Then the yuppies took over in the 1980s and wanted to show those old rich pricks who is in control of Wallstreet and THAT is how Bimmers and Mercedes cars got a foothold on the luxury side of things in the US... Rest assured though, those younger chicks that cheated with those old rich pricks in the 1970s...all married guys that drove Lexuses in the 1980s and 1990s. But dont forget...those yuppies that drove those Bimmers and Mercedes cars in the 1980s and 1990s...all drive Teslas now...

And I noticed you IGNORED 0-60 times of the Raptor and the Shelby. Raptor is a tick above 5 seconds... BUT... Let me know when a G80 could do this (for the SECOND time) Oh...the Raptor could just flat out GO THROUGH the NURBURGRING by actually GOING THROUGH the twists and turns...

word pollution. But...Ill humour you. This is what pick-up trucks do...what they are meant to do...with 420 HP and 460 ft/lbs are meant to do....there are base V6 engines in these...and Ford has preferred to go 400 HP with turbo V6...but... Let me know when a G80 or a Caddy CT5V can do this or this Or even this... 0-60 and Nurburgring times are less relevant in times like these...me thinks... Screw your head on straight dude. Discuss stuff more like an adult and less like a teenager, please.

That is what was funny. I honestly never shunned GM for badge engineering. Well...to the extreme that auto journalists and haters do to this day. VW did to a better job of badge engineering marketing wise and better job of differentiating in the 1980s and 1990s, but today, you could clearly see (if one chooses to take the VW blinders off) that VW has done a shytty job of badge engineering the last 20 years... As bad as GM was doing it during those 1980s and 1990s... Honda and Toyota...if one chose to take the blinders off back then...would see that their badge engineering efforts were the SAME as GM's in the 1980s and 1990s. Its their marketing department that was better than GM's... But in order to see that...one has to take off the blinders. One has to ease up on the GM hate and one has to ump their sarcastic view they have on GM and transfer that to Honda, Toyota and VW... I just wished GM had better marketing then and today to offset the badge engineering efforts.

Inspiration: Also...it kinda looks like a high on meth Ford designer was trying to green light a Taurus coupe.

Yup...in Quebec too. We still have that in some ways still today. Stores close at 5:00 PM on the week-ends. Actually, it has been barely 20 years that stores open until 9:00 PM on the weekdays. Stores closed at 5:00 PM all week long.

Are you buzzing again? JUST because there isnt a Silverado SS 454 or Ford F-150 Lightning like there was 20 years ago...doesnt mean these machines do not have performance... A Silverado has a a 6.2 liter 420 HP and 460 horsepower V8 under the hood. Also...the Ford Raptor IS a performance machine... And you saw what I wrote? I said 20 years ago... PERFORMANCE muscle trucks EXISTED while Elon Musk was still a baby... 1978 (And yes...it was performance for the time...) And there are a slew of other noteworthy performance trucks from then until now... The Cybertruck is still not in production but Ford will gladly sell you a performance pick-up right NOW And there is another that Ford could sell you RIGHT NOW The rest of your post is just word pollution...

Correction... I just researched and I will retract my statement. Dealerships in Quebec are indeed closed. Along with the auto repair shops. Until April 13. I misunderstood the news from a week ago. Quebec shut down all non-essential business last week except pharmacies, hardware stores, grocery stores and gas stations. Restaurants with drive thrus could remain open (YAY!!!) but only serve peoples through the drive thru... Dealerships are closed and the auto repair shops would remain open...but 24 hours later, our politicians deemed auto repair shops non-essential, so those closed after. As of now, all auto related businesses are closed. But..the idiocy shall remain... Bicycle repair shop owners complained and convinced our politicians that THEIR services are essential so...BICYCLE repair shops are open... Also...we are in complete shut down of ALL businesses EXCEPT pharmacies and gas stations on Sundays.

Any econobox FWD sedan, coupe, CUV made from 1975ish up until April 4, 2020 from any manufacturer fits into that description right there. I dont understand why you only target EVs that way... These arent even econoboxes...just generic GM FWD re-badges. and have a personality of dry, whole wheat toasted bread. OK...the Caddy with that weak ass transverse V8 is butterless whole wheat toasted bread with a smidgen of orange marmalade. Not even strawberry jam but shytty orange marmalade... Oh...look...its got amber style fog lamps,. This is EXACTLY what maniacal Honda fanbois and gals WANT from their cars... (up high mind you making them totally useless in foggy conditions but that discussion is for another day). Yeah... "VTEC just kicked in Yo" just oozes from this machine...

Quebec closed auto repair shops deeming them not essential as well. And check this out...the dealership part to buy cars are open. Try to figure out that idiotic move... Other than that, Quebec politicians and health advisors are managing this pandemic quite well. Kudos to them.

Which leads to the 1980s version Which then leads to And then to Funky Town Im having a blast listening to all this!!!

Now I feel listening to loud arena rock. Too bad my wife wont allow me to sing on top of my lungs to disturb to whole damn neighborhood!

And now Im into 1950s rock-n-roll love songs

Santorini Blue And since I started with reminiscing of traveling back to Greece...with Mr. Orbison's angelic voice, I might as well continue listening to him.

^^^ Very soothing

@ocnblu

That is how my dad did stuff too. He did all kinds of stuff around the house. And when he wanted to make more than one of a particular object...he created jigs to replicate that very object he wanted fabricate. Working at Canadair and manufacturing aircraft, he learned that skill as that is how aircraft production was made back in the day. It's awesome Balthy that you could work with metal to fabricate jigs like that. And I bet you could work with any metal you could find. Scrap metal or otherwise! Just like my dad. I snapped his Chevy Celebrity's rear beam axle that connects both rear wheels (dont ask how I did that) and he, with a scrap metal bar he had laying around, he Frankensteined a repair job. Wasnt perfect. But it worked. We didnt have a lift either. He used what we had to lift the car. A couple of jacks and a jig to hold the car high enough so he could bolt and weld the shyte together. Aircraft grade nuts and bolts and the like... I just wished I was more serious about learning those skills from him. I just wished he FORCED me to learn those skills. He taught me. I observed, but I know he was aware that I was more into playing sports than to learn do it yourself skills from him. He was the one to teach me how to catch a baseball, how to bat, how to skate too... He taught me how to use tools as well... I guess, he knew I wanted to play sports more than fix things, so he was more serious in showing me how to play sports... Cant fault him there.. He was in tune to what I wanted more. (You were a GREAT dad, dad! I love you!) (tearing up as I write this!)