cp-the-nerd

Nooooooooo

Wait... did this replace the Colorado?!

24 minutes ago, oldshurst442 said:

PS:

@cp-the-nerd

BTW: this is where your Chevy SS comes in!

Its a perfect mix of muscle car madness, pony car nimbleness as a 4 door sedan....(former Camaro platform  after all) and luxury....yes luxury!

Through pictures as you know, Canada does not get these, seems like the Chevy SS is very well built, fit and finish being outstanding and the leather appointments look like they could belong in an Oldsmobile or Buick as opposed to Chevrolet!

And THAT is what makes the SS such a fantastic car!

Lmao, sure I'll segway into talking about my SS!

Let me tell ya, interior quality is even better in person. Suede and leather abound with sexy red accent stitching. Very soft touch points for your elbows, a wonderfully meaty, perforated leather, flat bottom steering wheel, heated and cooled seats, color HUD, 9 speaker premium sound system. Definitely fits the $50k price point, and doesn't look like a car that has a $30k base V6 trim at all.

Only thing I miss from my Malibu is the acoustic laminated glass for highway speeds. But that's like asking for a cherry on top of a deluxe banana split sundae with sprinkles, fudge, and caramel.

10 minutes ago, surreal1272 said:

And that definitely but I am betting my bottom dollar on the Ativan being the main culprit. My years working in behavioral health have shown me what can happen when you take too much of that mess, especially if you have a history of depression. Just very sad for his family having to deal with this. 

Ok, I just thought you were saying it was a drug OD. Nvm.

6 hours ago, surreal1272 said:

Early reports (mostly form his wife) state that he may have taken more than the recommended dosage of Ativan. His wife remarked that sounded very different on the phone after the show and was slurring his speech. He also told her he may have taken more than he was supposed to. Ativan is typically prescribed for anxiety but it carries the same side effects as just about every other anxiety med out there, suicidal thoughts in rare cases. This would certainly explain a lot but it makes it no less tragic. 

The very first report released stated he was found on the floor and had a band around his neck. Police are officially calling it a suicide by hanging.

Is it smart business for easy profit? Yes, BUT...

It's not doing their reputation any favors. An equal number of people will rejoice as will roll their eyes. FCA needs compelling new products ASAP, and not under Jeep where there's a built-in consumer base already. The Pacifica is a great start, but the brand is begging for a flagship to establish momentum forward.

2 hours ago, dfelt said:

I on the other hand love them, I love the customization of what info you want and the various ways to present said info. I love having HUD. Once you drive an auto with HUD and custom screens, touch or not, it is very hard to go back to old style traditional manual gauges.

I have an HUD. I can confirm it's the greatest feature I never even knew I needed! They ought to be in every car. It genuinely feels strange to look down at the gauge cluster for speed now.

3 hours ago, Cmicasa the Great said:

People like to bitch about anything that is CHANGE. My father still has a freakin flip phone because of this.. it has buttons. As to consumer complaints.. f@#k em.. I'm all for progress. If turning a knob influences your decision that I would tell them to go for the inferior car. The interface is easy as pie to use. 

@Drew DowdellCadillac sales.. CADILLAC sales have to do with lack of product (CUVs and variants) not the CUE system that even the magazines are now calling "quite good." Initially it had some hiccups in performance.. that is not the case anymore. My V's CUE is just as easy to operate as my MyLink in all the other cars.

Progress would imply touch capacitive systems are better than analog controls. At best, they can only be equal, but more often than not, they're a distraction and a gimmick.

I can tell you right now MyLink is easier than CUE based solely on the fact that I was using HVAC and radio controls without looking down by the time I finished driving my SS home. Knob for volume, knob for fan speed, knob for temp, all where you expect them. CUE is essentially a similar screen interface but with a touch panel using raised bars to guide your hand. That is objectively more difficult to use. Not subjectively like personal opinion, objectively provable.

Your sales argument kinda evaporates when you realize the sedans are lagging significantly behind the germans, worse now than pre-CUE models. Again, CUE isn't the only cause, probably not even the primary cause, but it's a contributor nonetheless. And I am a HUGE fan of Cadillac, I'd probably own an ATS if they were priced about $5k lower. I just won't give them excuses because they don't need them anymore.

3 hours ago, smk4565 said:

Is XTS a money maker, or does it steal sales from a higher priced CT6?

I don't have the sales figures, but I'm almost positive half of XTS sales are fleet. I wouldn't be surprised if the retail sales were cannibalizing the CT6 to some extent.

1 hour ago, dfelt said:

And yet myself and @Cmicasa the Great who have put our money where our mouth is do not seem to have the problems so many of you state CUE has. So is this just repeating what other magazines are stating due to a lack of familiarity with the system or what?

Touch interfaces are one of the top consumer complaints in the auto industry. It's a case of you seeing a problem through rose-colored glasses. Cadillac sales don't line up with the impressive quality, performance, and engineering behind them, and CUE almost certainly factors into that.

For me personally, I really wanted to give the ATS a chance, but it was priced out of contention. I got my Chevy SS for the price Cadillac wants for a mid-level ATS 2.0T with less equipment. Having MyLink with buttons and knobs is certainly a bonus. I'd say that I, too, put my money where my mouth is.

14 hours ago, dfelt said:

 

Buick and Lincoln do not need to emulate this 1980's warm over nor do they need to follow the whole RWD thing. FWD and AWD works and has not stopped plenty of people from buying Audi.

CUE is good, but can be even better with more responsive touch system and a current nav equal to google or a couple other industry leaders.

For the most part, CUE works just fine except when you get to non-GM drivers that seem to think CUE should be just like the germans or asians and cannot seem to figure out how to use it.

Kinda like Apple or Windows. two different interfaces and part of the group is always confused.

Disagree with your premise. CUE in the CTS doesn't need a more responsive touch system, it needs more intuitive physical controls. The redesigned layout in the CT6 and XT5 is a step in the right direction, but I heard the mouse pad thing is terrible in execution. Firmware updates might be able to sort that out.

What bothers me most is Cadillac saw the negative feedback Ford received for capacitive touch systems and doubled down anyway, introducing the original CUE center stack unchanged across the lineup over the course of 3 years. That's just flat out stupid.

BMW has so many variants on each body style that I have no idea how they've remained profitable. The 3-series GT and 4-series grand coupe are/were the peak of the insanity. Just go back to coupe and sedan, and if the 4-door coupe look is so popular, design the standard 3-series around that and drop the nonsense.

3 hours ago, riviera74 said:

Sounds like a really good car at a great value.  Why can't Buick or Lincoln do this?

GM already has the CTS for midsize RWD luxury. The only thing wrong with that car is the poor execution of CUE. From an engineering standpoint, Cadillac crushes anything Hyundai has to offer. Buick has a very profitable niche of FWD-based luxury. If value and comfort top your priorities list, then you can get a fully loaded Lacrosse with a torque vectoring AWD system in the low $40k range.

Lincoln... has a laundry list of issues and I'm not going to beat a dead horse. Everyone already agrees the brand needs to go RWD.

36 minutes ago, Cubical-aka-Moltar said:

Regardless of the invention of such features, without regulations requiring them in the US and other countries, no cars would have such features.  Car makers wouldn't add such features without being pushed to do it.   The development of ABS and airbags pre-dated their regulation, for example, but without regulation, they weren't being put in cars.

Consider markets such as Mexico and India--they generally don't have many safety features, as their markets don't have such regulations (airbags are just now coming to some markets, I believe). 

You can't compare Mexico and India to the American market. The poor in America have a higher living standard than the vast majority population in either of those countries.

3 hours ago, ykX said:

@cp-the-nerd I strongly disagree with your claim that safety tech would develop due to a free market.  The majority of people would buy cheapest cars given the opportunity regardless of consequences.  Car companies would not develop the safety tech without regulation because it increases the cost and the complexity of cars which they have to pass to a consumer to keep being profitable.  If that would be the case I doubt  we would see even airbags in today's cars.

 

I might agree that fuel economy regulations didn't produce desired effect and that probably should be left to a free market.  As soon as prices on gas will go significantly up, people will stop buying cars that do 15mpg and would look at ones that do 30mpg forcing automakers to adapt.  

So frontal airbags, curtain airbags, back-up cameras, blind spot censors, automatic braking, stability control, disk brakes, and ABS weren't developed by the freemarket, despite the very invention of them preceding government knowledge of any practical application for them?

7 hours ago, riviera74 said:

That leads me to this question: if you wish to stop raising safety standards because you believe that leads to a price problem, where should we set car safety standards?  Now, or 2005, or 1990, or 1975?  Also, we as a society have done relatively little to improve driver safety education over the last 25 years or so.  How do we address that?

Innovation happens as a result of the free market, not legislation. Forcing safety and fuel economy to advance beyond A) consumer demand and B) natural technological progression inflates cost rapidly. Those costs are passed on to average car buyers who had no say in the decision and may not want or need what they're forced to pay for. Like it or not, even if you bought a Tahoe, you're still paying for R&D for 40 mpg compact cars with 7, 8, 9 speed transmissions and 10 airbags.

In some cases, "innovation" on paper actually under-delivers in real world conditions which seems to be the case with many sophisticated downsized and turbocharged engines.

As far as improving driver safety education, it's as simple as pointing out the greatest dangers statistically and applying that knowledge to the driving test curriculum.

I've been talking about this for a while. Among a slew of unnecessary technology and general over-engineering, new compact cars have 8-10 airbags. Not only is this part of the price inflation problem (even a decent subcompact will approach $20,000), but in a moderate front impact directly off the dealer lot, the car is totaled.

I personally think ever-increasing safety standards and crash tests are screwing the working class out of buying new cars more than it actually saves lives.

39 minutes ago, Drew Dowdell said:

You'll want to send your Thank You note to Mark Reuss.  He's the one who's kept this car alive for as long as it's been going on. He had major input in the Zeta program way back when he was working in Australia. 

I always liked Reuss. Seems like a guy who can pound some beers with you and talk cars for hours.

14 minutes ago, Stew said:

We usually don' get much of a winter here, at least as far as snow.  I sill have my 4x4 Dakota too if i was needed.  It would be a while anyways.  My brother is already talking about selling/tradinhis ATS, it is AWD maybe he would give me a heck of a deal

Why is he getting rid of his ATS already?

How has it been transitioning from the 2.0T and silky 6-speed slushbox to the N/A 2.0L and DCT?

5 minutes ago, KevinW said:

In Sport Mode, I seem to invoke Performance Algorithm Shifting quite frequently while merging on highways, in the case of a 2007 SRX V8.  The triggers are likely accelerator pedal movement characteristics and accelerometer data.  Once PAS mode is engaged, it won't upshift even when the accelerator is released; this enables a quicker response when the driver gets back on the throttle to navigate around slower traffic or pull out of a sharp corner. 

I believe that's the case, but I haven't been able to find the parameters responsible for that in the tune. I'm sure it's there, but there are so many data points to sort through, it's like opening a 400 page novel and searching for one particular paragraph.

19 hours ago, frogger said:

Love this car, fixed what I didn't like about the G8 (mostly the interior).  It would be very hard to resist picking one up at some point, but it was never available in Canada.

It really impressed me how GM never stopped tweaking and improving the SS, maybe we have Holden execs to thank. By '16-17 this car had added magnetic ride, dual mode exhaust, manual transmission, front and rear 4-piston brembos (rears were conventional brakes in '14-15), and that sound induction tube from the intake for extra V8 noise in the cabin. If there's anything still lacking whatsoever, I don't know what it is.

Assuming it's reliable and I can make the payments till I own it, you'll have to pry the keys from my cold dead hands. Also, I'll be in the driver's seat with rigor mortis so have fun getting me out.

2 hours ago, A Horse With No Name said:

Interesting, so to flash a transmission in the Malibu, all one would have to do is wake up sport mode?

No. All three shift tables in the Malibu were garbage and I rewrote standard and cruise control from scratch. I attempted to assign the sport mode to something so I could have regular, cruise, and sport depending on my input, but I gave up after a half dozen failed attempts.

After that failed, I created a compromised regular/sport mode, the car drove like a dream on that shift pattern so I had no complaints other than I wanted a stick shift.

1 hour ago, Drew Dowdell said:

Cool to know. Like I said, the sport mode in that 5-speed was extra aggressive when pushed hard, sport mode in more recent transmissions don't have such a drastic difference in mode... Even the Cadillacs.

I tried finding a gen 1 CTS stock tune to show you screen shots, but apparently the 5-speed automatic isn't supported by HPTuners, so the TCM appears blank.

1 hour ago, Drew Dowdell said:

Honest question:

The 5-speed auto in my '04 CTS did seem to adjust to my driving pattern when it was in sport mode.  If I put it in sport and drove normally, it would hold a gear a bit longer before shifting, but otherwise drove normally. If I was in sport mode and being very aggressive, it would hold a lower gear longer even after I let off the gas..... if I calmed down, then it would go back to normal sport mode.... but it always took a few minutes of driving before it did.  I realize that it is not the memory that @Cmicasa the Great was talking about, but the transmission did seem to adjust to variations in driving more distinctly.   I will say that I have yet to experience a transmission with that level of variation in attitude since then because just after that model, everyone went to paddle shifters and the sport-automatic modes don't seem to be as aggressive. Did I imagine it?

Cadillac automatics have additional responses to driver input. For example, many GM performance cars in sport mode automatically downshift when the computer senses steering input going through a sweeping turn. Like I said in my other post, aggressive driving can trigger different things as well.

I don't know all the ins and outs of GM performance progamming, so I can't give a complete answer. I just know that the shift tables and responses to input are written in stone unless a tune is applied.

To give a brief idea of what's in the TCM, all GM 6-speeds I've looked at had 3 separate automatic shift tables not counting the paddle shifters or limp mode. One of them is standard driving mode, one is for cruise control, and the third is sport mode (and possibly tow/haul mode for trucks). In my Malibu, sport mode was permanently dormant.

8 minutes ago, dfelt said:

Very Cool, Once you get your high speed or aggressive driving shifts down, I then Challenge you to take it one step further. Learn to speed shift in your auto. That does depend on RPM but man can you fly for fast responsive changes and lots of aggressive driving fun!  Not sure what I am talking about here is a good overview.

http://www.ehow.com/how_2084716_speed-shift-manual-transmission-drag.html

Also you can then take this one step further with clutchless shifting, timing is everything but once you learn your timing, you can shift without  depressing the clutch.

Your car is very cool, Rock on!  

Ahh I was confused by that term at first, most people I know refer to that as "power shifting" not speed shifting. One day when I feel I've mastered the car and it's paid off, I'll probably try that. In the 70s and 80s, my dad's daily driver was a badass LeMans/GTO conversion that had a 326 racing motor with judge cam. He'd power shift that 4-speed and knock off 12s all day. Doesn't sound like much now, but back then not much could run with him.

I'm never going to attempt clutchless shifting though, that seems pretty foolhardy for an extra tenth or two in the 1/4 mile, and I'm not looking to abuse the car.