surreal1272

(Looks at your average blinked out G-Wagen and laugh at your Escalade assessment like it’s the only one capable of looking “tacky/gawdy”. Just astounds me the level off BS you resort to when putting down domestics yet ignore similar or worse issues with the Germans. Pathetic.

Two things. One: It still has a better design flow than any BMW or Benz of that era and even in monotone, it looks better than the 5 series mentioned above. Two: There were other color options that you, of course, ignored. And quite honestly, you are out of your German loving mind if you think it looks worse than these (slabs of plastic and all):

No the hell it was not. It’s only selling point was performance. That thing, as evidenced by the pic above, had just as much plastic as anything from GM and that’s saying something. There was not one thing luxury about it. I know you now down to all things German but you need your eyes checked if you don’t see the plastic hell that was in those.

Your emphasis on the negative, from the get go, suggested otherwise. I stand by what I said. They are not handing a damn thing over and emphasizing said statement in bold does nothing to change that fact.

Good grief @balthazar. You spent all those words just to ignore the actual reasons why they are doing this in the first place. You even included an apples to oranges baseball team comparison. Don’t know what the deal is with you making phantom issues out of this but history has shown this has been part of the business since day one and it is not going to diminish GMs brand but doing this. It’s really that simple.

Why would they need to do that? In other words, they don’t need to buy into Honda.

Until you had to replace that motor. My best friend had a ‘97 back in the day and when the water pump took a dump, it wrecked the motor as well. Ford wanted $16K to replace that motor. It was still $8K to replace it second hand. Just obscene but not shrouding given that the motor was only ever produced for that one generation SHO.

The above is what you said, clearly separated from the rest of your statement @balthazar and I stand by what I said. You can’t simply ignore the consumer factor just because it doesn’t align with the rest of your argument. “The end is nigh” is obvious sarcasm and does not change my core point.

Not according to Balth. Apparently it’ll be the end of GM if they do what they’ve been doing for decades lol. And that is why you apparently don’t get it.

All of this because somehow it has never occurred to Balth that GM is well aware of the very thing he thinks is an issue. They are not going to do something like this if they thought it would put them at a competitive disadvantage. That would be simply asinine logic to have otherwise.

That advantage will still be there. Not sure what part of “2027” you are not getting here. GM has a dozen or so models planned before then and this deal will greatly reduce costs, yet another common practice amongst carmakers seeking mutually beneficial deals. Like I said, a non-issue.

You're right. you're always right Balth. WTF do I know? I yield. Just skip the fact that said platform won't be in anything by Honda until at least 2027 and ignore what I just said about the average customer not knowing or much less caring about such things, you are always right. And here I thought SMK was the skilled one at cherry picking, bar moving, and creating phantom issues that only HE thinks are issues.

Not so long ago, the Saturn Vue used the Honda built 3.5L V6 and I guarantee you that most buyers were not even aware of it when they bought. There are plenty of other examples of this but that is the first one that came to my mind. Ford and GM co-opted the 10 speed transmission that is in their current autos and trucks. How many buyers are even aware of any of these things? Not many so save for the car nuts here, it is (again) a non-issue.

Competing companies have been doing this for decades without negative effects. I see no issue here.

I’ll believe it when I actually see a production one. They have promised past iterations of one only to end up vaporware.

What you missed there @smk4565 is that every first time Tesla buyer was once an owner of a gas powered car from another maker. Do you see the connection yet?

Way to miss the point and your hypocrisy by a country mile yet again.

@smk4565—You said this barely a year ago. What changed? “More EV's from Ford, VW, or anyone else, is just moving sales from gas to electric, it isn't stealing Tesla sales and taking them down.“ But now you say the exact opposite using your Toyota example.

Only a Benz fan would say that like it was something to brag about, forgetting that you still have to see the outside of it everyday before you actually get in to drive it. Audi and Porsche both shame Benz in these regards. And no, the much pricier 580 will not outsell the base model 450. Again, only a Benz fan would say something like that with a straight face. Correction. Tesla has sold 4 millions EVs and already has repeat buyers since they have been doing this for a decade now. Simply amazing that you don’t see that.

Corrected in bold because auto-correct sucks.

Two each to the east and east of me and all four are "base" models, i.e. no hyper screen equipped models.

But Mercedes...

You just answered part of that above and I would like to add the various FWD based sedans and CUVs they have released over the last twenty years, where as before FWD luxury cars were absolutely taboo for any German luxury maker. Those are the very definition of "compliance cars". It's not even debatable and you can say that you could acre less about what was on the lot and that is your choice. However, it is also your choice to ignore the contradiction in your earlier assessment of their "showrooms". You can't look at the showroom without passing through the lot first and seeing those various non-luxury vans sharing the same lot with $100K luxury cars, something the resident Mercedes fanboy has shredded GM for in the past (Cadillac sharing lots with lower tier GM makes or Chevrolet selling $100K Vettes alongside $13K Sparks). That is all I am going to say about it. That is a common theme with just about everyone right now hence these higher than average prices on literally everything with wheels on them. Mercedes is in no way unique here and you know that.

Example number 3. You want more examples of your about face prior to Mercedes officially joining the EV game? Funny. I strolled through one of their lots in Glendale, AZ (Arrowhead Mercedes) and found vans parked next to E-Class and S-Class sedans. They are not as "exclusive as their fans make them out to be. Furthermore, David has a point. They more compliance autos than ever before and love pulling that visual slight of hand with even their upper end offerings like the EQS (see the base model dash but just don't look for it on MBs website since they only show the hyper screen models). Are they still a luxury car company? Sure, in the technical sense. Are they are "exclusive" as they once were? Hell no.

Example number one of your previous touting of Tesla. Example number 2