regfootball

I won't say I don't love the Mini, but I drove one last year (a customer's, on a road test with him in the passenger seat) with 36k miles on it, and all that pretty, hard plastic schtuff on the dash, doors and center console just creaked and groaned over bumps. It was an S, it may have been with the hard suspension package, but yeah.

It was great fun to drive, though, and I liked hearing the supercharger.

A Works will run ya $30k... is it worth all that extra money over the sublime Cobalt SS Turbo? That is debatable.

car and driver didn't think so. and honestly that SS cobalt is also a few grand off sticker right now too.

it depends if you want to blow money on a toy car. fun to drive, sure, but really its go kart handling is its only thing. the interior in the mini is unique, but not nice enough to ask 30k.

at least get a volvo c30 if you're gonna blow money like that. something with a hint of luxury to it.

so not only can the cobalt out perform the mini for thousands less, in regular trim levels, the cobalt is a better car for the money than the yaris.

the mini is a fashion accessory. if it weren't a BMW product, i bet half of the mini buyers wouldn't buy em. its simply like those who buy calvin klein t shirts or whatever. can't swing the 80 dollar sweatshirt, but need to have the logo, and the t shirt is the cheapest way to get it.

I will go with Ion. Vue had built some momentum for Saturn as a more than one model car. I think the Ion destroyed whatever GM had because it was so needed for the Ion to be a homerun and it was a big let down in a huge way. Then the Aura as good as it was could not overcome the damage Ion did to the brand.

the only thing i can think of why zeta is being ditched.....weight vs comparable fwd future GM platforms with them being so scared of future cafe. every 100 pounds of vehicle weight would matter. my question is, why not just find a way to make zeta cars lighter? stop using the cheap steel. for one.

that and GMNA being provincial and territorial about it not being developed a lot here.

call me chauvenist.

point one. do women (as a whole, not saying their are not hot rod gals out there) GET performance cars like guys do? if so, why is a woman in charge of pontiac? or at least, speaking on its behalf.

point two. oddly enough, the men must be women haters if Saturn and Pontiac are going down. Since both were kinda in charge by women?

I seriously think this is more about platform consolidation than anything else. GM is in dire financial straits and it may appear to them that it is more economical to base their products on the fewest number of platforms as possible. Since the FWD platforms are necessary for volume, my guess is that they will survive while the RWD platforms will be discontinued or (in Alpha's case) cancelled. I think it will primarily be reduced down to Gamma, Delta, Epsilon, Theta, and Lambda in the future. If the Corvette survives, then they will need to continue the Y-body. If they continue to produce trucks and SUVs with any kind of useful utility, then they will need a sturdy platform for these products also. Everything else will probably end up on some version of the 5 primary platforms. It's sad and unfortunate (because I would prefer to see the DT7 and the next gen Escalade based on Zeta or an extended version of Sigma instead), but I think it is the reality.

That being said, I don't know why GM doesn't base the DT7 on Lambda instead of Epsilon. The Lambda platform is large enough to support a proper flagship sedan for Cadillac, although it would be more of an A8 competitor than a 7-Series or S-Class competitor. That way, both of the brand's future flagship vehicles (DT7 and next gen Escalade) would be based on the same platform (which I guess would be more economical?). That would leave room to move the next CTS (or CT5?) to LWB Epsilon II and base the compact size AT3(?) on SWB Epsilon II. I certainly wouldn't base any Cadillac sedan on Gamma II or Delta II, no matter how improved those platforms may be.

Anyway, I don't ven know how we got to the argument, but since I don't care enough to reread 5 pages...so I'm done with it.

The bottom line at the end of the day is that no Cadillac, especially not the flagship, should be FWD.

well, GM is forced to do a lot of silly things these days now that they are the governments beeoch.

and its not just one ralph nader on their ass this time. it's like a hundred thousand of them.

AWD is fine as an option, and yes most people are f@#king stupid and think that FWD or AWD is needed to get around in the snow. All I'm saying is 1.) That's not true. 2.) All it takes is common sense 3.) Give them the damn option of AWD, but FWD doesn't need to be substituted for RWD architectures.

its does when you are a manufacturer if most of the sales volume is 2 wheel drive only, and you need to sell that vehicle in many states consistently.

i am not disputing that a top lvel caddy should be rwd. I am saying that GM is probably so strapped with development cash, that they have to put all their eggs in one platform basket. The bigger sin to me, is why not spend a little and market some AWD zetas or more AWD sigmas? then EVERYONE CAN BE HAPPY.

It's not like snow tires are insanely expensive compared to the cost of buying a new car anyway.

I'd love to see how my friend's FWD Acura TL would do in the snow with the performance tires it comes with...but see he's smart and puts snow tires on in the winter.

he has to because his performance tires are summer tires only. are they all season tires? again, we prove the reason why all season tires are so popular. YOU DONT HAVE TO FUTZ WITH CHANGING THEM. i like the summer only / winter only idea, but the other 99 percent don't want to deal with it. my guess is he had no clue his performance tires were crap in winter. or he didnt care and then found them one day to be really slippery.

It's not like snow tires are insanely expensive compared to the cost of buying a new car anyway.

you just pieced together any amount of money you could for the down payment on the car. the tax alone was probably 1500. you signed up to pay for the thing for 5 or 6 years.

you honestly think someone is going to embrace 5-800 bucks for 4 snow tires and wheels (or blow money each fall and spring to swap tires on the original rims, which by the way is really stupid).

(me standing and applauding your winter droving prowess).....sarcasm

listen, i've driven in whiteout freaking blizzards on flat barren ND interstates in nut chilling and dangerous cold and blizzards on closed roads in my RWD buicks and chevys many times. you know what, it don't mean squat as far as the car buying public.

you still ignore what the buyer wants when they are in the showroom.

you are still sitting there saying 'this is what the buy should be happy with' instead of 'we will sell them what they want to buy'

Odds are good they weren't equipped with snow tires. How much snow did you get? Define "heavy snow"

why would they want the hassle of buying snow tires and wheels and doing the changeover every year and spending the money and time to do that?

I've done that with my thunderbird. its a pain doing that each fall and spring and then having to find room in your garage to store it. if you have the money and time and space its great, but even then you might as well get AWD and snow tires then, its an even much better solution.

not sure what the actual amount was. we had some nice warm rain in the morning and fresh wet snow to glaze over it. it was likely 8-12 inches of fresh snow, with some of the parts of the roads and parking lots had well over a foot once it got pushed around a bit. allthough the asshole on the city plow left about two feet at the end of my driveway.

in other words, nothing that would faze an SUV or crossover, which is why they became so popular in the first place.

fun watching the news about the teeny snow dropping in atlanta or wherever the other day.......boo hoo, talk about people making it look easy to drive in snow, the video had a tow truck pulling a mustang out of the ditch because it wiped out. that rwd driver was soooooo skilled.........

No, that's not my reasoning. Of course it's good to offer RWD for the tools who think that they'll DIE if they get behind the wheel of a RWD car and a flake of snow lands on the grass 3 miles away.

However the TRUTH is that RWD is more than capable in the snow.

but not as capable as fwd or awd.

or as convenient. or as hassle free.

I live in a snowy place, although mostly it is just 1-2 inches, only a few times a year do we get 4+ inches. But I still see a lot of Mustangs, Corvettes, Ford Panther platform cars, the old CTS, 7-series, Lexus LS, and Mercedes without 4Matic. People that care about driving dynamics will buy RWD, they won't get scared away.

last thursday here in snow central, waiting to pick up my kid from school in heavy snow. two cars in five minutes got stuck in the school driveway ON FLAT ROADS and needed to be pushed by humans to get going again. One was a rear drive Lincoln LS, and the other was a BMW 3 series. I was LMAO. Everyone else in their FWD or AWD was spinning and having a rough go, but it was not only ludicrous as hell to see those helpless rwd people begging for help to move their cars, it was also another sad reminder why generally, the other 99 percent of people who don't frequent car sites and brag about driving uphill in a snowstorm both ways on the way to school when they were young, prefer to spend real money on something besides rwd only in challenging climates for all season cars.

Exactly (although snow tires on the back is all you need), 4 is nice though.

steering and stopping is as important as gription on the drive wheels and like any body selling snow tires will tell you.....you must have them on all four corners. you actually screw it up more by only putting snow tires on the back.

It's not penis waving, it's having a brain and some common sense.

no its about WHAT PEOPLE ARE SPENDING THEIR MONEY ON IN THE SHOWROOMS

a- what do we want to sell

b- WHAT PEOPLE WILL BUY

c- is the customer wrong (i.e. whould we tell the customer its about brains and common sense?)

d- NO YOU MAKE WHAT THEY WANT TO BUY SO YOU CAN KEEP SELLING PRODUCT

by your reasoning, niether BMW, Mercedes, Lexus, Infiniti, Cadillac, would have added AWD to their sedan lines, nor would chrysler have hedged their bets on the LX cars by offering AWD as well.

Someones jealous of the fun-mobile. I'd hope its the fun-mobile, because ther really isn't any reason to be jealous of the other one, unless you hate buying gas so much you'd love to only have to hit the gas station twice a month.

and to circle the wagons back around....not only would that cobalt cost half as much to pay for, even the mpg is better as well.

wait you talking about the prius?????

now that's FUN....or wait, is that EXCITEMENT

not quite there

doesn't hide the fact that scion is being ridiculed and generally ignored, now, like 5 years after it was spawned. Toyota needs to kill brands and get rid of underperforming and inefficient marketing channels.

Yup, exactly no Pontiac equals less sales, less profit, and lots of pissed of loyal GM owners of Pontiac and other GM vehicles.

as long as the lefties, greenies, CR bangers, college professors, journalists, uptight rich whiteys, self obsorbed youngsters and trendies, and otherwise confused 'can't make up their mind themselves so someone has to tell them what to buy' set are happy, that means GM must cut their second biggest selling car brand.

sadly, this is a result of too much asian influence in auto design. or to much anime or what. i sure hope at some point we move past this immature style language.

Not really, the Fit is a better design.

neither is good. calling the fit 'design' is like calling rosie odonnell sexy

the lexar one i have has a little visible gauge on the outside to be able to see how much space it has left on it. very handy.

last time i went chevy shopping they had a buttload of XFE's on the lot. but the cobalt that appealed to me most was an LT because i think doesn't it get different tires than the XFE Low rolling resistance skinny tires are nice from an MPG standpoint but not from a traction standpoint.

Get a job

i don't need to. i don't stock my garage with overpriced girl car / fashion accessories with limited function.

besides, i made more money in the last 3 months of last year and more off my leftover vacation pay than you probably made the last 3 years.

and i don't spend it on overpriced toy cars.