A Horse With No Name

Still not a bad looking little ride.

I would love one, but I am kind of tired of the Retro Muscle car thing. I still love them, but want something else for my personal car. Not bad choices either one. VW looks good in grey.

Sad, I would say that there is about a thirty percent chance that VW will eventually take the Volkswagen brand out of the US market and either only sell Audi and Porsche or brink in Skoda or seat to replace VW. We are not anywhere near the end of this. ...and as much as I love my TDI, will be very glad when they keys are back in Volkswagen's hands.

They are doing quite a bit of good, actually.

Protectionism is often not healthy for an economy, this just sucks, actually.

I do not think you will regret the Mazda, and it should be decent on fuel also. Crosstek manual? Mini is better looking, but I am biased!

Sad but in many ways rational. They are going exactly the wrong direction. Next big fuel scare, they will be in big trouble.

I feel your pain...

A 500 Abarth might be fun, although it would have the added benefit that no one would ever borrow it.

And no one in the thread is touching the other issues regarding Teslathat I brought up. Although I do think that they are somewhat supply constrained as to their sales being flat. And once again, go back to my comments about Tesla still learning how to build cars. Tesla has had some reliability issues, many of them simple things someone like Cadillac would have simply gotten correct for a car that was that price.

They are undoubtedly expensive to maintain. For me personally they just do absolutely nothing for me...at least the modern ones. I really love the vintage ones. Do not tell Oldsmodrew, but I would love to own something like a 78 450 convertible or an older Benz diesel. Guy I know here on the east side of town runs q shop that fixes nothing but vintage Benz. But the modern stuff leaves me cold. The former owner of my Mini Cooper S traded it in at a specialty vehicle dealer here in Columbus on a C63 AMG. Found myself parked next to her quite by accident at a local restaurant. Decided at that point I would rather have the MINI Cooper S. But you have no condemnation from me personally. I am thinking about buying an FRS/BRZ/Toyota 86 to replace the TDI, either new or gently used. That sum of cash would easily buy a gently used ATS, a decision every last other person on this board would probably make.

Also my remark was about running costs, which are in no way remotely comparable. Nothing whatsoever can touch Lexus for reliability in terms of imported Luxury cars. Mercedes are maintenance and repair pigs, a fight you have lost repeatedly here at C and G. No sane person wants to own a European luxury car out of warranty. The Bolt will have a market. This is the same sort of irrational whining this forum was filled with seven or eight years ago on the Volt, and the Volt is doing fine.

Your graph actually proves my point quite well. Notice the Kermit the Frog green line for Lexus, which crosses the line for Mercedes in the early 1990's and never looks back. The older LS400 was a car Toyota spent a ton of money developing to beat Benz. Benz cheapened their products in the early 1990s and they have never been the same.

Not really sure that will have the same appeal with buyers....we will see!

...as if the average Tesla 3 buyer is looking at running down an RS or a V as part of the buying calculous. SMK is being profoundly absurd.

No we are saying mistakes happen. I am probably the harshest critic of Fiat Chrysler here in and G, and I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Indeed, but I would want a DSG tune as well. Was going to put one on the Jetta before the buy back scenario.

Agreed. FCA seems to want to walk away from passenger cars altogether in the North American market unless it is a challenger or a charger.

Agreed. To me, it is about corporate culture, and Fiat Chrysler had no intention of defrauding it's customers in regards to safety.

Prius, the current generation is indeed a brilliant car. People will want pure electrics though, and it is here that GM has the best long term strategy.

And price is going to be huge for young professional people with a ton of college debt to pay back and an expensive apartment lease in that city they just moved to for that entry level dream job. This will be the market for electric cars. I work on a college campus. Most of my students do not want ICE, they want electric. They also will not be able to afford a 50 thousand dollar car until well into their career. And this is where GM has an advantage with the Volt. People buy them as affordable used cars and love them, especially young people who cannot afford a pure electric. Volt to Bolt will be an easy transition for them. Or even Prius to Bolt, as they will have grown comfortable with the idea of buying from a very established mainstream carmaker.

They will be a successful niche marketer, GM will be a very successful mainstream marketer. GM has a huge lead. Tesla has nailed selling electrical cars, but GM has over a century of experience building actual cars. Tesla is still figuring out how to build cars. GM can learn to market cars much faster than Tesla can figure out how to build them.

Germans are building overly technical cars that have largely list their way in terms of handling, cost of ownership and reliability. Go try to sell a ten year old Lexus and a ten year old BMW or god forbid Benz. People will line up for the Lexus and walk away from the BMW...and in general run from the Benz. People are not stupid when it comes to the off lease ownership costs. As for Cadillac, I regularly see Cadillacs from the seventies, eighties and nineties tooling around the streets of Columbus Ohio where I live. GM design and engineering philosophy has been flawed at times, but when they get it right, they get it really right. Which they are doing with the Bolt. Toyota has excellent hybrid technology, but is not marketing full electric cars. They along with Honda have chosen the fuel cell route. It costs well over a million dollars to build a fueling station for a fuel cell car, fifteen grand to build an electric charging station from scratch. Given two hundred plus million cars in the USA and those costs, who is on the right track, GM or Toyota?

And there are other issues with Tesla as well as long term financial stability. GM has a large dealer network and a much more developed engineering department for two things. It also has a much larger base of established buyers whoa re sued to and comfortable with its products.

I do like that Dashboard!