razoredge

Nope.........Balthazar certainly is not this sites................ass clown

Wow...............how can such an amazing collections of photos both impress me and make me feel homicidal at the same time ???????????????????? I wonder what Wagoner & crews annual take was around 2000 ? ? ? ? ?

That would be a hard find today. I dont know about the voice warnings, I know the mid 80's Imperials had it but never knew about Olds or GM's using it. Search autotrader.com and maybe someday one will pop up. The late 80's Regency "touring sedans" have won over a few hearts as well, but still never heard of that voice warning. Im not a fan of digital or led dash gadgets myself but our 89 New Yorker had one and it never failed and that was something I was counting on failing.

The waxy stuff GM has used for years is the best, you will see in on strut towers, under the trunk lid seeping out around the reinforcement bars. It seeps into the seams and stays there, repelling condensation. Eastwood sells it, its self healing, so they say. Never gets real hard and is supposed to flow back into an area where it got scrached off. Except areas like fender wells that take a beating tar type undercoating is a good thing to stay away from. Eventually moisture gets under that thick film of tar and rust runs rampant. Ive seen the steel of entire wheel houses turned to crust and you would never know it by looking, untill you push against the undercoating with your hand and find there is nothing but huge flakey c-rust behind it. This was what my 90 Regencys front inners were like at 300,000 miles 1.5 years ago when I bought it. All fixed now. The rest of the car was clean as a whistle, just under the heavy "undercoated areas" was gone. Its never a good idea on a used car to put any undercoating over already formed rust, it will just seal in the rust making a nice little incubator for the little rust varmits. Rust Lives.....................

Sad thing is guys, that will never happen. The insurance companies are ruling the world now and I dont think a car will ever weigh less than 3400 lb again, no mater what the size. We must have 500lbs/$5000 worth of airbags, hoods that wont dent the heads of those idiots that Momma never taught to look both ways before crossing the road. High belt lines and high ride height so cars dont get lost in the never ending sea of SUV's, Kenworth size PU's, and "Crossovers". A pillors that are large enough to be considered timber and B & C pillors large enough to be considered "old growth". Mans only natural preditors has been cancer & the automobile and now they are trying to rule that out...............so much for survival of the fittest.................... The same thing that you are talking about with the Beetles is only part of what I loved so much about my Sunbeam. The wireing harness on that car was so simple. It had 2 fuses. You could open the hood and start the car from under the hood by pushing a button on the remote solenoid while tinkering. You would be under the hood tinkering just because it was fun and not overwhelming. And you know what....if I rolled it over I was going to die and that was knowingly accepted and the knowledge of that made me a better driver. Today you open a hood and its like "what for" to look at gobs of plastic engine covers and electro gadjets that you can do nothing about, nothing with. A real engine modification today takes nearly 3000.00 and a engineering degree in computor technology...........then there will still always be some bug that no one even the genious's can figure out. No doubt cars are better today, less hasstles until they reach their half life............then look out. Look at a dashboard and imagine if you ever needed to get in there to fix some stupid electro gazmo that was designed to fail at year 5 or 100,000 miles/whatever comes first.............like GM's moronic fuel gauge issue. Reads empty after a fill up, straightens out for 3/4 of a tank and works proper then rises toward full again as you are nearing empty It it were'nt broke, why on earth would you waste R&D $ to make something so simple as a fuel gauge so unreliable, complicated and no doubt heavier ? Friend of mine had a Vdubbya, it was cool to drive and "bomb" around in but it was too much like work getting up hills.

All Aurora owners are automobile enthousiasts........if they werent they would be driving V6 Camaros, Mustangs, Camrys and Accords like the rest of the sheeple. If you have a problem with some of the GM oriented topics perhaps you could spread your BS elsewhere and stay off topics about that which you seem unable to cope with. After all you only appear to have one purpose in replying to this topic and that was to insult over an incidental. Perhaps your pissed off to find out little 2 litre and under, $25,000 FWD cars are blowing the doors off $33,000+ 2.7-3.0 litre RWD cars in a series as important as Grand Am ?.............I mean who knows what would have spured you to freak out about FWD on a topic that was about the track provensuccess of a GM product that also happens to be FWD. Once again I seem to have been fooled into thinking that GM successes are what we were all here for.................. ah......the ponderance of it all..................

Yes they are supercharged. These are fairly close to showroom stock classes. They are allowed few modification. Cobalt get its HO by use of forced induction, Honda and BMW get theirs with HO NA methods. Heres the list of allowed modifications and car specs. Cobalt is allowed at lot of weight reduction and aero panels, but they are not the only ones. Also note most all other cars beside various Honds, A4 and Protege most engines are closer to 3 litres. You'll also see many of the small I4's are allowed factory forced induction. This is how they level the playing field. You'll need to scroll down to ST (street tuner) the top is GS class which includes the larger cars. http://www.grandamerican.com/CONTENT/Docs/...emode=bookmarks

Evok - "older people are easier satisified" Before you get a life you need to come back down to planet earth. Everyone knows all older people do is nit pick and bitch and moan about the downward spiral of socioty and all things earthly. "Nothing to do, so I think Ill get that window switch that just doesnt feel quite right fixed this week". Well then yes they will give the dealers a good rating because they took the time to fix the item or at least pretend too and humor the old folks as they spend the afternoon "hanging out". Older folks are also more apt to take their car to the dealer for service year after year after year, long after warranty. This is also the same reason BOP and Caddy had higher complaints on initial quality in some poles. Nit pickin. Toyotas are for people that could care less about cars but need one for transportation. So they buy what is presumed to be the best and drive it till trade in time and begin again. Nothing like down playing any thing positive about GM while making large of anything negitive about GM.

Now this one did go right over my head.......must of never seen these books, is there a story behind this ? ***There shouldnt be any inaccurate data if Balthazar edits it. ............Hey..............Ill do the spelling edit...................

Theres a white GXP locally and it stands out well in the crowd. Just like its sista the Aurora. Thats quite a car to aspire too, you have good taste.

"larger diameter makes surface intrusions smaller. But thats old farm tractor tech nog log y" Correction..........that dates back to covered wagon and stage coach tech.........then even earlier in Europe.

However, larger overall diameter tire surface will have more grip due to contact patch.......and...........larger diameter makes surface intrusions smaller. But thats old farm tractor tech nog log y I believe it applys to todays tire tech, F1 tires are huge, not real low pro though. I walked by the tire mounting area at ALMS race but never thought to see what size the tires or wheels were. They were at least 18's I would say and maybe a 50 series kinda profile.............and W I D E. They werent rubber band tires thats for sure. A trailor being towed past afterwards had slicks with huge rubber globs stuck to them that looked far worse than the underside of an old school desk. On these smaller lower powered cars the ticket is to have the grip you need for the weight and nothing more, more robs HP and top end speed. 250LM..........hell yea ! Amounst the first mid-engined automobiles, a fine era indeed

Yummy ! I could really go for one with all red interior, everything, leather, carpet, panels, black cherry wood. Black and Red. Thats priced steep but would be hard for me to resist, 2 months ago, in its proper price range. That $5900 range is for nearly mint final generation Rivs. I wonder if the few remaining examples of these generations will have a bit of value in 20 years ? To the right person I suppose..........or will no one care because there is no more gasoline ? This styling is So American and So GM if you really stop to look at it.

TricriBob - Yes they were iron blocks/aluminum heads.......not the 215 (all aluminum) and Im not sure what the block in Quad 4 was. I know what you are talking about with different materials and their expansion rates & temps. I dont think any engine fairs well to overheating............oh wait.............I forgot, we had a 89 NYer that ran the 3.0 SOHC V6 Mitzu, aluminum head/cast block and we over heated it bad at a crowded toll booth, now I was older and wise but I knew no way in hell did I want to shut that car off on the interstate, let alone in that traffic. We drove that car another 2.5 years and never had a head problem. At 150,000+ miles it finally developed a rod knock. Another effect of overheating. The 60* Chevy V6 family, has had aluminum heads for a long time as far as I know and I dont believe there has been problems due to the head material. Im not worried about the 3.9.................that wont go bad until it hits 36,001 miles ....................shoehorn SC3800 ?............just kiddin I hope. Balthazar - the word porosity seems to keep poping up, I have no first hand experience with the engine but every topic Ive seen or any time the subject comes up it seems to have a certain amount of "not so great" surrounding the life span of the origional (GM) engines. Something about a large % of rejected casting and others making it to market that shouldnt have. Others know the story, Ive only read/heard it a handful of times. I dont know how British Leland did with them. Heres an interesting little story about coolant and an all aluminum race engine. I read it years ago and now just recently found it again in a different story. Seems unbelievable but interesting if nothing else DAYTONA 24 HOURS 1970 - Having qualified as 13th the N.A.R.T. Ferrari 312P Berlinetta - chassis 0870 - of David Piper and Tony Adamowicz finished as 5th overall. Years later Tony tells: "I remember that I was very impressed with the strength and integrity of the 312P. I recall that the track surface deteriorated during the last half of the race - revealing coral under the surface. Bits of the coral kicked up and began to eat away at our radiator, which was mounted very low in the nose. Mike Parkes had unfortunately crashed the #24 bubble roofed car during the early morning hours, and the only spare radiator between the two Ferraris had been used in repairing his car. The track conditions would eventually render our own radiator useless, and David and I had to drive for five hours without any water in the system, using the oil temperature as a guide to finishing the race. And so that's racing, not bad for the first ever ride in a Ferrari."

Sunbeam put aluminum heads on all the Alpines starting in 59. I never heard of a head problem with the Sunbeams heads and many were worked to quite high compression, which I believe was one of the reasons for using aluminum. I dont know about all Toyotas or Datsuns engines but they have been using aluminum heads on some of their motors since the early 70's. I drove a L20B some rediculous distance without coolant and didnt warp the head until I added water.................dut da da ! Ah, to be young, ignorant and stupid again...................I'll pass. I have always felt alot of the "aluminum heads = bad" talk amounst American oldtimers was little more than folk lore and just plain fear of a soft metal. However we are now quite aware of the vast cheapness surrounding the American automakers with that war between engineers and bean counters. If they can save 10 cents on a casting or metalurgy, thats what they will try to do, even if it fails. Buick 215 is a prime example. quad4 another One the flip side I have an 64 English Ford 330 ci I6 with a cast iron head that has a bit of an engineering flaw. The head gasket will eventually fail in this one location and pump compression into the water jacket, thereby pumping coolant out the radiator overflow unless you leave the radiator cap loose...................... 671 Detriot Diesels, another I6 with a single cast iron head also experienced some head failure Nothing is carved in stone that will not eventually erode.

We need a world where these worthless corporate/government leaders stop playing companies and citizens like little games at Vegas. Fire a few of them or better yet hang them at high noon in front of their families....................then the message will get out there...................this is our country.............these are our jobs, our families, our homes, our land..............and we're tired of you all destroying what took generations and generations to build MORONS !

Wow really ? I would like to recieve a PM from Balthazar on this one at least. Im more than disappointed, had a bit of effort into that one meself, but the overall effort was astonishing and it may have been the most complete history of GM's XP vehicals anywhere. That was one of the few good topics on this forum.........................

Cant seem to see it.

You'll also notice the inside front tire has very little weight on it either, check it out

Arent all "Hemis" ............semi ?

I dont give a hoot about touchy feely plastics. If thats what the average car buyer does, molest the interior and if it doesnt get them aroused they go look at the next car, I can see why the roads are clogged with numb brains. Plastics dont sell cars. "Oh, ew, ah, I just had to have that car, the ?plastics? were just so soft"...........alrighty then. Warrenty sells cars especially 10/100,000 I myself can admit to be tempted Firesale sells cars. I am currently a good example though we were looking before 0% We have a local Hyundia dealer that spends a small fortune on radio advertising every August and floods the road with Hyundias, its visably noticable. Then Im sure after that other local dealers including Rice find sales slow. We looked at Hyundia last year and walked away, guess I should have rubbed all over the interior................maybe that would have changed my mind. Crushed Velour Rules.......................GM U S E D to use it. Hinty hinty

I guess I can atleast give them credit for still using names rather than yet another letter predictably followed by a number or 2 or 3.

One of the earliest FWD majic tricks was performed in the 1967 Pikes Peak Hillclimb when 2, thats TWO FWD Toronados fooled everyone into thinking they won the darn thing.

And that would explain why Cobalt and Acura are leaving ultimate driving BMW's in the dust. Who enthousiasts ????????????????????????? Is that a special club ????????? Did I say I was trying to impress someone because the wheel was off the ground ? It was just a bit of interest in a photo I grabed for a topic about how the Cobalt is kickin ass in GA Cup. I have seen a picture of my good friend and fellow Brit sports car enthousiast in a Cobra he built with both inside tires in the air on some corner at LimeRock or the Glen. DOnt know how he could have figured he would have any traction doing that.....thats like what ? 50%...................must be he was going.................fast ???????????? The inside rear tire is always the go to tire in hard cornering, thats why the WRC fellows hang em right of the edge of cliffs. some RWD owners will do amazing majic tricks to win we non enthusiasts over.............like the wonderful smell of burning rubber............I like it so much I think I'll go set some old tires on fire, the wind is just right, I can get the smell to flow through the house. Not bad for only having 75% of a car..........or was that just another one of dem dar majic tricks ?

Imagine that 99% of "us" cant keep up. shush refers to the wispering behind the scenes, you know, picture someone with their finger to their lips telling their gossip friend "shush"............ get it contribution - exactly my point, lets see more input to a topic rather than what was givin. I must have never been in all the right topics to see these large contributions. G6 styling base needs to move rapidly over to more serious chassis and powertrain layouts. Suspension needs to be better sorted on GTP. I like the interior in light against the black. Would like it more with less black. I like the materials, but prefer the softer interiors of the 80's to these new plastic interiors and that includes the imports. Id rather have a stowable rag top with detachable hardtop than this particular "gimic", cool as it is. These will be good cars to stay away from used, sad but true. Repairs I imagine will be costly and certainly sure to happen with age. Who figures the Sebring convertable is the only competion for this G6 ? Id say all convertables are in competition with this car.