Robert Hall

A couple bizzaro sightings today-- A pristine, mint condition--unrestored, I think '82 Cadillac Cimmaron (or was that Cimmaron, by Cadillac? ) A gold Chevy Classic (Malibu from 2 generations back) with a giant aluminum Fast & The Furious wing (as high as the roof) and the Classic badge shortened to read 'CLASS'. Stock wheels, etc. I wonder if the driver realizes that the car makes him look like a complete dork.

LoL. Speaking of more numbers, it seems automatic transmission ratio counts keep going up and up....10 - 15 speeds will likely be here in the next decade. But manual transmission ratios seem stuck at 6.

Not relevant...what counts are production engines.

How effective are the cupholder ergonomics? Are the seats comfortable (I always read that Corvette seats suck).

Never heard of any...do any exist in the wild other than a handful of prototypes?

New for this generation, though. The '09 and '10 were V8 only.

About all I know of Baltimore is from watching The Wire on HBO. Lots of poverty, crime, corruption. But seriously, I was there for a few days in 1997 for a conference at a hotel in the Inner Harbor...took a harbor dinner cruise, went to some bars in Fell's Point. Seemed like some pretty nice areas mixed in w/ sketchy areas, not unlike Cleveland in the '90s that I was pretty familiar with.

5-10 years down the road, w/ higher CAFE standards and higher gas prices, M-B may likely sell both the A- and B-class in the US...maybe GM can respond w/ premium Cadillacs based on the Spark and Aveo. Something to look forward to.

I like the dark gray/titanium wheels and trim look also...even Ford is advertising their V6 Mustang that way...I've seen a great ad w/ a dark gray car w/ darker gray or black wheels. Definitely nicer than chrome wheels, which look out of place on modern cars, IMO.

Ok, change 'my lifetime' to 'last 40 years'..makes the same point...semi-recent history, esp. the last 20...how Mercedes or Cadillac was perceived in markets 50-60 years ago or more isn't relevant. Good question... I assume they are doing them in FWD to get economies of scale by sharing the platform w/ cheaper models (Mini, Smart).

Esp. on Nissan Versas for some reason. Looks better than cheap plastic wheelcovers.

Are you unaware of the AMG models? Among the best luxury sports sedans on the market.

I assume they are going for the FWD/AWD subcompact and compact premium market where BMW is going and Audi already is...these models are primarily for Europe and other markets w/ high fuel prices. No...aspiring to build the highest performing luxury sports sedans is consistent w/ the goal of building the best engineered cars available. 'followed'? Cadillac has been doing the following... Mercedes had their AMG sports sedans long before Cadillac had their V-series models. As far as 'non-luxury', maybe true 50 years ago, but in my lifetime Mercedes has been at or near the pinnacle of luxury cars...(w/ the S-class, SL, etc).

wood

Wouldn't that intrude on Cadillac's ATS plans?

On '60s-70s musclecar restorations in recent years, the steelies w/ dog dish hubcaps seems to be a very popular trend..esp. w/ Mopies. I see a lot of them in the mags and at car shows.

It looks better than plastic wheel covers, IMO. For some reason, I see a lot of Nissan Versas this way. I did this myself 20+ years ago in college--in the winters I ran my Mustang LX on 4 snow tires on black steelies..looked good w/ the dark gray paint, IMHO. The rest of the year it had the factory wheels which were strange non-alloy alloys. As far as this look from the factory, I esp. like the black steelies w/ small hubcap look on the Crown Vic PIs and old Impala 9C1s.

Saw a silver CTS coupe today, first one I've seen in the wild. Sharp.

Turned out to need a new coil pack along w/ 1 spark plug. Got that fixed today along w/ the passenger front window--the regulator was broken and the motor dead.

arachnidism

I've been in the hobby off and on since childhood...my older brother got me interested in it when he gave me his old '60s vintage builtups around 1978. I've had some periods where I've built a lot and years where I didn't finish any... starting from about 200 kits built from '78-88, after grad school in '97 I started buying kits again--new ones and old unbuilts and old restorable kits...I have about 1500 unbuilts now and another 300 or so old restorable builtups and unbuilts, going back as far as the AMT/SMP annuals from '58. I love the hobby, really need to spend more time building kits than buying them... I'm not really into customs or hot rods, my favorite types of kits are stock '50s-70s domestic cars (esp. full size), muscle cars, European cars, F1 race cars, some Japanese subjects. I'm pretty active on three of the biggest online modeling forums (Scale Auto Magazine forums, Model Cars Magazine forums, and Spotlight Hobbies message board) and go to local shows/swap meets (and a few national ones like the NNL West now and then). I'll post some pics of some of mine soon..

Saw a black '11 Grand Cherokee this morning, first I've seen on the street..very sharp. Also saw a very sharp black '10 Taurus SHO w/ dark window tint and a set of subtle aftermarket rims that had black spokes.

case

Hmmm..I don't think I've ever photographed the engine compartment of any car I've owned. I think my Jeep has a lot of dusty oily black and silver stuff under the hood.

Nice, but unfortunately they are 1000s of miles away and worlds apart from GM NA's FWD reality.