PurdueGuy

Hey, even if it is ugly, it's a shirt to work on the car in. That, or an "I've been too lazy to do laundry for the last 2 weeks, so I'm down to this" shirt.

There's not *that* much resemblance. I doubt I would mistake any one for another. Sure, there's simmilarities, but they're simmilar sized cars going for a simmilar image. I still don't see any total copycat-ness about them.

Didn't watch all of the game (and thus, not all of the commercials), but I really liked the fly/defib one - hilarous! The streaking sheep was decent, too.

there's actually a fair number of Baja's running around town here... of course they're made across town...

Link?

looks like a (poorly) restyled xA, but I'm guessing it's bigger than that? Really, if they changed the horrible color and redid the hood, it could be ok.

wow... that's some nasty fit & finish...

Actually, it's been found (according to my farmer father-in-law) that high levels of eth. in the fuel causes seal failures in all but the most recent farm equipment. Want to study waste: consider replacing all the farm equipment across the country... it's not like cars that people already replace every 5 years, farmers run their equipment FOREVER! (how much energy/materials savings would there be if everyone repaired their cars instead of so many people whining & buying something new whenever the first malfunction occurred...)

Trouble is, it's a turning point that's many years away, even looking at it optimistically, simply looking at infrastructure. Mass production and distribution of hydrogen won't happen quickly, nor without a ton of politics. GM does need to keep pushing in that direction, but it's not like hybrids are distracting them from something that's 5 years off. They need to be in both arenas.

Well, considering agriculture IS an Industry...

What's regenerative breaking, or what's the EV1? I'll assume you mean what's regenerative breaking... regenerative breaking almost doubles the range in electric cars, and contributes greatly to the efficiency increases in gas/electric hybrid cars. When you press the breaks, the electric motors reverse their function to become generators, slowing the car (there are still regular breaks as well), and charging the batteries.

Another great GM innovation: regenerative breaking (EV1)

What got spotted early before?

I think a semi-luxury, stylish car based on the same platform as the cobalt/ion could be good for Buick. Skylark would be a great name, too. Something that's a good blend of mature & cool. I think some neat things could be done with the point in the middle of the grill like the '90's skylarks had, too.

GM sure seems to be taking this embrace of hybrids seriously. For a while they seemed to ignore it and focus on fuel cells. Hopefully they keep working on the fuel cells too, but it's good to see them making serious strides at hybrid technology.

You guys act like Toyota is totally taking over Subaru. I don't think we'll really see that much change in Subaru. BTW, that plant (which is about 10-15 min from me) was producing Isuzu products along side the Subaru products for a long time up until a couple years ago. (thus, the production space Hudson mentioned)

But what's the car to person ratio for Brazil? I bet we've got 'em whooped on that figure.

I would think it would be fairly easy to do a top for the convertible that makes it look much like that coupe. Maybe GM doesn't want them to do that... maybe a coupe already in the works, and they don't want to steal its thunder? (total speculation...)

The look has too much Catera and not enough CTS. Don't bring it here.

...summed up exactly what I was thinking. Chunky Vibe.

dang, that mini concept is fugly. I like the cooper, but that thing is hideous. 'course it's gonna be tough for mini to make anything other than the cooper and not get ripped apart by fans for having ungainly proportions. That concept goes beyond ungainly proportions, though. nasty colors, odd/dumb features.... blah.

I think it looks great, but a fastback might very well look even better. Still, MORE AFTERMARKET FOR SATURN!

Saturn S-series, if you can find one that hasn't been run into the ground. They're cheap & easy to work on, cheap to buy (I got my '99 for just over $5K over a year ago, and there are better deals than that out there), and if they haven't been run into the ground, are generally very reliable.

I would think that brand shouldn't be axed, but possibly brand infrastructures consolidated. Why ditch something that has brand recognition? Find some way to use it, even if you have to somewhat redefine what that brand is. For example, if they decided that Pontiac wasn't pulling it's own weight - combine it with Chevy, and make the pontiac vehicles simmilar to the chevy vechiles (share platforms), but with different sheetmetal and with details more oriented to a performance customer. It's practically what they are already, you just make it so the same people that handle the admin stuff for one brand also does the other, and sell them out of the same dealers. Of course there are downsides to that - the Pontiacs sold through chevy discourage things like the SS chevy models. But face it, that's already overlap, and that overlap might be addressed more effectively if it's in fewer offices. *shrug*

They already ditched the Neon. You basically saying to make Plymouth their value brand?