System i Addict

I have been known to like cars. I like nice well done cars. I currently own a Volvo which I adore. Now before you chalk me up as some Euro car nut that is to good for an American car lets get this straight. While I like my very affordable Volvo, which is also very safe, Volvo is owned by Ford which I really have never seen how they stay in business. But I drive my lovely Volvo and it’s a trooper of a car.

GM is having a rough go at it, and while I know why they have missed the boat and over time will eventually fail. Why David, you ask, is GM failing? I will tell you. GM has made mistakes, big nasty ugly mistakes like keeping Buick around and Pontiac for that matter. I am going to catch hell for that but in the end there is nothing you can say to change my mind. GM should have shut down Olds, Pontiac and Buick all at the same time. They kill any profit that Gm would have made and I don’t care what the numbers look like, they make your car company look old, which is something the System i is fighting too so I know how that battles goes. They are old, tired looking cars that no one wants….except old people who have been buying them for years and can’t put themselves to looking at one of those “Jap” Honda’s….I hear it everyday and it kills me. So be it.

Next is Chevy. The only thing they have going for it is the truck line and the Corvette. Everything else is crap. I mean it and I am not joking, it’s all crap and looks like it was all built out of cardboard and old  beer cans. The engineering in them is old and tired and you would expect to see it on a kids power wheels but not in a car I just paid $20,000 for.

Deep down inside we all know Chevy has it in them, We all know Ford does too, they show it over and over again at times, but they never put it all in the same car. Ford poured theirs heart and soul into the Mustang and it looks great but still have a really cheap feeling interior and the solid rear axle is ridiculous. You saved the customer $3000 so that they could have the worst ride ever in the newest Mustang ever. How sad.

Let’s see, I am going to build a great sports car with heritage and a loving fanatical customer base, and short sheet the customers buy dropping 90 year old technology in the form of a solid sprung axle? What were you thinking Ford? You have Volvo, Land Rover, Jaguar, and others with independent rear end technology and you opt to go the stupid route. Not even Chevy is that stupid they actually did the rear end of the Corvette proper!

Now onto Toyota. While I think they produce some of the ugliest cars coming out of Japan you have to give them a gold star for the quality. Those Toyota’s will freaking run forever, and they are on the bleeding edge of where everyone wants to go with fuel economy. While the Prius is just plain hideous to look at, it’s smart and other car companies need to look at it and say, that is smart but we can do it better! Because you can. 50MPG is not a new thing. I had a 1993 Honda Civic VX that got over 50MPG and it hauled arse. There was nothing wimpy about it, but some 15 years later we are all giddy over 30MPG? What happened….we all went backwards a bit.

Take a look at what BMW is doing. They are building great cars and giving them hot engines that also sip gas, Audi and Volvo are doing it too. They have been and everyone is ignoring them? We expect it out of Japan, we expect the gas usage to be lite out of a Honda or a Toyota and with a German or Swedish car we want some performance too.  Japan should call Germany and see what  they can work out. I think at one time they did and made a company called Mazda which everyone seems content to ignore too, they are just one of the most loved racing car companies on the face of the earth yet they get no air time with GM and Toyota hogging all the free news clips and other media.

I am kind of happy in a way to see GM and Ford hurting. I thought a few years back it would teach them a leasson and make them rethink autos and how they did things and Ford seemed to wake up and take some action but GM kept on doing the same old thing.

GM has a company in Australia that makes hot cars, and yet we are subjected to “OK” Chevy’s here in the states. Why is that? Why can’t GM bring some of  the cars from the land down under to the US and sell them as Chevy’s?  Holden is the name of the company and you can find them here. Who out there would not want one of these? Holden Commodore SS?

I am done. I think GM needs to re-tool and make some damn good cars and stop playing like they just need to edge out Ford and Dodge. GM you need to edge out BMW, Audi and Volvo….the only way you are going to do that is stop the line and re-tool how you do things. You need to know your customers and they are not red-necked NASCAR fans, they are Americans who want a good car, that looks classy and does not have a bench seat in a sedan? Nice tight seats that hold you and an engine that moves you with a suspension that is not made of pound cake.

Just once start with the Corvette and work out from there…….