Cadillac may be gunning too hard for Germany’s domain of rear-drive sports sedans, but one area where The Standard of the World won’t be gunning for them is in the volume race. GM CFO Dan Ammann told Automotive News that unlike BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Audi, ”We’re not going to be in every single segment that they’re in”.

“In some ways, I think that not having the pressure to sell the last incremental car at whatever cost … is actually not a bad place to be right now. Continuing to move down price points, and microsegmentation of all of these little categories, all seems to be driven by a sort of volume-at-all-costs mentality,” Ammann said. “What that does long term for brand health I think remains to be seen.”

Now, it’s true that Cadillac is working with a different set of circumstances than the Germans. For one, its product and sales base is much smaller than globally-integrated German luxury marques. And frankly, Cadillac should expand a little if it wants to make a real run at Europe and China. A small crossover to compete against the Audi Q3 wouldn’t be a bad idea, along with a brand new Cadillac SRX.

On the other hand, I’m glad that Ammann feels no need to pursue this strategy of going for every last niche. In the long run, I think it will do some damage to luxury brands if they keep moving too down market, as their premium position will be diluted by making the brand too accessible. Europe is plagued by a declining car market, an aging population and a lost generation of young consumers. Their auto makers have to do something to make their products accessible to the next generation. Like Jaguar Land Rover, Cadillac isn’t as exposed to these problems as Europe’s auto makers. Their big markets (the United States and China, India and the UK for JLR) have both economics and demographics on their side. Refraining from the “volume or bust” mindset is a luxury they can afford to indulge in.

The latest round of bad news regarding the Australian domestic auto industry has shifted TTAC’s attention to Canada, another country burdened with some similar issues. If Australia’s own car industry is getting hammered, then how much longer does Canada have?

Australia’s car market was once far more protected, but the reduction of imported vehicle tariffs and cheap exported cars from countries like Japan and Thailand have made locally built cars an extremely expensive proposition. Unlike Canada, Australia’s vehicle exports are minimal, and the domestic car industry has been reduced to relying on local consumers and government handouts to help stay afloat. While Australia has rapidly switched from locally-made, thirsty V8 sedans to small, fuel-efficient compacts, Canada has always had a taste for gas-sippers. Hell, two of them (the Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla) are even built there.

But Canada now finds itself in a paradox; the country relies on exports, yet has a very strong currency. Once upon a time, Canada’s dollar was worth around 62 cents, which made it a much more attractive place to build cars. The loonie’s recent rise to parity has made it significantly more expensive to build cars in Canada, and it’s not just the auto makers who are recognizing this.

An Automotive News article quotes one Canadian Auto Workers union official who seems resigned to the fact that increasing costs mean dwindling prospects for Canada’s auto manufacturing industry.

“As those costs increase — 40, 60 percent — we simply can’t compete anymore,” said Ron Svajlenko, the president of Canadian Auto Workers Local 222, the union whose membership has dwindled to 3,500 from 12,000 in 2002. “When it comes to a decision about where you’re going to do things, you go to where the costs are low.”

The CAW was a very tough negotiating partner for the Big Three in the last round of contracts, managing to stave of a full implementation of a UAW-style two-tier wage system for new hires. But the CAW didn’t get all of the investment it was looking for either. While Ford got a commitment to upgrading the Oakville plant, upgrades for Chrysler’s Brampton plant (which builds the LX cars) never materialized and GM even shifted product out of Canadian factories, leaving the future of its Oshawa Assembly plant in doubt. Canada, and the province of Ontario still maintain some advantages; a publicly funded healthcare system and a generous regime of tax credits and low rates for corporate income tax can be compelling reasons for auto makers to continue to build cars in Canada.

But the currency issue will remain a thorn in the side of Canada and Australia, albeit for different reasons. Canada’s strong dollar makes it not only unprofitable to build cars there, but also gives the OEMs a good reason to pack up for low-cost Mexico or, even better, “bring jobs home”, as in the case of GM moving production of the Impala (at least in part) back to Detroit.

We don’t get enough good questions from the readers, and it’s a damn shame. Reader Steve Hofer sent us a great one via email; what if Elon Musk was running General Motors?

I was thinking about how Steve Jobs came from what was essentially a failed company with NeXT, to raise Apple from the dead. I imagined the possibility that GM would take over Tesla. Thinking of the Apple precedent, I imagined what if Elon Musk pulled a Steve Jobs and leveraged a board seat into effective control of the company. Assuming Elon became GM’s CEO, does he have what it takes to do a good job? Perhaps he does. I have some reasons.

(1) Elon is smarter than anyone at GM.

(2) He understands how to put together a critical path to implement very complex tasks, whether building an electric car or a private space program.

(3) He is not risk adverse.

(4) He is not tied to 19th or 20th century ideas.

(5) More traditional choices failed and will likely fail again.

Personally, I am not willing to take the Thomas Friedman-esque leap of logic that posits that a successful tech entrpeneur should be put in charge of America’s auto industry. Tesla and GM are as different as two car companies could possibly be, and who is to say that there isn’t somebody at GM that has an equally formidable intellect as Musk does. We don’t know for sure one way or another. In any case, there are plenty of commenters who have actually spent time working with (or for) GM who have a much better insight than I do. Have at it.

Reader Summicron manages to both praise Jack’s review of the Dodge Avenger while also bringing up a very interesting point. Summicron writes

Baruth does the best job I’ve ever seen of answering the question:

“What does this hardware actually do?”
versus:
“What will snobs think of me if I buy it?”

This immediately made me wonder what vehicle is most unfairly maligned by the auto press and popular opinion?

The Chrysler 200 and Dodge Avenger are most frequently singled out by the automotive media and armchair auto execs as some of the biggest stinkers for sale right now, but as Jack’s review shows, they really don’t deserve the bum rap they get.

My own nomination is “any crossover”. The amount of hate that this segment gets is, in my opinion, totally unjustified. I was at a launch event not too long ago where I overheard a fairly prominent journalist (in terms of access and audience, not necessarily talent) bragging that they “did not review crossovers, because who gives a fuck”. When I published a fairly positive review of the Infiniti JX35, which is guilty of being a CUV with a CVT, there were legions of negative comments decrying my fairly positive assessment. Such a vehicle was evidently a capital crime against all that car guys stand for. Meanwhile, the notion that some people want a CUV for any sort of rational reason seems to dumbfound a very vocal minority. Clearly, millions of consumers each year continue to make the wrong choice and must be re-educated. I still think the CR-V is brilliant (but boring to drive, yes).

But my real nomination will come as a shocker to many of you who insist that TTAC is nothing more than a propaganda arm for a nefarious anti-GM conspiracy. Are you ready for it? It’s the Chevrolet Malibu. I had the chance to drive the 2LTZ with the 2.0T engine and, well, it wasn’t bad. I wouldn’t say it’s top of the class, but there’s no way that it deserves the absolute dog-piling that the critics gleefully participated in. The 2.0T powertrain was quite powerful and dare I say smoother than in the Cadillac ATS, MyLink was simple to operate and it made a comfortable cruiser along I-95. The back seat was a bit small, but not enough to upset my brother, who is 6 feet tall and wears a size 48 suit jacket. And the trunk was certainly generous. I generally concurred with Michael Karesh in thinking that it was a pretty good car. It seems like the Malibu just became the unfortunate whipping boy for a journalistic corps that couldn’t tell human excrement from Swiss chocolate. The again, I haven’t driven the other versions, and Karesh was none too impressed with the eAssist. But who cares what I think? Let me know in the comments.

A Reuters article on Hyundai’s recent quality problems raises an interesting question. Has the company grown too fast following an unprecedented image makeover?

Reuters quotes a Korean professor of automotive engineering discussing Hyundai’s recent quality issues

“Hyundai has built factories very fast around the globe until recent years, but its quality improvement has failed to keep up with its rapid volume growth,” said Kim Phill-soo, a professor at Department of Automotive Engineering at Daelim University College in Seoul. “The latest recall highlighted loopholes in Hyundai’s quality system.”

The most recent recall, which involves a brake lamp switch, affects 1.9 million vehicles in the United States alone, according to Reuters. There have been other recalls as well, including rusty subframes and self-deploying airbags. Despite these problems, Hyundai has managed to ride a wave of goodwill on the strength of their products and their image turnaround. Hyundai has become an underdog company that people are willing to root for, and the recent fuel economy snafu, that ended up becoming a non-event for many people, is strong evidence of how effective they are at managing their PR affairs.

On the one hand, I have to wonder if the latest recall is a result of the increasing standardization of auto parts. The nature of this phenomenon suggests that when parts fail, the failure can cascade across mass quantities of vehicles, resulting in the mega recalls we’ve seen over the past few years. With the implementation of modular architectures and further standardization, the potential for these mega recalls only increases. Just wait till Volkswagen’s MQB cars suffer their first recall for a look at the “new normal” of recalls will be.

But that shouldn’t discourage us from asking if there may be underlying quality issues at Hyundai. Jack Baruth noted that the Elantra he rented last year looked a little worse for wear compared to other cars of a similar vintage – though notably, the car’s fuel economy did meet his expectations.

Lacking the requisite manufacturing and engineering knowledge, I’ll put this one to the B&B, rather than submitting my theory as a definitive answer. Have at it.

The multi-billion dollar endeavor of developing a new car has effectively ended the one-off specialty car that many enthusiasts still clamor for and wronglyassert is feasible in this era. Supermodel-thin margins, a saturation of brands and vehicles and an ultra-competitive global marketplace have killed the previous formula for developing a production car, which was mostly a one-off solution to local road conditions and buyer tastes

The necessity of scale is a double-edged sword; if the bean counters deem a product too costly and it may proceed as a watered down version of the original concept. If a new architecture or platform is approved, then we are practically assured multiple variants spun off that platform.

As it turns out, GM nearly took the cheapskate approach to developing the Cadillac ATS. But at the 11th hour, the General decided to change course, and enthusiasts will be all the better for it.

Automotive News outlines how Cadillac’s 3-Series fighter very nearly became Cimarron 2.0, with plans underway to build it on the front-drive Delta platform.

“We were going to do a front-wheel-drive Cadillac compact off of Delta because it was going to be less expensive,” Doug Parks, GM’s vice president of global product programs, told me at the Detroit auto show in January. “There were people in the organization saying, ‘It’ll be OK. We can dial it in.’” So serious were the plans that Parks, who was based in Europe at the time, found himself driving 150 mph on a test track in Spain in a 2.0-liter turbo test mule built on the Delta platform.

“We actually made it pretty darn good,” Parks said. “But in reality, you can’t go beat BMW or Mercedes when you don’t have the right weight balance and everything else.”

GM’s decision to develop Alpha ensured that its performance vehicles have a new lease on life. The ATS will be the start of a range of cars, with the next-generation Camaro to follow. Two vehicles off of Alpha won’t be enough either, but what will follow the Camaro is anyone’s guess.

Passover is upon us, and starting tonight, the Zionist Occupation forces of TTAC’s editorial roster (as well as our 44th President, and Road Tester Emeritus Michael Karesh) will refrain from eating bread as we recall the Exodus from Egypt, and the last time The Tribe ever did any manual labor.

In honor of this momentous blockbuster occassion, which spawned the blockbuster film starring Charlton Heston, I’d like to discuss the 10 Plagues that currently afflict us car fans. Brett Berk did one a couple years back, but it’s time to update it. My own list, which I will spill 10 drops of wine for both tonight and tomorrow

1. Homogenous vehicle offerings
2. Overly complex touch screens
3. Nonsensical CAFE regulations
4. Pedestrian safety dictating automotive design
5. The Chevrolet Camaro
6. Inflated used car prices
7. Road salt
8. Non-trade barriers like FMVSS and the Chicken Tax
9. Autoplay Youtube videos on automotive sites
10. Jeremy Clarkson’s writing being taken as gospel

Feel free to share yours.

Miata. E30. Panther. Is it time to add another nameplate to the Used Car Hall of Fame? Because the 2012+ Chevrolet Impala looks like a sure-fire winner to me.

TTAC reader (and sometime contributor) Andrew Bell has been a tireless advocate of the W-Body Impala, to the point where even our own Zackman looks like a halfway-committed dilettante. While discussing the latest Kelly Blue Book Total Cost of Ownership study, Andrew laid out the case for a one-year old Impala as the used car buy.

Not much to break on it really. The design is ancient. The new one with the 3.6 is one of the greatest deals on the market. 300+hp, Bluetooth, decent stereo, 4 wheel discs, <3700lbs, 6spd auto, power everything (windows, locks, auto-start, remote trunk, seats), <$15000 (2012 LT with about 30000km). <9L/100km with 87 octane, unstoppable in the winter, and cheap to insure.

Pricing for one of these cars runs from $13,445 for a base model LS ex-rental with about 34,000 miles, to $24,995 for a loaded LTZ with half the mileage. Since these are Canadian prices, they will undoubtedly vary compared to the United States. As Jack noted earlier this summer, The Impala may not be the most sophisticated or engaging car to drive, but for the price of a stripped out subcompact, you can have a nearly new full-size sedan with plenty of standard equipment, a legitimately well-engineered powertrain and halfway decent fuel economy (18/30/22 city/highway/combined mpg).

The Impala may not satisfy our collective desires when it comes to personal transportation, but as a mode of transportation for a college-bound younger sibling, a grandparent on a fixed income or someone like Andrew, who needs to churn out hundreds of highway miles each week visiting rural job sites, it’s hard to think of a better fit than the ol’ W-Body. According to Andrew, the Panther was a close second, but in the end, the front-drive layout and superior fuel economy were better suited to rural Ontario’s climate exorbitant gas prices.

As I gear up for NAIAS (read: do laundry, look for my passport), I am scanning the schedule for what press conferences are worth going to and what’s worth skipping? If you have any special requests, speak now in the comments or forever hold you peace. Personally, I’m most looking forward to seeing the new GM full-size trucks. I liked the old GMT900 pickups, but the bar has been moved forward consecutively by both Ford and Ram. The old formula of a simple, honest no-frills truck may not be enough – and that could be a disastrous miscalculation by GM, leading to a Civic/Malibu-esque need for a mid-cycle refresh.

Domestic cars don’t get enough attention on TTAC, but we can also be prone to heaping too much praise on particular examples; I may be the lone dissenting voice on the roster that does not swear a blood oath to the Panther. The W-Body Impala, which is set to go into Panther-like fleet-only production until mid-2014, is similarly polarizing. Some adore it, some despise it while others reflexively disdain it due to the effusive praise heaped upon it.

Personally, I think the later 3.6L cars are fantastic bargains, and even better sleepers. The “High Feature V6″ is a gem, even when hooked up to GM’s pokey 6-speed automatic. The interior and trunk are both cavernous and the massive depreciation occuring within 12 months of their purchase date makes them a compelling used car choice.

From the Blue Oval, my pick would be the Flex Ecoboost. The boosted box-on-wheels is hardly the value proposition that the Impala represents, but it’s pretty hard to argue with a family wagon capable of running high-13s in the quarter mile. The relative rarity of the Flex makes it even sweeter.

Lastly, the Pentastar brand has a wealth of options. Any of the Pentastar cars could be viable candidates. How about a Pentastar powered Dodge Avenger or Chrysler 200? The 6.4 second 0-60 sprint is more than class competitive. Those who want a bit more flash could opt for the V8 powered Chrysler 300C (not the 300S or Varvatos Edition), but my own pick would be the redneck-special Ram Express, driven over some jagged rocks to ensure maximum damage to the mufflers.

Feel free to nominate your favorite domestic sleepers from the past or present. Having been before slightly before the Internet, I delight in hearing my Dad and Uncles tell stories about their old Satellites that they’d race up and down the winding streets of Montreal, or the 440-powered New Yorker that left frequent rubber deposits at every intersection. First person to say “LT1 Roadmaster” loses the game.

As the year comes to a close and we choose our most reviled cars of the year, it’s also worth reflecting on the most compelling narratives of the year.

At TTAC, we pride ourselves on covering stories that other outlets overlook. Whether it’s territorial disputes in China, overcapacity in Europe, a manufacturing boom in Africa or implosion in Australia, we do our best to deliver compelling content to you, the readers, and we’re always amused and intrigued by your comments. But our news judgement and yours don’t always align.

The floor is open to what mattered most to you. We’re cognizant of the fact that not everyone likes low-cost cars or Chinese sub-brands, so let us know what kept you reading this year.

Personally, low-cost cars and the proliferation of modular platform kits are most interesting to me right now.

Bring A Trailer rarely disappoints, but today is an exceptionally fruitful day. Not one, but three delightfully kitschy relics of the Reagan era are on sale, offering something for a broad spectrum of tastes, whether you like new wave, metal or the burgeoning urban genre known as “hip-hop”.

Option 1: The Callaway Corvette – This baby did not age well. The teal paint and “ribbed for her pleasure” body cladding evoke the worst possible Corvette stereotypes; impotence, pattern baldness, substance abuse. The 345 horsepower figure isn’t anything to write home about in an era where a Lincon MKWhatever Ecoboost would leave it for dead at a stop light. But like those impossibly high-cut bikinis, it’s still appealing in a strangely retro way.

Recommended soundtrack: The Scorpions – Rock You Like A Hurricane

Option 2: The AMGrey Market Mercedes – if you’ve ever fantasized about yourself and Lorenzo rollin in a Benzo, this one’s for you. The monochromatic red aesthetic looks Straight Outta Compton’ by way of Stuttgart, and there’s room for yourself plus some additional honeys. You can even have a couple sit on the rear deck as you slowly cruise down the main drag, puffing on a Philly Blunt. This 500SL makes today’s AMG cars seem like commoditized simulacra intended for the spouses of developing world plutocrats. Oh, wait a minute…

Recommended sountrack: Eric B & Rakim – Paid In Full

Option 3: The RUF 911 – this car kills novice drivers. ‘Nuff said. This is about as far removed from a Cayenne as one can get. I’ll take it.

Recommended soundtrack: The stereo was removed by RUF to shave 1.3 kilograms off the curb weight

The bidding kept going down and down at the inop auction. A sale where all cars are usually either dead or dying.

“$200! would-a-give-me $200! $100! $100! How about-a-hundred!”

Pretty soon the bidding went all the way down to $50. For a whole car! No takers. No sale. Until…

I was a member of the auction staff at this public sale. Unlike other junk public auctions which usually offer cleaned up basket cases from the impound lots, this one specifically sold dealer trade-in’s.

The vehicle in question was a 1993 Subaru Impreza.  Four speed automatic. 165k. Primer. The vehicle didn’t even have a lick of paint on the outside.

But it looked clean. Too clean to be used as crusher fodder at an auto recycler.

“Rick? Do you think the Chevy dealer would take $25 for that thing?”

It just so happened the owner of that dealership had a twin brother who also happened to hear me ask about the car.

“You want that junker Steve? It’s yours! Enjoy your new tinker toy!”

So for $25, plus a $50 fee, I had my own Subaru paperweight. That was until I replaced the battery and the shiftlock overdrive mechanism. It ran like a top. Two weeks later I bought a 1988 Toyota Mr2 at the same sale with about 110k for $225 that only needed a fuel pump.

Two cars for less than $500 altogether.

Eventually I sold both vehicles on Ebay for $1576 and $2712 respectively. A rally coordinator for Subaru flew in from California and kept the Impreza for another 50k miles before turning it into a race car. The MR2 went to a super nice guy in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where thin framed older cars have limited lives.

I’ve made more money with plenty of other cars over the years. But these two have always been close to my heart. What about you? What was your best deal? Feel free to throw in a parts story or two if you like.

Elon Musk is known as a bigtime Barack Obama donor, and he is hoping he will get his money’s worth. Musk thinks (hopes? knows?) that government largesse for electric cars will continue unabated during the second term.

“I think that we can expect at least that things will continue as they have,” Musk told Reuters. “I wouldn’t expect it to get any worse for electric vehicles, hopefully it will get a little better.”

Not surprisingly, Musk also is for raising the federal tax credit for electric cars to as much as $10,000. Tesla received a $465 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy in early 2010,

What do you think? Will there be more – the same – less government money for  EVs in the four more years?

Attention B&B; TTAC recieved an email from Ford, announcing a new “people mover”. Anyone care to venture a guess as to what it is?

The email states that

Ford will unveil a new vehicle with stand-out styling, flexibility, superior fuel efficiency and affordability… a people mover that stands apart from the crowd.

Consumers are facing tougher demands than ever to manage work-life balance and balance their checkbooks.  Cleverness and flexibility are mandatory to make the most of every moment and dollar.  It’s a new multi-purpose vehicle for people with multifaceted lives.

Based on previous reports, I’m going to say the B-Max.

The V6 Mustang reviewed yesterday wouldn’t be the car it was without the Track Package, which provides pretty substantial upgrades to the brakes and suspension.

As Sympatico’s Brian Makse points out, most performance packages are nothing more than new wheels and tires, but the Mustang really delves into the nitty-gritty. Items like the brake booster and control arms are borrowed from the track-ready Shelby GT500.

With plenty of you having track experience in one form or another, it’s worth asking, what makes a good track package, and who does it right. Conversely, who does it poorly? If I had to give my two cents, I’d say good brakes are worth more than anything when it comes to a factory track car. In our comparison test with the Scion FR-S, the Hyundai Genesis Coupe and the Mazda MX-5 the lower weight and tossable handling of the FR-S and overall fun factor of the MX-5 were both worth little when they had to be brought in after a few laps. The Genesis, with its superior Brembos, resisted a brake apocalypse far longer than the other two.

Click here to view the embedded video.

TTAC’s inbox was inundated this morning with reports of Hyundai’s revised mileage claims, which remove a number of its vehicles from the 40 MPG club.

According to Hyundai

Procedural errors at the automakers’ joint testing operations in Korea led to incorrect fuel economy ratings for select vehicle lines.

Maybe it’s time for a new way to measure fuel economy standards?

Over-inflated MPG numbers aren’t the exclusive domain of the United States either. Fuel economy numbers in Canada are widely inflated to the point where the advertised numbers bear zero relation to real world figures, thanks to a combination or arcane test methods and shady “imperial-to-metric conversion practices”.

The irony of the Hyundai case is that independent tests have corroborated the Elantra’s mileage claims. Popular Mechanics re-created the standard testing procedure, did their own version of the test and their Elantra (presumably a press car) delivered 34.1/47.6 MPG city/highway. Our own Jack Baruth rented an Elantra that had seen better days, and found the mileage consistent with expectations – even though it was slightly below the advertised 40 MPG rating.

There’s nothing scientific about the resulting 35.5-ish MPG rating, but based on the way I drove it, the mileage and abuse the poor little car has suffered, and the entirely adequate performance from the engine and transmission, I’m giving “Consumer Watchdog” a thumbs down. Had I purchased this Elantra, I wouldn’t feel cheated in any way. They promised 40MPG under ideal conditions, and I’m getting 35-36MPG in conditions which were far from the test lab.

The gripes surrounding fuel economy testing, whether it’s the test procedure, the self-reporting by the OEMs or their failure to match up to real world conditions, are enough to prompt calls for a change in the way things are done. Tell us how you’d change things below.

Pursuant to our continued discrediting of the “Jeeps built in China” lie, Donald Trump took to Twitter to further propagate that falsehood. And the Donald ended up getting a virtual earful from Ralph Gilles, head of Chrysler’s SRT Division.

The Trump tweet that launched a thousand shits reads as such

Obama is a terrible negotiator. He bails out Chrysler and now Chrysler wants to send all Jeep manufacturing to China–and will!

Gilles took a direct and concise course of action, one that may even qualify him for a Farley Award. Now, if I can find an auto exec willing to rebut a silly question from a journalist inquiring why their new product’s rear sway bar isn’t 2mm thicker, I will die a happy man.

“Take BMW. In the near term, they will have nine entries in the compact segment. This is basically our heartland,” he told me on the sidelines of the Paris auto show. “With the brand reputation they have, you start to have a massive problem.”

-Gunnar Herrmann, Ford of Europe’s Vice President of Quality

Roughly a decade ago, BMW Canada started advertising how their new 320i (Canada-only, not for the USA) was retailing for $34,000, about the same price as a generously-equipped Honda Accord. The implied question was, what would you rather have? A Honda Accord, or a Beemer.

The first shot in the paradox of aspirational marketing may have been the Mercedes-Benz A-Class, a Golf competitor from the brand that made the 600 Großer. Rumor has it that Ferdinand Peich was so incesnsed by this, it spurred him to create the Phaeton, a Volkswagen that could compete with the S-Class. We all know how that turned out.

As the Automotive News article notes, a base model turbocharged BMW 1-Series is only 500 euro more than a mid-range Ford Focus with a similar powertrain. The quality gaps between the two must be nil, otherwise Ford risks losing customers to BMW. But what happens when the brand equity of BMW is so devalued that it ceases to mean anything? Mercedes answer to this question was an enormous flop. But if this strategy continues to be pursued, then prole drift is inevitable, and the only way for the wealthy to distinguish themselves via consumption will be Bentley, Rolls-Royce, Aston Martin, Ferrari and the like. ‘

“When you do everything right but too late, you do it all wrong. Before reaching a dead end, PSA decided to forge a partnership with a manufacturer [General Motors] that I don’t consider to be among the industry’s leaders of the pack. Overall, I think there is a lack of ambition [when it comes to product] from the French manufacturers.”

-Thierry Morin, former CEO of Valeo

Given how much love there is in certain sections of TTAC for PSA products – the Citroen C6, for example – this quote seems like a dagger in the heart for some readers. I profess a profound affection for the C6, the DS range and even newer Peugeots like the 208 and 508. Renault’s lineup, particularly the Renaultsport cars, are undeniably enticing and I one day hope to be the world’s preeminent scholar of Dacia’s impact on the auto industry.

Viewed through a North American lens (i.e. the grass is greener on the Continent), I can’t say I find French cars to lack ambition. On the contrary, I find their styling and packing quite bold and innovative. I dare anyone not to look at the C6 above and be dumbstruck by its elegance. But there’s the undeniable fact that French cars are non-entities in virtually every market save for France and Iran (where Peugeot is a big player).

Morin cites the lack of powerful engines as a reason for the decline of French cars and their inability to maintain a premium position, but French cars have never been about big power. The Renaultsport lineup is consistently praised by the enthusiast press, and is popular enough that when Renault’s lineup was all but eliminated in the UK to make way for Dacia, the Renaultsport cars were spared the executioner’s axe due to their strong sales.

And then, Morin hits on what may be the ultimate reason behind the decline of French cars relative to the competition

Year after year, the gap widens between German and French car manufacturers. Germans, just like the Japanese, always deliver better cars to market. They are really passionate about cars and they are focused on improving everything about their cars from one generation to the next. When you get in an Audi A1, it is exceptionally refined for such a small car and it echoes the premium-ness of the bigger A6 or A8. While German CEOs are real ‘car guys,’ in France, many people thought that being a wise and talented executive was enough to be successful in the automotive business. It proved wrong sometimes. This lack of obsession is the main difference between France and Germany. I think that being too disconnected from the product is a problem.

Stop me if you’ve heard that before.

“When you are a young designer of course, you think everything is wrong and should be different… You want to conquer the world and with great ideas. But over the time you have to really understand what Golf is, what VW is, And to mature to a certain degree, I needed that time. It took 15 years before I really knew what I was talking about.”

The quote above comes from an interview with Klaus Bischoff, Executive Director of Volkswagen Design, regarding the seventh-generation Golf. I found it hit home – when I arrived at TTAC, I thought that I was all-knowledgable, that verbosity, snark and humor thrown into a blender was the recipe for a world-class car review, that brown wagons were the solution to all the problems of the auto industry. What I didn’t know could fill volumes.

My birthday is tomorrow, and in the eyes of most of you, I will still be a mere neophyte. My one year anniversary at TTAC is closing in quicker and quicker, and it seems like forever ago that I wrote the now-infamous “game changer” post about the new Ford Fusion. I still think I’ll be vindicated.

I’ve been humbled by Bertel’s patient mentorship, Jack’s command of the English language, the real-world experience of Sajeev and Steve, Murilee’s ability to take his encyclopedic knowledge of the automobile and put out an article about it every single day, Alex and Michael’s painstakingly prepared reviews and Ronnie’s ability to pull diamonds from the rough on a weekly basis. And to you the readers, for catching mistakes, adding information and insights to my articles and making the site what it is. Without you all, I wouldn’t have any command of topics like manufacturing, finance, the economics of vehicle development, CAFE, marketing or sales analysis. That’s not to say I am all the way there yet, but your help has cut the time down from 15 years to significantly shorter.

The Opel/Vauxhall Cascada got a surprisingly warm reception on TTAC, considering that it’s a ragtop with humble origins based on the Delta II platform (thank you, readers, for correcting my mistake).

The internet seems to think that its importation as a Buick is pretty much a done deal, but we can have a thought exercise where you get to dictate the terms of its introduction.

I’d like to sell this car as a Riviera, since it has a nicer ring to it than “Regal Convertible”, and it’s not really a Regal either (Delta vs. Epsilon platform). Even though it shares its underpinnings with the Verano, a separate nameplate might even be a bit of a halo car for Buick. Not everyone wants a Camaro when choosing a ragtop. This is a great alternative.

Put the Verano Turbo’s 250 horsepower Ecotec in there and you’ve got a pretty credible number to throw out in advertisements  and enough “pep” to impress customers on test drives. The exterior styling and interior materials, at least from the initial press shots, look like they were done right from the start.

Apparently, a couple version was also planned, but budget constraints have put it on ice. Too bad. That would have made a great Cruze Coupe. What would you do? Different name? Different powertrain? Different brand?

Every day seems to bring new tales of doom and gloom for Europe. Is it time for a Continental Deathwatch?

Europe alone is host to a number of problems;

• An ongoing capacity crisis with plants outputting far less than necessary to stay profitable
• Opel facing a meltdown and a possible merger with PSA
• PSA being eaten alive by rival Renault’s low-cost cars
• Fiat fretting about…well, nearly everything from capacity to EU assistance to labor
• Ford sales taking a swan dive
• An overall bleak picture for auto sales, at their lowest in over a decade.

The time may be right for a Europe Deathwatch. Maybe not in the same vein as the GM Deathwatch, but there is no doubt that there will be major changes to the continent’s auto industry. The PSA-Opel merger, if it goes through, could be the start of massive consolidation in an overly bloated industry, and no amount of editorials lamenting the marque that brought us the 505 STX and the 205 GTI can change the facts on the ground.

In the mean time, have your say.

This essay, which likens supporting a sports team supporting a sports team to being in an abusive relationship, struck a chord with me even though I care little about pro sports. But what about you?

Imagine a girl. Very pretty, a joy to be around, and a nice person that is kind to animals and people alike. She’s a good person, and deserves a good boyfriend, someone who is nice and kind to her.

She has a boyfriend. But he sucks. He makes her pay for everything. When they do something, he tells her what they’re going to do, never asks what she want to do, and never makes any accommodations to her wishes. He only pays attention to her when he wants something out of her, but when she needs something, he is totally unresponsive. He relentlessly lies to her, and is transparently dismissive of their relationship and her as a person. He makes important decisions that impact her without asking her, or consulting her or even considering what she wants. He takes her completely for granted, and almost seems like he holds her in contempt. In essence, he treats her like garbage. Yet, she worships him and supports him no matter what.

What would you tell her? You’d say what any reasonable person would say: What the hell is wrong with you? Why are accepting this? You can do better. He’s not worth it, there are so many other great guys out there who won’t treat you so badly, stop putting up with this.

Now, think about this: If you are a devoted fan of a pro sports team, you have the exact same relationship…with that team.

You are the girlfriend, the team is the boyfriend, and they don’t give a shit about you, and you love them anyway.

TTAC writers and readers are accused of bias at every turn. Sometimes, they are flagrant trolls looking to incite discord, but other times the accussations are made in earnest by people who do contribute valuable insights to Planet TTAC.

As far as favoring one car company over another, I feel exactly the same way the author does with sports teams; no matter how much companies try to “engage” their clients, whether they are paying customers or automotive journalists, they are ultimately after your money, and everything else is secondary.

Sure, there are individual models I prefer in any given segment, and there are legions of dedicated, hard-working people working to make the best cars possible, but that does not detract from the end goal; make money by selling more cars than the other guys.

As the author eloquently puts it

“Stop and really look at it, especially if you are really intense about your team. Why do you buy their gear? Or emotionally invest in their results? Why do you put so much effort into them? Why do you identify with them…when they don’t give a fuck about you? In what other arena of your life would you accept such incredibly awful abuse and one-sided loyalty?”

In light of this view, it strikes me as absurd when TTAC is accused of any sort of bias. Personally, I have other things to invest my emotions in, like human relationships for one. And I’ve always felt that the attachment of one’s identity to any sort of tangible manufacturer element, like a genre of music, a style of dress or worst of all an automotive brand, is modern day tribalism at best, a pathetic desire to belong to a group at worst.

Ask someone why they love one car company unconditionally, spending hours arguing on the internet about its supremacy or defending it from critics when discussing cars with their social circle and their reasons are often flimsy. “My Dad had one” or “We’re a [insert brand here] family” are among the more concrete ones. It’s not for nothing that “fanboys” are the butt of online jokes for some car guys. Most of these people just want confirmation that what they bought was the right choice. Others exhibit Salafist-like fanatical affiliation to a faceless entity that doesn’t care a lick about them beyond their pocketbook.

But then, maybe you’re someone like Mikey, who has worked at a plant for 30 years and feels immense loyalty to an auto maker. Or you might just love to accuse us of hating General Motors and watching our reaction.

I don’t have any particular bias against American cars, but it’s fair to say that I’ve always preferred imports over American muscle, save for one major exception; the GMC Typhoon.

The first model car kit I ever built with my Dad was a GMC Syclone, and as I learned about the cars over the years, my interest has only deepened. Here is a relatively crude package, based on a BOF truck platform, that was one of the fastest accelerating cars at the time, and can still keep pace with a lot of today’s performance cars.

Every so often, I check the internet for Typhoons, then talk myself out of it. I would need to store it in winter, be extra careful not to damage the now-irreplaceable factory cladding and be extra careful with using the twin-turbo AWD drivetrain at every single stoplight.

My most recent Ebay foray led me to the Typhoon you see above. Priced rather optimistically at $99,999 OBO, it has just 9.6 miles on it, making it essentially brand new. I wouldn’t even want it. Every time you drive it, it depreciates incrementally and loses that “preserved in frozen carbonite” mystique that made it so special. Give me a nicely broken-in example, even with 6 figures on the odometer. If it cleans up nicely and everything’s in good working order, that’s fine by me. I know there are others out there who need to have that all-original, delivery miles-and-window-sticker garage queen. But I’m not one of them. Are you?