akirby

There was a lot of confusion on these with the 2012 Focus. It was never clear which models had them or didn't have them.

Did he also offer to change the blinker fluid? Don't ever fall for that trick. You can change it yourself.

The point was Porsche didn't become iconic overnight - it took decades. Same for BMW. We're sorry if that doesn't fit into your timeframe. As for the MKS and MKT - those were refreshes on old platforms. Why would lincoln spend any money doing a significant redesign on a lame duck platform? That would be stupid at this point, especially since the end result would be compromised by the current design and platform. Better to spend the money on the new stuff and make it spectacular.

Yes - and they got caught. The penalties - both financial and from a pr standpoint - are too significant for mainstream manufacturers to risk it. We've also heard from employees how serious Ford takes this internally. And they don't just trust the mfrs - they actually audit a sample of vehicles every year and they audit the mfrs testing procedure. It's not easy to cheat and not get caught. There is no way Ford would do this intentionally and virtually no chance of a mistake. Ford understands the EPA tests better than the EPA.

Ford has never charged a premium for paint colors other than tri-colors or other paints that require extra steps or where the paint itself is super expensive. Paintscratch.com shows Ruby Red as a tri-coat paint.

Lincoln is choosing to build the brand slowly, starting with the foundation (Dealer experience, dedicated design team) rather than throwing billions at a couple of flagship vehicles. Lincoln could improve sales a lot by throwing more cash on the hoods but they don't need to do that right now and if they did it would cheapen the brand even more and make it harder when the new vehicles get here. Even the MKZ is a stop gap, albeit a good one. I know you can't understand anything other than sales volume but at this point it's simply not relevant.

Totally not necessary. Just say no.

Looks like a Titanium hybrid labeled as a SE. And yes - it was a pre-production model for the auto show.

My wife went from 2 explorers, an aviator and an expedition with the separate window to an Edge with the power liftgate. Don't miss the window at all. Just hit the button and open the hatch.

It's not obvious to the average consumer. They think the Volt's drivetrain is something out of the next century that's never been seen before. They also think that there are no emissions whatsoever for an electric car.

I would keep the Buick cars and ditch the Malibu and Impala. I thought Oldsmobile had the best GM sedans right before they killed it too.

I didn't mean literally but they share the same platform and I assume are close to the same size and both are hatchbacks. C-max is just taller while Focus is better looking. It wouldn't make much sense to invest in a Focus hybrid when they already have the C-Max right now.

Then it's not a problem, is it?

And just as accurate.

So don't buy it then. Nobody's holding a gun to your head.

Good point. I guess I have a hard time when people know there is a hurricane coming and they refuse to get out of harm's way forcing other people to risk their lives to come to their rescue. Hurricanes are not tornados or earthquakes. You have days if not weeks advance notice. Just get the hell out until it passes.

So it was ok to do it to Bush including blaming him for Katrina but it's not ok when it's Obama? Mmm-kay.

The Chevy dealers around here are not advertising any Volt leases and neither is the Chevy website. Gee - I wonder why? I know the $199 dealers aren't available but Chevy is still subsidizing the leases. I'll ask my neighbor next time I see him.

They said it was due to the coastdown procedure.

I had one of those riding mowers for about 12 years. Left it outside during out basement remodel for about 6 months and it wasn't the same. Transmission finally went out so I junked it and bought a new John Deere.

Not buying it. There have been problems with individual vehicles but never anything this widespread. And I doubt any other mfrs had trouble interpreting the coastdown rules. This smells like plausible deniability to me. Let's fudge on the coastdown and if we get caught we'll just say it's too complicated and we made a mistake. Nope - not buying it. I'm expecting to see internal emails and memos start to surface over the next month or so that indicates as much. If I'm wrong I'll apologize.

Overreact much? It's only been 2 years and for the hundredth time there was no lack of testing or debugging - there was only lack of time and expertise to fix the bugs they knew about. The majority of buyers are not having serious issues and they're recommending MFT to others. It's not fantastic that some are still having problems but it's certainly not the end of the world and it certainly seems to be helping rather than hurting sales.

Yes, but we also said that it would be very difficult for them to do this without getting caught. Well, I guess we were right on both counts.

But if you were the insurance company that has to pay for all that damage, would you ascribe any liability to the owners for not doing that?

They have an actual key in the ignition that you must leave in the On position which unlocks the steering wheel. Hopefully they have a controller that turns the ignition off and on based on the push button otherwise you'd still have to turn the key back and forth every time.