jcartwright99

Having gone to almost every NAIAS since 90, I decided to take in the view on Saturday. I knew it would be the last winter one so I couldn't miss it. It was the saddest show I can remember. So much empty floor space. So many uninspiring displays. Bias aside, I really think Ford had the best setup this year. Trucks, SUV/CUV's and the Mustang. I really liked the Ranger setup with a lot of cool accessories. Lifted tent was a winner in my book. I got to actually sit in the Ranger. Impressed for the most part. Although, supercab is way to small for normal adults. Really liked seeing the Edge ST and Explorer ST in person. Cobra looked awesome, as expected. They even had a small course to drive the Explorer on. It by far had the most people packed in. Lincoln had a nice display. The Navigator color combo was beautiful (blue/white). Aviator looked fantastic, and I predict will sell very well. Wish they had production versions to sit in. Surprisingly, Toyota had a giant swath of the show floor and had a pretty good setup. I actually like the Supra much more in person. A little too many fake vents but design was solid. A few of the 4runner's they had were pretty nicely done. GM I thought totally mailed it, in every brand. Kia had a decent setup too. Really pushing their new SUV. It by far was the quickest I went through. Got there at 12:30 and was out by 2:30. That was fine with me as we went to Green Dot for beer and sliders. We'll see how next years goes, as these next couple of years will really determine the future of NAIAS.

It will most likely happen. I also think it will keep a V8 but it will eventually lose the 5.0 and get smaller.

I have a $100 bet with a Tesla fan coworker of mine. I made this bet with him 2 years ago. I actually think I will lose because I said by 2020 they will either be bankrupt or be bought. I am starting to think it will happen IN 2020. The fact is with the tax credit expiring and more competitors, 2020 seems to be the year they will lose their MOJO sales wise. I think Tesla is a great electric vehicle, but the company is run by a bunch of morons that have no business mass producing a car. Musk even admitted that they were really close to bankruptcy this past summer. I just don't see how it gets better for them.

Hey man, that old codger can stay as long as he wants. Growing up, I watched MW on Saturday mornings. Goss's Garage taught me a lot of useful things. Some of it seemed a little advertisey but most was solid advice. It's amazing that for Pat and John are still doing the show after 30 plus years. As far as their reviews go, I always thought they tried to put a positive spin on them. They did highlight the bad but none were over the top negative such as what you would find in the magazines.

I didn't realize it was still going on. Hilarious (or sad) that this been on going on for 20 years. One would think they could of come up with solution by now if they wanted to. Yet, this thing still sells more than any other pickup in this segment regardless.

Yeah the frame recall was almost 20 MY ago. It's been at least 10 years since the leaf spring recall. I think they have learned their lesson with oxidation over the past 10 years. Doesn't make my statement any less true though.

It is what it is. A little harsh being that it performs better in almost every metric compared to it's competitors. It's not ground breaking in the segment though. The segment leader Tacoma has succeeded based solely on it's bullet proof reliability. The whole segment has not been innovative compared to full size pick ups. Virtually all of them are old dressed up dinosaurs. I don't put this in the Ridgeline category, no matter how Honda markets it.

Except when they have outages. Then you are in a really bad spot. Microsoft really wants to push everyone there though. I like AWS but security issues happen all the time and there really is no recourse (speaking from experience). Asia regions are the worst. In my industry, the race for internal private cloud is on. Another problem with my industry, cloud services don't support multicast networks.

Put them in a RAID array if your board supports it.

It seems like they carefully crafted their surveys to include/exclude certain things about reliability to skew the results in their favor. GM gets called on their BS. I wonder how many millions they dumped into that one for about 2 weeks worth of play?

I would expect that to be on the horizon eventually.

I was just thinking that a fully electric F100 would make the most sense. Especially for commercial fleets. I would expect the performance/payload probably being better than the V6 anyway.

You mean the 3 sedans that they are most likely turning into 1 after investing a few billion in them?

I was more referring to the idea that it won't beat a ZL1 1LE around the track or beat a Demon (mixed it up with the Redeye) at the strip. I am not saying I agree with any of it but the internet trolling would make you think it's DOA. In all seriousness, any one have any estimates on what it weighs? Again, hearing rumors that it weighs more than 4200lbs but I don't buy it.

It's a double edge sword. I don't care how many 'itanium/Vignale badges they put on it, Ford isn't a Luxury car. Unless they are fine just being as nice as Buick and that's it. Ford Trucks can get away with over the top packages/prices and do well. I don't think that will translate the same with SUV/CUV's. There are too many true luxury brands that are close in that price range. I honestly think Ford has the right formula for Lincoln now (2-3 years) but leaving them without a BEV is a sure death sentence.

I mean let's be real here. Unless they want to kill Lincoln or watch it die, they at least need to have a full cutting edge electric in the next few years. PHEV is great for the next 5 years (maybe longer) but the writing the writing is on the wall for ICE engines.

Wait...I get what you are inferring but is there evidence of this? A simple yes or no will do.

The biggest gripe is what it always is with any Ford performance related product. They are painfully slowly releasing the specs, which creates a lot of guessing and speculation. That generally turns negative pretty fast as rumors spread that may or may not be true. Add to it, it should have been released in 2018 which infuriated people even more. Then add internet trolls (think GM and Chrysler) fanning the flames and this is what you get, a lot of pissing and moaning. Now the GT500 has become a year or so late with only 700hp, dct (no manual), weighs 4500lbs, cost close to 100k plus ADM, cant match the ZL1 around track, can’t beat Redeye at strip and will surely have engine and build quality problems. Did I miss anything? LOL I don’t believe that but Ford certainly has a bad habit of doing this. It’s possible that it could be a stinker but doubt it.

Yes, hell has frozen over. Actually, most on here have been calling this for some time now. It’s seems the automotive media are late to the party. The cars were great performers. However, interiors were pretty bland. The only luxury cars that sell are the Germans, because of the badge. Nobody is going to pay that for Cadillac no matter how it performs. Lincoln still has a ways to go and have had their missteps (MKT) but they have been on the right path for a few years now. Cadillac is just grasping at straws. It reminds me of the tortoise and hare. Slow and steady.

I’m glad it got the DCT. There were some rumblings that the A10 was going to be used due to cost. Numbers be reported are 755/700.

It's Trucks! The Amarok is a tough truck. Not sure what this all means but I can wait till Tuesday.

How many billions can GM just waste on Cadillac? It's infuriating that over the last decade and a half they have spent billions trying to chase the Germans (erasing a lot of debt in their bankruptcy). They are finally wising up, realizing that it doesn't matter how good your sedan is, it may even perform better than a BMW or Merc, but nobody is going to buy it because it's missing that badge. Plus the people who would buy a Cadillac, would rather have have an CUV, which until recently had few options. The SRX/XT5/XT4 are all really just OK. It looks like their next CUV, which debuts next week, is expected to be very meh as well. So now this is what they throw at the wall. SMH! If they would have just not made the Bolt look like a 90's hatchback and actually styled it better, maybe there would be more buzz. However, this seems more like a cry for help for Cadillac, than any indicator of how good/bad the Bolt is doing.

That's not that much if that saves them time and gives them data the data that helps with the business. Knowledge acquisition.

I just checked it out the site and I just laughed my ass off. If you go to Explore you heritage and look at all the old Explorer pictures, What tires are on them? You would at least think they would have photoshopped the Firestone’s off first.

Don’t make that assumption. I would at least check if you’re up to date. Like all software, there will be bugs. You may solve your problem with the update.