Summer Cruiser

It is supposed to be a pretty neat system. Everyone can use a little better fuel economy! Especially when government is making requirements quite a bit tougher in the next few years.

The Cruze is doing the same thing Jeep did with the diesel Grand Cherokee a few years ago when it too was relatively testing the market - it has pegged it as a very premium option, with many other miscellaneous options to go with it. A base Cruze is $17,000, it's not the diesel engine alone that makes that version nearly $10,000 more. You get some in the hands of consumers and try and set it up for the future as a desireable premium option. Why bag on Cadillac, it could transform like Audi did, but it takes time. Audi did not have to go through bankrupcy as a stumbling block. I don't necessarily agree with the extent of Euro lust of its cars tuning, but opinions differ. Make Cadillac just be great and people will come. If it's performance, make it great, if its a smooth ride, make it great but don't dilute one to try and get the "best of both worlds". Just make a stand and stick with it.

If the public does not seem to mind CVTs on the new Accords and in the Toyotas in the next 2-3 years, I would not be suprised to see Ford take a good look at them again. If you look at Nissan you cannot get an automatic Altima without a CVT. The latest iteration of it has done quite well here in the US.

Cheers to that! :beerchug:

For size it does, but if they are two completely different cars, unlike the Avenger/200C, it does not. Chrysler did not do too bad on exteriors, but interiors... Maybe they go a different route too, like a C-Seg hatchback.

I think the move makes fine sense, you will not have all of that product overlap that they had a few years back when the lineups (Plymouth, Dodge and Chrysler) all had a minivan, midsize, and fullsize and you could buy a Neon as both Plymouth and Dodge which did not even sugar coat the likeness. I think they are headed in the right direction. Especially if they have a plan to bring in a similar size Fiat or Alfa one day.

I went last fall. Highpoints for my kids were dinner with Cinderella at the Grand Floridian and Breakfast with Mickey at the Contemporary as far as meals went. Epcot was cool for Mom and Dad - we also went in October and they had a "taste of the world" event going on where there were booths with snack-size foods from the different countries that were not the normal restaurant fare there. Magic Kingdom was a 2-day event for us. Also try and see one of the parades at night there. I would second the going early to extra magic hours for the parks. The extra hour does not seem like much, but it is nice.

I'll have to look for that. I always did like the ominous looks of the GN's. BTW - nice Mustang!

I would be curious to see if that holds true. I imagine a lot of the VW diesel fans are that way because nobody else sells an affordable, non premium market diesel in the last 20 years (in high volume, a side note for all diesel Liberty/Grand Cherokee people out there)

I agree - it's real tight for a rear-facing seat. Popping the seat on the base isn't hard, it's getting the seat out when you're at the destination. I test drove one for a day and the passenger seat did need to be all the way forward (or 1 click back if the seat-back is bolt upright!). The solution for the whole getting the seat in/out - buy the convertible.

I was thinking that it was just some odd thing with my machine. Nice to know it's more of a widespread issue.

That was my thought too, the compacts that have been coming out lately are so good they probably did not want to include those older models. They also may not want to have been seen as Japanese car bashers.

This is cool. I can only imagine trying something like this someday.

I am looking forward to this response - I have an 08 and was wondering the same thing. I know the transmissions are the same. I believe the main differences may be the additional trans cooler, the 5-pin harness, not sure if different springs...

Some of it made sense and some of the criticizms that were struck were sheerly subjective. The profile of a loggerhead turtle I may not agree with. In general the styling is better than the Sebring IMHO. But I certainly do not thing these things should have been edited after the fact based on an advertiser's feedback. He has given many good reviews of other Chryslers, he just did not care for this particular model. Most people will read it and either agree or just say - awww...he's just an import lover or some such general argument. It is an interesting chain of events.

Each time I visit Canada I make sure I fuel up before crossing the boarder. It always struck me as odd that a country right next to the U.S. could have such higher fuel prices.

Forcasting gas prices has got to be one of the hardest things to predict (maybe outside of the weather). Any hiccup in any oil country seems to cause the price to go up astronomically.

Why wait - if Chrysler builds the 500 in Mexico, they could contract some work to add some Ka. Use the same automatic that is in the 500 since its a tier 1 supplier anyway. Granted the question is still "if the auto fits". That should take a fair amount of production costs out of the equation. Of course there is still certification, and cost analysis. But that is a main point, if you do not have some sort of automatic, don't bother.

That's a really good question. Perhaps the durability in the new 6-speeds is better due to inherantly having to shift more, so when towing it uses the first overdrive in steady driving for better fueleconomy, shifting down in higher-burden situations. But that's just my speculation.

I think diesels have an application in cars as well. Yes, emissions equipment takes away some of the fuel economy benefits, but there still are benefits. The costs of building an EB engine are a bit closer to those of a diesel - turbo, high-pressure fuel system, etc... than the 2.0L Focus engine. They have similar design. I cannot remember who on the previous page keeps touting 1.0 and 1.4 EB numbers which are pretty impressive. That's fine and dandy, but compare them to a 1.6L diesel, not a 2.0L. How do they stack up at that point. But lets also consider where diesels may shine, maybe not fiestas or even Focus', but put a diesel in the Explorer or Escape or a Taurus and they would probably sell like hotcakes. They have plenty of torque which would make those moderately larger vehicles very happy.

Does your new fiesta take a sec to find the gear when first going? I drove a new Passat with a dual-clutch and it seemed to take a second or two from park to gear or from reverse to forward to understand my emotion of "hey car, I would like to move now". Something I have never had a problem with on a normal automatic. Otherwise, I found the shifting in that car quite nice.

I think the doors on this thing are pretty cool. It would be nice if that B-pillarless concept could be adapted to the C-Max as well.

I love this feature. I had it on my old Taurus. By the time I realized how truely useful it was - my main use was leaving my stuff in the car at the gym - I totaled the car a few months later. Hopefully my next new Ford will have it. I did not know the tricks to pop the other doors/trunk. Nice. I was thinking about the onstar thing vs. the key pad - you cannot lock your phone in your car if you go to the beach or something like that where you don't want anything extra with you.

The article by CR did say that that cold weather does cause poorer results since it had to keep the cabin heated and such. The standard still fell within GM's 25-50 mile expected range. In a way it seems CR is continuing its Japanese bias, but at the same time, GM carries some of the blame - they should not have released the car in the winter! That's when initial press fleets get their hands on it and the impressions for the writing. I only hope they also tested the Nissan Leaf and similarly bashed it for shorter-than-expected range. Ford's solution is good, but in a way it does not compare. They have to try and maximize battery life since it directly affects overall range of the vehicle. The Volt doesn't need it, it has its combustion engine to keep you from getting stranded. If I made enough money to satisfy my desire to be enviromentally friendly in a technologically supportive way, I would buy the Focus EV or the Volt. Unfortunately, I do not have an extra $30,000+ to buy such a car at the moment.

Around here (Detroit), diesels do tend to have a higher resale value. I also seem to remember that diesels tend to get better fuel econ than their window sticker alluded to, but I do not remember if that changed much with the changed testing standards.