SoonerLS

Windows Phone is successful with its users, if not necessarily in the marketplace. Sync (which was developed my Microsoft) was wildly successful, and even the (technologically-literate) autojournos who bitched incessantly about MFT had nothing but praise for Sync.

It's funny--just a few years ago they made a big deal about adjustable pedals, power seats, and tilting/telescoping steering wheels to accommodate drivers of all sizes. Has that gone by the wayside? (I don't know; I'm 6'3" and, ahem, a "big ol' boy," and I haven't had a problem fitting into any of the Fords I've tried, but I haven't tried any of the newer cars yet.) Americans are getting taller as well as bigger, so if car designers are designing around midgets, they're going to lose a lot of business... On a semi-related note, I still remember a Saturn commercial from the late '80s or early '90s with this "Texan" talking about all the headroom in his Saturn and how he didn't even have to take off his hat. I thought that was particularly ironic, given that he couldn't have been more than 5'6"; I'd sat in one of the bloody things when a friend was looking at one, and I couldn't have worn a ball cap in it. I somehow got into the back seat, and I thought they were going to have to get the jaws of life to get me out again...

I've seen some locally, as well as similarly-constructed smaller commuter buses. Those buses looked odd as all get out with that long Super Duty front clip where you're expecting to see the stubby nose of an E-Series...

Really? We had quite an interesting discussion about it at the time. If you missed it, you ought to go find it, particularly Austin's post on why Wixom will "never, ever" produce cars again.

I don't think they're chasing headlines--I think they're pushing an agenda. I think we all agree that distracted driving is a problem, but they're so deep into their Quixotic cause that they cannot (or will not) see that it is already lost, and that the tack taken by Ford (and others) is the only sensible course for dealing with the reality of the situation. I'm sure there will come a time when they accept reality, but 'til then I wouldn't be holding my breath waiting for anything but negativity towards Sync and MFT.

In October and November, I spent a decent mount of time on this one's bigger brother, a 4000, pulling a disc mower, then a hay rake, then a baler, so I have a soft spot for Blue Oval ag equipment. Still galls me that Ford sold its tractor business...

This one's something of a Thanksgiving tradition for one of our local radio stations: http://youtu.be/LjKF7aQthcQ If anyone needs me, I'll be over there sitting on the Group W bench.

Oh, sorry, I meant to say: OK.

That question has already been answered here, at least on the Ford front, more than once.

Perhaps you should listen to what Mulally has actually said on this topic. It is a fact that drivers are bringing these devices into the driving environment; with Sync (and, by extension, MFT), Ford is trying to fight distracted driving by integrating them into the driving environment, so you can control them with voice commands (or touch control mounted high in the center stack) instead of fumbling with the radio dial or your smartphone. That is the key idea that CR is too stupid (or too biased) to understand--you know that people are going to do it, and there's no way to stop them, so you make sure they're doing it more safely. Remember--cockpit design was one of Mulally's areas of expertise at Boeing. He knows a thing or two about making systems work for the person at the controls...

I agree--a Fusion, Focus, or Escape hybrid might bring in a few conquest sales, but it would mostly bring in people who were already looking at a Fusion, Focus, or Escape. The C-Max is going to bring in new customers, and their C-Max experience might make them more amenable to buying a Fusion, Focus, or Escape hybrid on the next go-around.

Did you realize that if you look really hard, you can almost see a car in the background? At least that's what I'm told... I read somewhere that Fiat was stacking lots of money on the hood of the 500 to make sales; one of the ladies at work bought one, so maybe I'll ask her.

Almost completely off-topic, but the title of the thread just made me think of an altered Shakespeare quote: "Cry Havoc! And let slip the hamsters of war!" :fear:

Wasn't the D3's progenitor the Volvo S80? My eyes may be deceiving me, but I'm pretty sure the S80 is/was a sedan...

My understanding is that it has more to do with them being installed with a dry gasket. The last car I bought new (the LS) came with 12-month/12K mile "free" service (really? with a 5K oil change interval you do 12K miles?), so I let Lincoln do the first oil change; as a result, I don't know if the guys at Wixom torqued that son of a gun.

What they need to do is change their manufacturing capacity to match demand; if they start adding products in Europe for export to the US, that undercuts their case for cutting Eurpoean production--and the EU has notoriously whinybitchyprickly regulators when it comes to American companies. Just ask Microsoft, Boeing, Google, etc, etc, etc...

My '92 Escort (the first car I bought brand new) came from Hermosillo, and the only production-related problem I had was that I had to stick a screwdriver through the oil filter to remove it at the first oil change. (There was a blown speaker that the dealer fixed before delivery, but I attribute that to a bad part, not assembly.) Otherwise, it was a flawless vehicle; if someone hadn't tried to open the trunk with a Mitsubishi, I'd certainly have kept it longer...

I don't know about special cases like Khaleefohneeya, but prices around these parts have been ebbing for the last couple of months. Today I paid $3.39/gal for no-ethanol 91 at a name-band station; I could've paid even less at 7-11--and one of our Wal-Marts is down to $2.95/gal for 87...

I don't know, but this one is getting outrageous mileage, going thousands of miles on no gasoline at all. :lol:

http://youtu.be/0WQwebJ5kQ0

If it's like the gas tank on the mule with the underhood shots, it's probably not a production tank at all, but a special tank for testing purposes. At least, I'm not aware of any (current) production Fords with fuel dumps on their gas tanks...

If we assume that Ford actually put out such a rumor, the fact that they didn't actually import such vehicles indicates that your assumption that people would buy them is faulty. Maybe some people would (though that has to be a vanishingly small number of people, given the dearth of wagons in the US market), but Ford obviously thinks there won't be enough to make it worth their while. So, yes, it's bullshit.

Racing tractor? The last thing I want to think while I'm driving my tractor is "steer into the skid"...

Ahem.

I heard it was the 32nd of Octember. Ironically. I have a project that's supposed to be finished on that date...