“Hummer deal up in the air; Saturn on its way out - Shreveport Times” plus 4 more

Hummer deal up in the air; Saturn on its way out - Shreveport Times
Inside autos: Auto legends to join hall - Detroit Free Press
Saturn dealers, owners shocked over end of brand - Poughkeepsie Journal
If only car insurance ran like health care - Spartanburg Herald-Journal
Penny wise-pound foolish auto glass decisions - Houston Community Newspapers

Hummer deal up in the air; Saturn on its way out - Shreveport Times

Posted: 03 Oct 2009 09:34 PM PDT

The past week was eventful for General Motors Corp.

While negotiations for the sale of the Hummer brand to a Chinese company are ongoing, discussions for the sale of GM's Saturn brand to Penske Automotive Group collapsed.

Progress still is being made in talks between GM and Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co., Hummer LLC spokesman Nick Richards said. "Once we get a definitive agreement, then that will be used to work with the appropriate agencies to secure regulatory approval."

GM had hoped to finalize the accord by the end of the third quarter. However, the complex nature of the deal coupled with the Chinese regulatory approval process have delayed progress, Richards added.

"The timing for this is not out of the ordinary. But it's still moving along. We are very optimistic."

The news bodes well for GM's Shreveport plant, which produces the Hummer H3 and H3T as well as the GMC Canyon and Chevrolet Colorado. The plant will be shut down by June 2012, GM announced this summer.

Sales of the H3 are 43 percent off last year's pace. During the first eight months of this year, 7,545 H3s were sold, compared to 13,242 in the same time period last year.

Sales of the H3 have been slipping every month of the year, with the highest monthly sales 1,261 coming in January. There were 3,343 H3s sold in January 2008.

August, at 728, was the worst month for sales, compared to 2,219 in August 2008.

Since the H3T was not released until September 2008, the only available data are for September 2008 to August. So far this year, there have been 1,928 H3Ts sold. There were 222 sold in August.

Part of the reason for slow sales is the company pulled all marketing of Hummer when the brand was put up for sale early this year, Richards said.

Meanwhile, GM has announced it will phase out the storied Saturn brand and its dealership network.

On Tuesday, GM thought it had a deal to sell Saturn. But Wednesday afternoon, a day before the deal was to be announced, the Detroit automaker was blindsided by the news that businessman Roger Penske's deal to acquire Saturn had collapsed.

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Inside autos: Auto legends to join hall - Detroit Free Press

Posted: 04 Oct 2009 12:12 AM PDT

Automotive legends Craig Breedlove and Hal Sperlich are to be on hand Tuesday as they are inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame in Dearborn.

In addition to Sperlich, the product-planning genius behind the Ford Mustang and Chrysler minivan, and Breed-love, who held nine land-speed records and was the first person to top 400, 500 and 600 m.p.h., three pioneers will be posthumously inducted into the hall:

• Pioneering aerodynamicist Wunibald Kamm.

• Richard Caleal, the influential design chief at Ford who created the 1949 Ford.

• Mickey Thompson, racing icon and one of the creators of the performance-parts industry.

The ceremony takes place at the Dearborn Performing Arts Center, 15801 Michigan Ave. Tickets are $125 per person and can be purchased by contacting the Automotive Hall of Fame at 313-240-4000.

Electric car updates

News from the alternative energy beat:

• Nissan will start taking reservations for its Leaf electric car in spring 2010. The Leaf is seen as a competitor to the Chevy Volt. Both cars are to come out next year.

• Toyota Motor Corp. said it intends to begin offering plug-in versions of the Prius hatchback to U.S. consumers within three years.

Toyota is cautious about sales prospects for plug-in vehicles because of its earlier experience with sales in California of the battery-powered RAV4, Miller said.

"We had a lot of people raising their hands for the RAV4 EV," Irv Miller, a group vice president for Toyota's U.S. sales unit, said at a conference in Los Angeles. "As soon as we made them ready for sale, that line evaporated very quickly."

• The mileage that will be listed on the window stickers of electric cars like the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf is being studied by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. GM's figure of 230 m.p.g. for the Volt, exceeded by Nissan's 367 for the Leaf, raised a lot of eyebrows.

The EPA said last week it would "initiate a new rule-making to explore in detail the information displayed on the current fuel economy label and the methodology for deriving that information." In other words, look for some changes.

He said

"They say that young people are moving away from cars. But surely it is us -- the automakers -- who have abandoned our passion for cars."

Akio Toyoda, president of Toyota Motor Corp., in one of several apologies that also included a large recall and falling sales.

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Saturn dealers, owners shocked over end of brand - Poughkeepsie Journal

Posted: 03 Oct 2009 11:57 PM PDT

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Many Saturn dealers have already been through difficult times recently. GM reported Thursday that Saturn sales were down 84 percent in September from a year ago. But about 13,000 jobs are still tied to Saturn, the vast majority of them at dealerships.

GM had a conference call with dealers to discuss the closures. Dealers said executives expressed disappointment and shock that the Penske deal fell through but gave few specifics.

The mood was grim Thursday at dealerships, where owners said they were blindsided by the news.

"This is nothing short of the bride running away at the altar," said Lou Gonzales, president and owner of Saturn of Antelope Valley in Palmdale, 60 miles north of Los Angeles. "The millions of Saturn customers across the United States, I'm sure are disappointed. But they will not be left out in the lurch."

At Day Automotive, owner Bill Numrich said he planned to keep selling Saturns as long as he could.

"We still have a Saturn customer base that we have to service," said Numrich.

GM spokesman John M. McDonald said GM estimates it will take four months to sell the existing inventory of 12,000 Saturns. Dealers think it could take longer, worried they will have difficulty selling a lame-duck brand. There are no plans to offer special incentives to help sell remaining vehicles, McDonald said. Other brands that are winding down like Pontiac are selling well without any extras.

Martin bought the Saturn dealership three years ago because he liked the product line of reliable vehicles with good gas mileage, like the Aura sedan. "We had a lot of faith in Saturn," he said.

So did customers. Saturn was meant to be a warm and fuzzy car company, one that invited customers to annual events at its plants. It featured low-key showrooms and no-haggle prices, part of its "a different kind of car company" slogan. But the brand struggled to make money and receded into the background as GM focused on higher-profit SUVs and trucks.

Yet some buyers stayed loyal to the end. Frank and Erika Martin of Hampstead, Md., were looking to buy a new Saturn Thursday at a Baltimore-area dealer even after hearing the brand will end. Their grandson was born in the back seat of their first Saturn - and they e-mailed GM to try to persuade the company to keep Saturn going. They also credit Saturn with their lives. The 2007 Saturn Ion they wanted to replace was totaled three weeks ago.

"I completely credit Saturn with why we're not badly injured," Erika Martin said.

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If only car insurance ran like health care - Spartanburg Herald-Journal

Posted: 04 Oct 2009 12:12 AM PDT

No car would ever be totaled that could possibly be repaired. The appraiser would look at your 1996 Ford Aspire after it was struck by a tractor-trailer, toppled off a cliff and caught fire and say, "Well, we can fix it, but it's going to cost $400,000, and this car is so old, it probably won't last six months after we do all the work, and it certainly won't run very well," and you'd say, "Fix it. I love this car. I can't face life without it. I got my first slap in the face in this car. Give it every bit of care you can, even if it only buys a few weeks' time, and damn the cost."

Car insurance wouldn't only cover vehicles involved in accidents. Any problem with your car would be addressed, and there would never come a time when it could be agreed your car was too old to be worth saving. Ever. All car life, we would agree, has value, and every possible measure would be pursued to keep the 1964 Impalas and 1983 Yugos running, forever.

And the definition of "running" would have to change dramatically. Even cars that could no longer move of their own accord would be cared for. Automobiles that could only be started would sit idling, fed gasoline through a small tube. Mechanics would attend these immobile machines, changing batteries and oil, and attendants would wash them weekly to prevent rusting, or "bay sores."

When my engine exploded and I had the car towed, the mechanic would say, "This motor doesn't have a drop of oil in it. In fact, the whole car is bone-dry. There's no brake fluid, no power steering fluid and no transmission fluid. The tires have never been rotated, the belts have never been changed, not a single thing has been done to make this car run properly."

"Don't you dare judge my car maintenance choices," I would thunder. "Auto repair work is a basic right of man. Just fix it."

The runaway expenses would start long before cars aged. Untold billions would be spent, even on automobiles that had come off the assembly line completely dysfunctional.

"While it's true that this newborn vehicle will never 'run' in the traditional sense, never carry people and cargo from place to place, we do feel that with therapy, time and the efforts of our team of specialists, this car can make progress. There is a good chance the radio will someday work, AM only, and the air conditioner could be equipped with a $126,000 computer that would allow it to defog the rear window."

The cost of automotive care would be infinite.

If our desire to see health care improved is unlimited, if our desire to see longevity extended is unlimited, if we think treatment of even the most damaged and unworkable bodies should be unlimited, then the long-term cost is infinite.

Remind me again, what's your plan to fix that?

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Penny wise-pound foolish auto glass decisions - Houston Community Newspapers

Posted: 03 Oct 2009 10:46 PM PDT

Everybody loves a bargain but, being "penny wise" is "pound foolish" when selecting an auto glass service provider. Like anything else, you get what you pay for and "cheap" is not what you want when replacing auto glass. Quality and professional competency should be the top priorities for every person in need of auto glass service.

The fact is that most automotive safety experts rank the windshield as the third most important safety component in today's cars and trucks. Seatbelts and airbags rank first and second. All three components are part of what automotive engineers refer to as a vehicle's safety restraint system (SRS).

The SRS is intended to keep vehicle occupants within the relative safety of the passenger compartment during a collision or roll over. SRS components work together. The windshield provides virtually all the support a passenger side airbag needs to deploy properly. If the windshield falls out in a collision, that particular air bag is all but useless. Similarly, the windshield provides much of the roof support for most cars, especially mini-vans. If the windshield is displaced, much of that structural support is lost along with most of the crush resistance designed into the vehicle.

Laws exist that require seatbelt use. Laws exist to prohibit tampering with or disabling airbags. However, there are no laws that govern how a windshield is replaced once the vehicle leaves the factory. An improperly replaced windshield could – and sometimes does – become detached from the vehicle during airbag deployment; from the force of a collision; or, when the car rolls or flips over. With the windshield displaced, the effectiveness of SRS is seriously compromised.

There are thousands of responsible auto glass companies in the U.S. that perform high-quality, safe windshield replacement. There are also some that do not. If you know what questions to ask in selecting a glass shop and what to look for during the installation, you greatly improve the odds of avoiding the unprofessional practitioner.

The National Glass Association recommends that consumers ask prospective auto glass service providers if they:

Have NGA certified technicians.

Endorse the Auto Glass Replacement Safety Standard (AGRSS).

Use the manufacturers recommended urethane adhesive.

Review the "do's and don'ts" of post-installation usage with customers.

During the installation, watch to see if the technician:

Checks for a passenger side airbag and, if present, uses urethane rated for that type of installation.

Removes the old sealant leaving approximately 1/16" bonding surface.

Wears gloves to avoid contaminating the bonding surfaces.

Cleans and primes both the glass and the area on the vehicle (known as the pinch-weld) where the glass is to be set.

It is also recommended that the vehicle owner ask to see the manufacturers' expiration date on all preps, primers and adhesives to be used during the windshield replacement. If any of these materials are passed the expiration date, do not allow the installation to begin until acceptable materials are located. If the installation is already in process, it must be stopped and started again from scratch after all bonding surfaces have been thoroughly cleaned.

After the installation is complete, inspect the work carefully. You do not need to be an auto glass expert to identify the "tell-tale" signs of improper installation. From outside the vehicle, check to see if:

The windshield is perfectly centered on the car. The distance between the left side and the right side of the windshield and the auto body should be the same.

Inspect the molding to be sure it fits around the circumference of the windshield and there are no visible gaps.

The molding should be flat and not look like a roller coaster.

Most importantly, the glass should be flush to the vehicle's body.

When shopping for auto glass repair and/or replacement services, people need to be quality conscious to a fault. To be done properly, windshield replacement requires the use of the best materials technology can provide and the skills of highly trained, experienced and, above all, detail conscious technicians.

John T. Taylor is with Rhodes & Dunlap at 805 Spencer Highway in South Houston.