GM still doesn’t get it

40 days, in-and-out of bankruptcy in record time, and General Motors still doesn’t get it.
The TV News marches us through the styling studios at mighty GM.
We are shown dashing young stylists carving full-sized clay styling bucks of the exciting cars that will save the company.
A return to the hoary days of old.
I’m a car-guy, but neither of our two cars are smashingly attractive.


The CR-V. (Photo by the so-called “old guy” with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100 camera.)

One is our 2003 Honda CR-V (pictured above), which looks fairly attractive, but not as attractive and the first Ford Escapes, which like it or not, are a Japanese car — a Mazda.
The other is our so-called “Bathtub” (below), our 2005 Toyota Sienna All-Wheel-Drive minivan.


The “Bathtub” at Cass Scenic Railway in eastern West Virginia. (Photo by the so-called “old guy” with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100 camera.)

It looks kind of flaccid and dumpy, but it does the job, which is mainly to reliably cart our dog from pillar-to-post.
GM gained market dominance in the ‘30s, with dramatic styling from Harley Earl’s “Art and Color Studio;” e.g. the LaSalle and various Buicks.
By the ‘50s they were getting out of hand; garish overblown monsters. The Buicks looked angry.
Then the bean-counters took over, refusing to make the technological leaps the ferriners were making. —I remember when Honda was a joke.
The ferriners were doing overhead-cam four-valves-per-cylinder; yet GM was finessing engine technology from the ‘50s, and using band-aids to meet emission requirements.
Attractively-styled cars are a siren-song, but not enough for me to turn over my hard-earned buckaroos.
If that were true, I’d be buying Chryslers. They’ve fielded some of the most dramatic styling jobs of late.
Best is their PT-Cruiser. I’d buy one, but I’ve heard horror stories.
The PT-Cruiser is based on the Neon, and a friend had nothing but trouble with his Neon.
Plus another friend has a PT-Cruiser, and it has been troublesome. —It blew a head-gasket.
Attractive styling is no longer important to this kid.
What matters is that the car start, and function reliably.
I don’t know how bad the domestic manufacturers are, but they have a reputation for unreliability.
I have another friend who had a Ford F150 pickup, and it drove her crazy.
I had a Chevrolet Astrovan before the Bathtub, and it went 140,000 miles — not bad, compared to 30 years ago.
But during that time it -a) broke a torsion-bar, -b) developed a massive oil-leak (which Molye Chevrolet fixed), and -c) kept throwing the “check-engine” light at me. —Molye fixed that too; they correctly nailed a problem Hoselton couldn’t find.
In 1990 we bought an All-Wheel-Drive Honda Civic station-wagon, which ended up being the best car we ever had.
We drove it 166,000 miles, and would still be driving it if it hadn’t been smashed up. (We bought the CR-V because of it.)
I’m a Chevy-Man, and would rather buy a Chevrolet.
But I need cars that start, and function reliably.
166,000 miles and never in the shop. Three batteries, ignition wiring, and three sets of tires.
All repairs were done by myself in my garage. It ran like a watch, and never got stuck.
If GM wants my money they gotta forget glitz, and rebuild their reputation for reliability.
“Here, we can fix that.......” Um, I don’t want that to happen.

• RE: “‘Old guy’ with the dreaded and utterly reprehensible Nikon D100.......” —My macho, blowhard brother-from-Boston, who is 13 years younger than me, calls me “the old guy” as a put-down (I also am the oldest). I also am loudly excoriated by all my siblings for preferring a professional camera (like the Nikon D100) instead of a point-and-shoot. This is because I long ago sold photos to nationally published magazines.
• Cadillac “LaSalle,” a lower-priced Cadillac model, 1927 to 1940.
• “Ferriners” equals foreigners.
• A “torsion-bar” is a front spring; except it’s not a coil-spring — it’s a straight horizontal bar.
• Molye Chevrolet in nearby Honeoye Falls; Hoselton Chevrolet, where I bought the Astrovan brand new in 1993. (“Honeoye [‘HONE-eee-oy’] Falls” is the nearest town to where we live in western New York, a rural town about five miles away.)