Is RAM no longer a Dodge brand?

Yes, it's now just RAM. The pinheads have also dropped the name HEMI from the V8.

And you won't see the name HEMI on other models either.

Chrysler banishing Hemi engine name to Dodge, Ram By David Zalubowski, AP

When Chrysler rolls out its new version of the once-hot 300 sedan, don't bother asking the obvious: "That thing got a Hemi?"

The hulking V-8 that Dodge made famous was a prominent feature in the existing 300 model, but it won't show up by name in the new one, The Wall Street Journal reports, based on dealers who have been briefed by the company.

Even though the 300 -- that's a line of the 2009 model in the photo above -- will get a big 5.7-liter V-8, it won't be called a Hemi. Rather, that name will be reserved for "certain Dodge cars and Ram pickup trucks." The engine will continue to be an option in 300 and Jeeps, but it won't carry the famous name.

Once a boon to Chrysler, Hemis now are viewed as powerful but fuel- inefficient. Not the image that a new 300 should carry.

Throwing out an iconic brand is shear stupidity, do you see Apple renaming the iPod to just the Apple MP3 player? Hemi is one of only two valuable brands that Chrysler owns (Jeep being the other), it evokes Chrysler's glory days of the 50s and 60s. Without the Hemi name the Chrysler V8 is just a generic big engine. Taking the Hemi name off of the

300C does nothing to enhance the sales of that car. The 300 appeals to aging boomers, I'm one of them I have a 2006 300C, because it's the car they wanted as school boys in the 60s. Anyone who has fuel economy at the top of their priority list isn't going to look at a 300 with or without the Hemi. The 300 is as heavy as a Sherman tank and it has the aerodynamics of a brick, that's why it's fuel economy sucks. The difference between the V6 and the V8 is one MPG, as long as you are going to burn that much gas you might as well have fun doing it. If they aren't selling enough 300s anymore they should just kill it off cleanly, if they think they can get a few more years out of it then they should stick with what works for that car.

BTW what the f*ck are they thinking by limiting the Fiat 500 to a handful of dealers and making them set up separate showrooms for it. It's just a crappy econobox, do they really think they can create any buzz around a hideous dated Fiat? The 500 may evoke fond memories in Italy but nobody in the US ever aspired to own a Fiat, it was known as Fix It Again Tony. The current one is probably much better then the junk they sold in the US before they pulled out, but then all cars are much better then they were. If the plan is to turn Chrysler into Fiat North America then they should just do it and get it over with, put a Fiat sign up on all of the Chrysler/Dodge dealers and sell a full range of Fiats and let Chrysler pass into history with Packard and Studebaker.

THAT is true.

The problem is that all of the people who were young 20-something kids 10-15 years ago were buying Neons and Focuses and other cheap small cars like that. And while most of them beat the crap out of those cars and threw them away when their engines blew up, the serious car guys in that group discovered something about performance.

You see, "fun to drive cars" are nothing more than weight & horsepower. For example I just recently bought a Frankenstein's Monster 2002 Ford Focus which someone pulled out the crappy single over head cam job in and dropped in a dhoc ztec. I can spin the tires off the line and chirp them shifting into second, and probably take that new 300 V8 in the quarter-mile. And that's just the stock manifold. And yet, I get 30MPG if I drive it like a grandma-car. And where do you think Ford got the idea for that? The Neon, of course.

The firt generation Neons were fantastic cars. DOHC, high-revving engine with the powerband up above 4K rpm, they would do exactly the same thing as my Focus. Yet the cars were so light, if you wanted good MPG you just kept the RPM under 2500 and you were good, but if you wanted to smoke tires you doubled the RPM. (and watched fuel consumption jump of course) The DOHC engines love high RPMs and the manual transmissions in these cars allow you to choose your driving style, good MPG or good accelleration. And the young guys learned from that that you don't have to have a monster low-revving V8 that sucks gas ALL the time to smoke tires. All you need is a DOHC

4 banger that will spin up to 7K rpm, in a light car, and a manual gearbox so you can control the shift points. Shift at low RPM's and you have a grocery-getter econobox, shift at high RPM and you have a performance car.

And now we come to today. Nobody wants a gas-hog even though everyone still wants performance. But what did Chrysler do to all their high power DOHC 4 bangers? Hung automatic transmissions on them, and programmed them as grocery-getter econoboxes. Oh you want a performance car? Well we have these nice $50K sports cars over in this corner that are stuck in V8 gas-sucking mode. Great balls of fire, no wonder their sales sunk.

All Chrysler is doing with the 300 is they figure that it's going to die anyway, so they just want to get a few more years out of it so they can have the time to get something like the '96 Neon Hybrid back out there. The name of the game now is plug in hybrids because the Obama administration is forcing the Big 3 into them. (and for damn good reasons, in my personal opinion) But we are years away from a grocery getter hybrid that has performance. Oh sure, some super-expensive sports cars will come out that are hybrids, but that's about it. So in the meantime Chrysler is going to use whatever performance car they have in their lineup

Please don't forget that Fiat isn't the controlling owner of Chrysler. While Fiat may want to bring it's name back to the American market, while the current controlling owners of Chrysler may not be car guys, they aren't that stupid, they aren't going to allow even the perception that Chrysler cars are Fiat cars.

Anyway the entire issue of the subcompact in the US market has been botched ever since WV stopped producing the Beetle. Chrysler just doesen't know if a subcompact (a real one, a city car) is ever going to take hold here to make money making them in quantity. It's smart to hold that kind of car at arm's length.

Ted

The Beetle was never a great car but became iconic. Did a job for its time. Now many more good small cars around (incl from VW), but maybe not in NA.

DAS

To reply directly replace 'nospam' with 'schmetterling'

When younger I had two Beetles; 1956 & 1961 models. The reason was simple.

-It got almost twice the fuel mileage of a current Chev.

-It was the only small car in NA that could be driven all day at highway speeds and survive. Then most other small cars were British junk- I had a few of them earlier.

-It was tough, both the drive train and the body.

-It had excellent traction in snow.

But there were a "few" disadvantages:

-Very poor brakes.

-Very poor cornering in slippery conditions.

-A next to useless interior heater, which often sucked in engine fumes.

-Took a while to get to 60mph, which it couldn't maintain up hill or into a slight wind.

After the '61 Beetle I got a '63 Chev II 6 cyl, which was far superior overrall, except for winter traction because of RWD. My current Chrysler 300M is much better in all respects. The 300M even gets fuel mileage similar to the Beetle.

It amazes me that a few in my area continue to drive the Beetle, anything for attention.

Probably the reason is because it is a collector car. I drive my 41 Chrysler around during good weather, and yes, it does get attention!