Re: Soldering irons: made in America but designed in Russia?

You are wrong. Despite the recession, Chrysler has sold considerably more than 200 of that model.

I should h "There are probably 200 US cars with this sort of styling [Chrysler

300] for every US car that looks like this [Chrysler ME] and that one is still very angular."

Of course that Chrysler ME 4-12 is a concept car and not for sale.

This is not a concept car and you can actually buy one for a reasonable price. I lately had the pleasure and that thing sure corners well. Best of all, on the freeway it doesn't use more gas than a compact passenger car:

Same here:

The Corvette and Viper are lovely cars. They're not exactly typical of American design.

That's what I meant when I said there are probably 200 cars which have that "hit a brick wall" look for every one which looks sleek and smooth.

They are as American as it gets ;-)

Well, I am not a great fan of US passenger cars. Not because of the looks (where I could care less because that doesn't matter to me as a buyer) but because of reliability. US trucks, however, are real work horses and they don't really have any EU equivalent. AFAIK only two foreign companies, Toyota and Nissan, make such trucks.

Then, the little Jeep looks quite cool.

If you want to stuff a huge V8 with 200 tons of air conditioning and power-everything under the hood, you need a lot of hood.

But Cadillac and most things Chrysler are admittedly over the top. They corner the ugly-car-lover market.

John

For good reason. In 1978, the congress critters passed the gas guzzlers tax:

The typical land yacht, with about 15mpg, pays about $4,000 in gas guzzlers tax.

The idea was to discourage big ugly oversized non-commercial vehicles. However, they exempted anything over 6000 lbs GVW. So, in accordance to the law of unintended consequences, the industry simply delivered monstrous vehicles that officially weighted 6001 lbs and save a bundle on the taxes.

Of course, the government derives substantial revenue from taxing what are now economy and mid size cars, so don't expect the situation to change in the foreseeable future.

If the politicoes had any guts+sense, they'd just up the taxes on gasoline, and let the market take care of the rest.

John

Ahhh - seppos in attendance!

Neither of the above match the fuel economy of my proper sized passenger car.

To be fair, they did try to make it look like a Bentley!

That last one looks more like a racing car than something for everyday use.

Is the Chrysler ME anything like Windows ME?

Jeep reliability and build quality is, however, a bad joke. I've had the opportunity to compare ten year old Jeeps (Cherokee and Grand Cherokee) with my ten year old Ford - the Jeeps have all been in poor condition at lower mileage. I've also found the Dodge/GMC trucks to be better built than Jeeps, which seems odd. I conly guess that the old AMC spirit of building rubbish that falls apart still prevails at Jeep.

What's wrong with the 300C? Put a mesh grille on it and most people think it's a Bentley. I don't mind kicking the septics for their dreadful taste in car design, but the 300C or Merc E-class as we call it here, is a relatively successful design. It's just a shame that the powertrain and suspension engineering isn't as good as the chassis.

Have you ever driven a Corvette? What was the gas mileage?

Joerg gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

I've never driven one. Nobody this side of the pond feels they need to compensate quite that badly for such a tiny penis.

But, fortunately, we can refer to the official figures.

That'll be

btw.

The extra-urban number for the 'vette is 31.4mpg. Quite impressive, I'll agree, given the type of vehicle.

But not exactly comparable with the official extra-urban figure for a "compact passenger car" - let's say a 1.6TDCi Focus. 74.3mpg.

If you look at the much more representative combined figure, the Focus achieves 62.8mpg vs 21.2 for the 'vette. That's the "economical" 6.2 'vette - the 7.0 Z06 and supercharged ZR1 are worse, of course.

As for the Viper... The official figures for the SRT10 roadster (only Viper we get through official channels, so the only official figures) are

21.4 extra-urban and 13.4 combined.

The Excursion is holding up spectacularly well. 125k mainly urban miles and nothing serious has fallen off or broken in close to seven years. Trim doesn't squeak or rattle (but is resolutely 'hard touch'), leather is as new, engine is still near-silent and incredibly smooth, gearbox is obscenely smooth shifting and responsive. I'm amazed how good it's been.

It's needed a couple of wheel bearings (understandable at 5 tons, up from 3 ton 'standard' weight), an alternator (again understandable with extra electrical loads) and the AC radiator changing (once again, extra load compared to factory spec).

Only things that have broken that you could reasonably blame Ford for are a coil pack went down at 110k miles (£27) and the fuel tank sender has packed in, but only to the gauge - the computer still knows how much fuel is in there.

Until we all storm Washington, DC with our pitchforks and torches. >:->

Cheers! Rich

I could live with arbitrarily high gasonline taxes, since I only have a bike. ;-)

(admittedly, bus fares might go up a bit.)

Cheers! Rich