What does GM have to go toe to toe with this??

Styling is in the eye of the beholder. I don't care much for that Nissan at all. Exterior is boring, and the interior isn't all that great either. When I get in my '96 (yes, a 1996) Bonnie, it feels like I am in the cockpit of a fighter jet. It will also go like a bat out of hell.

You like performance? Take a look at the GTO, the Grand Prix or the (no longer made) Bonnie's. Damned fine looking cars, and they will move with the best of them. But, like I said, styling is personal preference. Some people can look at a Ferrari and vomit, while others will look at a Yugo and think it's as good as gold.

Perhaps you might want to compare the torque rating for both. The Japanese have a tendency to spin their engine rather wildly to obtain HP fro advertising purposes. In doing so the torque drops off. I is torque that gets you going a keeps you going on grades. That is why most Japanese cars are the first cars to die on hills. The Camrys one sees on the road are slugs. The reason is, eight our of ten sold in the US have only 4 cy engine..

mike

"Mike Hunter" proves yet again that he has never actually driven a Camry... I'd far rather have a 4 cyl Camry (with available 5-speed no less!) than the sluggish, automatic-only 3.4 V-6 Impala.... yes I have been in both and the Camry is a better car in every respect.

nate

Mike Hunter wrote:

No offence Nate, but I have a couple of relatives who own Impala's, and they love them. One has the 3.4 (a 2003, if memory serves), and one the 3.8 (a

Obviously you are entitled to you own opinion but apparently you do not live in a mountainous part of the county if you really believe that ;)

mike

Copying the japanese car styling is a big mistake because most of them are hideous. This altima rates a 7 on a scale of 10, but is one of the rare exceptions.

The current toyota camry is just as ugly as the Aztec, a one on a scale of

1. The honda ridgeline is uglier than the aztec, a zero. (Please don't park that thing where I can see it). The honda civic is a 3 and I don't see many of them on the streets. The hot selling toyota corolla is only a 4 to me. The japanese are revising their jelly bean styling by adding lumps. The headlights on their minivans and many cars are frog like.

Most GM cars have only managed to get up to the 5 mark The cobalt / pursuit is a 6. The G6 is a 4 as are the expensive buicks. The cadillacs are 3's. By comparison, my boring jelly-bean 97 cavalier is a 4. The new mustang is an 8, the only one I can think of that is outrageously expensive. The chrysler sebring was a 7 but they revised it to a 5 by making it look like a saturn. All of chryslers other cars are starting to look like trucks and SUV's. The SUV is dead dead dead. They have never done anything at all for me and they are churning them out, all looking alike.

Car makers have to stop using the color gray. No more grey interiors. A grey car looks like they didn't bother to paint it. GM has very few nice colors, all of them are greys, silvers, sands, dark muddy colors. I guess the color really doesn't matter if the car is a 3 or a 4 anyway.

Just a few of my unsolicited opinions.

Strange, the ad campaign for the solstice seems to showcase the different colors, all bright and primary that they paint it. Of course a troll sees in black and white so they don't notice the colors.

Now that you mention it, the solstice and saturn sky are beautiful cars.

Transfer similar styling to the grand prix or the G6 and they wouldn't be able to make em fast enough to keep up with the sales. People would actually get excited about them.

well my G6 convertible looks almost the same as the Nissan. How much does their altima convertible cost? but I do agree GM needs to do something like build a car that doesn't look japanese or is it the japs build cars that look like american?

You call that styling? It kills me the way people cry about GM styling and compare it to Japanese styling as if those bland lines on the imports are something special. Man - there is nothing appealing about the styling of that Nissan.

Spinning a lighter engine at higher RPM to make it's power only when needed is an engineering decision. Lighter engine means the whole vehicle can be lighter giving better performance and handling. Losing some torque and having to adjust driving style to increase efficiency isn't unreasonable. I'd prefer a Huyabusa to a Harley anytime. Sorry, not that into auto engines anymore. Torque has real world advantages but HP is still HP. Might just be the mindset of someone who'd buy a Camry. How many sportbikes do you pass going up a hill. They have really small engines.

Gee, Toyota and Honda sure sell a **lot** of cars. Could it be that they are building the cars that people want to buy and Little Three are not building them?

My $0.02. YMMV

Albeit running at 10 RPMs or more ;)

Running a too small 4 cy at 3,500 RPM, a point past is top torque rating, to maintain 65 MPH is not efficient. Running a larger engine at 2,000, well below its top torque rating, to maintain 65 MPH in top gear is much more efficient. More importantly, having 2,000 RPM of torque left, if one needs to get out of the way of something, is much better position to find one self..

mike

Except for the fact that GM sells more cars in the US than Toyota or Honda, they just do not have the same brand name on the grill. ;) .

mike

Maybe I am spoiled (by what? my 20 year old German cars?) but my '05 with a 3.4 is a loud, coarse, unrefined slug. I sound like I'm racing just driving around, it has to drop two gears to get anything resembling acceleration.

Compare and contrast with a 4-cylinder Camry and the Camry wins, hands down, plus it is so much less frustrating to have a manual transmission than a badly programmed automatic (OK, well, maybe not BADLY programmed, but programmed with fuel economy numbers as its ONLY priority)

nate

Obviously you are an idiot and have never driven a 4-cylinder Camry. It is much more pleasant to drive than a 3.4 Impala and FEELS LIKE IT HAS MORE POWER. Jeez, I could put a "GM Mark of Excrement" badge on my feces and you'd tell me it was better than a Toyota just because it said GM on it.

Of course, GM could at least meet me halfway and offer a manual transmission, but no...

nate

Mike Hunter wrote:

Geez, you just like proving yourself a complete moron, don't you. Why don't you take your drivel to alt.self-important.blowhards.bullshit.bullshit.bullshit - I can't even bother to argue with your post below because it doesn't even make enough sense that I can figure out what the f*ck you were trying to say.

In any case, I can tell you that high RPMs and high efficiencies are not mutually exclusive - I've logged many miles at >3000 RPMs in some of my old VWs and still got consistent 30 MPG tankfuls.

nate

Mike Hunter wrote:

Don't get me wrong I am not crazy about the Altima styling though they are on the right track compared to previous models...yet it still looks better than anything that GM is offering currently in that class. The sad truth is that GM styling sucks. If GM had stayed with the original prototype G6 styling they would have one heck of a nice looking car but they strayed from the original style and ended up with mediocrity.

performance.