Up until now, General Motors has remained deliberately vague in public about the scheduled Job 1 date for Chevrolet Volt production. Given the complexity and new technology involved in the program, the automaker’s reluctance is understandable. After all when you don’t know what the future holds or what problems will crop up, you don’t want to put a misleading date out there, years in advance.

Internal schedules, on the other hand, are something else altogether. Every program needs to have deadlines so that people know how much time and resources to allot for a given task. Those internal gantt charts have undoubtedly had the magic Volt Job 1 date on them for several years. Among the stakeholders that need to when a vehicle will launch are the dealers that have to schedule orders for inventory. Around about this time of year, automakers usually brief dealers on when the current model year vehicles will end production and new ones will start.

With less than ten months to go, GM has set November 1, 2010 as the Chevrolet Volt Job 1 date on the production start list for dealers. By September, dealerships will need to start giving GM an indication of how many Volts they want to order so that the head office can determine allocations. Interestingly, the GM chart indicates that dealers won’t know their allocations until two weeks after production starts, and won’t be able to start placing orders until then. Typically, those last two items happen about two months before production starts. The timing for the Volt production kickoff is still far enough out that those dates may yet change in the months to come.

A final item of interest is that the Cruze, which was originally slated to launch in April and subsequently pushed back to September, is listed as TBD.

[Source:Autoblog]

Determined to allay any concerns that the Pontiac Vibe – a clone of the recalled Toyota Matrix – has safety issues with its brakes, General Motors conducted its own vehicle tests over the weekend at its Milford Proving Grounds. “We ran the Vibe wide open at 60 miles an hour and the brakes were able to bring the vehicle to a safe stop within 169 meters, consistent with our internal requirement for brake performance,” said Martin Hogan, GM director of brake systems.

While the tests may have successfully exonerated the Vibe’s braking capability in a controlled unintended acceleration scenario, they did shed some light on the increased distances required to bring run-away vehicles to a stop. According to a recent Edmunds road test of the 2009 Pontiac Vibe GT, their test vehicle panic-stopped from 60 mph in just 127 feet. Converted, GM’s quoted stopping distance is 507 feet – meaning the full-throttle Vibe took four times the distance to come to a safe stop when fighting both inertia and engine power.

Nevertheless, prior to the Toyota recall announcements, GM says it had not received any relevant customer complaints on its 2009-2010 Pontiac Vibe models (although the Vibe is currently included in two Toyota recalls). The recent actions against Toyota did send a few Vibe customers to GM’s hotline, but none have reported any crashes or injury. Even then, GM is quick to reiterate, “In the rare case of a sticking throttle, a driver should apply the brakes firmly and steadily until you come to a stop. Do not pump the brakes, which can deplete the available vacuum boost from the brake system.” Park the vehicle, and then have it towed to a GM dealer for inspection.

[Source:Autoblog]

When Koenigsegg dropped out of the running to purchase Saab from General Motors, there apparently weren’t many automakers interested in rescuing the Swedish brand from the abyss. The only company with any serious interest, Spyker, seemed to be a long-shot to bring the brand into its portfolio. Of course, we now know that other investment groups were in the running, but Spyker came out on top to purchase Saab for $75 million and a closet full of clogs. But just like the winding road that led to the sale, the story doesn’t simply end there. According to several reports, the deal could have been done a month sooner were it not for the involvement of the Russia’s Antonov group.

SR International is among several international news agencies to report that the Swedish government was under the strong suspicion that the Antonov group has strong ties to the Russian mafia. The Antonov family is allegedly tied to organized crime and money laundering, and the English government has blocked the family from investing in the UK because of similar suspicions. The Swedish government then reportedly informed America’s FBI of their findings, a move that lead to the U.S. government telling the GM board to stop the sale of Saab to Spyker on December 18. Hans Lindblad, state secretary at the Swedish Ministry of Finance, has reportedly confirmed the situation, adding that the discovery gave the Swedish government more time to help broker a deal.

In the end, Spyker was able to purchase Saab from GM only after the Antonov group was bought out of its interest in Dutch specialty automaker. And we thought the Saab tale couldn’t get any weirder… or convoluted.

[Source:Autoblog]

General Motors and Magna may weren’t exactly seeing eye to eye when the Canadian supplier failed in its efforts to purchase Opel from The General, but the two companies are obviously still on speaking terms. Automotive News reports that Magna’s Car Top Systems group has won the convertible contract for the Chevrolet Camaro. The General is reportedly expecting the droptop Camaro to account for 20,000 sales annually, matching the Ford Mustang as the top convertible sold in the States.

While Magna is the latest supplier to win the Camaro convertible bid it, isn’t the first. Edscha AG originally won the contract, but the abysmal state of the convertible car market in the U.S. contributed to the German supplier filing for insolvency. And when we say the market for convertibles was bad in 2009, we’re talking flat-line, bag it and tag it bad. Fewer than 50,000 convertibles were sold during the year, compared with over 200,000 sales only four years ago. GM switched the contract to the far healthier Magna to ensure that production of the upcoming Camaro variant isn’t delayed. Magna will reportedly build the Camaro tops at GM’s Corvette plant in Bowling Green, Kentucky with materials from Mexico.

It’s hard to say if the Camaro will keep enough momentum in the next year to make 20,000 convertibles possible, but we’re guessing a droptop version of the Bowtie pony car may well be the right recipe for keeping the Camaro lineup fresh. Now, about that Z28…

[Source:Autoblog]

It is easy to forget that among the debris swirling in the tornado of claims against Toyota, the Pontiac Vibe is really a Toyota Matrix. Hence, the Vibe is also included in Toyota’s recent recall of 2.3 million vehicles to repair accelerator pedal mechanisms that could stick and cause unintended acceleration.

The Vibe was built at the NUMMI plant in a California. The joint venture between Toyota and General Motors became a victim of last year’s industry turmoil. GM pulled out of the partnership last June, and Toyota is reportedly ending production there in March.

GM doesn’t yet know how many 2009 and 2010 model Vibes are included in the recall. When it receives details on numbers and the fix from Toyota, customers will be notified and they can get their hatches repaired at Buick-GMC dealerships.
[Source:Autoblog]

$40,000. That’s the potential price we’ve heard for the first-gen Chevrolet Volt for ages, and it’s the number we get again, now that the recent “low 30s” price rumor has been put to rest. Again.

General Motors spokesman Dave Darovitz confirmed to Green Car Reports that GM CEO Ed Whitacre’s recent statement that the Volt would be priced “in the low 30s” and be profitable was misleading/inaccurate. The reality is that the car will cost around $40,000, and a possible $7,500 tax credit from the federal government would move the price into the low 30s. Specifically, Darovitz confirmed to GCR that, GM “has not officially announced final Volt pricing, a price in the low 30’s after a $7,500 tax credit is in the range of possibilities.” We knew that. Why would we think it was anything else?

[Source:Autoblog]

General Motors had a tough 2009, but one very bright spot was the success of some of its newest models. GM North America President Mark Reuss has informed reporters at the Detroit Auto Show that the plants that build the Cadillac SRX, Chevrolet Equinox and Buick LaCrosse are already at full capacity and The General simply cannot meet demand. That’s a good problem to have, and GM is working on a backup plan in the event demand for cars and trucks exceeds its current capacity.

The Associated Press reports that Reuss told the media that the solution to too much demand could be to reopen one of the General’s shuttered plants. Reuss specifically pointed to the company’s Spring Hill facility in Tennessee as a factory that could reopen to augment production, which makes sense in light of the fact that GM recently spent many millions of dollars to upgrade the plant to build the Chevrolet Traverse. Assuming GM can relight the fires at Spring Hill, that money would appear to be well spent, as Reuss reminded reporters that Spring Hill is flexible enough to build several different models.

GM has placed its Janesville, Wisconsin and Spring Hill plants on standby in the event that it needs more capacity when the U.S. auto industry begins to improve. Considering that new plants can cost over a billion dollars, we’re thinking that’s a pretty good idea.

[Source:Autoblog]

Consumer Reports has surveyed 380,000 subscribers to rank the most satisfied new car owners and a newcomer came in and dethroned the Toyota Prius. An amazing 92 percent of V8-powered Dodge Challenger owners said that they would definitely buy another Mopar pony car if they had the chance to do it all over again. That’s a big-time win for Chrysler, as the Pentastar has been getting dinged badly in recent CR studies. Hybrids have been very popular in the satisfaction survey over the past few years, but the perennial champ Prius wasn’t even the number one battery-assisted model. That honor goes to the new Ford Fusion Hybrid, which came in second overall with a 91 percent rating. The Chevrolet Corvette, Porsche 911 and Prius round out the top five. To make the top of the satisfaction list at least 80 percent of customers need to say that they would definitely buy the same vehicle again.

Detroit automakers substantially improved their standing in the annual survey versus last year, as nine percent of overall Motown models were at the top of the list. That’s still down substantially against the 12 percent Asian automakers and 23 percent of European automakers scored in the top tier. While GM, Ford and Chrysler each found success at the top, each scoring a hit in the top five, two of the three automakers also filled out the entire bottom ten. Owners of the four cylinder Chrysler Sebring were the least satisfied among all surveyed. In all, GM had seven of the bottom ten while Chrysler had three unlovable losers. Head over to the Consumer Reports site for more details.

[Source:Autoblog]

As a brand, Hummer has been in limbo since General Motors announced it was selling the downtrodden marque to China’s Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co. Ltd. Speculation remains that the sale could be completed on or around December 1, pending approval from GM and the Chinese government. For now, everything is on hold, though Tengzhong and new Hummer CEO Jim Taylor are apparently still working hard to plan Hummer’s future.

First on the “Honey Do” list is to arrest the free-fall of Hummer sales. Right now, sales are down 64% on the year to about 8,500 units, but Hummer is looking for 25,000 sales in 2010. That will be a tough nut to crack, but Automotive News reports that the company optimistically plans to get things done in part with some aggressive marketing. Ultimately, however, new product will be needed to get dealerships buzzing with customers again. In the meantime, Hummer’s 154 U.S. dealers need more inventory in the showrooms to help move metal. AN says that dealers only have 1,300 units in stock, compared to the 7,400 vehicles at the same time in 2008.

The last piece of the Hummer reclamation project is adding those new models. When Tengzhong gets the keys to the Hummer kingdom, it will also receive engineering plans for the H4, a new smaller model that is reportedly based on the HX Concept from the 2008 Detroit Auto Show. Taylor reportedly told AN that Hummer’s Jeep Wrangler fighter could arrive within three years. Also possible is an even smaller Hummer H5, which would help the SUV automaker to meet future CAFE requirements. Taylor even goes as far as to say that the smaller H4 and H5 could one day replace the brand’s heavier and thirstier H2 and H3 mainstays. The next big challenge for Hummer once the sale becomes final is to find a manufacturing partner to build these vehicles. GM will reportedly cease building Hummer models as early as the end of 2010.

[Source:Autoblog]

After much hemming and hawing, General Motors will reportedly build a version of the Cadillac Converj, the gorgeous but awkwardly named extended-range coupe concept first shown at last year’s Detroit Auto Show. According to The Detroit News, the Converj will probably take a few years to reach dealer showrooms, as GM will first direct its efforts on launching the Chevrolet Volt, the more affordable sedan with which it is likely to share much of its Voltec drivetrain architecture.

From where we sit, the Converj seems like a natural move for GM, as Cadillac’s higher margins should help offset the research, development, and production costs of everything from the Volt’s lithium ion batteries to its motors and control modules. For its part, however, Cadillac is still declining to comment on the story, and the DetNews story doesn’t name a source.

Either way, GM vice chairman Bob Lutz has previously gone on record as a champion of a production Converj, and he has said that a serial version would look very similar to the 2009 showcar – in much the same way that the Camaro evolved from concept to production. As the concept was gorgeous, we’re down with that – we only hope it doesn’t take as long to build as the Bowtie’s broad-shouldered muscle car.

[Source: The Detroit News]