Off-topic thread - talk about anything

[Dave T]

Looks like a car related to a Saab model has ended production. The Buick Regal was made in Germany and related to the Opel Insignia, which the last 9-5 was designed at the same time and related. The Buick Regal ended production with the 2020 model year but I didn't know it until today. With that, Buick no longer sells cars in the US, only crossovers. Buick does make cars in China for their domestic market.

The average age of a US Buick owner is 60 years old but rumored to actually be closer to 70. There is one Buick dealer in Seattle that went out of business about a decade old after scamming an old man who didn't have all his marbles. They got him to pay much more than sticker price and in cash. Not an equivalent to cash but actual sacks of money.

The scandal originated in July 2006, when a 59-year-old customer who had a history of mental illness came into Huling Brothers wearing feces-stained pants and seeking to buy a truck. The man paid $30,000 for a vehicle, and told a salesman he had far more money back at his apartment, according to police reports. The next day, Dillard and five underlyings practically tripped over each other to be the first to steal the remaining cash; Dillard and another salesman, Ted Coxwell, succeeded, according to a Washington State Patrol report.


After being beaten to the cash by co-workers, another salesman, Paul Rimbey, managed to steal the man’s new $30,000 truck by getting him to sign over ownership while the man was in Harborview Medical Center’s psychiatric ward, according to charging papers....

To understand why business had dropped, Gee said his company commissioned a survey of West Seattle residents. About 90 percent of the respondents said they knew of the criminal allegations at Huling, Gee said.

“Even though we made significant efforts to differentiate ourselves from the former Huling name, the impact of this event and stigma associated with it, we weren’t able to recover from,”

The lingering taint of fraud scandal at the former Huling Brothers auto dealerships in West Seattle has forced the new owner to close their doors, according to the dealerships’ CEO.

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle...-bros-scandal/

I sort of like the Buick name but I doubt I'll ever own one. Buick, Ford, Chrysler, Jaguar, Alfa Romeo. All names that I like but will likely never own one. Many of them don't have anything I want to drive despite liking the name, particularly Buick and Jaguar.

[nordwulf]

Not a huge fan of Buick but I like the TourX and the regular Regal had a bit of an euro vibe. And is was based on the Opel Insignia after all and many were made in Germany. This could have been the base for the 9-3 as well. I wonder what a present day 9-3 would have been like but unfortunately will never know.

[Dave T]

I'm not a huge fan of Buicks either but I do like the name. If I were CEO of GM, I would make Buick the sports sedan brand and Cadillac the luxury brand. But then, I'd also do some car things that the Board wouldn't approve and I'd be forced out.

Buick has a big following in China for historical reasons. In the 1920's, Buick was like the Mercedes Benz of China. The emperor and the first president of the Republic of China had Buicks. It was a hot seller in the 1930's. That shows that brand loyalty is worth something. Now, Buick sells fewer than 250,000 vehicles in the US but over 800,000 in China. The Republic of China government fled to Taiwan where it still remains. The mainland started the People's Republic of China.

If Saab were still around, the next 9-3 would still be made. It was supposed to come out around 2012-2013 but I thought it would be late and come out in 2014. The 9-5 came out just before Saab went under so it would still be around but maybe a new 9-5 might have been in the works for around 2021-2023. The 9-4X would be gone because the Cadillac SRX ended production during the 2016 model year. In its place might be an in-house new 9-4X design or a 9-4X based on the 9-5. Maybe that project would suck all the research and development money, causing the 9-5 to be delayed into the 2024 and the 9-3 replacement to 2027.

The bottom line, I believe, is that Saab didn't grow fast enough after the mid-1980's. Maybe its costs were too high?

[nordwulf]

The 9-4X could have been based on the Cadillac XT5 which is the successor to the SRX.

But perhaps Saab may have been sold to the PSA group together with Opel and now part of Stellantis. But they seem to have too many brands so Saab may not have made to today anyways. We'll never know.

[Dave T]

But perhaps Saab may have been sold to the PSA group together with Opel and now part of Stellantis. But they seem to have too many brands so Saab may not have made to today anyways. We'll never know.

Maybe that might make some of us feel better. Even if Saab were alive, it would have had a rough environment and not made it out with Stellantis. They might have been biased towards Citroen and Alfa Romeo and not really want Saab to continue.

There's no substitute for Saabs now. Different people had different things that they liked about Saabs so possible weak substitutes might be Volvo, BMW, Audi, VW, Subaru, Mazda, Acura, Honda, Alfa Romeo, Jaguar, Mercedes Benz, etc. But to me, just weak substitutes. I chose BMW but it's really not like Saab.

The practicality of FWD is replaced with RWD and good snow tires in my BMW but not the same. The RWD does handle well in dry, warm weather. Some of the small details of good design seem to be replaced with complicated design in a BMW but not to the level of Mercedes Benz where everything is hard for the DIY to even do routine maintenance. (The winner of complexity of DIY maintenance might go to a mid-1980's Maserati Biturbo 2 door where, I believe, the radiator had to be removed to replace the battery. Or was it to change oil?).

I don't see getting an electric car before 2040. I see getting a new car around 2027-2030 (delayed due to my car being the last of the manual transmissions) and keeping that car longer as it may be the last of gasoline powered cars. I like manual transmission because I can think better than the machine can think as far as desired gear. Plus, no need to step on the brake at stoplights.

[Dave T]

I recently saw a 2003 film starring Halle Berry, Gothika. It's a crazy (ha ha) story about a psychiatrist locked up in a psychiatric ward for murdering her husband. The star of the film might be Halle Berry and Robert Downey, Jr., but the third star of the film was the car. The Halle Berry character is driving during pouring rain and swerves to avoid a ghost of another murder victim then drives the car into the ditch. That car appears to be a dark, possibly blue Saab 9-5 SportWagon (around 2002). The car wasn't shown much, just about two minutes but most of the time, just a little view of the seats or side windows.

The crazy thing was the Halle Berry character did kill her husband but while possessed by the ghost of a young woman whom Halle Berry's husband killed. That husband and the sheriff were serial killers jointly killing women. Halle Berry solved the case before she had to go to trial.

[Digger]

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Don't quite understand you angry post. Is this posting an attempt to redirect Saab site users to an invasive sex site app? Or is there really something in the above posting that you find pathetic?