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Originally Posted by paul8488
I got thinking tonight... why are there two midsize BOF truck / SUV platforms? In what world did GM think it was necessary to have the Colorado and Canyon on one platform and the Trailblazer and its 10 variations on another? Why can't their powertrains be interchanged? Why do different versions exist in Australia and Thailand and South America?
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I have often wondered this. Just think of the development dollars that could have been saved when creating a new platform for the midsize pickups. And for that matter, they wouldn’t have needed to add new variants of the Atlas Inline-six and add more cost than needed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by paul8488
You're saying that as if Pontiac is going to get serious about Pontiac, but they're not. The G5, Vibe, and upcoming G3 are proof that GM doesn't see value in Pontiac as a performance brand. They've decided that Pontiac needs as much volume as possible... which makes it Chevrolet.
The Saturn Vue is a gas hog, and the Astra apparently isn't all that efficient either. Chevrolet has comparable vehicles that get better gas mileage. Hybrid sales are somewhere around 1000 for the year for all of GM, according to another article on GMi. If Saturn is the green brand then Buick is the hip brand.
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I can see where you are coming from. Pontiac isn’t a serious performance brand, and a die hard Pontiac fan (me) is ready to write them off. There is nothing wrong with having a smaller more efficient car in the lineup, but a new grille and red lit gauges don’t change the fact that it’s a Chevy in drag. I was referring to Pontiac in its heyday, when Pontiac was synonymous with Performance. When Saturn was created, it had a few little cars that got great fuel economy, again, not so much anymore. I’m hardly saying that Pontiac is performance, Saturn is green, Buick is near luxury, Saab is Euro, but I’m saying what it
should be. Personally, I don’t think that giving the brand these qualities would hurt them one bit, in fact, they would probably do great.