Rumormill: Suburban, Escalade ESV moving to Lambda

[nailhead425]

Originally Posted by Caleb02

who cares(sic) the suv and full size trucks are a dying bread for the non commerical use person. IE the soccer mom and hockey dads do not need a truck or suv when a Honda Ridgeline will do just fine.

Yeah, don't take it off-road, or expect it to stop with a load.
By that logic an Aveo is a perfect family car.

Originally Posted by KingElvis

I follow this pretty closely. My understanding was that the 35mpg was for both cars and trucks, rather than having 'light trucks' get a special lower standard all to themselves.

But the over 8500lbs gvwr class has NEVER been regulated by CAFE - hence it's still only '1/2 tons' that have any standard applied at all.

If you have a link or info re the 8500lb thing, I'd like to check it out.

Nope, over 8600 lbs are still exempt.
Light trucks have a weight, payload and footprint average that hurts HHRs and helps Diesel 1/2 tons.
When Gov't types and media talking heads discuss the truck loophole, they mean car based minivans that the EPA classifies as trucks.

[Buick Riviera]

Originally Posted by crazyjkz

GM really must be insane for greenlighting the Suburban to be moved to the FWD Lambda platform along with the Escalade because just initially hearing that the Escalade might of been moved to the Lambda platform was bad enough, but to see that the Suburban is going as well is just plain ridiculous for GM to even consider let alone actually implement.

The next generation Suburban and Escalade should most definitely be moved to the RWD Zeta platform, and since the Zeta platform is ALREADY reinforced for towing and hauling it makes even more sense to do so because it would need very little modification for SUV use. Wake up GM, ask yourself who on earth would possibly consider buying a FWD Suburban? Am I missing something here??

Trust me it wouldn't be FWD. And how much can there zeta platforum tow?

[Hurricane]

Originally Posted by northernmi

Guess I will order my last "real" suburban in 2013!

Seriously. I am still amazed at this.

[PhishPhood]

Originally Posted by srd275

Dumb, Dumb, and Dumber.

When will GM realize that not everyone want's FWD?

What is it with them.

They already have the Traverse, Arcadia, Enclave to handle thoese that use those vehicles for more people hauling than trailer hauling.

GM WAKE UP! You cannot base a whole product lineup on trying to meet CAFE no matter what.

It was a mistake you guys did in the 80's with the cars.

Do you think people who were use to RWD Regals, Cutlass, Grand Prix were happy when they moved it a FWD.

It is one thing to offer FWD products, it is quite something else to expect all buyers to want it!

CAFE has little or nothing to do with the decision. I've explained it over and over again but to no avail. Whenever GM makes a major decision like this ( note that it's only GM ) they pull out their whipping boy ( CAFE ) to deflect attention from what the real reasons are. The vehicle makers, all of them, have discovered that the vast majority of the buying public, maybe as much as 90%, do not want heavy BOF vehicles. This is the market speaking.

Here are the facts...the auto makers are the ones that wrote the final bill that Dubya signed. It was they who got their wishes written into law. They will easily make CAFE 35 by 2015 and 2020 without a sweat ( explanation upon request ). But they can get their truck-based faithful up in arms by just putting the acronym CAFE in any press release thus generating 11 pages of vitriol against the evil government. This takes the heat off the ones that actually made the decision.

What they are saying is that those who do need and want a big hauler/tower can use a truck. But those that want a BOF SUV well your interests are being ignored. That unfortunately is part of being a minority interest in a business decision. It's only about cold hard cash. In this case it's about using limited resources to build products that will sell to the greatest number of buyers. It's survival.

GM/Ford and even Toyota of the next decade are not the giants that they were in the last century.

[aznative981]

Yeah, Ford? Hello? Yes, I will take the Expedition EL in the Kings Ranch version also. Ummm, Blue, with silver trimmins if possible. Yeah, the color that I had on my Suburban. Yeah, yeah, it is a joke what GM did to the 'burb...

For all of you who keeps asking "Who needs a full size 'burb, anyways?', I ask once again, where can I get a BOF full size SUV that:

Carries my family of 7

Carries the related cargo that goes with a family that large

Has real 4wd. You know, winter in Wyoming and all, camping with the Scout troop (remember, cargo and passenger room)

Can tow what I want, when I want, and yes I do use the towing (horse trailer, towing my pos BroncoII when it breaks down again, towing a camper trailer

and do all this in style an comfort?

Man, GM keeps getting worse and worse...

[MCGARRETT]

The other trick might be offer something like the unibody full size SUV to satisfy most full-size SUV buyers and the offer only SWB and LWB 2500 "cafe excempt" (read over 8600 GVWR )next gen Suburban for the BOF die hards.

[ponchoman49]

America has been on the decline for years starting in the 70's with the oil fiasco. All the decisions made up to this point have been either hair brained like the 5.7 GM diesel of the 70's and early 80's, the Vega with it's aluminum cylinder liners, the Pinto which exploded if you sneezed on it's bumper, the rot as you drive Toyotas and Hondas etc or stupid like tan black or gray only interior color choices of this dreadful decade or the "lets strip everything off the sides of our vehicles so they all look like plain generic stripo base cheap clone models". This news takes the cake as being the single most stupid asinine decision every made by a car company and really just tells me that GM won't be around much longer as a full car manufacturer.

When will the madness of this horrific decade stop!

[CadiEldo67]

How about a Lambda-Zeta platform? It could be premium enough for these rides, although I'm not sure how it helps with towing strength, Zeta is supposed to be very strong, but I don't believe its Escalade strong.

[Caleb02]

Originally Posted by nailhead425

Yeah, don't take it off-road, or expect it to stop with a load.
By that logic an Aveo is a perfect family car.



Nope, over 8600 lbs are still exempt.
Light trucks have a weight, payload and footprint average that hurts HHRs and helps Diesel 1/2 tons.
When Gov't types and media talking heads discuss the truck loophole, they mean car based minivans that the EPA classifies as trucks.

you can not tell me that you take or even have any use to take your suv off road. What reason would you even need to take a auto off road? We need to rethink our way of autos and how we use them. GM should reuse the t-models and the cavalier to create a new awd system part fwd part rwd and use that as the next suv trucks etc. A car should only need to seat 4 or 5 people for safety reasons. also cars dont need a radio and other infotainment. the driver should be in a cone of silence.

[Caleb02]

Originally Posted by fan

Designing a platform - Lambda 2 - for the crossovers and another one for the Chrysler\Dodge minivans could not make alot of sense. Don't think there are significant differences between the two styles of paltforms. The current Chrysler minivans won't be transferred to current Lambda anyway, since they are good enough sellers. The next Lambda would be designed taking more into account minivans, so they should be ok. I mean GM considered minivans on the current Lambda. They are wide, FWD\AWD, good towing rates. Engines are ok - what could be wrong about Lambda minivans. Ultimately, they could modify Lambda to perfectly fit the requirements for a minivan, but not so sure about a dedicated platform.

Regarding towing on Lambda...
The truck platforms are meant for towing. I think that modifying Lambda to allow towing rates (10000 lbs) comparable with GMT900 or C3xx would make them more expensive and possibly heavier. I'd rather see them cheaper and tow 4000 lbs (crossovers and minivans) than expensive for the sake of towing.

Anyway, since the C3xx truck plan is gowing forward, it would be an easy and acceptable fix to have a longer crew cab version for those that want to tow and carry 6 people. 1\2 with longer crew cabs and shorter beds would be ok for most, not necessarily Ram Mega Cabs; or 'a box on top' .

gm should just commite suicide and be done with it or do the right thing and place the trucks on the caviler platform. and that of the t-body chevette and then merge the corvette to fwd

[SierraGS]

Originally Posted by neqqy

The economy does not follow a textbook supply versus demand model because the financial markets are manipulated. Regular gas prices will go back up into the three to four dollar range sooner than you think. In part due to OPEC but also because of increased taxation that will raise the price floor. Platform plans have to be made five to seven years out. In six years, gas will not be two dollars per gallon, I assure you. I am in touch with people in environmental groups and they are feeling highly empowered about change. Take that as a warning. Joe the plumber will just have to pack his smaller vehicle more efficiently before he drives to the job site.

I agree that the economy will probably continue to sputter for the next several years intermixed with brief uptrends. In the short term, oil prices will of course bottom out then normalize but even at $100 a barrel, our bi-partisan Congress was doing laughably little to encourage alternative fuel development. No petroleum alternatives are anywhere near developed enough to sustain global fuel demand anytime soon. It would take tremendous funding and research to find that solution, but money is instead being diverted to widen the income gap. With current prices, it is true that people are buying full-sized vehicles again but consumer spending/saving habits prove that the average American does not think about tomorrow. These same people will be crying big baby tears to the media when they again have to drop a Benjamin every time they top off their BOFV.

The environmental groups are forgeting one thing about change - everything they propose has to work perfectly and quickly since there are no scapegoats to pin "problems" on and higher taxes on gas will result in a depression in the world economy plain and simple and the "green movement" will end - quickly.

The problem with $100 a barrel oil is not the $4.00 a gallon gas - it is the $5.00 - $7.00 a gallon Milk, $5.00 a loaf of bread and the $6.00 a dozen eggs.

Companies held back these massive increases in basic food stuffs this last "oil bump" it will not happen next time, the "big baby tears" will be from starving babies and someone will have to answer for it.

We need a comprehensive 20 yeat energy policy starting with oil drilling and transitioning to over 50% renewables from U.S. based sources and even oil producing countries will support something along these lines because the "cheap oil" is going away and the world economies cannot transition fast enough or at a high enough volume to sustain $70+ barrel oil.

If the environmental groups want "change" that will work they need to accept drilling in the short term and create a viable transition plan to get to alternatives in the long term - there are no "silver bullets" and any successful plan will take 10-20 years to be fully implemented.



Back on topic, why is GM "moving" the Suburban to the Lambda when it already has the Traverse/Acadia/Enclave in the volume Tahoe/Yukon/Escalade/1500 Suburban slot?

The buyers that need a BOF SUV will still buy them but in much lower numbers, and with GMC/Cadillac sell in sufficient volume to justify keeping them on the GMT900/CX300 - in short the market will go back to the early 80's when the Minivan boom started and families will replace most BOF SUV's with Minivans and Mid (Equinox) and large (Traverse) Crossovers and some will move to small (HHR) crossovers and even wagons like the Insignia and Astra if GM would only offer them.

[ausrutherford]

By the time GM gets towing numbers o Lambda up to 8000, Ford will have the Expy/Nav up to 12000

[goblue]

Originally Posted by ausrutherford

By the time GM gets towing numbers o Lambda up to 8000, Ford will have the Expy/Nav up to 12000

And the only people who will be able to afford the 12K trailer will be exactly the type that would never pull it.

The typical thinking doesn't work anymore. You'll see Toyota abandoning their BOF vehicles, Ford will follow suit soon.

There will be a place for pickups, and if gas stays down or ethanol takes off, the platform will be there.

However, GM thinks that they can get better packaging, good towing, lighter weight, and better fuel economy to better align with the way most people were using their Tahoes. We'll see. The H1 has an IRS. The usual rules don't always apply.

Maybe GM can make a 9K unibody tow rated Tahoe with a fantastic suspension, true 4WD and better economy and weight that the current gen. A Suburban with unibody packaging would have amazing space and utility. It would exceed the current Lambdas. That would be fantastic.

[ausrutherford]

Originally Posted by goblue

And the only people who will be able to afford the 12K trailer will be exactly the type that would never pull it.

The typical thinking doesn't work anymore. You'll see Toyota abandoning their BOF vehicles, Ford will follow suit soon.

There will be a place for pickups, and if gas stays down or ethanol takes off, the platform will be there.

However, GM thinks that they can get better packaging, good towing, lighter weight, and better fuel economy to better align with the way most people were using their Tahoes. We'll see. The H1 has an IRS. The usual rules don't always apply.

Maybe GM can make a 9K unibody tow rated Tahoe with a fantastic suspension, true 4WD and better economy and weight that the current gen. A Suburban with unibody packaging would have amazing space and utility. It would exceed the current Lambdas. That would be fantastic.

Well with everybody getting out, one auto maker can take over the whole segment and have a monoply on it and that will be Ford.

[PHAT-JAY]

I cannot believe this, this is the dumbest thing GM can do since getting rid of real full size rear wheel drive cars. I have a new body style avalanche and outside of my vette its the best car/truck I have ever owned, Its styling and function are both great. I went to Penske Chevrolet a few weeks ago to put deposit on new Camaro while I was there I test drove a Traverse, that thing sucks, even the sales person told me why would people pay $45+ for a fwd Piece-Of-Sh*#!!!!! and they can buy 4x4 2009 Tahoe with all the bells and whistles for $40k with a little less fuel economy. People buy BIG trucks because they/we need them, NOBODY IS GOING TO BUY A FWD P-O-S TO TOW ANYTHING!! Another mistake that makes GM what it is today, and nowhere close to what it used to be!