Kill the Messenger - this time the LA Times

[wolf]

My first car, a 1984 Datsun 210, backfired with some regularity.

[xoxoxoBruce]

How many miles on it Wolf? Sounds like the catylitic was dead.

[wolf]

48K when I bought it, 88K when I traded it in.

The problem did actually stop eventually, about 2 years after I bought the car ... that would be "eventually" after the original exhaust cracked off in front of the cat and they had to replace everything from the manifold back ... including the cat.

[busterb]

Is not the photo in post #44 about the same drive train that's, was used in Snapper lawn mowers? To go faster it move to outside of disk.

[tw]

Previously posted were discussions about GM's Mona Lisa room, created by one who would later start the Saturn division. It was and still remains an example of why GM products are so bad.

Maryann Keller again writes, in waves, of problems in GM. An informed person best never misses what she writes about cars. Even the LA Times article (that created GM revenge) was not so damning. From the Washington Post of 12 Jun 2005 on page B1:

Dull at Any Speed
In a Detroit suburb in the late 1980s, General Motors established a large technical facility it called the Mona Lisa center, where its engineers disassembled Honda Accords and Toyota Camrys in a desperate search for the secret of their Japanese competitors' success. They analyzed the smallest pieces trying to figure out the best attributes to include in future GM models.

The reasons for GM's decline could have been found there on the floor of the Mona Lisa center, but not among the parts. It was the whole approach. Taking apart existing cars is a backward-looking exercise; it doesn't tell you what's going to sell four or five years down the road. So while GM was staring in its rearview mirror, its competitors were zipping ahead.

What ails GM today is much the same as what ailed it then -- and it's not just a matter of big pension plans, health care costs for workers or undervalued Asian currencies.

[richlevy]

This article is interesting.

GM Halts Stock Trading by Top Executives By DEE-ANN DURBIN, AP Auto Writer

DETROIT - General Motors Corp. has forbidden senior executives and other employees with access to internal financial information from buying or selling company stock indefinitely, a spokeswoman for the automaker said Monday.

GM spokeswoman Toni Simonetti said a memo was sent to senior executives May 24 barring them and some of their employees from buying or selling stock. Simonetti said she didn't know how many people were affected, but the company has about 400 senior executives.

Simonetti said GM regularly has blackout periods when employees aren't supposed to buy or sell shares, such as before quarterly earnings announcements. But this one is unusual because it's indefinite and was put in place because the company has declined to update its full-year earnings forecast since April.

"What's notable in this one is that it's been mandated right now because of the lack of financial guidance in the public domain," Simonetti said.

Simonetti said the ban will be lifted when GM's legal advisers feel it's appropriate to start trading again.

"I suspect that would be at a time when we are getting back to a routine environment here," she said.

At least this is a reverse-Enron, with senior management locked out and the rank-and-file able to bail if they want.

[tw]

GM now has lost something like $5billion this year. Trivial intelligence is necessary to appreciate why GM is losing so much money. Routinely perform HP/Liter calculations for their crappy engines. GM products need typically two extra pistons to obtain same horsepower. So the technology originally pioneered by GM in the early 1970s still will not be sold in that brand new car - using the same technology from 1955 models. From the NY Times of 4 Dec 2005:

Engines Go Back to the Future
GERMAN automakers gave up pushrod engines long ago, in favor of more complex overhead-cam power plants. The Japanese have essentially quit making the old-design engines. Ford is down to just a couple.

But Chrysler, with seven, and especially General Motors, with about a dozen in 21 different forms, remain bastions of the pushrod engine, also known as an overhead-valve design.

Not only has G.M. continued to carry forward older engine designs, like the famous "small block V-8" in your grandfather's 1955 Bel Air (and your son's 2005 Corvette), it has been designing new ones. The Chevy Impala offers two pushrod V-6's that are new for 2006.

Today we have another GM solution. Promote more MBA types into top management. From Bloomberg News of 6 Dec 2005:

GM's Henderson Is Finance Chief; Devine Stays 1 Year
General Motors Corp., the world's largest automaker, appointed Frederick Henderson chief financial officer and vice chairman to help end losses in North America after he trimmed jobs at its money-losing European business.

Henderson, 47, will replace John Devine, who will serve as a vice chairman, GM said in a statement today. Henderson will help Chief Executive Rick Wagoner eliminate 30,000 factory jobs and close 12 facilities in North America, where GM has lost $4.8 billion from its auto operations this year. ...

Henderson since June 2004 has led an effort that included slashing 12,000 jobs in Europe, where GM hasn't had an annual profit since 1999. The European business in this year's second quarter posted its first profit in five years, before slipping to a $382 million loss in the third quarter.

GM was once making a profit in that International division when Louis Hughes was runnning it. Hughes is a car guy. But Rick Wagoner, the finance guy (bean counter) who was running North American into losses, instead, got GM's top executive position.

Hughes left. MBA types ran his operation for years losing money. At what time does someone in GM start cutting the heads off of finance guys and start promoting car guys? When we finally drive this anti-American company into bankruptcy so that it will fix the problem - top management?

Can you believe it. They are still designing new engines with 1950 push rod, obsolete technology. Then promoting more of the problem - bean counters - to solve their crap product line.

Let's see. The government gave them how many hundreds of millions of dollars in 1994 to build a hybrid? Where are those products? It requires an MBA to worry about the product - to innovate. Finance people cannot innovate except on spread sheet. In some places, spread sheet innovation is still called fraud - when they don't contribute enough to Bush Cheney campaign funds.

Here's to all you fools who voted for an MBA educated (mental midget) president - and buy GM cars designed by MBAs. Thank you for pomoting the 'heart attack of America'.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

I believe in being fair to Republicans. You don't. I think that's known as bigotry, tw. Not a mental problem with me, but it keeps your mind in some pretty unsavory ruts.

I buy German autos, and voted twice for Bush. That's because I'm brighter than you, you know, and I never tire of reminding you of that. The Democratic Party is once again demonstrating they have no more ability to win the war than you do. Crankery is bad for your brain, laddie, but you aren't capable of understanding that.

[tw]

It has been another bad week for General Motors. Their bond rating has dropped two more notches to Grade B. One notch above a worst possible rating - Grade C. Bond analysts are being generous to GM. General Motor's product line under the MBA Rick Wagoner has become that worse. Their engines alone are some of world's worst.

Other automakers, since the 1970s, design new engines with overhead cams. GM will debut two new engines next year - both using 1950 technology push rod designs - not overhead cams. No problem. If George Jr can get a 47% approval rating by being incompetent, then enough stupid Americans will also buy this - what we already know will be - GM crap. Industry analysts who have seen what are coming have already panning those crappy products. So bad that those new products should be aborted in the foundry.

Wagoner would not know. Where is his driver's license?

Kirk Kerkorian had declared intentions to become a major GM stockholder as he was when Chrysler made a comeback. Kerkorian bought a maximum number of shares - 9.9%. Quietly last week, Kerkorian sold some 12 million of his 56 million shares. Obviously for major losses. But that suggests Kerkorian is coming to a same conclusion that both Carl Ichan and Warren Buffet had long ago concluded. GM will remain that poor an investment. Their bad management is that deeply entrenched.

While listening to Rush Limbaugh's show last week, who was a guest right after coming out of the White House? Rick Wagoner. That caught my attention. Why is Wagoner visiting the White House? Do you remember the $8+billlion that a mental midget president gave to the airlines with no strings attached? He did so and Americans said something equivalent of, "We don't care how many die in New Orleans." Airlines then burned through that money in months and went begging to George for more. A complete gift so that badly run airlines would protect their only problem - their MBA management.

So who is on George Jr's gift list this year? Let's see. A $450,000 campaign contribution from First Energy permitted them to keep running a nuclear reactor with its potential Three Mile Island problem. Happy Holiday. Citizens of Toledo don't matter when there is money to scoff. Will George Jr now gift Rick Wagoner so that stockholders don't rise up against Wagoner - an MBA with George Jr's competence? Well, Wagoner made same type of lame arguments on Limbaugh's show that George Jr also used to justify unauthorized wire tapping. With some basic newspaper reading, one should have seen right through his lies.

Somehow, Wagoner forgets to mention the pension funds and health benefit that were underfunded many years ago so that GM's 'profit and loss' sheets looked better. IOW the real losses should show more than $5billion hole that now exists. GM should make up those missing funds - with interest. So Wagoner claims those 'unfair' pension funds and health benefits cause GM's downturn. Bull. Those accounts should have been funded when employees were still working. Rick Wagoner and his predecessor used that money to cover up massive losses years ago. Rick Wagoner hopes you don't remember that missing fact when he blames others.

So yes. A visit to Rush Limbaugh - to talk to radio listeners who do not think. Who blindly believe what they are told. Who forget to ask why those pensions funds were so underfunded years ago. (Let’s not forget that George Jr can have a government Pension Guarantee Trust Fund pick up the tab for those pension funds - more corporate welfare.) After all if Rick Wagoner visited George Jr, then Rick Wagoner must be a good guy - to Rush Limbaugh listeners? Only if you believe in astrology, spontaneous regeneration, intelligent design, and that George Jr never lies.

GM in one month has become worse. Bet that your government will give GM free money - this time fund the underfunded GM pension fund. Only thing that will save GM is bankruptcy - so that American workers don't lose their jobs. Bankruptcy so that Rick Wagoner is removed. But George Jr will always protect rich people at the expense of workers. And then lie - claim he saved American jobs. George Jr will save the only job that provides rich campaign contributions - Rick Wagoner.

Will Toyota become the world's #1 automaker next year? Toyota announced next year's sales will increase another 10%. Toyota permits car guys - not bean counters - to design their products. Wagoner probably hopes to add Rush Limbaugh listeners as customers - so that he can continue getting rich as American workers (current and future) lose more jobs and their pensions.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

I believe in being fair to Republicans.

So do I. Notice how I never once mentioned what a crook Tom DeLay really is? Not that I expect Urbane Guerilla to be honest and mention it. That would be too honest and too much against his political agenda.

[Elspode]

Originally Posted by tw

But George Jr will always protect rich people at the expense of workers.

Well, duh. Isn't this some sort of Republican platform plank or something? For Republicans, everything starts with the business. The people who make up the workforce are simply pieces in the machine. Why do you think they call it "Human Resources"? People are just another tool to be managed, exactly the same as an inventory of spare parts or hard drives, man.

Labor costs money, it does not produce money. Or so goes the Republican financial theory. That's why jobs are being sent where people will do them for the least possible amount of money.

Don't think for a moment that people like Bush look at people like us as anything other than cattle, just as disposable, and just as subservient.

Disclaimer: The Democrats are no better.

[tw]

From MarketWatch.com on 21 Dec 2005:

Kerkorian's GM sale raises questions
The last time General Motors Corp. shares traded around these levels, Ronald Reagan was busy waging his war on drugs, Pac-Man was all the rage, and Michael Jackson's Thriller was flying off the shelves. ...

More than two decades later, Kerkorian is swimming in red ink with his investment in Detroit-based GM, shares of which fell as low as $18.99 on Wednesday. Estimates put his losses at more than half a billion dollars. ...

This could be the first step in Kerkorian's eventual exodus from GM, according to Peter Morici, professor at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at University of Maryland.

"I wouldn't be surprised if he looks for a different situation where people are more receptive to change than General Motors," he said.

While to some the move comes as a sign of Kerkorian's weariness in holding tight to his evaporating stock value, others on Wall Street are hesitant to draw too many conclusions.

Today, GM's stock dropped another 2.15%.

[busterb]

Michael Jackson's Thriller was flying off the shelves. ...
Some how I'm glad I missed that one.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by tw

So do I.

Not on the evidence, dear boy, not on the evidence. Threads with numerous posts by you that do not include less-than-justifiable railing at Republicans by you are more the exception than the rule.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Don't use a CVT in an electric final drive when you can have the series-wound motor. I understand this type does not need a transmission and its friction/heat losses because it develops high torque at near zero rpm. Useful for the motor-at-wheel kind of installation most electrics seem to be using.

Gravely brand power mowers also used a pretty feeble CVT back in the day. I used to wrestle one of the things as a teenager. The moving wheel was rubber-tired, the fixed wheel was steel. Power? -- not. This alleged self-propulsion was of some help getting the great heavy thing moving, but hell, I could push the thing along on my own legs two times faster than it could drive itself. Maybe the drive was prone to slippage, as I certainly never stalled it from (relatively) high speed that I can recall.