I remember when Daewoo went under, the local dealership was selling them, "Buy one, get one" :cornut:
I kinda feel bad for Fiat. They left the market on a sour note way back when. It seems like nothing is going right for them now that they are trying to re-enter the US market. Everything that can go wrong seems to be going wrong. The poor dealers are taking a hit I'm afraid. That has to trickle down to how the customers get treated when they come in for service.....
Hang on just a sec... Feeling sorry for them would be OK if something were happening that was beyond their control. Their president lied, fabricated, and mislead. Now they are getting their arses handed to them. I don't feel sorry for them any more than I feel sorry for Chrysler and GM. They suck. They have proven it for decades by shoveling massive loads of crap out their factory doors. FIAT keeps getting their butts kicked here because they decided to do things stupid... AGAIN. :frown2:
Just can't believe that without a solid brand like BMW to piggyback into the market on as Mini did, they didn't release the Abarth along with the 500....and made their dealers build Fiat only stores....
I think if they could have combined Alfa with the Fiat at the dealership they would have appealed to a broader base.
That was the plan. Year 1 was to get the 500's out there. They were late, poorly marketed leading to slow sales. In November the combined 131 Fiat dealers in the US sold 100 Fiats. That's a whole of steaming not good. Alfa's were to start rolling in as 2012's. Now it will be 2013's at best. Lancia was discussed for 2014, who knows now. All this and Dodge is reviving the Dodge Dart based on an Alfa Romeo Giulietta. The Alfa is a pretty car too. Now if I'm a Fiat dealer that looking over my very trendy looking expensive yet deserted showroom this is not good news to me at all. Gonna piss off these guys. There are four teaser shots Dodge has released. The Dart will be at the 2012 Detroit Auto Show.
Those teaser shots are great... Unfortunately, when it comes out, it is still facing one horrible reality; It's still a Dodge. Unreliable. Crappily built. Or in the words of Nathan, a whole lot of steaming not good.
I have to give defense here..... My husband has an '03 Jeep Rubicon. He has completely abused this thing. It is the only vehicle that has always started and been consistent for him... even after he parked it on it's roof at his last competition. I rate it way over my MINI and any other vehicle any day in terms of reliability.
Even a monkey can play Beethoven... :biggrin5: That is great. Glad you had a winner. Most do not. And the Jeep is a bit of an enigma anyhow. Jeeps tend to be better than the rest of the Chrysler brands for reasons unknown to me.
Have a friend that has well over 300,000 miles on his Cherokee and is just now doing a motor rebuild. I would have no problem owning a Jeep. That said a few years back my mother bought a top of the line Chrysler and by 30,000 miles it drove and road like it was worn out and in just over two years old she dumped it for a Volvo..... But maybe we all should step down from our high horses and be realistic; in comparison to say a Lexus, the Mini Cooper is by no means a super reliable car brand, not bad but not great. Just Thanksgiving I told a Brother in law who lives in a town where the nearest Mini dealership is a couple hours away, not to buy one for his wife, my wife's sister.....sorry but Honda they are not. But me do love mine!!!
It is a motor developed by BMW and Chrysler, built in Brazil, so yes we do have a bit of Chrysler. But we don't like to dwell on it.....lol
One of the most reliable things about the R50-R53 is that Chrysler lump under the hood. Many great things have come from Brazil. The Peugeot lump in the newer MINI seems to be less reliable. Only time will tell once folks pile the miles on. I'm hoping they prove reliable so I can buy one in the future once I wear my old Brazilian one out. :wink:
You must be talking about the "S" version of that engine, right? :lol: BTW: How many miles is a "Brazilian" anyway? Jim
I have already lived the nightmare.....don't get me wrong, there was a lot about Fiats that I liked and I generally had pretty good luck with them....that said..... In the mid 70's our Porsche+Audi dealership was having trouble surviving, we couldn't get near enough Audis and Porsche prices had doubled in only a couple of years. The owner decided to add another line and we all hoped it was Honda (even tho Honda really didn't have that good a rep or even products in the early-mid 70's) but instead, we were informed we were becoming the local FIAT dealer. Things went OK, we got and sold a lot of cars, didn't make a lot of money on them, but did a lot of warranty work and later regular service work. 6 months later we added Alfa Romeo - the thing I remember most besides how difficult it was to get the engines to run smoothly (in all fairness a lot of cars didn't run well in the mid 70's due to emmissins requirements) with the spica mechanical fuel injection was the fact that the cars frequently came off the truck with rust holes in the bodies! The final straw was the addition of Lancia. I really liked how the Beta Coupes drove and handled, although they were way underpowered, but quality and reliability were not hallmarks of Italian car manufacture in those days. I had hopes that times had changed for the better, but I'm not so sure based on what I've seen so far. Time will tell.....and it may be a bit early to judge.
Just not sure what they expected. They partner with the lowest quality manufacturer in the States who already has one foot in the grave (would be IN the grave had the bailouts not been forced on us). They had a golden opportunity to reintroduce their brand and perhaps have a huge win, but then not only missed the train, but fell on the tracks in front of it.