Jeremiah 29:11

I still feel like I have legs.


February 10, 2008

Chicago Auto Show

Tasty Morsels on a Limited Menu


By LAWRENCE ULRICH
WITH no real rivals in its path, a hot-orange Dodge muscle car smoked the field at the 2008 Chicago Auto Show.

The show, which opened for press previews on Wednesday and runs through Feb. 17 at McCormick Place, follows prominent events on the international circuit in Frankfurt, Los Angeles and Detroit, filling a lull ahead of next month’s exhibitions in Geneva and New York. Those higher-profile shows gobbled up the season’s major model unveilings, leaving mostly crumbs for Chicago.

That left the showroom version of the Dodge Challenger, a car introduced as a design study in Detroit two years ago, as the center of attention among the Windy City introductions. The 2008 Challenger SRT8, a virtual Xerox of the 1970 original, is powered by a 6.1-liter 425-horsepower Hemi V-8 and should burn from zero to 60 m.p.h. in 4.9 seconds, Chrysler said. It goes on sale in June starting at $40,095, including a $2,100 gas guzzler tax, and will be followed in the fall by a broader line of V-6 and V-8 models that will be announced at the New York auto show.

Michael J. Accavitti, marketing director of Dodge and the SRT series vehicles, said that while cars such as the Challenger drank their share of fuel, the performance market still had legs.

“It would be naïve to think we could build these for the next 50 years,” Mr. Accavitti said. “But enthusiasts who put great value on the driving experience are willing to pay extra in fuel to get it — that doesn’t make them bad people.”

It was not only sporty coupes that drew from the past. The GMC Denali XT Hybrid Concept ran with the car-meets-pickup theme once offered by the Chevrolet El Camino and the Ford Ranchero. Based on the same rear-drive global platform that underpins the coming Pontiac G8 sedan, the Denali XT combines intimidating styling with a 326-horsepower V-8 and General Motors’ new two-mode hybrid system.

G.M. said it had no plans to produce the Denali XT, but a GMC spokesman, Randy Fox, said car-based trucks might have a future even as sales of traditional compact pickups have evaporated.

Ford’s determination to import some of its global-market successes to the United States could be seen in the debut of the Transit Connect, a space-efficient compact delivery vehicle that is popular in European cities. Sharing the tall and narrow proportions of the Dodge Sprinter commercial van (though it is much smaller than the Sprinter), the gawky Transits will be offered only to commercial customers at first — caterers, florists and the like — beginning in 2009. A Ford spokesman, Alan Hall, said the Turkish-built Transit could eventually be sold to everyone.

Many announcements in Chicago offered little more than cosmetic freshenings, updates that might serve dealers and customers well but didn’t exactly set off show fireworks. Those included 2009 facelifts of the Acura RL and Mitsubishi’s Galant, Eclipse and Eclipse Spyder. Other introductions were for offshoots of existing products: a pickup version of the Hummer H3, to be called — here’s a leap of creativity — the Hummer H3T; and the Chevrolet Traverse crossover, a bowtie-badged sibling of the Buick Enclave and Saturn Outlook.

Journalists and industry analysts gave a cool reception to the Volkswagen Routan, a modified Dodge Caravan minivan that seemed to glisten with flop sweat under the Chicago lights. Unable to bring its acclaimed Microbus concept to production, VW turned to Chrysler for a hand in getting a minivan into its American showrooms.

The partnership was struck during the tenure of Wolfgang Bernhard, the former high-ranking Chrysler executive, during his short run at VW. Chrysler will begin building the Routan at its Ontario minivan plant later this year.

Here are some

kramtrah

I still got my legs too an despite the cost in gas, my legs feel stronger today knowing the Challenger will soon be mine!

Jeremiah 29:11

I saw our gas just dropped to $2.76/gallon. So it is certainly going in the right direction.

kramtrah

we are down to about $3.05 a gallon here in Seattle and while I agree it has gone down, it makes me laugh when we celebrate that its headed down towards $2.50.

Jeremiah 29:11

I am sure these lower prices are short lived.

RoswellGrey

You can be SURE gas will go up ... the day you buy your Challenger.

BurntGauge

Will it need premium or will regular suffice?

Albeeno

I paid $2.99 / gallon yesterday in MA. The lowest I've seen it around here was last week and I paid $2.87 / gallon at the time.

DSkippy

Thought I posted this, must not have finished the post. But anyone remember 87 cents a gallon in the late 90's....how far we've come is such a little time. I've been encouraging my mother who owns a 30 some odd foot RV and an oddly thirsty Liberty to put some of her retirement money in petroleum companies. Figure, it will hurt her less when she sees gas go up, 'cause she can at least take comfort that her stock is rising with it! ;-)

Dodge Favre ever

Checkout www.gasbuddy.com for local gas prices in your area.