Like the title says, this is a little bit of a rant....

I have been watching a lot of TV lately, because of the Olympics and I noticed some comercials .... comercials I find completely misleading and it sickens me some companies are willing to run themm

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Lexus
What Lexus is doing: They are running new commercials cmlaiming how innovative they are putting TPMS in their cars

What is TPMS: Tire Pressure Monitoring System is a system of four sensors places inside tires that send info about the air pressure to a central unit. If the pressure falls 30% under the spec, it lights a warning light and sounds an alert sound

Why is this not innocative: Besides being an old system, and option on plenty of cars (my 2004 Mazda3 has it) it is REQUIRED on all 2007 Model Year vehicles.

In other words.. it is something like advertising having basic frontal airbags and basic seatbelts ..


GM
What GM is Doing: GM is running ads saying they are THE manufactutrer promoting E85 in their vehicles.. and we should buy them because it hass les emissions, is renewable and is not-imported from foreign countries

What is E85: E85 is a mix of 85% Gas and 15% Ethanol. There is about unde r10% of Ethanol in regular gas on regular engines... but to run higher content the engine needs to be prepared for it. Ethanol has the nice feature of being produced from Corn which besides being a domestic source is also renewable. It has slightly lessemissions and sometimes improves mileage

Why is this not innovative: Besides Ford outselling GM on E85 vehicles and even having E85 hybrid in the pipeline, the campaign lies about E85. Someone calculated that even if we switched all US automobiles to E85 we would reduce the dependence on foreign oil only VERY marginably... we would kil about a couple days of import a year. Lastly, again it is an old technology that has been pushed plenty of times, but it held up bu lack of filling stations ...

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I know this little rant fits nicely into my two hated manufacturers, but it is just too much for my stomach... The lies sicken me...

BTW ofr my credit , I love the new saturn comercials showing off Sky, new Vue and Aura

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Igor

I've seen more than just Lexus boasting about the tire pressure monitoring. I agree that it's sort of funny that they are simply implementing a system that will be required on all cars soon, but because they have the system in place before the deadline they act like "look what we've got that the competition doesn't" even though soon enough all cars will have it.

The GM thing bugs me too... I know I've seen at least Rangers using flex-fuels as far back as 2000 or 2001. There could be other vehicle or they coulda been further back than that, but all these corn ads with GM online are sorta annoying.

I mean Ford (well, Lincoln) had a Town Car (or its Mercury equivalent, whatever!) with the little road and leaf badge at this year's Autoshow. Didn't see any flex GMs... didn't spend hardly any time in the GM section either.

Originally posted by Lil PZEV
The GM thing bugs me too... I know I've seen at least Rangers using flex-fuels as far back as 2000 or 2001. There could be other vehicle or they coulda been further back than that, but all these corn ads with GM online are sorta annoying.

I mean Ford (well, Lincoln) had a Town Car (or its Mercury equivalent, whatever!) with the little road and leaf badge at this year's Autoshow. Didn't see any flex GMs... didn't spend hardly any time in the GM section either.

Yeah Ford http://www.e85fuel.com/information/ford.php
And GM:http://www.e85fuel.com/information/general_motors.php

GM seems to have just switched over some engines...

Igor...

the corvette had a tire monitoring system sometime in the early 90's i believe.

Originally posted by teddyrob
the corvette had a tire monitoring system sometime in the early 90's i believe.

Yeah my point.. it is not very widepsread, because it is a little bit annoying with aftermarket rims... but it has been around for ages.. otherwise NHTSA would not make them required...

Igor

Tire pressure monitor first became available for the Corvette in the 1989 model year according to my quick check, so yeah, it's nothing new. In my opinion, the requirement that all new cars have a TPMS is just another electronic nanny because there are too many careless people out there who never bother to actually check their tire pressure, even though tires are one of the most critical components on a vehicle.

^^^yea, and the next most crucial thing about a vehicle is gas, and some people dont even pump their own.......no surprise.

dude, have you seen the one for Toyota (I think) pushing automatic rain sensing windshield wipers !?

I hate to say this, but most people are totally clueless when it comes to automobiles. That's why cars like the Chevy Impala can still be amongst the top selling cars in the US.

The worst part is how stupid some of this technology is. Tire pressure monitoring only became a new reg after Ford royally screwed up their Explorer. If the regulations really want to limit roll overs, there should be a maximum centre of gravity allowable. Of course this is hard to explain to the drooling public...

E85 is a bit of a sham because there is not enough arable land in the world to grow enough fuel to replace oil. That's even assuming that we starve ourselves. The real solutions are much tougher to accept: limit air travel, ban large passenger vehicles, improve public transport, heavily tax goods based on how far they are transported. I think some of these ideas would be considered extreme by Ralph Nader, let alone the guy lusting after a new Escalade.

Igor: if you want a really good read that will boil your blood, read LJK Setright's "Drive On!". LJK points out a hundred such marketing schemes.

^^^^ Gotta remember that most people on this list are car lovers, or at the very least car appreciaters... while for the average public they're more of an appliance, and the only time they get attention is when they don't work.
(BTW, this is in agreement with your first line [:)] )

A point of clarification.
E85 is 85% ethanol & 15% gasoline. Not the other way around. e85fuel.com

The reason GM is touting E85 vehicles is because the government has been giving Ford and GM credits on CAFE requirements for years for producing Flexfuel vehicles. However, the government has recently debated the value of the credits because people do not use the E85 fuel in their cars. Ford and GM responded by stating they cannot force people to use E85 in their Flexfuel cars. Ford and GM do not want to lose these CAFE credits. So GM is touting E85 to "enlighten" people on E85 so they can keep the credits coming.

Originally posted by shlbygt
A point of clarification.
E85 is 85% ethanol & 15% gasoline. Not the other way around. e85fuel.com

The reason GM is touting E85 vehicles is because the government has been giving Ford and GM credits on CAFE requirements for years for producing Flexfuel vehicles. However, the government has recently debated the value of the credits because people do not use the E85 fuel in their cars. Ford and GM responded by stating they cannot force people to use E85 in their Flexfuel cars. Ford and GM do not want to lose these CAFE credits. So GM is touting E85 to "enlighten" people on E85 so they can keep the credits coming.

Yeah thanks for the E85 clarification.... I realized it after I posted it... but forgot to edit the post...


And I thought I heard something about the credits... Yeah Ford was the first to use E85.. and outsels GM on them.. also their response to the threats is by building a network of filling stations in the midwest....

So much for www.onlygm.com <<------That is where GM wants you to go...

Igor

Except for the fact that studies showed earlier this year that Ethanol fuel actually costs more energy to produce that it saves. IE the manufacturing, shipping, distribution, etc. actually uses more fuel than it creates.

http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/July05/ethanol.toocostly.ssl.html

Bring on Hydrogen, LPG, and diesel baby!

Ford's SUV's have a different valve stem that incorporates the sensor for the tire pressure system. You can remove the stem/sensor from the OE wheel and use it on custom wheels. We've had several customers do that. Our former genreal manager had a King Ranch Expedition that he had custom wheels put on and they had to take them back off to put the sensors back on.

The Corvettes had a band that went around the wheel itself. IDK if they still use that system or not. It's been almost seven years since I did GM parts.