Thanks for the info. I wouldn’t mind test driving a Sonic, but I’d have to say that an Aveo would never been on my radar screen as far as buying. On a side note, the Chevy Cruze gets almost 40 mpg. hwy. while the “sister” car (Verano) coming out by Buick is projected to get worse gas mileage than a Malibu. It’s also larger in size to the Cruze, so it’s got less in common than what most other “sister” vehicles might have. Only the wealthier segment of people (who care little about mileage) will buy the Verano, but I’m hoping that GM realizes (if they don’t already) that the only way to win back or gain new customers is to promote the mileage and work on getting them up to the new standards before the competitors get too much ahead of them. That’s the only way they’ll ever be back on top (in my humble opinion).
“…but I’d have to say that an Aveo would never been on my radar screen as far as buying.”
That’s why I said it is a good thing the Aveo is no longer manufactured for the USA. It might continue to be sold in much of Asia, though.
the Mazda 2 is rated for 35 highway and would probably be pretty fun to drive
FWIW, Daewoo almost became a branch of Ford.
In 2000, Ford won the bidding war for Daewoo, offering up $6.9 billion. At the time Ford won, Daewoo was reportedly $18 billion in debt, and the creditors had agreed to write off the $11.1 billion difference.
Then Ford was allowed its due diligence period when it got to examine the books more closely.
They found out that Daewoo had cooked their books so badly that their debt was actually $79 billion, not $18 billion, and Ford would have been on the hook for a lot more money. What’s $61 billion between friends, right?
Needless to say, Ford pulled their offer and the Korean gov’t had to try to find another sucker to take Daewoo off their hands. They found GM, who agreed to buy most of Daewoo’s assets for $400 million (they didn’t buy the company directly - just the assets, sort of like new GM vs. old GM)… at the time, Daewoo was still losing near $4 billion per year.
bscar -
If someone is considering the Mazda2, they should look at the Ford Fiesta. They’re very closely related (same platform), but the Fiesta has better mpg…
Daewoo was a conglomerate. I think that the parent company was the one in deep financial trouble. They sold Daewoo Motors to GM. At least the automobile part. The commercial transit part was sold to someone else.
Daewoo (the conglomerate) was in financial trouble, but the auto arm was worse off than the parent. The auto arm alone was $79 billion in debt and lost near $4 billion per year when the conglomerate’s total losses were actually less…
The conglomerate didn’t sell Daewoo Motors to GM - the Korean government took over the entire conglomerate and then broke it apart prior to selling it off…
Honda’s response.
Either some copious amounts of illegal substance was consumed when he gave his response, or he was just too drunk from partying after landing his gig, but he disagrees with CR’s statements.
I dunno. The reporter may be the one that phoned it in. I didn’t see any quotation marks, and the article is not at all detailed. Anyway, what do you expect Honda Marketing to say?
I been saying this for years now. Honda makes great automotive appliances! They are the Maytag of car makers. Their cars are reliable to a fault with about as much excitement as your dishwasher.
Honda has killed off every cool car they ever made. Recounting from my own experience these beloved cars are all dead: Prelude, CRX, S2000, Element, even the Accord coupe. (I’m sure I’m missing a few)
It seems to be Honda’s belief that any car they make that actually raises the pulse rate of owners is to be discontinued. This careful “selection process” has resulted in the ultra-reliable, ultra-boring batch of cars.
If you are bored, check out Top Gear’s review of the Element.
http://www.streetfire.net/video/089-top-gear-honda-element_181916.htm
@Goofcat - the Accord coupe is still around.
Boring or not, their interior exectuion is not seen by consumers as up to other competitors in comparison tests. See Hands On Comparisons and check out ratings in a few segments.
Funny this should come up. My SO is looking to replace her aging car. We test drove a bunch of cars over the last couple of weeks. I was very disappointed in both the Civic and the Fit. The interiors weren’t all that good, and their performance was abysmal. We felt like we had to sit down and convince the car that, yes, we really did want to go highway speeds, and would like to accelerate to them some time before next week.
Comparing the Hondas to the Hyundais (Accent, Elantra), I think Honda is in trouble. The Hyundais are less expensive, have a much better warranty, better performance, and the styling is better to boot.
And that’s coming from a guy who’s had Hondas in his garage since his first car, and currently owns 2.
I don’t know but when we were test driving the CRV interior was much better than the RAV4 or the Rogue we looked at. We did not check the new Kia/Hyundai though.
I feel the interior of my Cx-7 is pretty good; the sand leather and carpeting and black dash give a nice 2-tone look.
It isn’t hard to have a better interior than the RAV4. What a horrible design that is. The CRV’s interior is nice - makes up for its exterior 
I’m on my fourth Civic, and I’ve driven each one pretty much into the ground. The first (1982) went 220,000 miles before I sold it; no telling how far it went after that. The next (1990) went 125,000 before being wrecked, the next (1995) went 145,000 before I sold it to a tuner (they love the '95 hatchback), and now I have a fully loaded 2010 sedan that I really like to drive.
Handling has steadily improved, along with size and comfort, so Honda has done a good job of following their customers through life. The engines generate quite a kick at high revs, which makes the cars fun to drive. The only consistent downer has been interior noise: for some mysterious reason, Honda can’t come close to Toyota on sound-proofing. (At least you can listen to the radio at 65 mph these days – that was impossible in the '82.)
I can’t comment on whether they’ve dropped the ball for 2012 in terms of engineering. CR’s gripes about design strike me as mostly nit-picking about personal preferences, but I have to agree they’ve gotten way too conservative on styling. Hyundai is taking risks and (mostly) getting it right; maybe there’s too much money at stake for Honda to take those kinds of chances.