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Automotive News & Views Are gas prices fueling your pain? 
10042 messages, Last post on Jul 12, 2008 at 3:07 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: gagrice (Apr 28, 2008 12:33 pm) So not worth it huh? |
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Replying to: texases (Apr 28, 2008 12:37 pm) I doubt this is ever the case, I would have to see the facts on that. I don't know of any company selling products for less than what they make them for... Asking price is retail. This inst what the dealership pays for it. Your trying to tell me that a vehicle retailing for $25k is costing the manufacture more than that? They would be loosing their butts on these cars and there wouldn't be any point in producing them.
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Replying to: lmpracetech (Apr 28, 2008 1:31 pm) Can happen. Ford's been said to lose money on each Focus it sells, but it has to to meet CAFE regs. And any year a company posts a loss, like the Big 3 have done lately, they're, in effect, losing money on each car they sell, on average. As to hybrids, GM has been forced by Toyota to pour lots of R&D into the Tahoe hybrid, so if you include that money, I'm sure they'll be in the hole on the hybrid effort for several years, at least. But it is great PR for them. |
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Replying to: lmpracetech (Apr 28, 2008 1:31 pm) Though the Prius may be profitable by now. Not sure about the Camry Hybrid...maybe, since it's an add-on technology to an existing vehicle.
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Our policies which try and cater to everyone from oil company executives to environmentalists and up benefiting no one, and now were all paying the price. Weve spent decades giving billions of dollars to in government subsides with incentives for the wrong things, weve mandated that huge areas of farmland stay open for conservation and were using grains that could feed tens of millions of people to make a crappy biofuel that you cant even buy anywhere. Where did i read this?
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Replying to: bpizzuti (Apr 28, 2008 1:37 pm) Its no wonder people are losing their jobs and the industry is in the dirt right now. How is anyone going to sustain a living when they are losing money everyday?
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Replying to: lemko (Apr 28, 2008 12:17 pm) Now there we don't know that guys physical condition, he may not be able to make that walk or it may be very difficult for him (her?) to do so. People do have physical conditions that limit how far the can walk. |
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this weekend, and I will tell you something, those truckers have SLOWED DOWN. The speed limit for trucks is 55, and there were many doing exactly that. Clearly they are in fuel conservation mode. I just paid $3.95/gallon for regular. 
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Replying to: gagrice (Apr 28, 2008 11:14 am) And where do you think those trackers placed their money just before they made that prediction? |
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Replying to: lmpracetech (Apr 28, 2008 1:48 pm) The math for the 2-Modes is easy to do since GM already gave us the variables. For the Toyota's it's just as easy to do the math when you look at the big picture. For example what is a Prius? It's a 1.5L ICE 5 door hatch with some geegaws..... and a battery pack, wiring, two motors, inverter, converter, and a simplified transmission. Are there any other vehicles like it to compare it with? Yep the Matrix is also a 5 door hatch but with a 1.8L engine and a traditional transmission. A non-hybrid Prius ( if such a thing existed ) would be a Matrix in a different shape selling for about $20,000 +/-. How much did the Prius cost to develop? Pick a number.... $1 Billion? $2 Billion? $4 Billion? $4 Billion ???????? that's a lot of money. Here's the comparison. GM in it's announcement said that the total R&D cost for the 2-Modes was $1 Billion...and they split that with Daimler and BMW. As of the end of 2006 Toyta had announced that it had sold 1 million hybrids ( that figure is probably closer to 1.4 million by now ). IF..... Toyota's hybrid development cost was $3 Billion or 3 times as much as GM, Daimler and BMW spent then when divided over 1 million units the cost per vehicle was $3000. But when 1 million vehicles was reached that initial cost was fully recouped. Well that makes sense because in May of 2007 Toyota reduced the price of the top trim Prius' by $2000 and kept the discount in place til the present. Why? Because the VOLUME necessary to amortize the initial expense was reached. Volume, volume, volume. So at what volume does GM have to be in order to reach its full amortization point. Well if the initial press realease is to be believed and the cost of R&D was $1 Billion split three ways, then assuming GM took the lead and also took most of the most cost then it's share would be say $500 Million. Divide $500,000,000 / 150,000 units and the cost per vehicle becomes...$3333. At 200,000 units the cost per vehicle drops to $2500 per unit. At 200,001 units the cost is $0. Fully recouped. All it takes is volume.
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