Potential Auction of Chrysler Motor Company

[hemotox]

Here is an interesting link as to the potential selling of Chrysler by Mercedes

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,252739,00.html

[Vypr Phil]

Thanks for the link Hemotox!

This reminds me a bit of a parallel story circulated a few months ago, when there was a lot of speculation about Hyundai buying Jaguar.  To date the "Leaping Cat" is still very much part of the Ford group.  Ford however is a bit more serious about the possible sale of Aston Martin to a moneyed suitor. 

That Chrysler is in deep trouble would be an understatement of industrial size.  Chrysler has massive excess inventory taking up huge chunks of real estate in and around Detroit.  The dealer/manufacturer relationship is very strained as producing more cars than dealers can sell has been a long-standing Chrysler problem.  There are also still many unsold 2005 and 2006 Vipers out there (Check out  E-bay: "Buy It Now" prices in the high 60's to low 70's foe 06's).

And let's not even mention the "Merger of Equals" fiasco. 

The Mercedes branch of Daimler Chrysler has made a serious mistake by going down-market, trying to be all things to all people, therefore diluting their image and prestige all while running into quality problems at all levels, making the old slogan "engineered like no other car" totally unbelievable. 

How is all this affecting us, the dedicated to fanatic Viper owners?

We can reasonably expect 2008 models to hit the showrooms sometime during this year, as development, testing and certification seem to be close to done.  I give the Viper team a lot of credit for going after meaningful mechanical upgrades, huge power increase, good torque increase, relevant engine development possibly leading to better fuel efficiency therefore benefiting us with better fuel mileage (I know, we can all afford the gas, but a bit of extended range would not bother me in the least), better clutch, transmission and differential.

Hopefully, all these upgrades might make the car a bit more "user-friendly" while benefiting from more power at the same time.  Due to obvious limited financial resources the design of the car was left intact in the cockpit and only marginally revised outer skin (the new hood is growing on me).

We can hope to see 2009 models, very much unchanged from the 2008 versions, assuming the 2008 sales reach expectations.

Will there be a Gen IV?  Unless a very talented outsider can turn this company around in a relatively short time period I would say that the future looks dreadfully bleak.

Hope for the best, in the meantime we should all enjoy our Vipers for the great machines they are.