Best-selling cars of April 2010; Top-20 list

[ifcar]

http://www.examiner.com/x-1017-Autos-Examiner~y2010m5d3-Bestselling-cars-of-April-2010

[Nethead]

Honda & Ford battle it out with three each in the top ten, but Toyota's sales setback is probably about to end--especially with Toyota's incentives being continued into May.  I'm surprised that there aren't three Toyotas in the top ten anyhoo.  Hyundai finally has an entry in the top ten, and I expect that will remain the case.  

Biggest surprise of all is the torpedo that the Altima took amidships and now has waves breaking over the bow--WTF happened here???  Women & children to the lifeboats, please...The SonDude has an Altima 2.5S 6-speed manual and it has had a lot of warranty issues in the roughly three years that he has had it.  He's easy on cars, but he does put on the miles.  Nissans were better vehicles when they were still made in Japan.  Toyotas probably were, too.  OTOH, our former Accord was built in Japan and it suffered a reliability collapse at the three-year mark and was a sorry-assed POS when we managed to dump it off on a car dealer four years thereafter.  Go figure?

The Ram pickup is having a hard time getting traction in the current marketplace.  Maybe "That thang got a Hemi innit?" is coming home to roost...But then GMC is sorta off the scope, too, and will likely get the axe in the next round of GM downsizing.  With the highest-placed Chrysler in seventeenth, it won't be much of a challenge for Chrysler-badged Fiats to show some big improvement over the legacy Chrysler products.  OTOH, Fiats have a dismal history in the US and the Nethead here can't see how badging them as Chryslers will erase the collective consciousness of the Ghost of Fiats Past.  Marchionne might wanta brush up on the particulars of what makes a really cushy golden parachute in his spare time...Fiats, Simcas, Vauxhalls, and Renaults have all been here--and most were glad to see them leave here or didn't notice that they were here at all...

Let's hope the sinking of that oil rig in the Gulf doesn't generate more "the sky is falling" posturing by the oil companies to justify an additional $.45--$.75 US at the pumps...If that happens, whatever progress has been made in the economy will get tanked hard--and the auto industry will be facing the Fall of 2009 all over again...

[ifcar]

The Altima had a huge March, so I guess they either depleted their inventory or used up their customer base.

[Nethead]

The Altima had a huge March, so I guess they either depleted their inventory or used up their customer base.

I hope that was it--Nissan needs the Altima to succeed...