Dammit, Carlos Tavares, I just can’t quit you. I’m committed to giving Stellantis a chance to undo all the damage done to the company since it became a company. But just when I think I’m out, they pull me back in. And by “they” I mean “executives with an ax to grind who want to talk dirt about CT.”
Based on traffic this morning, it’s clear the Dodge Charger Daytona review is something y’all want to talk about so I’ll give you another chance in today’s Morning Dump. Sam did his typically thorough job so there’s no shortage of topics worth covering, so it’s worth thinking about the news that Tavares ignored North American execs, combine it with the return of Tim Kuniskis, and consider what could have been… or what might be.
We aren’t going to CES this year and I’m sad because the mood is going to be weird. Every year car execs love to go and talk about the future and then introduce stuff that inevitably flops. This year the talk of CES is going to be less about the far future and more about what happens next year under a new president.
In that context, GM’s latest moves make a lot of sense. You can prepare for uncertainty, believe it or not, and GM is ready for it. Is VW ready for it? The company has been in the middle of a union fight in Germany that’ll involve cutbacks, but here in America, the automaker is offering wage hikes.
So You’re Saying There’s A Chance…
I’ve already written too much about Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares leaving, so I skipped sharing the CNBC article from earlier this week featuring mostly North American employees complaining about the French guy who clearly few of them liked. It was well-reported, but I don’t want to be accused of piling on after basically calling this outcome back in April. It’s unseemly. There’s taking a bow and then there’s grandstanding.
While editing Sam’s review last night it struck me that I probably should reference the article, especially when he went into full detail about how the Charger’s new platform was designed to be flexible enough to take any powerplant. It’s why this version is currently offered as a BEV or a Hurricane inline-six powered model, though a plug-in hybrid is likely.
Could a V8 be likely, too? Let’s refer to the article, which quotes a lot of anonymous people spilling a lot of (probably accurate) tea:
Sources said his perceived arrogance toward some U.S. hourly and salaried employees peaked this summer when Tavares — who lives in Europe and was compensated nearly $40 million last year in salary, stock and other benefits — publicly announced that he would spend time in North America for a few days to fix problems during his summer break. Such a break is a regular occurrence in Europe but not in the U.S., where sources said it rubbed some employees who don’t get a monthlong vacation the wrong way.
Meanwhile, U.S. leaders, due to the time difference, dealt with regular hourslong meetings in the middle of the night — before having to work their full U.S. day — as well as a smug sense of intellectual supremacy from Tavares and a dismissal of opinions, specifically regarding product planning, the sources said.
“When Tavares started, he said the center of the company is somewhere in the Atlantic … but it became very clear to us that the center of the company was in France,” said a former Stellantis executive.
The article mentions the time Tavares took a break from his month-long vacation in August to visit North America for a couple of days to “send a clear signal” that Tavares was serious. Clearly, the message it sent was “this guy sucks.”
More relevant to our interest in the Charger is this section of the article:
Sources said Tavares’ cost-cutting measures also included simplifying vehicles such as the Jeep Grand Cherokee while increasing its pricing above market norms; outsourcing critical engineering work to lower-cost countries and consultants such as France-based Capgemini; and micromanaging budgets and decisions to a point where U.S. leaders felt they had their hands tied behind their backs. A notable one included killing the automaker’s popular V-8 Hemi engines.
“Everybody wanted to keep [Hemi],” said one source. “But it was, ‘You need to be greener’” and there was little to nothing they could do to change the decision.
That’s a strong statement. “Everybody” wanted to keep the Hemi!
In fairness to Tavares and Stellantis, the perceived upcoming CAFE changes would make it hard to sell a V8 given that the company has few offsets in the rest of its lineup at the moment. Still, where there’s a will there’s a way, and that cost can be passed onto consumers. Ford is making it work with the Mustang.
This seems like a huge loss for a brand that became known for V8 power and the return of Tim Kuniskis, the exec most associated with the brand’s muscle image, makes me think the return of the V8 in the Charger isn’t that far-fetched. Most people bought V6-powered Chargers, but they bought them because of the image the big V8-powered version conveyed.
A super expensive, limited edition V8 Charger just makes sense to me.
CES 2025 Will Be Strange
I had to keep the above caption with the image because it’s just too good and is a great intro for what’s coming.
Yesterday I led TMD with the notion that carmakers make bad tech companies, and I didn’t mention the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that occurs in Las Vegas every January. My mistake. The “let’s be tech companies” mania that took over car companies a few years ago could easily be seen with the transition from CEOs making big announcements at the Detroit Auto Show to the similarly-timed CES.
CES is coming up and I’m a little sad I’m not going because I love awkward vibes. According to this Automotive News preview, the vibes seem Tim Robinson-levels of uncomfortable:
The annual technology showcase occurs in the twilight days of one administration and on the precipice of the next one, and the latter is expected to bring seismic shifts in transportation policy that reverberate across the auto tech landscape.
“That’s going to be the shadow hanging over CES,” said Jeffrey Hannah, chief commercial officer at consulting firm SBD Automotive.
Oh, hey, Sam is quoted in this one:
Pre-COVID, the technology showcase became a de facto auto show, as car companies sought to recast themselves as technology and mobility companies.
More recently, “I don’t think they felt like they were getting the return on investment they were hoping for in terms of changing that perception,” Abuelsamid said.
Does this mean the January Detroit Auto Show is going to be good?
GM’s Subtle Restructuring
If I had a nickel for every time someone mentions that GM has been ahead of the curve with some product or idea only to back down I’d have at least enough money to buy a nice dinner.
Is that fair? Few of the people who run GM now were running the company back when it killed the EV1 or abandoned the Corvair Turbo. This current iteration of GM’s leadership did prematurely end the Bolt, and that’s bad, but right now the company seems to have been slowly reforming its business to prepare for an uncertain future.
In that light, the abandonment of Cruise isn’t GM backing away from another good idea but, instead, the company getting ahead of big changes in the automotive industry.
At least that’s the story the Detroit Free Press is peddling this morning:
“When I first saw the news, I thought, ‘Oh thank God! It’s the new GM,’ “ Mike Ward, managing director of research at Freedom Capital Markets, told the Free Press Wednesday. “The old GM would have been stubborn and kept throwing billions at it. GM can’t compete with Waymo. GM doesn’t need to be in the robotaxi business. This move shows capital discipline. What got GM into bankruptcy in 2008? Undisciplined capital allocation, plain and simple.”
It’s the new GM!
VW Workers In Tennessee Offered 14% Wage Increase
Being a global company, Volkswagen is simultaneously threatening to close plants in Germany and offering to raise wages in the United States. Why? The UAW, high on the success it had in Detroit, finally managed to unionize Volkswagen’s plant in Tennessee.
VW quickly recognized the union and has been bargaining with the UAW for months. The company’s most recent offer is a 14% wage hike plus profit sharing and better healthcare options for hourly workers.
What does the UAW think of this offer? They don’t love it.
UAW-VW Bargaining Committee member Yogi Peoples criticized the offer.
“We’ve been bargaining for months, and VW is still not taking our demands seriously. With the record profits they’ve made and the dividend schemes they’ve used to pad the pockets of shareholders, there’s more than enough money to meet our demands for a record contract,” Peoples said in a statement.
So that’s how it’s going to be, huh?
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
I remember flipping through the channels as a teenager and seeing a rerun of the 1978 “Austin City Limits” featuring Tom Waits. I had no idea who Tom Waits was before this moment. Was this jazz? Blues? Or maybe some sort of bizarro world where Harry Connick, Jr’s life went real bad, and he got punched in the throat a few hundred times by a cigarette vending machine? I was captivated and have been a fan ever since. It’s the holidays, so please enjoy “Christmas Card From a Hooker in Minneapolis.”
The Big Question
How long before we see a V8 in the Charger again?
Top image: Setllantis/FCA
Shoulda Had a V8 is the proper answer. At least until the Turbo sixes and electrical stuff proves to be at least 3.6 V6 levels of reliable. run them side by side, let the big v8’s sell the turbo sixes. Let the few EV variants prove stellantis is truthful about range and battery longevity. And for the love of god take the turbo’s off the 3.0 and add a generator to the back and let’s see if the instant torque and lack of need to sit at a charger for and hour or so will convert some of the petrol heads over to EV Performance. The Durango needs all of this as well.
That’s the best description of Tom Waits I think I’ve ever read.
And I already have a Hemi, so I’m good.
I’m of the age that my first introduction to Tom Waits was on “Tommy The Cat” by Primus. I quickly learned that he’s an underappreciated musical genius.
With regards to the Hemi situation, I’ll be over here, laughing in Mustang GT.
V8 charger:
By third parties? Next year, heck by next Summer even.
By Stellantis officially? Assuming they stay relevant enough to exist in NA, my bet is on MY26-28.
How long before we see a V8 in the Charger again?
I have always said Dodge abandoning their roots in favor of a full BEV pivot would be their death knell. I’m glad to see the NA office still has some rational minds that care more about short-term profits and chasing the Next Big Thing. An American needs to be running the NA office and given plenty of space to make magic happen with all the Stellantis brands.
THAT SAID
I don’t have much hope that the next admin is going to have much of a difference on what cars get made. Gas is going to become a luxury soon and the average consumer isn’t going to be interested in a V8, even with all the efficiencies in the world. Sure, maybe they’ll have 1 or 2 special edition models starting in 26/27, but they’ll be at least 85k plus another 15 in dealer markup. The V6 hemi is already a thing, all you’d need to do is design one in-house and slap the HEMI badge on it. “The Modern HEMI for the Modern Driver”.
“new” GM
Are the people plotting the new course going to be the same people who approved getting rid of Apple/Android CarPlay for their in-house software to put user data collection ahead of user experience? I’m reminded of the old Henry Ford quote, “If I gave the people what they wanted, we would be making a faster horse”. All these companies think they’re doing this, but that kind of magic only works a handful of times per generation and Steve Jobs used up a lot of it.
Correction: ” rational minds that care about more than short-term profits”
Okay, so Carlos did one thing right.
Thank you Matt for supporting the most influential singer/songwriter/composer of all time! Christmas Card From a Hooker in Minneapolis is one of my all time favorite tracks.
I celebrate the man’s entire discography. I’ve been a HUGE fan since I was a teenager. My favorite song of his is “Romeo Is Bleeding”, which also appears on the same album as “Christmas Card From A Hooker in Minneapolis”.
To make this more car-centric, I bought Blue Valentine at a Borders my during junior year of high school. I listened to it on my Discman-tape deck adapter in my parents 1998 SL2 on my way home from my then-girlfriend’s house. It blew my mind.
The HEMI V8 basically defined the brand, completely and totally.
Dropping it was a mistake, but one that needed to happen at some point. I just don’t think we were at that point yet.
tldr; they are brining it back faster than fast now that Carla is gonzo.
My guess is that a brined HEMI wouldn’t run well for long. Rust issues an all.
We’ll see how the market reacts to Tavares’s unilateral decision to kill the Hemi V8. That engine was about the only reason buyers might have had to buy the Charger. People might not be inclined to fork over the pile of cheese Stellantis is going to try to get for the car without a V8, at least not as long as the Mustang is available with one.
Ego has been the cause of death for many companies. And CEOs.
How long for a Hemi? About 6 months.
But an LS swap? They already measured the engine bay based on photos, have mounts ready, and it will be done 2 days after getting the body.
Lean into the Australian MOPAR heritage and do a Hemi-six!
But then the engine will be upside down!
And spin backwards!
They can’t even figure out what side the steering wheel goes on!
Did GM go bankrupt in 2008 because it was undisciplined in capital allocation? Or because it made cars that no one wanted to buy?
I think it’s probably correct that the bankruptcy occurred specifically in 2008 because of poor capital allocation (they lost a ton in GMAC alone), but that it was also inevitable at some point and that product decisions over the preceding 30-40 years were ultimately responsible.
Yeah, turned out GMAC getting into the mortgage game at the pinnacle of deregulation and going full-bore into chasing the dragon wasn’t such a hot move.
Fair point. GMAC had actually slipped my mind (which was flooded with images of hard, grey interiors).
To be fair to GM, my 2008 Pontiac had a hard, black interior
The 2007 Saturn Aura was an all-around great car, probably GM’s best mainstream sedan in years. IMO both the interior & exterior were classy as hell. (How odd that the Malibu and G6 did not get the same treatment.)
On the topic of interiors, I don’t know how GM got raked over the coals so badly, when contemporary Toyota interiors were atrocious.
Yes
alright, alright, you win this one
Isn’t making cars that no one wants to buy a prime example of undisciplined capital allocation?
Careful, don’t kick over the Hornet’s nest.
It’s probably a full nest, too. No one is buying em. Hey, speaking of undisciplined capital allocation…
Well played!
The answer lies within one look at the 2006 Chevy Malibu.
It was mostly bad timing with the global crash hitting just as Bob Lutz’s influence was showing up in mass-market products.
Ugh. Lutz. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GK49VeLFOk
They’ll shove a hemi in it but it’ll be in some ultra expensive limited run version for Boomers to mothball
And nothing of value will be lost.
I read the headline as hemi-V6. Has there been a V6 hemi?
Yes. Also a 4 cylinder hemi. The term refers to the hemispherical shape of the combustion chamber, but capital-H Hemi is mostly a marketing term for Chrysler’s V8 engines. There are lots of engines out there from other manufacturers that use hemispherical combustion chambers but no one cares because they aren’t Dodge V8 muscle cars and its not really that big of a deal anymore.
My 1985 Nissan 720 Truck has a Hemi. It even has 8 spark plugs. But otherwise that 2.5L of 4 cylinder power probably makes about 35hp today.
I had a couple of Toyotas with a Hemi.
Indestructible. No joke.
And am so old that I remember 4 dollar spark plugs too…
The 56 Ferrari 860 monza had a 3.4 liter 4 cyl hemi.
lol. A former friend has 3 Ferraris.
I had to stop hanging with him.
And they say PORSCHE owners are insufferable dicks?
I know a couple of Ferrari and Porsche owners. They are all fine people.
I do as well. Yet the turds kind of overshadow my desire to learn who is who.
But I also live in a 3rd world state. lol
That statement covers a lot of the internet as well.
Touche? lol
Ferrari as a company are insufferable dicks so this is no surprise.
Some K-Cars even had “2.6L Hemi” badges on the side.
That was a Mitsubishi 4 banger if I remember correctly
Yep
I believe even the Citroen 2CV was a hemi.
Alfa would like to join the conversation.
The Hemi could already be in the works for 26, now that Tavares is out.
Now that the VW plant is union, when are they going to set up the works council? That’s the whole reason VW wasn’t as hostile to the union as Nissan and others.
I want to believe.
I’m less interested in “How long before we see a V8 in the Charger again?” and more fascinated with “How much can Dodge push the price on what people will pay for a V8 Charger?”. We are not far from a world where a goddamn Dodge Charger is well over $100K.
The limited run Redeyes and such were already there (the Challenger Demons were deep into 6 figures).
Even the base model straight six is going to start at over $40,000 in essentially rental grade spec
The looney tunes MSRP that nobody will pay after the first month?
As is recent tradition for Stellantis
But, I suppose mandating the usually optional Factory Fuel Economy Delete package (AWD and twin turbo) on every car contributes in some way
I have to wonder if the new Charger was designed, much like the original XJ Cherokee, to not be able to fit an engine that someone at the company was trying to kill- in that case the AMC I-6, in this, the Hemi. Will be interesting if we get a subtle redesign in 2-4 years with the Hemi coming back.
Sounds like being a union member in Tennessee isn’t worth much.
This is how the first round of negotiations always goes, no matter the industry. You never take the first offer, and you rarely take the second.
I don’t know what planet Tom Waits is from, but I’m glad there are enough people who get him that he can keep working here.
I have a similar thought: I’m not what I’d consider to be a big Tom Waits fan, but I’m so glad he’s here!
It’ll take a while for the Carlos Tavares (not pictured above) stink leaves Stellantis.
In the meanwhile here’s Tom with a car song.
https://youtu.be/IroALj0mjoE?si=cAAMGLsx7eX3jgs4
They could have stuffed a HEMI in these.
But no, why do things that people actually might want, right?
Fuck them.
People don’t want to spend the money for the thousands of V8 Charger & Challengers on the lots as is. I highly doubt people would pay for a Hemi in the new Charger, with what they’d want to charge.
Also, it’s a Hemi. It’s junk. Its only good use is being a boat anchor.
Only Chrysler engine that’s worse is the EcoDiesel. It deserved to die, and anyone who thinks otherwise never owned a Chrysler product before. Capital J, U, N, K.
See them all the time with nothing but issues. Wish people would get over that piece of crap.
Thanks. I asked a few days ago if they ever fixed the various issues with the HEMI.
I would wonder if the take rate on the 6 cylinder was an economic thing, combined with the known issues?
BTW, owned many Mopar products, but that was back when they could build a decent engine. When dinosaurs roamed the earth.
On the other hand, if they could build a V8 that was not crap, well maybe there’d be more folks buying. I have little to no faith in the current plans for the Charger at this point.
Have a good one.
My Hemi has given me 16 years and 220,000 miles of faultless service (not acceptable, not pretty good – faultless). Where are you seeing all these major engine failures? Do they all live in Never-change-the-oil-berg? Do you work exclusively on company trucks that no one gives a shit about and get flogged like a government mule until they literally won’t move anymore? Some context would help.
I have an 05 Magnum R/T with 178K and it’s been fine. Minor stuff like replacing the valve cover gasket but that’s it.
Same exact year and model here. Everything else is aging out, but the drivetrain has been perfect.
I don’t drive a whole lot, so I usually try to get the engine up to temp before shutting it off because I know that’s been one of the issues as well as turning off MDS if you can, unless you got one of the upgraded Eagle heads.
I see them at work, not under the limited view of singular ownership like the rest of the internet.
As a mechanic / technician, I assume? That’s why I was wondering if you were working on mostly fleet/work trucks, or personal vehicles, or what. It might shed some light on the type of usage where they fail.
Working in a repair shop puts its own bias filter on your experience, just like ‘singular ownership’ of potentially a lucky fluke might be on mine. The vehicles you see are only the ones with problems. 😉 For instance, if you saw ten Chevy 1500’s per year but only five Ford Escapes, you might be tempted to conclude that the truck is less reliable, but as a fraction of total sales the truth would be the opposite (taking the 2024 sales volumes, they sold 550,000 of the former but only 140,000 of the latter).
Just curious. It is difficult to find decent reliability data that you can trust. Things like CR’s ‘initial quality’ isn’t terribly useful imo – nothing of any consequence goes wrong on a modern car in the first year or so of ownership. Beyond that it is all opinions. Sometimes you can sift through enough complaints and a unified picture starts coming to light – it is pretty uncontroversial to claim the 5.4 Triton Ford with the weird spark plugs (back before ’09) were bad, m’kay? Clear design flaw. GM 60 degree v6’s with coolant that ate their own intake manifold gaskets? Yep, that was a real problem there for a while. But it takes a while (and a bunch of model-specific research) to figure out which ones are really frequent problems and which are overblown.
I mean, the Mopar Quality Lottery has gotta have some winners.
What and break from the pack, deviate from the trend line, be different?
Any potential V8 Charger almost has to be a limited run, expensive top of the line model.
If they try to replace the Hurricane in volume, they are going to seriously undercut their efforts to sell it in Rams and Grand Wagoneers.
“Meanwhile, U.S. leaders, due to the time difference, dealt with regular hourslong meetings in the middle of the night “
Yeah that’s a total Arrogant Asshole move. People like that should have Negan’s spikey baseball bat shoved up their asses.
https://hips.hearstapps.com/digitalspyuk.cdnds.net/16/14/1459849626-walking-dead-negan-jeffrey-dean-morgan.jpg?resize=1200:*
And will there be a return of the Hemi? I hope so.
Without the Hemi, not only does it hurt the Charger, but it also hurts their heavy duty truck sales.
In my view, they should bring back the truck 6.4. And for the Charger, they have/had a 7L crate engine version of the Hemi.
It would be nice to see the return of the ‘426 Hemi’ Charger as a low-volume/high dollar special edition. That way they make good money, get good PR and it would have minimal impact on CAFE.
I know internet discourse can be vulgar but the suggestions about the shoving of sharp things up asses is just so gratuitous and gross. Just like – damn. Why?
I agree with it, myself. I’ve had to deal with evening meetings before with foreign countries. It sucks. Often these meetings can be half the length than they actually are, but aren’t.
Ah but the 6.4 “BGE” Hemi still has 4 years of supply contract for the HD trucks.
They could use it in the Charger since its the same external dimensions as the Eagle/Apache 5.7/6.4 but the BGE is different as it sits at the top of the family tree that spawns all the hellcat iterations because the block is reinforced for towing/boost.
Sadly, the industrial force and money needed to completely restart Eagle 5.7 production will never be justifiable at a cash strapped company
I didn’t think I’d log in to see John Reep this morning (the Hemi Guy) but at the time I had no idea he was a well-established standup comic. The guy is hilarious and a genuinely Good Dude.
Carlos’s tonedeafness is so typical of a lot of multinational executives — what he sees as a good gesture of taking time out of his vacation is nothing but more evidence of how detached he must be from the regular line workers (to say nothing of middle management teams).
Hemi? How about a PHEV charger with a tiny, itty bitty little 2-litre Hemi Range Extended WITH FUEL-SAVING MDS? No, really, like a muscle car take on the Chevy Volt, but one with an actual exhaust note to appease the purists.
The one thing Mopar should definitely not do is reintroduce MDS. MDS is the core weakness of the previous Hemi’s. The non MDS versions were crazy reliable (after the first couple years of head issues go figured out).
I was just riffing on the old Hemi ads…but I’ve heard tons of people say that Hemi MDS was one of the most reliable cylinder deactivation efforts of all time. But that’s anecdote. None of them are really good.
Thats really interesting. I work in an industry that gives me access to a ton of auto repair data (costs, what was repaired, hours, etc) for the last 10 years plus. The MDS engines are the ones that have lifters turn sideways, and then the edge of the lifter becomes a cutting tool and shaves the lobe off the cam. The most severe of those I have seen had nearly ground down to the base circle on cam. Freaking nuts. But lifters are the biggest issue I’ve seen for the MDS engines, and the non MDS engines report WAY fewer repairs and replacements. Oddly, for the same miles covered, we found SRT models to have many fewer failures than normal models, as the SRTs avoided the MDS for a few extra years.
GM’s MDS system definitely has its own issues. LS based will collapse lifters and sometimes damage the cam. When they “fixed” it for the LT engines, it seems like now the lifters jam awkwardly instead, basically always destroying the cam, shedding tons of metal, and now always require a new engine. So that didn’t exactly help.
A HEMI in the new Charger? There will probably be 5 at SEMA next year