Hands-free driving is coming to all Cadillac models, other GM brands | Fuel Injection/Nozzle

Most cars have Bluetooth, yet how many people do you see still holding their phone like a pizza, yakking into it like a Muppet as they drive? I won’t disagree about anything passive, seatbelts are passive at this point and if you don’t wear one for whatever reason, that’s on you. I won’t disagree about blind spot monitoring, but how can you have that and not rear view cameras or the associated cross-path detection that many have with the system?

Chevy had to recall thousands of 2015 Silverado HD and GMC Sierra HD pickup trucks when retention clips attaching the generator fuse block could come loose and shift. If the generator fuse block shifts it can cause the exposed conductors to hit the mounting studs and cause a potential fire. Pickup trucks with a 220 Amp Generator were affected by this issue. According to Edmunds, no injuries or deaths were reported with the retention clips becoming loose. Chevy asked owners to bring their vehicles into dealers for an inspection of the clips and made the necessary repairs as needed. Luckily this was caught before anyone was hurt.

Not only this, but the damned rimless Gentex electrochromic inside mirrors with a shape like the facial expression of a demonic, demented clown are smaller than the “normal” ones from a couple years back, and they’re finding their way into everything save for some HyundKia products. If anything, the mirror should be longer on the bottom than the top, or a simple rectangle, kind of like the non-autodimmers in VAG products, also from a few years back.

I’ve driven in vehicles with forward sensing collision systems, and they were overly sensitive and sent false alarms for things such as going over railroad tracks. Driving along in a perfectly safe manner and having the windshield light up with flashing red and stay beeping at you is less than pleasant and also distracting. I pay attention when i drive, i don’t dick around with my phone or other distractions. I don’t need the car to tell me when it thinks i should brake, i already know.

The new Silverado is bigger in every dimension, and most of that extra space was allocated to the cabin. There’s an additional three inches of legroom in the back seat of crew-cab models, and the cabin is 1.2 inches wider and 1.5 inches taller than the outgoing model. Overall, the 2019 Silverado is 1.7 inches longer, but with 3.9 inches added to the wheelbase.  

The TV cable essentially replaced the vacuum modulator valve that was the load sensing device for the transmission. The cable moves the throttle valve in the valvebody and increases transmission line pressure as the throttle opens. This would appear to be a simple operation, and with stock components, it’s rarely an issue. But with aftermarket carburetors, EFI throttle bodies, and various linkage mounts, the opportunity for mistakes is rampant.

1. Clutch. Although the KX450 now has a hydraulic clutch, it doesn’t mean it will stand the test of time. The KX450 clutch is weak. It feels light to the touch, but it burns up if you use it. Plus, it makes a horrendous squealing sound. We got rid of the judder spring, installed stiffer clutch springs, polished the ends of the push rod and switched to an ARC PowerLever (which has six different hydraulic ratios to insure that the clutch is diengaged before the lever hits your fingers on the handlebar).2. Fork springs. Too soft but great if this were an enduro bike.3. Airbox. It’s weird, small and tight, and it takes two different wrenches to get the cover off.4. Seat bolt. When you remove the seat bolts, the threaded plates fall out of the rear fender.5. Rear brake. The 250mm rear rotor is overkill. It locks up in every corner. We cut threads off the master cyllinder push rod and ground the rear brake pads down.6. Shock preload ring. We hate KTM’s nylon preload ring. Guess what? Now we hate Kawasaki’s and Suzuki’s nylon preload rings also.7. Levers. For some unknown reason, the clutch and brake levers are completely different, as though they came off different bikes. When the clutch was pulled in, the lever hit riders’ fingers. We moved the clutch perch over to avoid this, but it was only a modest help. Eventually we switched to ARC levers on both sides.8. Handlebars. The KX450 is the last production 450 with 7/8-inch bars.9. Grips. The hard rubber grips tear up your hands.10. Radiator cap. The engine runs hot and boils over. We run a Twin Air 1.8 radiator cap to keep it cool (this is a mod that all four of the Japanese-built bikes could benefit from).11. Chain roller. The bottom chain roller wears out (well, in truth it disintegrates). We use a 2018-19 KX250F chain roller to fix the issue. 

Another story comes from a gentleman named Mike Saad, who commented on the GM-Trucks.com story about Joe’s incident. Saad’s post shows a dark Colorado with its side airbags deployed after apparently driving on a fire road. He writes:

As per all statistics occupants of vehicles with modern safety features are less likely to die in a collision.

Other times the transfer case could also slip while a person was driving into neutral causing an accident.

But yes, we should have an option where people could buy the “Death Trap Special” version of a car, and let the insurance companies deal with them. Counter the cost of fixing complicated car and people bodies vs. the cost of totaling each.

Chevrolet issues the 2019 Silverado with its standard warranty of three years or 36,000 miles on the entire vehicle, plus a five year/60,000-mile warranty on the powertrain.