Official: Cruze is ‘Ohio car’ (Updated Made in USA 40 mpg Road & Track video)

[Omaha Steve]

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u10xcFfj0Ho

http://www.salemnews.net/page/content.detail/id/523166.html?nav=5007

By LARRY RINGLER
POSTED: February 27, 2010

BROOK PARK - General Motors Corp.'s Lordstown Complex, which will start building the brand-new Chevrolet Cruze in July, rightly claims the car as its own, but a GM official noted Friday factories around the state will share in the benefits.

"The Cruze should be named the state car of Ohio with all the parts that will be made in Ohio," Margaret Brooks, GM's product marketing director for small cars, said in introducing the upscale small car for the Cleveland Auto Show that starts today and runs through March 7 here at the IX Center.

It was the Cruze's highest-profile public debut in Ohio; the car didn't appear at last year's Cleveland show but did appear at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January.

GM's Parma Metal Center is one key beneficiary of the Cruze. The metal stamping plant will devote 18 percent of its production of "black metal" - steel pieces such as roof rails, framing and other parts that are covered by the outer metal made at the Lordstown Metal Center, Parma Manager Alan McLaughlin said.

"It'll be a very significant part of our production," said McLaughlin, whose plant currently sends 12 percent to 14 percent of its products to Lordstown for the Chevrolet Cobalt small car.

A GM forging plant in Defiance will make engine blocks for the Cruze's new Ecotech engines, while the company's powertrain factory in Toledo, which announced the recall of 300 laid-off workers, will make the six-speed transmissions.

FULL story at link.

[jimshoes]

1. Good news for Ohio

Good news for Ohioans.

[Turbineguy]

2. Well, it took 50 years

but GM finally "gets it".

You don't make crappy small cars just to offset the nice profitable gas guzzlers.