2000 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 Ls Extended Cab Pickup 4-door 4.8l on 2040-cars

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Chevy Corvette Stingray "colorizer" lets you chase the rainbow

After you've convinced your better half to let you buy a new Corvette, then comes the hard part... actually figuring out which 'Vette you want. While Chevrolet has yet to release the official configurator for the 2014 Corvette Stingray, it did give us something else to kill some time playing around with.
The C7 Corvette "colorizer" recently went online, and it lets you look at the car in all of its available colors and wheel options from four different angles so that when this car does go on sale, you know exactly which one you want. It includes the Corvette's full pallet of colors including Torch Red, Laguna Blue and the hue you see above, Velocity Yellow. Toss in the black wheels, and we're sold. If you have some time this afternoon, be sure to check it out the Corvette colorizer for yourself, and even if you don't have the time, we've put together a gallery with all of the possible color combinations.

Expect greater differentiation in GM's next-generation SUVs

General Motors says its next-generation Chevrolet Tahoe, Suburban, GMC Yukon and Cadillac Escalade models will offer shoppers improved interior differentiation. Car and Driver recently caught up with Chris Hilts, GM's creative manager of interior design, who said that the cabins will all feature unique instrument panels, consoles, center stacks and switchgear moving forward. Apparently GM is now aware that consumers may be bothered by the fact that today's $85,000 Escalade has effectively the same cabin as a $45,000 Tahoe. Hilts says SUV buyers want more refinement than their pickup purchasing counterparts - and those same buyers also want their SUVs to have more exterior differentiation between the company's Silverado and Sierra pickup lines. Shocking.
That all sounds good to us, but we've heard this song and dance before. GM made big waves about how different the new-for-2013 Silverado and Sierra would look from each other, but judging by what we've seen so far, GM's stylists are painting in shades rather than with the full spectrum. For more on the what to expect out of GM's new SUVs, click on the C/D link below.

Chevy Spark EV could be coming to Midwest later this year

Ohio is not known as a hotbed of EV sales – if anything, the state is a bit anti-EV, thanks to a legislative fight against Tesla's direct sales model – but it might be on Chevrolet's short list to expand the market for the Spark EV in the near future. The latest official GM press release on the battery-powered Spark still says the car is "available exclusively in California and Oregon," but Hybrid Cars found four Ohio dealerships that list a Spark EV on their websites, with hints the the car will be coming to the Midwest state by the end of the summer. See, for example, here, here, here and here. But that's probably not going to happen, according to Randy Fox, GM communication's manager for passenger cars. Fox told AutoblogGreen that, "At this point in time, we don't have any official plans to expand the Spark EV beyond California and Oregon." The reason is that California and Oregon have the infrastructure to support EVs, Fox said, and GM wants to be able to support its EV customers. "We are continuing to look at other options," he said. "The selling point for electric cars today is not advertising, it's eyeballs, it's peer exposure" – John O'Dell John O'Dell, a senior editor at Edmunds.com, told AutoblogGreen that, "It makes sense for [GM] to expand sales and it makes sense to do it in a quiet manner, to get these vehicles on the road. The selling point for electric cars today is not advertising, it's eyeballs, it's peer exposure. If someone in my neighborhood has one and he likes it, then maybe I can trust him. So it's important to get these vehicles on the road." Chevy sold 182 Spark EVs last month, a significant increase over the 98 sold in April. That's still small potatoes compared to the 3,000+ Nissan Leaf EVs sold last month, but making the electric Spark available in Ohio, say, or GM's home state of Michigan could boost those numbers. AutoblogGreen called a few dealerships in Michigan to see what they had heard. One salesman said he didn't think GM had started production yet but the inventory manager for another dealership said the Spark EV is scheduled to arrive in the Midwest in "roughly the fourth quarter." What would GM's incentive be to offer the car in markets outside of California where it can gain ZEV credits with each sale?