Category: Buick News

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Buick Delivers Best February Sales Since 2004

Verano, Enclave and Encore help drive retail sales growth of 13 percent

DETROIT – Buick’s February retail sales were the best since 2004 with a 13 percent year-over-year increase, the 10th consecutive month of higher sales to individual customers. Total sales, including those sold to executive fleets and other commercial customers, were up 15 percent.

Buick’s newest models continue to drive retail sales growth, with Enclave, Verano and the all-new Encore leading February’s gains. The Enclave luxury crossover SUV continues its sales momentum for the fifth consecutive month with retail and total sales up 22 and 26 percent year over year respectively. Both represent the best February ever for the Buick Enclave.

The Verano compact luxury sedan continues to sell well representing a significant growth over 2012. One in two Verano customers come from outside General Motors’ brands and the luxury sedan was recently named U.S. News and World Report Top 2013 Cars for the money.

The all-new Encore small luxury crossover is off to a strong start with more than 1,834 sold since shipping to dealerships began in mid-January.

“New models like the Verano and Encore continue to bring new customers to Buick showrooms,” said Brian Sweeney, vice president of Buick Sales and Service. “With the introduction of the redesigned Enclave, we are seeing a new generation of loyalists returning to the showrooms for another Buick.”

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Quiet Cabin Makes Buick LaCrosse a Better Listener

Speech engine picks up accents and dialects from IntelliLink voice commands

DETROIT – When General Motors speech recognition engineer Robert Sims worked to develop one of the industry’s first in-car hands-free calling systems years ago, his goal was to make the call quality clear enough that his wife wouldn’t hang up on him.

Today, Buick’s IntelliLink system can do far more than place a call, and QuietTuning technologies like those in the LaCrosse luxury sedan make using voice controls easier for owners regardless of marital or relationship status.

QuietTuning is Buick’s comprehensive engineering process to reduce, block and absorb interior noise. For LaCrosse, that means features like laminated window glass, triple door seals and liquid applied sound deadening.

“There’s definitely an advantage when we’re developing voice controls in a quieter cabin,” said Sims. “The system’s ability to hear a command relies on SNR, or signal-to-noise ratio. If noise is extremely low like it is in the LaCrosse, the user’s voice, or signal, can be lower. In other words, a LaCrosse driver can easily speak to the IntelliLink system at a normal, conversational volume.”

As someone who drives an 80-mile commute each day, quietness and minimizing distractions are a personal matter for Sims. That’s helped drive him to make Buick’s IntelliLink voice commands simple, intuitive and designed around the controls drivers need most.

With IntelliLink – standard on every 2013 Buick – drivers can use voice commands to control navigation and audio functions with the push of a button while keeping eyes on the road. With a smartphone paired, IntelliLink’s voice commands can even tune to a Pandora internet radio station or “like” a song.

How does it work? Using a microphone in the cabin’s headliner – optimally placed by Sims and his team – the system uses a speech engine to match spoken words to known voice commands. When the engine finds a match, that command is executed.

“We’ve also designed the system with speaker adaptation, which means the engine is trained for different accents or dialects,” said Sims. “It can begin to predict speech patterns based on those models. Your LaCrosse remembers your speech patterns even after the car is turned off and on, but it can also identify another user and predict his or her patterns as well.”

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QuietTuning Meets Exhaust Tuning with Buick Verano Turbo

Turbocharged engine sings sweeter without background noise

DETROIT – When the 250-hp Buick Verano Turbo luxury sedan was introduced late last year, engineers knew an aggressive exhaust note was essential for a car capable of 0-60 mph acceleration in an estimated 6.2 seconds.

Yet that had to be balanced with delivering a quiet, comfortable driving experience – a core objective in the development of every new Buick model.

“Verano customers who opt for the Turbo are choosing it for the power, and we wanted to make sure they get the full experience,” said Carl Sperling, vehicle performance engineer. “We made sure to create a sound to complement the feel.”

It may seem like a cabin tuned for quietness is a difficult environment for sound waves to thrive, but Sperling said the Verano actually made his job easier.

“Without wind and road noise being prevalent, we could tune the Verano’s exhaust to have a sporty note without it being too loud,” Sperling said. “A loud, droning exhaust can be fatiguing over a long highway drive.”

Inspired by the Regal GS luxury sport sedan, the Verano engineering team tested numerous exhaust systems, sorting among those they felt were too loud or too quiet until they settled on a sound befitting the Verano Turbo’s character.

Buick’s exclusive QuietTuning, employed on all Verano models, is designed to block or absorb sound and dampen or eliminate vibrations. It is included in every facet of the Verano‘s architecture to make it the quietest compact sedan on the road and quieter than many midsize and full-size cars.

Verano‘s quiet cabin is supported with numerous features including acoustic laminated glass, triple door seals and refined chassis dynamics. Even its 18-inch standard wheels are specially manufactured to minimize road noise.

Click here to discuss the Buick Verano in our live community.