Toyota Motor Corporation released global production, domestic sales and export results for January. Two words: Not good. While Toyota’s global peers can boast of surprising numbers for January, TMC’s worldwide production dropped by 3.9 percent across Toyota, Daihatsu and Hino. The Toyota brand has even less to show: Minus 4.7 percent. And this while the competition is busy dethroning the leader of the pack. (Read More…)
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As I write this, I’m sitting on the floor of the bag-claim area at the Houston airport, waiting for my LeMons accomplices to arrive from California, with Pantera cranking in my headphones in order to get myself in the proper Texas frame of mind. Yes, races on consecutive weekends; it’s like being in a traveling rock-n-roll band, only with the smell of burning brakes/engines/wiring instead of groupies and limos. With low-budget racing in mind, let’s contemplate a battered little racer that won’t be seeing a track, ever again. (Read More…)
According to Porsche [via PistonHeads]
In 1900, Ferdinand Porsche, founding father of the present-day Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG, Stuttgart, entered unchartered territory. With the first functional, full hybrid car in the world, the Semper Vivus (‘always alive’). the principle of the serial hybrid drive had been born.
In a stunning four year project the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart has had the Semper Vivus recreated. Next week, 111 years after this ground breaking innovation by Ferdinand Porsche, the Semper Vivus will again drive into the limelight at the Geneva Motor Show 2011 followed by future appearances as part of the Porsche Museum collection in Stuttgart.
The Detroit News reports that top White House economic adviser Austan Goolsby indicated today that the government would be exiting its equity position in GM in the short term. The DetN’s David Shepardson quotes Goolsby as saying
The writing is clearly on the wall that the government is getting out of the GM position. The government never wanted to be in the business of being majority shareholder of GM. It was only to prevent a wider spillover, negative event on the economy. So we’re trying to get out of that. We’re not trying to be Warren Buffet and figure out what the market is doing
And he’s not kidding: GM’s stock just closed at its lowest level since the IPO, after GM’s Q4 results came in below analyst expectations and the overall market experienced turmoil due to Middle East unrest.
For most Americans, the appeal of electric vehicles is somewhat blunted by the fact that they tend to be small, European-style hatchbacks rather than large, red-blooded “American-style” sedans. But what if large, rear-drive electric sedans were developed, using battery-swap technology that could allow battery-leasing business models and instant range-extension? Might Americans rethink a few of their long-held stereotypes about EVs?
Well, the United States isn’t the only nation facing this dilemma, and unlike the US, Australia is actually doing something about it. Australian automotive suppliers, Air International, Bosch, Continental and Futuris, have teamed up with Project Better Place to develop seven “proof of concept” Holden Commodore-based rear-drive electric sedans that could be the first of their kind [press release here in PDF] in a joint venture called EV Engineering. The project is part of Australia’s effort to revamp its automotive industry by 2020.
Sales of Hyundai’s Sonata Hybrid may have begun already, but deliveries are delayed as new regulations were ordered just as Hyundai’s first hybrid was going to market. In January, President Obama followed up on a months-long effort by the National Federation of the Blind to require full-time audible warnings for electric-drive vehicles, and signed legislation directing the DOT to
study and report to Congress on the minimum level of sound that is necessary to be emitted from a motor vehicle, or some other method, to alert blind and other pedestrians of the presence of operating motor vehicles while traveling.
According to GreenCarReports.com, the possibility of these changes required a last-minute modifications to the Sonata Hybrid, in order to remove the option of disabling the Hybrid’s “virtual engine noise” in case that feature fell foul of the new regulations. The Sonata Hybrid had been developed to have the sound-disabling function, so the last-minute modification
required changes to the wiring harness, the user-interface software, and even the Owner’s Manual, which had already been finalized.
All this for an audible warning that research shows is less than effective and contributes more to noise pollution than an internal combustion engine. Oh well.
Think using your cell phone or other in-car distractions don’t affect your driving? Don’t try to prove it on the road (jackass), put your reaction-time skills to the test at the NYT’s multitasking reaction-time game. While using your keyboard to navigate gates, a cell phone will distract you with New Yorkian requests which you will have to answer while continuing to navigate through randomly-opening gates. The Times team that came up with the game explains
We weren’t trying to be an exact simulation of driving down the highway or the road — it’s not realistic to have all those gates and people often text in shortened words. It is a game to give you a sense of how a distraction can decrease your ability to react quickly
When you finish, the game will tell you how much multitasking impaired your ability to navigate. Let us know how you did, and if the game changed your opinion about distracted driving.
If you’re a brontosaurus, and you’re reading this, then your hindbrain is just now finding out about mommyblogger Crissy Kight Page and her refusal to spread (the good news about Toyota) for ten bucks. Well, there’s more news about Toyota out there now, and rather than wait for poor Tiffany Lewis of the recently deceased “Mommy Networks” to get the word out, I’m going to put my own money into this new publicity effort.
Mommybloggers, read on to find out how you can earn a $20 Amazon gift card, courtesy of yours truly,this very afternoon!
One of the strongest criticisms issued in the Congressional TARP Oversight Panel’s most recent report on the auto bailout concerned GM’s lack of effort to bring its former captive lender GMAC (now called Ally Financial) back to the fold, an omission the Panel termed “disconcerting.” After all, Ally’s business is still closely intertwined with GM’s, as the financial firm provides 82% of GM’s dealer floorplanning and 38.2% of GM’s consumer loans. And, as bailed-out businesses (Ally is now 73.8% owned by the US Treasury), any competition between GM and Ally will result in a lose-lose scenario for taxpayers. In recent months it seemed that the two firms were moving towards a deal at the initiative of GM CEO Dan Akerson (and likely motivated to some extent by the COP’s criticisms), but now Bloomberg reports that there are no negotiations between GM and Treasury about a reconciliation of the two firms… in fact, with an Ally IPO planned for this year, it seems the two firms are going to war.
TTAC Commentator GS650G writes:
I am looking for a station wagon in lieu of a mini-van or CUV/SUV. Whereas before almost all intermediate cars were available in station wagon trim it seems only European brands and a few Japanese brands such as Subaru offer a true station wagon any longer.
I would like to move up a bit and go with either a BMW 3 series wagon or Mercedes R Class. Both trade in the 22K to 28K range. I don’t care for Volvo or SAAB wagons and their recent ownership changes has me concerned about the brands.
The Beemer and M-B seem like well-liked cars with practical carry space along with excellent driving dynamics. I’m not concerned with repair costs since I do my own work no matter what I drive.
So which would be the better choice, a 328i Wagon or a M-B 320 R? I would also compare to a M-B E-Class wagon if the price was right.
Having been exonerated of any mysterious electronic causes of unintended acceleration, Toyota puts the issue behind it with a final recall of over 2m vehicles for issues related to gas pedal entrapment. At the same time, the NHTSA closes its investigation. According to an official release, Toyota
will conduct a voluntary safety recall of approximately 20,000 2006 and early 2007 Model Year GS 300 and GS 350 All-Wheel Drive vehicles to modify the shape of the plastic pad embedded in the driver’s side floor carpet. In the event that the floor carpet around the accelerator pedal is not properly replaced in the correct position after a service operation, there is a possibility that the plastic pad embedded into the floor carpet may interfere with the operation of the accelerator pedal. If this occurs, the accelerator pedal may become temporarily stuck in a partially depressed position rather than returning to the idle position.
And that’s not all…
Bloomberg reports that Spyker Cars NV has sold its sportscar business to former chairman Vladimir Antonov for €15m, with the promise of up to €17m more over the next six years if profits allow it. They probably wont, however, as Spyker’s sportscars sell at a rate of about 30 per year, and have never turned a profit in the seven years the business has been public. The move is necessary, however, as Antonov was forced out of his ownership stake at Spyker (at GM’s request) when the firm bought Saab. CEO Victor Muller bought Antonov’s stake through his holding company Tenaci, and by selling Antonov the sportscar business, Spyker can pay back some of its €74m debt to Tenaci (another €17m will be converted into Spyker shares). Plus, explains Muller
Spyker’s (luxury car business) is a small fish in a large pond. Spyker would need additional funds, but to issue shares and dilute shareholders seemed like a very bad plan so we decided to divest these activities
With Spyker no longer part of Spyker Cars NV (the firm that owns Saab), the firm will be renamed this May (probably to some variation of “Saab”) when it lists on the Stockholm stock exchange. Still, though Saab and Spyker sportscars are no longer combining their crazy plans into a pie-in-the-sky juggernaut, and this may help get the ship right-side-up again, there’s no knowing where it’s all headed. Antonov could still buy back into Saab, and it sounds like the two will continue to share distribution channels. Whether either side of the business can actually make money is still the real question.
GM has announced its full-year results for 2010 [Highlights here, Chart set here, in PDF], and has achieved its first full-year profit since 2004 by pulling in $4.7b. Perhaps more significant than the numbers alone, however, is GM’s claim that it has whipped its “material weakness” in terms of financial reporting and internal controls, an issue that had haunted The General since being disclosed in the runup to its IPO. Still, GM’s earnings were well below the $5b+ full-year profit expected by analysts, and its half-billion Q4 profit was considerably more “pinched” than the $1b that Wall Street expected. More importantly, GM burned $1.7b in automotive operating cash (including a $4b pension contribution) and another $1.1b in CapEx in the fourth quarter, resulting in a $2.8b automotive free cash burn for the quarter. Over the course of 2010, GM’s cash pile has gone from $36.2b to $27.6b, although GM has access to over $5b in new credit facilities while cutting debt from $15.8b to $4.6b. Still, a weakly-profitable Q4 is better than last year’s $3.4b Q4 loss.
A police officer in Houston, Texas thought he had a slam dunk case against a motorist he stopped for driving on the wrong side of the road on September 15, 2008. The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in a February 10 decision overturned the stop on the grounds that driving on the wrong side of the road is not always against the law.
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