The Killer Bees MGB has participated in just about every West Coast 24 Hours of LeMons race for the last couple of years. The Bees have done quite well, generally finishing in the top half of the standings, but somehow another entry managed to take home LeMons racing’s top prize in each of those races; even a British Leyland product has a tough time when submerged in a field of 150+ entries. This time, however, the yellow MGB finished well into the top 10 of the standings and claimed the IOE in a no-doubt decision. (Read More…)

A BMW has taken the overall win at the Pacific Northworst 24 Hours of LeMons, but it wasn’t yet another dime-a-dozen E30. Nope, the winner this time was the bigger and more dignified E28 5 Series. (Read More…)

In what could possibly raise eyebrows in Wolfsburg, Suzuki is getting  cozier with Fiat. According to The Nikkei [sub], Fiat will supply Suzuki with 20,000 to 30,000 1.6-liter diesel engines per year. The engines will be built in Europe. Suzuki plans to use the engines in the SX4, which was jointly developed with Fiat, at Suzuki’s assembly plant in Hungary. (Read More…)

Victor Muller will no longer have a problem reaching a quorum or a unanimous decision at Saab board meetings. Muller is the sole remaining director. The rest of the board bailed. (Read More…)

Man, I wish I’d thought of that “Godwin’s Law” thing before Godwin did. The closest I’d come was “Baruth’s Law”, which in its early form stated “Any museum which showcases the infinitely desirable, super-cool Messerschmitt 262 will eventually be forced to include an exhibit on the Holocaust, just to keep impressionable pre-teen boys from pretending to be Luftwaffe pilots during recess.” Here’s a newer version of “Baruth’s Law”: As the length of a discussion concerning automobiles and fuel availability increases, the possibility of some Manhattanite or Portland-dweller making an absolutely uniform, uninformed, completely ridiculous statement regarding mass transit approaches 1.

I know. No zing. I don’t know any other way to put it, however. Mass transit is wonderful, as long as the mass of people involved is dense enough. The response to the preceding statement is always something along the lines of, “Well, then, people should move out of flyover country.” This is one of those bits of advice which works for individuals but would cause bloody chaos if everybody decided to follow it at once. Perhaps, in the distant future, we will all dwell in fabulous Fullerdome arcologies while machines toil to grow our food in the blasted wilderness outside.

In the present, however, the immortal words of Young MC still hold sway for most of America: “Got no money/and you got no car/then you got no woman/and there you are.” Which doesn’t perfectly explain why, twelve hours after my car died in Franklin, Tennessee, I woke up in the frilly bed of a sixteen-year-old teenaged girl.

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History made on the mountain just a few minutes ago: Nobuhiro “Monster” Tajima just ran 9:51 and change in his run to the Pike’s Peak summit. Sayonara, 10-minute barrier! (Read More…)

Got a VW microbus in your garage, back from when you listened to Jimi Hendrix and the Doors? Need some serious money? Two options:

You can either try to find one of those asbestos heat exchanger class action lawsuits (although it’s a bit late in the game).

Or you could put your bus up for auction. A good one can fetch $217,800 (Read More…)

What’s a Wingle? It’s Great Wall’s Chinese-made entry in the “World Pickup” segment, taking on Ford’s Global Ranger, Toyota’s HiLux, Nissan’s Navara, Mahindra’s Scorpio Pik-Up and more. Having been limited to sales in Iraq, Australia, Chile, South Africa, Algeria, Syria, Uruguay, Russia and Saudi Arabia, Automotive News [sub] reports that Great Wall has wangled the Wingle into the European market by establishing a beachhead in Italy with a 2.0 diesel version. Obligatory crash-test video after the jump…
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I had to haul my bleary-eyed self out of the sack at 4:00 AM in order to grab this choice vantage point at 11,000 feet, about halfway up the road to the summit, but the sight of this incredible race car just made the sleep deprivation worthwhile. Everything else I see today will just be a bonus. (Read More…)

Dan Gurney signing autographs for members of the the media at the 2008 New York Auto Show

The big OEM car show season is over and now that summer is here, it’s time for car shows, meets and cruises. For the people who work for marketing in the car companies and in the aftermarket it’s really a year long season. I see some of the same faces at the NAIAS, the Detroit Autorama, the Hot Rod Power Tour and the Woodward Dream Cruise..

I’ve attended press previews of some of the big auto shows since 2002. I’ve worked Detroit every year since, Chicago every year but ’09, and Toronto a couple of times when it didn’t conflict with Chicago. A car show media preview is not the same as the public car show and not just because there is staging and seating for the press and the displays are not in their final form. In a word the difference is access. During the public days, some of the cars are locked, and the ultra luxury and exotic rides are completely roped off from the unwashed masses. If you have a question to ask, there are trained product spokes men and women who will tell you about the floor models or give you a shpiel about a concept vehicle. There may be some sales reps from local dealers as well who will gladly give you a business card. You never see an executive from an automaker on the show floor during the public days. If there are celebrities, like racers, athletes and entertainers making personal appearances, they too are usually behind ropes and if autographs are available, the lines are long.

The media preview is completely different. Aside from its utility to journalists, for a car guy or gal it’s an auto show on an exponential scale. Yes there are models and product specialists on the turntables and around the displays who can try to answer you questions, but more important there are all the executives, product managers, engineers, designers and marketing people involved in making this year’s tangerine flake streamline babies. I like to talk to pretty ladies as much as the next guy so the models and booth professionals are fine with me. If I have a question or comment about a car, though, I think the chief designer could probably answer my question better than someone who’s learned a script. If you had your choice of people to talk cars with, wouldn’t you pick Carroll Shelby over someone hired by a talent agency?

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The Freep’s Mark Phelan identifies yet another vanishing automotive phenomenon: the six-seater sedan. He notes

The Chevrolet Impala is the only six-person sedan you can buy. Other sedans — regardless of how big they are — have front bucket seats rather than the three-person front bench seat that was once common…

Chevrolet is weighing whether to build a six-seat version of the next Impala. Weighing against it, the car will probably be narrower than the current model. It’s based on GM’s Epsilon II global platform. It’s roomy, but probably not enough to fit three comfortably across up front.

About a quarter of Impalas sold last year were six-seaters…It probably makes sense for Chevrolet to concentrate on giving the next Impala a comfortable and attractive front seat that appeals to the other 75% of its buyers and wins some new customers.

I’m sure that front benches bring back a host of memories for TTAC’s Best and Brightest (mine is of grabbing the Hurst floor shifter in my dad’s 1966 F-100 with both hands and clunking from gear to gear on the way to the dump), and yet somehow I’m guessing that not many will agitate for its return. Like tape decks and carburetor tune-ups, the nostalgia of sitting between two other people in front seat might have a certain appeal in reminiscences, but anyone who actually transports six people regularly these days just buys a crossover. And guess what: the kids might be robbed of valuable future nostalgia (replaced by reruns of Spongebob Squarepants on the rear-seat entertainment system), but neither they nor their parents are likely to choose to go back. And so, we march onward, into an unfamiliar future…

The reports from Oregon LeMons HQ are in, and we’ve got some very interesting results for you. Sure, a BMW E28 in the lead is on the cool side, but a Jeep not far behind? Not only that, a British Leyland product is in the top ten, a feat long considered possible by, well, everyone. (Read More…)

Ever so environmentally conscious California  offered its citizen a rebate up to $5,000 if they buy an electric car. That and the $7,500 federal tax credit adds up to a good chunk of money. 1978 vehicles later, the state is out of funds. No more. According to the California Air Resources Board, “the Clean Vehicle Rebate Project may run out by July due to high consumer demand.”  May run out? It already did. (Read More…)

I’m not at Oregon Raceway Park to judge the Pacific Northworst LeMons race this weekend, because I just had to stay in Colorado to watch a bunch of freaks race to 14,115 feet. However, LeMons Assistant Perp Nick Pon has sent in some photos of yesterday’s prerace BS Inspections. (Read More…)

General Motors CEO Dan Akerson set off something of a firestorm a few weeks ago, when he said, in response to a question about forthcoming CAFE increases:

You know what I’d rather have them do — this will make my Republican friends puke — as gas is going to go down here now, we ought to just slap a 50-cent or a dollar tax on a gallon of gas.

Predictably, populists and economic alarmists of all stripes took great umbrage at Akerson’s candor, questioning his leadership of GM as well as his perspective on the shaky US economy. But Akerson is not alone in his support of some form of gas-tax increase. Bob Lutz and  Tom Friedman (an odd couple right there, if ever there was one) agree with him. Edmunds CEO Jeremy Anwyl defended Akerson and even suggested a $2/gallon tax earlier this year. Bill Ford and  AutoNation’s Mike Jackson are of the same mind as now-retired Republican Senator George Voinovich on the issue. And yet, inside the Beltway, the subject tends to draw a chuckle and a roll of the eyes. Everyone wants it, but nobody wants it.

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