After Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan over the last couple of weeks, by solidarity today we are visiting Norway and I will give you a short but rich overview of what cars Norwegians are most fond of.

Now if you are already Norway’ed out with all the tragic news coming from there right now, that’s ok I understand, and there are 154 more countries to explore in my blog, so I’m sure you’ll find what you’re looking for there!

Norwegians are exposed to extreme (cold) temperatures pretty much every day of the year (OK not quite true but I was there in the middle of summer years ago and it was freezing!) and also to near-constant darkness about 6 months a year.

So their cars need to do one thing: work. Start in the morning by -30 degrees and not fail in the middle of a lonely snow-covered road in some remote part of the country… And that, Volkswagens and Toyotas can do…

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Alex Dykes will may have another chance to review  a Mercedes-Benz C 63 AMG Coupé, the 2012 model this time. Although after the last review of a “halfhearted approach to a hotly contested and prestige-generating segment,” it wouldn’t surprise me if there would be a sudden shortage of the car when Alex shows up. (Read More…)

14 millions Americans are out of work. The government is facing default. U.S. home prices are at their lowest level since 2003, and Robert Shiller, the economist who co- founded the S&P/Case-Shiller index of U.S. home prices, said a decline in property values up to 25 percent in the next five years “wouldn’t surprise me at all.” From Bernanke on down, everybody is scaling back the rhetoric that economic growth is just around the corner.  Suddenly, automakers aren’t so sure anymore about all that pent-up demand that will bring back U.S. car sales back to their old glory. Reuters asked around and didn’t come back with good news. (Read More…)

Porsche and Volkswagen are the typical German couple: Not married, with children. Formally, the two want to say “Ja” once the pending lawsuits are taken care of. In the meantime, the couple cohabitates happily. CEO Matthias Müller is made from Audi-DNA. He is a confidant of Martin Winterkorn, who is Piech’s man. Müller runs Porsche like a full-fledged Volkswagen division, down to doing his share to fulfilling Winterkorn’s grand “Strategie 2018,” the plan for world domination by Volkswagen. Under Müller, Porsche doesn’t chase Nordschleife lap times. Porsche chases volume. (Read More…)

True, not every entry scattered its engine all over the track at Stafford Motor Speedway today, but it sure seemed like it; by late evening, I counted only 21 of the 60 or so cars still moving under their own power. Meanwhile, the Scuderia Limoni Alfa Romeo Milano will begin tomorrow’s session with a vast 68-lap lead. (Read More…)

Remember how everybody was scared by cheap Chinese car imports? It’s not happening. Leading executives of Chinese car companies have pretty much given up hope for major car exports in the near future. Instead of exporting cars, China’s auto makers should think about exporting technology and capital to get into foreign markets, said Xu Heyi, chairman of BAIC to China Daily. “This is an inevitable change for Chinese auto makers who want to go global,” Xu said. “Products export is a short-sighted behavior.” (Read More…)

California has backed up its strict emissions standards for years now with a $5,000 tax credit for electric, hybrid and fuel cell vehicles, which when combined with a $7,000 federal tax credit can often make those vehicles nearly as affordable as “regular” cars. But, reports Automotive News [sub], that state credit has fallen victim to California’s budget woes and oversubscription, and has been cut in half from $5,000 to $2,500. According to the report:

high demand exhausted the program’s funding last month. The Los Angeles Times reported Thursday that about 500 consumers who bought electric cars such as the Nissan Leaf or Tesla Roadster are on a waiting list and will collect the $2,500 rebate.

To deal with growing demand, the pool of money to fund the rebates was increased to between $15 million and $21 million for CARB’s current fiscal year ending June 30, 2012, according to CARB’s announcement. A total of $11.1 million was allocated in the program’s first two years, according to CARB spokeswoman Mary Fricke.

The increased cash pool and lowered rebate amount are aimed at making the incentive available to more consumers, according to CARB’s Web site. The changes are projected to fund about 6,000 rebates for consumers who apply for the program on a first-come basis, Fricke said.

Now California “green car” intenders not only get a reduced tax credit, but they also don’t get free access to the HOV lane anymore. It’s almost as if California wants “green” vehicles to succeed or fail on their own terms…

Last week, a small Swedish parts supplier by the name of SwePart did not want to wait any longer and asked a Swedish court to declare a key Saab subsidiary, Saab Automobile Tools, bankrupt. Bankruptcy of the subsidiary would have meant the end for Saab as well.  Hectic activity ensued. On Friday afternoon, there was an announcement that the matter had been settled and the bankruptcy petition was withdrawn. Expect a run on the bankruptcy court in the coming days and weeks. (Read More…)

The NYT reports that, having fallen out of favor in the Afghanistan campaign for its vulnerability to roadside bombs, the HMMWV is making a comeback. The Humvee was being replaced by mine-resistant armored personnel carriers called MRAPs,

But recent blast tests show that Humvees built with the new chimney could provide as much protection as some of the heavier, and more costly, mine-resistant vehicles that have replaced them in many uses.

And if the final tests go well, the invention could save billions in new vehicle costs and restore much of the maneuverability that the Army and the Marines have lacked in the rugged terrain in Afghanistan, military officials say. Engineers say the chimney, which rises through the passenger cabin, releases some of the explosive gases — traveling at twice the speed of a fighter jet — that have mangled and flipped many of the vehicles.

Pentagon officials have said little about the 11 blast tests so far, in which the prototype vehicles are engulfed by a cloud of smoke, dust and fire, but the passenger cabin remains intact.

It turns out that adding armor hurts the maneuverability that makes the HMMWV so prized, and is less effective than the new chimneys which deflect blast forces around and away from the passenger compartment. The military will conduct five more blast tests and could request bids for the new generation of HMMWVs sometime this fall.

The Michigan Congressional delegation’s letter, stating that the Detroit-based automakers are not technologically capable of serving the market while complying with a proposed 2025 CAFE standard seemed strange to me in light of the recent progress made by Ford and GM on fuel economy. Why, I wondered, would these firms boast of their fuel econmy efforts on the one hand while allowing their congressional representatives to portray them as unable to build a CAFE-compliant fleet on the other. Why, I wondered, don’t Ford and GM come out and angrily insist that they can build the most fuel efficient cars in the world? My guess: because they know that they can probably wheedle a loophole out of the feds if they keep pleading inability. Yes, everyone knows they can comply with CAFE… but even the UAW knows that when the government asks you to do something, you ask for something back. Which in turn made me wonder: what might the OEMs want? And, turning to the 2012-2016 CAFE Final Rule [go on, give it a read in PDF format here], I found a glaring loophole that all the manufacturers seemed to want, but which the feds turned down. I have no evidence that this is back on the table for 2017-2025, but I thought I’d put it out there to give a sense of what the OEMs may be pushing for by  pleading inability to comply with the proposed 2025 standard.

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Automotive News Europe [sub] must have been bar-hopping with German auto execs. On the same day it unearthed secret anti-X6 plans by Daimler, ANE also heard that Opel will lauch “a new flagship model” by the end of 2016 or early 2017. Not only will it be a “big Opel”, the car “may come to market with alternative powertrains such as a fuel cell system to help boost Opel’s green image.” (Someone needs to tell Opel that in Europe, one does not need to be ashamed of big cars, just like Silverados are o.k. stateside.) (Read More…)

When BMW launched its X6 a few years ago, it was widely considered an abomination and a deviation from the true BMW way. Justin Berkowitz, while still working for TTAC, called it the BMW Xcreable X6 and claimed it was conceived while “a BMW X5 went out drinking with a Scion tC. They had way too much Jose Cuervo and yada yada yada…”

As it happened so often, the opinions of the experts were ignored by the market, and the X6 turned into a runaway success. Audi supposedly can’t stand on the sidelines. Now, Daimler is rumored to line up an X6 fighter of its own. (Read More…)

Actually, the full name of this race at Stafford Motor Speedway is the Boston Tow Party & Overhead Cam-Bake, and tonight was just Part One of the BS Inspection (the track has some sort of event going on, so we’ll have to do the bulk of the inspections early Saturday morning). As far as I’m concerned, however, we can all go home happy right now, because a genuine Peugeot 405 Mi16 has finally entered a LeMons race. (Read More…)

With the 2004 X3, BMW offered a compact SUV a half-decade ahead of other German car manufacturers. So not long after Audi and Mercedes have introduced their first such vehicle BMW has an all-new second-generation X3. The first-generation X3 had its strengths, but its weaknesses tended to outweigh them, especially in the U.S. market. The […]

The Governor’s Highway Safety Association has reviewed a number of studies on distracted driving, and its report [PDF here] shows a number of disturbing findings. A few of the highlights (or is that lowlights?):

• At least one driver was reported to have been distracted in 15% to 30% of crashes at all levels, minor to fatal. The proportion of distracted drivers may be greater because investigating officers may not detect or record all distractions. In many crashes it is not known whether the distractions caused or contributed to the crash.
• In almost 80% of all crashes and 65% of near-crashes the driver was looking away from the forward roadway just before the incident and that secondary task distraction contributed to 22% of the crashes and near-crashes
• about two-thirds of all drivers reported using a cell phone while driving; about one-third used a cell phone routinely. In observational studies during daylight hours in 2009, between 7% and 10% of all drivers were using a cell phone… about one-eighth of all drivers reported texting while driving. In observational studies during daylight hours in 2009, fewer than 1% of all drivers were observed to be texting.
• Cognitive distractions by themselves – thinking about something other than driving, without any manual or visual distraction – can affect driving performance. Two recent studies reinforce the conclusion that distractions affect the mind, not just the eyes, ears, or hands
• [Two] studies found that crash risk was about four times greater when using a cell phone. Hands-free phones did not appear to be any safer than hand-held phones.
• In the only study of texting bans, HLDI studied their effect on collision claims using the same methods as their 2009 study of cell phone laws. They concluded that texting bans did not reduce collision claims. In fact, there appears to have been a small increase in claims in the states enacting texting bans compared to neighboring states… there is no evidence that cell phone or texting laws have reduced crashes.

If you’re at all interested in a relatively concise (50 pages) overview of the state of distracted driving research, this report is well worth a download. Ultimately, though, the report offers more challenges than easy answers, as it largely debunks the notion that increased enforcement or hands-free laws make much of a difference in the problem. [via AutoObserver]