Another 104 claims have been added to the pile for examination by Kenneth Feinberg and his staff, who are overseeing the victim compensation fund established by General Motors as a result of the February 2014 ignition switch recall.

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Stefan writes:

Sajeev, I recently had a conversation with my cousin in Wisconsin. He claimed that cars assembled in North America are more rust prone than cars assembled in Japan or other oriental countries. Apparently his observation was based on several cars in our extended family: An elderly Dodge Durango and a not-so-elderly Honda Odyssey with the traditional clapped-out transmission.

I have never seen any statistics to support these ideas and really don’t recall reading suchlike statements in the TTAC in the past. That older American cars rust more than newer Japanese, and vice versa, seems natural and I recall seeing many old Japanese cars with severe corrosion damage, but what is the truth in this matter? Over to you and the B & B!

Stefan (’97 Fat Panther without a speck of rust)

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This year is set to end on a high note as far as U.S. car sales are concerned, with 2015 shaping up to be the best year in a long time.

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For the few who will be purchasing a Toyota Mirai in 2015, you may be out of luck as far as tax savings are concerned. For now, anyway.

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(Please accept my apologies for this long-ago-promised and painfully overdue comparison. -DK) With the demise of the Chrysler 300 SRT, Americans are limited to two choices for a domestic sports sedan. And neither of them are built in America.

From the Twitter page of Juan Barnett comes a breakdown of sales of the last-gen Cadillac CTS. Including the CTS-V.

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Say farewell to the Subaru 3.6-liter six-cylinder boxer, as the automaker is considering smaller engines with turbos, among other options.

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There will be no manual transmission for the 2016 Cadillac CTS-V, but that’s ok. If you’d like a coupe, or a stick shift, there’s always the ATS-V.

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It’s official: As of this week, select Tesla Model S owners will be able to swap battery packs in a pilot program along the route between San Francisco and Los Angeles.

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GM Canada sold only 32 copies of its Chevrolet Orlando in November 2014, the worst month yet for the rapidly declining Mazda 5 alternative.

Although the Orlando set an impressive sales pace in its first 18 months in Canada – 2612 were sold during 2012’s fourth-quarter – it’s been in free fall ever since. Sales have declined in 19 of the last 22 months. 2013 volume was down 68%. Through eleven months, Orlando volume in 2014 is off by 43%. (Read More…)

Bill writes:

Hi Sajeev,

{the usual crap about long time reader, first time poster} I know you just answered a few emails about tire / tire size, but this has been sitting in my drafts folder for a while (the efficient side of me), I’m going to send it off before you answer more questions about tires..

My first question to you was ORIGINALLY about my now departed ’97 Volvo 850 a few months back when you were asking for more questions, but I answered my own question after reaching 3 pages of problems and issues. So I traded it in, more or less at scrap value, for a ’09 Lexus GS450h which came with a nice set of performance summer tires at 245/40R18. And as they say, winter is coming, and I’d be foolish to drive a RWD with summer tires north of the 49th. I’m planning to run 2 sets of rims + tire, got my eyes on some not so shinny Nokian “Hakkapelitaeraerfdaf?” R2 tires, but they are $300 a pop at that size. (Read More…)

Alfa Romeo will be going its own way for its upcoming Spider, directing Mazda to take its 2016 MX-5 over to Fiat-Abarth instead.

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Can you see a C7-era Chevrolet Corvette in that new Volt’s face? There’s a reason for that.

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With its GMAC Financial leather jacket burning in the closet while a supermodel lip-syncs in the tub, Ally Financial is at last free from government ownership.

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It’s taken a while to get started on the project to make my daily driver Saturn SL1 into a better handling car. I had the parts but it took a few weeks to be able to get the work scheduled at a shop that was willing to install my own components. Now that the work has been done and I’ve been able to drive the car in varying conditions, it’s time for a progress report. The short version is that I’m pleased with the results. For the long version, continue reading after the break. (Read More…)