For the “Back To The Future” fan keen on winning the parking lot at the next confab, DeLorean announced this week that it’ll make “new” cars again in Texas.
Thanks to a change in the small volume manufacturing law, DeLorean Motor Company said it could build around 300 new cars from parts it purchased when the original DeLorean went under.
The Texas outfit said they’ll bin the puny Renault-Volvo V-6 that made 130 horsepower in favor of a crate engine sourced from somewhere that’ll make 300 to 400 horsepower. Electronics, brakes and other drivetrain goodies will be similarly updated on the car, according to Jalopnik. (Read More…)
Refuting a report that many Volkswagen managers were involved with a widespread cheating scandal involving 11 million cars worldwide, at least three different regional offices and hundreds of employees, the automaker’s top brass has other ideas.
“No one has spoken with me,” Volkswagen’s CEO Matthis Müller told reporters on Thursday according to Reuters. “You got the information from some sources who have no idea about the whole matter.”
Set us straight then, Müller. Tell us how hundreds of confiscated hard drives and terabytes of data from multiple offices — those are VW’s figures, not ours — and more than 380 interviewed employees contradict a report that a department was scared shitless to raise their hands and admit failure to higher ups? Because that case is shaping up quite nicely. (Read More…)
I work with logos in my day job and it’s always nice to see a clever logo design. Maybe I’m strange but things like the negative-space arrow in the FedEx brand excite me.
That’s why I’m a bit perplexed about the current badge Ford uses on its F-150 pickup trucks.
Ford announced Thursday that it had earned a record pre-tax profit of $10.8 billion for 2015 — including $2 billion in the fourth quarter — bolstered by pickup sales in the U.S. and strong growth in China.
The record-setting year for the automaker wasn’t much of a surprise — second- and third-quarter results set records along the way — but Ford’s ability to finally turn a profit in Europe may be the most unexpected news. The automaker had lost money in Europe since 2011.
Latin America, notably Brazil, will continue to be a sore spot for Ford and other automakers. Ford said Thursday it expects to lose more money there in 2016 than the $832 million it lost there in 2015.
It was a pain in the ass — literally. “I spent two years training my ass,” Carl Reese tells me via phone, shortly after his announcement of YACCR (Yet Another Cross Country Record). “I was serious about my fitness. I even sat on my seat (a Sargent aftermarket replacement, with backrest) while I was on my computer doing my job. But by the time I got into Pennsylvania, I was in so much pain that it was affecting everything else. I was hitting the kill switch on the bike instead of the turn signal because my senses were overwhelmed. I was glad to see that New York skyline.”
As a devoted, even bigoted, owner and rider of Honda motorcycles, I was tempted to make a comment about BMW riders and their proclivity for “training their asses.” Instead, I let Carl Reese, already familiar to TTAC readers from the Tesla cross-country electric-vehicle record with Alex Roy late last year, keep talking about how, and why, he rode his BMW K1600GT across the country in a shade over thirty-eight hours, ass pain and all.
Now, on to this week’s question from youthful reader Greg:
Hi Bark,
I’m about to turn 16 and will be looking for a car soon. Being a car guy, I’ve been looking at sportier cars that won’t break the bank. My total spending budget is about $11,000.
Honda received much flogging from the press for the last-generation Civic. The 2012 model was the result of Honda improperly reading the Magic 8-Ball amid the global slowdown. Honda’s decision makers assumed shoppers would be looking for something more modest, perhaps even austere, and changed direction to suit. The competition, assuming shoppers would be looking for greater creature comforts […]
I’m untangling a logistical nightmare and I think a Panther can help.
This particular nightmare involves relocating from Urbana, IL to Idaho Falls, ID, a 1964 Corvette convertible that’s sitting in Richmond, VA, and a Grand Marquis in New Jersey. The Corvette “ran when parked” in my father-in-law’s garage in 1982 and brought back to Illinois by me using a rental van towing a car hauler. A moving company will take care of the move to Idaho including transporting one car, but not the Corvette because the car has to be operational. In the meantime, my Dad needs to sell my grandfather’s Grand Marquis.
An Illinois sheriff knows a barn find when he sees one.
According to the Northwest Herald, McHenry County Sheriff’s Deputy Mike Stadler spotted an old parade Chevrolet Caprice with 4,000 miles gathering dust in a shed and decided to bring it back into service.
The 20-year-old, LT1-powered police cruiser — which sports none of the modern police cruiser amenities including USB ports, massive touchscreen or even traction control — was pressed into service when Stadler’s Impala was retired.
“I could see the diamond in the rough,” Stadler told the newspaper. “Your non-car person would look at this thing and think, ‘Why would I want this 20-year-old thing covered in dirt?’ Where I was, ‘I really want to clean this thing up.’”
Guess what, enthusiasts? The automakers are lying to you. See that red tire? It may as well be a giant red X written across your hopes and dreams of a small, nimble, rear-wheel drive coupe.
The Opel GT Concept is just that — a concept. And it isn’t the first time GM has pulled this trick this year. Actually, if you look back over the past few years of General Motors rear-wheel drive, two-door concepts, only the Camaro and Cadillacs have come to fruition.
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles CEO Sergio Marchionne on Wednesday said the automaker would rely more heavily on profitable Jeeps and Rams in North America and Europe to help its business remain profitable in other sagging areas and regions.
“We are not of the view that this industry is facing an impending demise,” Marchionne said before announcing FCA’s adjusted earnings of $1.78 billion in the fourth quarter.
Marchionne and CFO Richard Palmer said Jeep’s success in North America and Europe led the company last year and would be the “bedrock” for the automaker’s future. The automaker laid out specific plans to bring forward a Jeep pickup and Wagoneer, and let wither less-profitable models such as the Chrysler 200 and Dodge Dart. (Read More…)
The American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy has released its Greenest and Meanest cars for 2016 — and it’s bookended by vehicles from Daimler.
That, Europe wants to open up ECU code, Bosch says “You wouldn’t understand, so why bother?” and GayWheels takes aim at a possibly tasteless German Opel advert about, erm, rear-ending … after the break!
In the war for ever-lucrative pickup truck money, conspicuous consumption is key. General Motors’ latest salvo in the pickup arms race has mudders, LED lamps, a spray-in bedliner and the letter “X” in its name, jack.
GMC announced Wednesday that it would sell this spring a Sierra 1500 All Terrain X package, which is derived from its All Terrain trim, and includes a handful of goodies thrown on at the factory instead of at the dealership to pry a few more hundred dollars out of the burning pockets of pickup buyers.
Interestingly, the All Terrain X package is available on its 5.3-liter V-8 (with performance exhaust!), not the hi-po 6.2-liter V-8 because product planners will have a name for that later. (Read More…)
After considerable thought, I have come to a conclusion: sunroofs are weird. I mean, think about it: it’s a hole in the roof of your car, designed to allow you to … what, exactly? Look up at the sky? While you listen to the incessant rattling caused by the fact that there’s a hole in the roof of your car?
Yes, folks, I’m being serious. Today I’m writing about sunroofs. And there’s a reason for this: I have recently come to the realization that sunroofs, unlike virtually any other feature or option available on an automobile today, provoke some seriously strong opinions. Some people like them. Some people hate them. Some people really hate them. I haven’t found anyone who really likes them, except for myself.
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