It seems like yesterday
But it was long ago
RS America in the dealership’s lights
Covered with dust and it had nowhere to go
And it sat there for a year
Till they sold it at a loss
Slow like a Boxster headlights just like a frog
And all the service had been skipped and no one gave a toss
And I remember how cheap they used to be
And I thought that it never would end
I remember how they bought and sold for pennies
Wish I’d had a crystal ball and bought one then
Did you make the sensible, sane choice of the four-cylinder engine in your 2015 Accord? What about refusing to perform an LS7 swap in your CR-V immediately after taking delivery? Well, now you are going to (have a one in three thousand chance that you will have to) pay for that mistake.
Following an unspecified “fracas”, the British Broadcasting Corporation has suspended Top Gear star Jeremy Clarkson and canceled this Sunday’s episode of the show. Mr. Clarkson, an actor and personality who portrays a car enthusiast on Top Gear along with two other actors who couldn’t hold up the ass end of a regional SCCA autocross if they had a GT-R Nismo and an extra day to practice the course, has a history of controversial statements, one of which may have led to this suspension.
The first round of reviews for the Porsche Cayman GT4 is coming in this week. Unsurprisingly, they are all rather hosanna-esque in nature; Porsche PR won’t permit anything less. With that said, this is the combination of Porker-LEGOS for which a lot of people have been asking for a long time, and there are some interesting tidbits from the reviews, summarized below.
It was one of those weekends where nothing went quite right. The first rental car I got was pretty banged-up on all corners, and the interior reeked of menthol cigarettes. Worst of all, it wasn’t even a Mopar, and since I was on the way to Thunderhill so I could race a Neon with famous […]
Twenty-four years ago, noted wearer-of-Givenchy-sweatsuits-with-burgundy-trim DJ Quik lamented that, thanks to the pervasive influence of gangster rap, everywhere he went was just like Compton. The same thing is happening with the American commercial-vehicle landscape. The first to fall was the hoary old unibody Dodge van, which yielded to the rust-prone Sprinter. Next was the E-Series, nee Econoline, which bowed-out this year in favor of the Euro-style full-sized Transit. Only the Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana are left to carry the glinting banner on which waves the heraldic American-van shield of a bleeding hand (from trying to wrench on short-hood vehicles), a one-dollar bill (to signify the aggressive cost-cutting which has come to dominate that business) a bar of candy (calling to mind the child molesters and creeps who formed the tertiary van market) and the symbols “O-” (the old universal-donor blood type, required for anyone who crashed a van above walking pace).
Mercedes started this party in the USA, of course, but they’ve been late to the intermediate-van game. The Metris, announced at a work-truck show in Indianapolis, will fix that oversight.
Sergio Marchionne had a surprise for Geneva Show attendees: a confirmation that FIAT’s version of the stellar new MX-5 will have an old-school name.
Jeep’s Mike Manley told the press at Geneva that there’s a Grand Wagoneer coming — but the details of that arrival are, so far, thin on the ground.
I was not exactly charmed by the current-generation Malibu when I reviewed it last summer. Its Kamm-tailed predecessor had enough virtue to face the Japanese-brand midsizers squarely on their own turf and come away with at least a respectable, stylish showing, but the current car is a retrograde step in everything from its regrettably truckish styling to its lowered-expectations driving dynamics.
Turns out that I’m not the only person, or corporation, if that’s not the same thing in 2015 anyway, who feels that way. If you’re renting at certain airports, you’ll have the chance to enjoy the Malibu at the same kind of deep discount it currently requires in order to slip the surly bonds of drab GM dealerships. I asked a rental-industry insider why that might be so.
Last year, our own Murilee Martin found a Euro-market Volkswagen light-duty commercial van during one of his many junkyard adventures. As often happens here at TTAC, we had a brilliant contribution from one of the B&B, fictionalizing the story of the van’s final days. Then, just two days ago, the van’s last owner showed up to tell the true tale.
“When seconds count, the police are just minutes away.” How many times have you heard that phrase used by gun-rights advocates? It’s a catchy but glib way to characterize the role of police in American society. The courts have ruled time and time again that the police have no duty to protect an individual citizen, and you should have no expectation of that individual protection.
The problem with the deduction that comes naturally from the above statement — therefore, I had better protect myself — is that very few of us are prepared to exist in what the late Colonel Jeff Cooper called “Condition Yellow” all the time. “Yellow” means that you are mentally alert and prepared to use force in your own defense. “Condition White”, on the other hand, is what happens when you’re asleep, daydreaming, using both hands to repair an automobile or tie your mistress to the hotel bed, playing Lumineers tunes on an Adirondack-topped acoustic guitar, or making your way through the tenth “Challenging Stage” of Galaga. Chances are that you’re in “White” right now. To test for this, have someone in the same room with you, no matter how large that room is, point their finger at you and say “Bang” quietly. If you weren’t prone on the floor with your personal weapon out before they finished the word, you’re in White. Congratulations! You’re not paranoid.
So here we are, one year after I took delivery of a 2014 Accord EX-L V6 six-speed coupe, eleven months after the first update, and five months after hitting the 12k mark. As fate would have it, at the same time the crew at Automobile was enjoying a free year in a car almost exactly […]
The Lotus Evora is one of my favorite cars ever. The new Evora 400 makes history by eclipsing the twin-turbo Esprit V8 as the most powerful production Lotus road car to date.
First, there was the five-seat Santa Fe, which in GLS V6 form was the ride of choice for our very own Bark M. back in the day. Then the Santa Fe went upmarket, so Hyundai created the Tuscon. Now the Tuscon is, apparently, going upmarket. It’s like what Chrysler did with Imperial, only in reverse!
Nine years ago, I paid fifty-eight thousand dollars for a new VW Phaeton, after paying seventy-seven thousand dollars for a different VW Phaeton six months previously. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.* I was very active on a VW message board at the time and it was not uncommon for me to get random private messages from teenagers:
99VWJettaSlushbox: lol suck it u loser the FAILton is the worst VW ever
I enjoyed my Phaetons tremendously and drove them everywhere from Manhattan to VIR. However, I was virtually alone in my enthusiasm for the model. My second Phaeton, the black 2006 V8, was one of just 300 brought into the United States that year. When VW discontinued US sales before the 2007 model year, most people took that decision as conclusive proof that you can’t sell a $100,000 Volkswagen to Americans. They were correct; however, you can sell a $200,000 Volkswagen to Americans, and you can do it for a very long time.
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