While I don't care for the Prius, I can't deny that it has been successful in America. Not just at sales or income for Toyota, but for having one of the highest profiles of any car on sale here and for legitimately changing the automotive game. But it looks like the Prius's developmental future is a lot more conventional. Michele Krebs, writing for Edmunds' Auto Observer, reports a number of unfortunate developments for the next generation Prius, to be revealed at Detroit in January 2009. It's bigger – 3-4 inches, although not much heavier. The engine grows to 1.8 liters, and combined gas and electric power is up from approximately 110 horses to 160. But don't worry, fuel economy is up. So it's all okay, right? Wrong. Most successive generations of automobiles are able to make improvements in all areas. That does not mean the distribution of those improvements – which are often compromises and tradeoffs – is ok. Fuel economy will be up in the next Prius? Imagine how much more it could be up if they weren't trying to squeeze another 50 horses out of the car, or adding 4 inches to the body. Ms. Krebs also confirms that the Prius model range will grow (hopefully a smaller, lighter coupe is included), and reminds that a Lexus version with a 2.0-3.0 liter engine is still on the table. This is an example of Toyota losing the plot, trying to make the Prius appeal to more people – and in so doing, diluting the one of the single most focused products on the automotive market. But hey, it's all in the pursuit of sales numbers. [Thanks to starlightmica for the tip]

The last gen U.S. S-Class lineup included a short wheelbase model with a 240hp 3.7-liter V6. Yes, the S350 was out there. Somewhere. In terms of sales? Nowhere. Hence today's U.S. S-Class consists of the S550 and S600 and variants. But now that federal fuel economy standards are promising nay demanding a higher love, is the time right to offer a new S350 or twin-turbo six-pot 735 to the American market? Overseas, such engine and car combination are, of course, de rigeur. Stateside, Merc and Bimmer have maintained their prestige and justified their high costs by cramming gadgets into the cars and upping standard horsepower again and again. On the other hand, only two years ago the S500 had 300 horsepower; the 3.6-liter V6 in the Benz SLK350 offers 269 horses. And BMW's 7-Series launched with 325 horses– a number that's not far removed from the twin-turbo I6' probable output. So why not? Many buyers of vehicles north of $60k just want the best, the most, the top of the line. An engine shared with a puny C-Class or 1-Series? They might just say no thanks. Are the two German automakers between Iraq's impact and a hard place?

Wow Volkswagen. Just when I thought you couldn't do anything more to get a VeeDub into the service bay, you really step it up. Right now, I just bring my GTI in every other month when the check engine light illuminates my face with fury. But the new "carefree maintenance program" announced Wednesday is next-generation stupid. For the first 36k miles of ownership, VW will do all your scheduled maintenance for free. What is the scheduled maintenance you ask? Changing the oil (which VW claims is only necessary every 10k miles on 2009s onward, thanks to synthetic oil) and uh, checking a whole bunch of fluid levels. VW's press release [via the great press release funnel otherwise known as Autoblog] touts the new program as a "great way to improve our owner loyalty for the brand, as well as increase consumer consideration." Uh no and no. This isn't going to sell cars, and the opportunity to save $20 bucks on the free oil change isn't going to make up for all the dealer-service department scamming guaranteed to take place. In fact, if I was a VW NA corporate suit (poor sods), I'd be doing everything I could to keep people AWAY from the dealers, to minimize the amount of rip-off-itude.

While rumors that GM's letting the UAW run it into the ground (accidentally on purpose) are pretty far-fetched, it's highly likely that GM knows its flaming-out (cash-wise), heading for C11 in a death spiral. So what's stopping them from using C11 to protect their current cash reserves (which they need for reorganization) other than, say, hubris and self-delusion? Chrysler. When Chrysler files ("how our employees spent their summer vacation"), GM and Ford will get a short term boost. Sales will come from former MOPAR devotees, rural areas without a large transplant presence and people who consider Chrysler's bankruptcy a "wake-up call" to start buying American. If GM files before Chrysler, ChryCo gets the dead cat bounce. Oh, and why not let Chrysler introduce Americans to the possibility of buying a car from a bankrupt carmaker? Look for a full editorial on the slings and arrows of a GM bankruptcy by the end of the week.

Speaking at the Beijing auto show, GM CEO Rick Wagoner went on the E85 offensive. The automaker's Beancounter-in-Chief ripped into a recent United Nations (UN) report claiming that ethanol production is warming the globe and reducing vital food supplies (a.k.a. a "crime against humanity"). Wagoner described the UN report as "shockingly misinformed." Yep, an army of scientists from all over the world has nothing on Rick Wagoner. Yes yes; the UN has a bureaucracy to rival GM's and its own political axe to grind. But more importantly, this kind of commentary from Wagoner [via the Financial Times] highlights GM's breathtaking arrogance and a failure to realize the development money they've spent on ethanol so far is a sunk cost. Wagoner tried to deflect attention the morality of raising cane in former rainforests and making corn juice out of food crops. "Oil prices are a far bigger driver of higher food prices than ethanol." Ain't moral relativism grand?

Rather than let the Fusion expire on the proverbial vine, Ford is rolling-out updates to the midsize, Gillette-faced sedan that racked-up 149,552 sales last year (up 4.9 percent from '06). The Fusion's 2.3-liter four-cylinder workhorse is headed for a condo in Florida. The new four-pot: a 2.5-liter I4 mated to a six-speed automatic (booya!). No word if a manual will still be available, but the magic 8 ball says "don't get your hopes up." Meanwhile, Ford was raising dealers' expectations, promising best-in-class fuel economy for Ye Olde Fusion. That'd be north of 32 mpg highway. Power also rises from 160 to 170 horsepower (the unrevealed torque curve will really tell the story of the bump in displacement). Ford also announced they're preparing a more powerful V6 mill for the Mariner and Escape SUVs, most likely a version of the corporate 3.5-liter V6. If true, the Fusion and Milan would also probably upgrade to the new V6 (although this was not announced at the dealer event).

VW's Lavida Chinese-developed sedan looks about as exciting as a postage stamp (apologies to philatelist pistonheads). Worse, the car's interior lacks VW's trademark style and quality, what with the world's worst fake wood trim (excluding the press-on plastic wood from the '60's). Never mind. Based on the VW MkIV Jetta/Golf platform, the Lavida will be cheap as chips to build. The selling price is a rumored  150k – 190k RMB ($21k to $27k). Talk about product overlap: China's version of the current MkV Jetta sells for 120k – 180k RMB. So, dollar for dollar, yuan for yuan, Lavida or a Jetta? Meanwhile, if VW could bring a lightly-contented version of this car to the US for say $10k – $15k, even if it had only 120 horses, it'd be a huge hit for a company that's abandoned its cheap and cheerful brand reputation stateside. It could happen…

Pixamo gallery includes the press photos and live pictures from the Beijing Auto Show.

Although spy photographers have captured exterior shots of the next E-Class floating around the net, the cars are so heavily camouflaged that it's hardly worth looking. There are, however, two fantastic pictures of the interior of the car. One comes by way of the UK's AutoExpress, the other is of unknown origin (and slight blurriosity). The interior is a fair split between the boxier, more traditionally robust interior in the C-Class and the leather-covered lunar module in the S-Class. And the same "hood" that covers the LCD screen in the S-Class (not to mention BMW's cars) appears here too. In all honesty, I'm not wild about it. But I don't get wild about much. Maybe an E250 CDI. Anticipate a formal debut for this car in the fall at one of the major European auto shows.

Usually new Chinese cars are either knock-offs or just look horrendous (see Chery's V2). But designs in the PRC have been getting better (how could they not?) And now Roewe– the company that bought the rights to make the Rover 75 sedan after the British company imploded a few years ago– has reskinned and updated the 75. And it looks outstanding. In fact, this might be the best-looking Chinese car to date. The Roewe 550 is a midsize sedan, on the scale of a Honda Accord. Much of the design and engineering work was done by boffins from the European engineering firm Ricardo, a subcontracter to Roewe's owner SAIC. The interior cribs some design elements from BMW and Renault. But overall this is a very impressive vehicle for a country known for platypusian vehicles and inelegant knock-offs.

Click here for Pixamo gallery 

Ouch, the metablogging is hurting my face. Toyota posted to their Open Road blog today with a post so genius they may not even know what it is.

A New Small Sports Car on the Horizon
– Scott Deyager, Corporate Communications

You may have heard that as part of strengthened corporate ties between Toyota Motor Corp. and Fuji Heavy Industries in Japan, Toyota and Subaru, which is owned by Fuji, announced plans last week to collaborate on a new small sports car.
We pay by the period here. Semicolons are also expensive. That's why I will continue to use plastic forks, knives, and commas I stole from the diner downstairs.

While the market introduction for this vehicle apparently is targeted for the end of 2011,
Apparently! Ha, I so nailed you new media! I'm implying that you have set a release date without info! Booya!

speculation on blogs, and in newspapers, already is vibrating along nicely.
Screw you, "blogs." And I guess you newspapers, too.

A report last week
Really leveraging the speed of blog posting to your advantage, I see…

in Japan's Asahi newspaper
Which readers of this American Toyota site probably know nothing about, since we had to explain that a company called "Fuji Heavy Industries" is in Japan.
But seriously folks, that's Toyota's great example of assumptions going overboard? Japanese publications are notorious for predictions, concept sketches and photoshops.

speculates
There's that word again.

that this car will be powered by one of Subaru's flat-four engines.
Yep, let's mock them for being optimistic that a 4-cylinder engine with a low center of gravity, which is easily configured to run power to the back wheels, would be the engine in the car. Rather than the cynical assumption they should have made that we're going to stick a Subaru logo on a Scion tC, and then take the rest of the day off.

Other speculation suggests
Okay, seriously, try a thesaurus.

that it will be rear-wheel drive, that it could go on sale as early as 2011, and that it will sell for less than $20,000.
Which we at corporate know would be too expensive (rwd), our engineers need to sleep (2011), and are you monkey crazy (<$20k)?

Stay tuned for updates surrounding this exciting new collaboration.
I'll bet you thought we were going to tell you some information. Validate or invalidate one of the rumors. Or even give you corporate vague-speak about how mostly one company's parts will be used. Well YOU THOUGHT WRONG, baby! High five! I got you so good! Oh also, please continue to come to our site again. When? Every day. Gotta convince the bosses that this blogging thing has legs.

Until today, we were dependent on "spy shots" to clock the new Honda Pilot. Taken by apparently very bored spy photographers lying in wait in parking lots for a glorified Accord-on-stilts (I guess the Camaro was not out testing that day), it seemed to be 10 percent less ugly than Honda's concept Pilot. As of today, the review embargo has expired. Pilot reviews are springing up like… are Eliot Spitzer jokes out of style yet? Honda appears to have forgotten to invite TTAC to the Pilot's launch, but other more "traditional" folks joined the junket. Edmunds says driving the Pilot is not "particularly memorable," but that the car/truck/minivan does its job. Los Jalopniks report that the refreshed Honda SUV is "not very exciting" but still the sensible car they ought to buy (life is too short for sensible, my friends). Car and Driver calls the Pilot "brilliantly packaged." I call it sorta weird looking, though given the current Pilot's core competencies, I'm confident that most folks will find this two-boxer more than merely adequate. TTAC will bring you a review of the new Pilot as soon as it's available to everyday folks.

That's right, today Chrysler sent out a press release announcing the introduction of its six-speed dual clutch transmission (a la VW's DSG), developed jointly with Getrag. Chrysler reports that it will "provide consumers with a fuel economy improvement and CO2 emissions reduction by 6%." The new cog swapper's going in the Avenger, Sebring and Journey in international markets, initially paired with a 2.0-liter diesel engine. Wait a second… we don't have that 2.0-liter oil burner in the United States. Does "international markets" mean "places that aren't North America?" Why yes, it does! Chrysler's biggest and most important market is not getting the dual clutch transmission from the git-go. But don't kvetch. Were you really considering buying a Sebring anyway? I didn't think so.

You'd think with an advertising budget of over $2b per year, GM could hire an advertising agency that "gets it." But you'd think wrong. We've seen plenty of "Pontiac Is Car," which is apparently is meant to appeal to illiterate Victorian-era men more accustomed to horses. And now we have an ad for the Cadillac Escalade that declares that it offers "The best highway fuel economy in its class." Do they know who potential buyers of Escalades are? Apparently an ad man was envisioning a fiscally-conscious, sensibly green guy sitting at the computer and having an epiphany. "Hey Miriam, call the dealer and cancel our Lexus hybrid test drive. The Escalade has the best highway fuel economy in its class." A proper Escalade advertisement would sell a combination of three things: instantly recognizable styling, supreme luxury, spaciousness. Maybe if we're lucky, this same agency will do ads for the iPod adapter in the new Buick Lacrosse. Or maybe Chevy's Corvette, which offers the biggest trunk in its class.

History is bunk. Although cars like the Jaguar XK120, Shelby Mustang and Porsche 911 have become legends, their modern equivalents offer far superior driving dynamics. And greater reliability. And safety. But it is their "soul" that resonates: the combination of icnoclastic style and man – machine zeitgeist. So when enthusiasts (and BMW PR) started comparing the new 135i to Bimmer's venerable 2002, expectations were sky high. The reality is more like a fat guy limbo dancing under a pole raised six feet off the ground.

For the last thirty years, Mercedes has manufactured the car we Americans know as the "G-Class" or "the Mercedes that looks like a brick shit house." The Geländewagen was originally built in the year the Shah of Iran skipped town (1979). Since then, Mercedes' truck has been regularly upgraded– provided you think giving an army truck a sedan interior represents an improvement. Someone does; the brand sells a fair number of these mucho macho SUVs into the U.S. luxury market. With this go-round, the G gets a new grille (to keep it consistent with the rest of the lineup) and a major engine upgrade. Out goes the G500's 290 horsepower V8. In comes Benz's ubiquitous 5.5-liter 388hp V8. Rappers and other off-road enthusiasts can also order some new toys, like a reverse camera and a Harmon Kardon stereo (perfect for soothing lions, gangstas and other savage beasts). Although some pundits had predicted that the urbane-in-comparison seven-seat Mercedes GL would replace the G-Wagon, the $90k+ style statement lives on. And yes, there is an AMG version.