We’re getting to the homestretch for TTAC’s 2016 Best and Worst Automobiles Today.
Our writers have voted diligently, and a couple of tie-breaking votes were cast to give us an even 20 contestants in each category.
I present you the 20 Worst Automobiles Today, as chosen by you and our writers, in alphabetical order, along with select nomination comments for each and every entry.
We’re getting to the homestretch for TTAC’s 2016 Best and Worst Automobiles Today.
Our writers have voted diligently, and a couple of tie-breaking votes were cast to give us an even 20 contestants in each category.
I present you the 20 Best (and 20 Worst, later) Automobiles Today, as chosen by you and our writers, in alphabetical order, along with select nomination comments for each and every entry.
TTAC commenter gimmiemanual writes:
I was living in China in late 2009, and decided to take scuba classes so I could dive the Great Barrier Reef.
My open water course was done in Qiandao Lake, outside of Shanghai, and this picture was on the wall of my (terrible) local hotel room.
I offered to buy it for what everyone with me considered a ridiculous amount, but the owner absolutely refused to sell it to me. I’ve lazily looked through the internet, but have been unable to figure out what it is.
Over the weekend and earlier this week, my girlfriend and I negotiated over and agreed to purchase a new car. No, it isn’t that.
After cleaning up the data as much as I could considering this smashing headache I’m managing today, I’ve crunched the numbers and come out with a magic number: 242. That’s the total number of vehicles you nominated that were eligible for this year’s Ten Best and Ten Worst.
Here they are, in order of Best to Worst, for your reading pleasure.
… a person I will announce after the jump.
First, here are some stats from all your nominations.
You’ve nominated almost every vehicle sold in the United States for TTAC’s Ten Best and Worst Autos for 2016 — but your nominations still count.
On the line is a $100 Amazon gift card and your chance to be immortalized in Internet glory as we use your nomination reasons for content fodder.
Consider this your last call announcement. Nominate your best and worst now!
Sergio Marchionne, CEO of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, could shed light on the company’s uncertain future this Tuesday when the company reports earnings. However, as the Detroit Free Press reports, Marchionne may not take the opportunity to clear the air, which would leave employees at FCA plants wondering about their futures for months to come.
The sweatered one has already stated in no uncertain terms that the Chrysler 200 and Dodge Dart will get the axe. Just when that will happen, and what product will fill freed-up plant capacity and dealer lots, remains a guessing game.
Uber isn’t having the best week.
In two separate legal disputes, Uber will pay out a total of $111.4 million. However, the larger of those two payments — $100 million to settle a class-action suit with drivers — is being considered a win by the ride-sharing company.
Update: I made a decimal flub. The math is corrected. Thanks to commenter ChemEng for pointing it out. We’ll post a new piece on Monday.
There’s no denying it: Volkswagen cheated. It confessed to the crime of emitting up to 40 times over the legal limit allowed for NOx. We learned yesterday (and the day before, to some degree), that Volkswagen will fix the vehicles that can be fixed, if owners so choose.
But what happens to all those diesel cars, which are perfectly good aside from emitting more NOx than they should, if owners decide to cut and run? And what happens to all those vehicles that can’t be fixed? Volkswagen has vowed to buy them back from customers — to which I ask, what then?
There are few options Volkswagen can employ to unload the massive windfall of cars coming its way, and none of them are particularly environmentally friendly.
So far, you’ve nominated 156 separate vehicles for TTAC’s 2016 Ten Best Award — including a cornucopia of models that shouldn’t be nominated. (Reading comprehension, people!)
Here are some insights into the Best & Brightest hive mind.
Mario Berthiaume will never forget May 21, 2015.
The rookie racer from Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada is laying down pre-season testing laps in a brand-new racecar prior to the first race of the Nissan Micra Cup. The car feels good. Mario’s lap times are falling, albeit gradually, thanks in part to a new set of tires. His approach is methodical. He’s taking on one corner at a time; after perfecting one turn as much as he can, he moves on to the next. After all, mastering braking points, lines, and apexes at Mont-Tremblant is key to getting the most out of the low power, pint-size racer.
Everything is going as planned.
That is, until seven laps into the fourth shakedown session of the day. Mario makes a rookie mistake and it happens. The rear of the #7 Micra swings right-then-left like a pendulum. The fresh rubber digs into the warming tarmac on the inside of Circuit Mont-Tremblant’s turn 10, causing the Micra to tip and roll. In under 10 seconds, Mario’s racing dream has turned into a $30,000 nightmare — and the twisted aftermath is resting on its side on the outside of turn 10.
His season is over before it even begins.
Nearly 10 years ago, Robert Farago and Frank Williams stumbled upon a grand idea: to counter all those other websites, media outlets, and blogs competing to see who could fellate automakers the quickest and fastest, TTAC decided instead to put on a pair of size 12 steel-toe boots and swing its leg where the sun don’t shine. Thus, TTAC birthed the TWAT awards.
Since then, The Best Automobiles Going (TBAG) awards joined its elder sibling, and the two were renamed so as not to offend the sensibilities of some. This year, Ten Best and Ten Worst are back — in a new time slot, but on the same channel — and it all starts with you.
Your mission: Set your typing fingers alight with vitriol and smash some keys. Nominations are now open.
Nevada, home to Tesla’s “Gigafactory,” is taking a different tack with its other soon-to-maybe-be electric vehicle producer, Faraday Future. To make sure its $215 million package of tax incentives and abatements actually creates a factory that will employ Nevadans, the state has levied a number of conditions on Faraday, which includes putting up millions of dollars to develop the future 18,000-acre Apex Industrial Park site the company will call home.
Last week, we pondered a semi-subtle Nazi-themed decal applied to the rear window of a Volkswagen CC (that obviously blocked the driver’s rearview of history). After we posted that piece, another reader supplied the image above, which shows a Volkswagen GTI sporting a novelty plate that directly links the Führer’s People’s Car with the Nazi execution of nearly 6 million Jews.
Are Volkswagen fanboys the most likely car enthusiast group to show full-on anti-Semitism?
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