One of the joys of watching a previous-generation JK Jeep Wrangler barrel into an obstacle at 40 mph in the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s driver-side small overlap crash test was seeing the vehicle shed its front wheel and scoot away as if nothing had happened.

Well, in just-published tests of a randomly selected 2019 Wrangler Unlimited, the first half of the crash sequence occurs pretty must as it did before. The front driver’s side wheel shears off, with little to no intrusion into the driver’s footwell. Great for Jeep. It’s the second half of the test, however, that punts the model’s small overlap score from “good” to second-worse “marginal” ⁠— the Jeep careened onto its side.

Not once, but twice. (Read More…)

With General Motors aiming for a May 18th restart of North American vehicle production, powertrain components, in some cases, need a head start. That’s why May 11th will be the first day back to work for many employees of GM’s St. Catharines Propulsion Plant, home to much-used V6 and V8 engines, as well as a transmission.

The gradual return to work ahead of GM’s restart date comes after the Canadian labor leader Jerry Dias expressed concern over workplace safety. (Read More…)

Hey, things crop up. Little things, like a global pandemic that ground the economy (and vehicle production, and sales) to a halt for two months, can just appear out of the blue and wreak all sorts of havoc.

Because of just such an occurrence, Volkswagen of America’s long-awaited return to black ink will have to wait. (Read More…)

Toyota appears to be ready to answer a call, hinting at — but stopping short of confirming — the future arrival of a small car with outsized performance on American shores.

The automaker’s U.S. arm greeted Thursday by gathering up consumers who’d like to hear more about a GR-badged hot hatch from the company. GR meaning Gazoo Racing, an abbreviation already slapped on a two-door Yaris screamer not available on this continent. Boasting a very blown three-cylinder and all-wheel drive, this Yaris is not your coworker’s wife’s commuter. Nor will its one-size-up sibling be anything to scoff at.

Toyota clearly sees opportunity in the compact hot hatch space, and rumors and trademarks have spoken to this for some time. Today, Toyota’s speaking about it. (Read More…)

It’s a situation a good many of us have found ourselves in — and one we’d all like to avoid going forward, if at all possible. Alas, fate isn’t known for its even-handed distribution of fairness.

Sometimes we’re forced to make a painful choice concerning something we love, with neither outcome a good one. In the case of aging vehicles, that choice is one repair bill away. (Read More…)

At this point, only Ford has yet to deliver a firm restart date for its U.S. assembly plants, with Detroit rivals Fiat Chrysler and General Motors pegging May 18th for a cautious ramp-up of manufacturing activities.

Elsewhere, things are getting back to normal — or as close to normal as one is allowed these days. Amid new health protocol and a weak supply chain, Hyundai and Kia flipped on the switch this week, joining a handful of other foreign brands that have already restarted production in the U.S. South. (Read More…)

What this spring needed was more talk of sudden death. So here you go.

According to preliminary estimates released by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, fewer people died in highway crashes in 2019 — pushing the nation’s death rate down even further from a modern-era high point reached in 2016.

While data from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) does seem to indicate a third straight year of decline, we’re still a ways off from numbers reached just a handful of years ago. (Read More…)

Things change, and things fall apart. Both of these truths can be applied to best-laid plans, but they ring especially true for those of General Motors.

GM might have wanted 2020 Chevrolet Corvette production to run uninterrupted from late last fall through this summer, but a series of ever-larger crises managed to keep its production numbers down to a trickle. The result is a first-model-year run so small, it’s almost guaranteed to make every 2020 ‘Vette sold a de facto Launch Edition model. (Read More…)

Fiat Chrysler is prepared to ramp up its U.S. manufacturing presence starting May 18th, but the situation on the south side of the Detroit River is another story. That’s according to Unifor President Jerry Dias, whose union represents Detroit Three autoworkers in Canada.

Dias’ U.S. counterpart, UAW President Rory Gamble, is now on board with FCA’s restart plan after initially opposing an early return to work, but the Canadian labor official is now having a change of heart. (Read More…)

Like its domestic rival, Fiat Chrysler, General Motors is also looking to begin firing up U.S. assembly plants on May 18th. The news first came by way of The Detroit Free Press, which learned of alerts sent from plant managers to UAW workers at GM’s Lansing Delta Township and Flint operations. The automaker later confirmed this via its first-quarter 2020 earnings report.

The non-renewal of Michigan’s stay-at-home orders (which run through May 15th), coupled with a new, company-wide health protocol and the UAW’s quiet acquiescence to a Detroit Three reopening, seemed to pave the way for a firm restart date. (Read More…)

The revamped, full-size Chevrolet Tahoe and Suburban and their GMC Yukon/Yukon XL twins gain significant length, interior volume, and creature comforts for 2021, but extra MPGs seem to be in short supply.

The vehicles are now even larger than their predecessors, are still heavy, and carry identical V8 engine displacements, so no one should have expected Prius fighters. Still, the changes in fuel economy are worthy of note. (Read More…)

Interesting, segment-shunning product isn’t as commonplace as it once was, but some automakers are still willing to think outside the box. The two-box shape, that is. Hyundai’s one of them, as the automaker’s long-awaited Santa Cruz pickup is now greenlit and headed for production in Alabama in 2021.

More consumer-friendly than the concept vehicle released in 2015, the production Santa Cruz has already been spied undergoing testing while wearing frumpy camouflage. Now, it’s been seen in the buff. (Read More…)

The first quarter of 2020 spilled a tsunami of red ink over Fiat Chrysler’s balance sheet, with the automaker posting a $1.84 billion net loss.

FCA seemed to be the canary in the coal mine when it came to the coronavirus, as the automaker was forced to idle an assembly plant in Europe even when the pandemic was still a regional outbreak in China. Where did the virus then take hold? In Italy, of course — FCA’s European base of operations. You know what came after that.

Seemingly more so than its Detroit rivals, FCA has been eager to get factories back up and running, and the Q1 earnings report only adds to its desire for something approaching normalcy. The folks in Auburn Hills want to open things up starting May 18th. (Read More…)

Your author can’t explain why his neighbor purchased a new Chevrolet Blazer Premier, but he can understand why General Motors felt the need to insert a new crossover between the Equinox and Traverse. CUV white space = $$$, I think the famous equation goes.

With this in mind, the existence of the new Chevrolet Trailblazer, slotted between the Trax and Equinox, is equally understandable. Boasting a brace of three-bangers and more space and MPGs than a Trax, the decidedly non-BOF Trailblazer serves as a larger stepping stone to the Chevy brand.

Timing, however, was not the Trailblazer’s strong suit. (Read More…)

The pursuit of safety can lead an individual down many paths. To a self-defense course. To a gun store. To a withdrawn, frightened existence well removed from the warm confines of relationships and social gatherings. And even to a car dealership.

Yes, owning and driving a car puts you more at risk of dying in a crash than riding the train or bus to work every morning, but in these strange times, a car can be more than just a convenient way to get to work on time (or not). It can be a sanctuary. (Read More…)