After taking a look around the loftiest of automotive landscapes and reading a few tea leaves, Lamborghini seems close to signing off on a model that won’t have reviewers searching for exhaust note adjectives. There won’t be any use for them.

As European luxury marques — especially those under the Volkswagen Group umbrella — tiptoe tentatively into the EV realm, Lambo is poised to make its next introduction an eco warrior. This, of course, after the recent introduction of the Urus SUV. (Read More…)

There’s a new version of a rarely-seen car coming out for 2020, meaning if you’re living in the right place, and can find one, you may be able to get into a $109/month lease with nothing down. That’s currently the best lease offer in the country. So, what is this low-priced wonder car?

Well, it gets 124 miles to a charge, seats five, and hails from Ulsan, South Korea. (Read More…)

If you’ve grudgingly followed the unseamly goings-ons in the defamation case filed against Tesla CEO Elon Musk by a British cave diver, things just took a turn. Documents filed to a California federal court this week by Vernon Unsworth’s lawyers reveal a plotline worthy of a better-than-average sitcom.

In stating their client’s side of the story, Unsworth’s legal team showcased communications from from Musk, in which the CEO expressed regret for calling the cave diver “pedo guy” on Twitter and sending accusatory emails to a Buzzfeed reporter. It also seems that the private eye Musk hired to dig up dirt on Unsworth is a convicted fraudster who’s now back in jail for parole violation. (Read More…)

Appearing midway through 2014 as a 2015 model, the Chevrolet Colorado and its GMC twin, the Canyon, are growing long in the tooth, which isn’t too big a concern in a segment that hosts the Nissan Frontier. However, consumers like alterations that show their truck is newer than other trucks.

As such, there’s a 2021 model-year refresh on the way for General Motors’ midsize pair. Just don’t expect wild changes. (Read More…)

No, not depreciation — though that might come into play here, too. A great number of car models are lackluster, deficient in style, reliability or panache, or basically appeal to buyers only for their low cost of ownership. Some vehicles are simply appliances, nothing more.

Yet appliances stimulate little in the way of bad emotion. They’re not meant to. So, despite the blandness of some vehicles, you wouldn’t call them depressing. No, that term is reserved for a very specific cohort of rides. Which models are they? (Read More…)

Volvo’s relationship with its Chinese parent is about to grow even closer. The Swedish car maker and its parent company, Geely, proposes to put an end to separate engine development, with engineering teams from both companies tasked with building common powerplants for all marques in Geely’s broad orbit.

For Volvo, the move to a new standalone business for its internal combustion engines would be beneficial, given its plan for the brand’s future. (Read More…)

Arguably the most interesting — or at least atypical ⁠— Buick in the brand’s lineup, the Cascada was a European creation that wore many badges. And now it’s truly, definitively dead.

Unlike the recent deep-sixing of the Ford Taurus and Chevrolet Cruze, the last Cascada to roll off Opel’s Polish assembly line did so with little fanfare. Perhaps a few autoworkers raised a tallboy of Tatra after work, we don’t know. For Opel parent PSA Groupe, the ceasing of Cascada production is akin to sweeping old cobwebs away in preparation for new wallpaper.

But what a life it had. (Read More…)

The Environmental Protection Agency has gotten around to tinkering with Ram’s latest EcoDiesel V6, and its early findings should put a smile on the faces of the folks in Auburn Hills. However, the estimated fuel economy of the latest (and totally legal) 3.0-liter diesel comes with an asterisk.

While the oil-burning Ram 1500 does seem to beat out Ford’s 3.0-liter Power Stroke both in terms of power and efficiency, both Ford and Ram take a backseat to General Motors. (Read More…)

In the wake of a deadly Ford Excursion limousine crash in upstate New York, the National Transportation Safety Board is calling on limo operators and builders to ensure passengers are belted in. It’s also calling on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to make its recommendation the law of the land.

The 2018 crash in Schoharie, NY killed 18 occupants of the aging SUV-turned-limo, as well as two pedestrians. Using this crash and several others as a starting point, the NTSB’s study and subsequent report found that the only way to ensure passenger safety is the most obvious one: buckle up. (Read More…)

Compared to the original BMC Mini from back in the Sixties, the modern Mini launched at the dawn of the 21st century was a portly affair, expanded in all directions to accommodate modern people with modern lives. And, compared to that first “new” Mini, the most recent generation of the three-door hatch looks positively ginormous. Somewhere along the way, Mini became not all that small.

Mini wants to correct the bloat, but only to a degree. (Read More…)

Not many of you will, of course, and not just because the Lincoln Continental Coach Door Edition now sells for more than $115,000. There’s too few of them, you see.

Last year’s surprise run of coachbuilt, suicide-doored Continentals sold out in 48 hours and totalled just 80 vehicles. For 2020, the fabulously expensive long-wheelbase Conti stages what might be its last appearance, offering a greater likelihood of scoring a buy. (Read More…)

Tax credits are a great way to stimulate purchases or participation, and in the politician’s mind, they often take precedence over affordability measures that would benefit broader swathes of society. That being said, they’re here to say… unless you’re referring to the slowly vanishing federal EV tax credit.

Automakers like Tesla and General Motors are already watching their $7,500 credits halve, then halve again, after surpassing the 200,000-vehicle threshold that starts the countdown to a credit phase-out. Now, the Treasury Department is claiming some recipients of the eco stimulus shouldn’t have received it in the first place. (Read More…)

Ford Motor Company may have sidelined thousands of 2020 Ford Explorers and Lincoln Aviators due to hazy manufacturing issues, but it seems many vehicles slipped through the quality dragnet and into the hands of consumers.

You saw a eyebrow-raising walkaround of a dealer-fresh Aviator here the other week. Owners, however, get to slip behind the wheel and, in some cases, experience a bewildering array of symptoms. (Read More…)

Lincoln’s MKC was a solid effort for the brand’s first foray into the compact premium crossover market, but certain gripes stood out. For this not-broad-of-beam writer, the relatively narrow front chairs didn’t usher in that sense of coddling a buyer demands of a high-end vehicle. In base spec, the 2.0-liter Ecoboost four-cylinder felt slightly labored, and that push-button transmission, with the selector keys mounted high on the center stack, isn’t something a driver grows used to in a hurry.

It looked above-par for its class, however. Kudos to Lincoln’s designers.

For 2020, the MKC nameplate mercifully bites the dust, replaced by an all-new vehicle with an honest-to-goodness name and an extra helping of style. (Read More…)

The badge you don’t see in the photo is the no-longer-Ram-associated Dodge badge, the one we’ll be discussing today. In a post the other day, yours truly waxed on and on, probably to your great annoyance, about the brand’s attempt to stimulate interest in its future via its past. What name would you like to see return, the brand’s Twitter account asked.

Some readers considered the tweet a possible sign of a returning Viper — the low-volume supercar that bowed out Dodge’s lineup not all that long ago. A month before his death, former Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne poured cold water over the idea, claiming the Viper could only stage a profitable return if it shared a platform with something from FCA’s European collection, and in doing so wouldn’t be able to handle a giant, honking, torque-laden American engine necessary for a Viper to be a real Viper.

Maybe it’s still a good idea to some, though others might feel a Ford GT-like one-off model punted to a Canadian specialty manufacturer and offered at a stratospheric sticker price is a better way to go. (Read More…)