Pity the Buick Regal GS. Since the idea of a hotted-up Opel Insignia was floated for the US market, fans imagined that Opel’s epic Insignia OPC would be headed stateside, complete with 325 horsepower, 2.8 liter turbocharged V6 and all wheel drive. Buick reps quickly ruled out the turbo-six engine, as GM’s corporate order demanded that the engine be limited to “premium” Cadillac and Saab models. Then we found out that the Regal GS would have the same turbocharged Ecotec four-cylinder engine found in its Regal Turbo sister model, tuned from 220 to 255 horsepower, leading us to conclude that

That engine can reportedly be tuned to an easy 310 hp and 300 lb-ft of torque, making the “base” Regal CXL with the 220 hp 2.0T engine a much smarter buy. Unless the idea of tuning a Buick is simply more cognitive dissonance than you can handle. Otherwise, the only thing the GS really brings to the table is AWD and a bodykit with more front-end venting than the United States Senate.

Well, now it’s time to knock another item off the list: Automotive News [sub] reports that the GS will not get AWD because

We really don’t think consumers will want that feature… It does take away from some of the performance capability of the vehicle.

Which is doubly strange considering that AN is forced to note that

The Regal GS will accelerate slightly slower than expected, with estimates having it reach 60 mph at less than seven seconds. In January, executives said the production car would accelerate about one second faster.

D’oh! With the Regal Turbo hitting 60 in about 7.5 seconds, it’s beginning to look like the GS really is all about the bodykit. The saddest part of all this: the GS will still technically be “the sportiest Buick ever,” and will certainly be marketed as such, just as the Regal Turbo is now.

After the Abwrackprämien-high in 2009 (which saved the auto industry from damnation and got rid of a lot of old cars), and the short hangover that followed, Germany is definitely back to normal. For the second month in a row, German new car sales are at 2008 levels. According to the official data of the German Kraftfahrtbundesamt, October sales were 20 percent below October 2009, but only 0.8 percent below October 2008. The graph above tells a better story. Read More >

As U.S. car sales are forecast to be growing once again, spare a thought for those less fortunate than you. Namely, those poor people in Europe. While you’re the U.S. market is expanding, sales in the Old Country are a big NSFW mess. Read More >

Germany’s new car market continues to be anemic. In September, sales for the first nine months were down 27.5 percent. Official October data are expected later in the day, or tomorrow.  Nobody expects sudden growth. (The whisper number is -20 percent.) Nevertheless, the German car industry runs extra shifts and out of cars.

Why? Read More >

Even though Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne’s disparaging comments about its over-reliance on Italian manufacturing have opened the door for more US manufacturing opportunities, United Auto Workers boss Bob King wants to make it clear that he won’t be taking advantage of Fiat’s rift with its Italian unions. Fiat tells Automotive News [sub] that failure to secure Italian union agreement with its new manufacturing plan could send increased production to Serbia, Poland and even the United States. King’s response [via Michigan Public Radio]:

They (automakers) won’t be pitting one worker in one country against another. We’re going to be part of working with our global partners in other unions and building a global middle class – and rebuild the American middle class, really.

Yes, in the brutally competitive international labor market, there is a way for everyone to win… really.

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Given that European luxury brands have generally had their way with Detroit-based competitors in the US market, it should come as no surprise that Cadillac has failed to make any appreciable headway in the European market. The brand has been launched and re-launched in Europe four times in the last twelve years, according to Autocar, and its latest relaunch was supposed to boost sales to 20,000 per year by 2010. Despite that ambitious goal, Cadillac has fallen flat with European buyers, having moved about 1,300 units this year. As a result, the latest re-launch of Cadillac has been accompanied by dramatically scaled-back expectations: 2,500 units per year within the next “several” years (Cadillac expects the new ATS to make up about 1,500 units of this volume). Only limited numbers of CTS sedans and wagons will be converted to right-hand drive for the UK, and diesel engines for the CTS range are on hold. But even with a more modest approach to Europe, Cadillac is widely expected to keep struggling in Europe. After all, Lexus spent some $2.8b attacking the European luxury market, but sales which peaked at 60k in 2007 have retreated to a mere 30k units. As Cadillac gets stuck into its fourth re-launch, analyst Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer is not optimistic

Since we’ve already irritated Saabistas by posting a comparison of the Nissan Juke to the 96, we might as well just come out and say it: Saab is one sick puppy. Third quarter results are out for the Dutch-Swedish automaker, and they’re not good: the firm has lost $70m on an operating basis last quarter, and has burnt through $160m in the the first nine months of 2010 [full results in PDF here]. Wholesale and retail sales in the first three quarters were down by 10 percent and 45 percent respectively compared to the first nine months of 2009, and Saab has cut its 2010 sales projections from 45,000 units to 30,000 units, or half of the 60k projection Saab started 2010 with. Improbably, the company still believes it will sell 80,000 Saabs next year, and 120,000 in 2012. And though Saab-Spyker has a negative equity of about $234m, the company says it does not need to recapitalize. In other words, comparisons to the Nissan Juke are the very least of Saab’s worries.

TTAC’s own Israeli man of mystery, Tal Bronfer, has been busy with non-TTAC related work this summer, but he’s just checked in from the Alps with brand new images of the Hyundai Sonata Wagon (known in Europe as the Hyundai i40) brake testing on Austria’s Grossglockner High Alpine Road. Tal was blasting through the Grossglockner in some rapid Teutonic metal (let’s just say it has at least one “R,” and one “S” in its name, and a review is forthcoming) when he smelled brakes. Naturally, his first thought was to check his own, but the culprit was this lightly-camouflaged wagon “slowly, braking downhill all the way from the top of the mountain.” Another Sonata Wagon was tow-testing.

What these pictures reveal is that the Sonata Wagon is not a simple sheetmetal job, as the elongated roof falls away gracefully towards the rear of the car, and appears to offer integrated roof rails. It’s a Euro-style “sport-wagon” in the mold of the European Accord rather than a US-style “cross-wagon” like the Venza or Crosstour, which indicates that it won’t come to the US. After all, with the Mazda6 and Subaru Legacy wagons discontinued, the mass-market station wagon seems all but dead. On the other hand, the Sonata has been punching above its weight since it debuted, and with the Euro-Accord wagon coming stateside as the TSX Sportwagon, and a Buick Regal wagon rumored, the i40 may yet come to the states as a Sonata Wagon.

Notice a difference between these two pictures? No, not the fact that one is a sexy press shot and the other is a bush-league amateur snap. Both pictures show the 2011 Volkswagen Jetta, but one of them has a torsion beam rear axle, the other has a variation of the Golf’s multilink setup. One has a 2.5 liter blunt instrument of an engine and a slushbox, the other has a high-tech “twincharger” engine that won the International Engine Of The Year award two years running, mated to a dual-clutch ‘box. One has a nasty, plasticky interior, the other offers “higher quality materials and trim.” By now you’ve probably guessed that the less desirable of these two Jettas is the US version, and the fancy-pants version has just been announced for the European market…
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Editor’s Note: On Monday, TTAC’s Martin Schwoerer wrote about a planned record-breaking non-stop run of 600 KMs, from Munich to Berlin, with a car that was equipped with a “revolutionary” electric battery system. Something smells funny, he said, and vowed to donate 100 Euros in case the drive was completed. Well, it was. So, how does it feel to have pie on your face?

How about Vegetarians Against the klan? Or maybe the Tugg Speedman Foundation? No, there are probably better organisations to give my money to. Guess I’ll ask the Best & Brightest… Read More >

No automaker has more to gain –and lose– in the early-adopter EV game than Renault-Nissan, and CEO Carlos Ghosn knows how the game is played. Nissan is investing $4b to rollout electric cars in the US, Japan and select Western European markets at the end of this year, but despite being committed, Ghosn insists that EVs aren’t ready to stand on their own yet.He tells Automotive News [sub] that

The Financial Times reports that Anti-trust officials in Switzerland are investigating the Bavarian car maker due to allegations made by a Swiss consumer TV show. The TV show sent undercover reporters to BMW dealerships in Germany (Swiss and Germany share a border, you know) to try and buy a car. The show claims to have found that BMW is blocking its dealerships in European countries from selling their cars to Swiss residents.

What makes this particularly egregious is that although Switzerland isn’t a member of the European Union (they like to stay neutral), it does have Bilateral trade agreements which guarantee free trade with its neighbors. Restricting trade? Under a free trade agreement? Uh oh…

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Tata reiterated its threat to invest the the U.S. and Europe with their bargain-basement Nano car. At an event held today in Toyko, Tata’s Vice Chairman Ravi Kant said that “Tata Motors now plans to take it forward to the developed markets in Europe and in the U.S.,” The Nikkei [sub] reports. “Now plans?” Read More >

We live in annoyingly ideological times, in which people get worked up about gay marriage, Christopher Bangle, or what religion their neighbor belongs to. This is foreign to me. If it works for you, then go for it, I always say. You like some wheels, you buy ’em; if you don’t, don’t.

So, it’s hard for me to understand what the fuss is about the Chevrolet Volt. It’s just a car, for Pete’s sake! On the other hand, I am a notorious gearhead and can appreciate the importance of what seems to be a totally new automotive concept. It’s new, but does it point toward the future? Let’s discuss it.

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You know that something is a fad when A) it’s bubbling on the stock market or when B) snake-oil salesmen tout the newest revolution, and regular folks actually start believing them.We’re not quite there yet with “A)”, but check out what I call an exhibit for “B)”. Read More >