The LS and I have had a long relationship. Back in 1993 I was an impressionable teenager nearing that holy-grail of ages: 16. This meant I dreamt of driving constantly. My parents were Oldsmobile and Chrysler folks, so my choices were a 1980 Custom Cruiser, a 1985 Cutlass Ciera, or a 1988 Grand Voyager. The Oldsmobiles were diesel. Need I say more? One day my best friend’s dad pulled up in a brand-new 1993 Lexus LS 400 for the school run. I had no idea cars could be assembled with that kind of precision and my world was changed forever. Needless to say, when the Lexus invited me to the unveiling of the fifth-generation LS, my expectations were set high.
What you see above is the S-Cross concept from Suzuki, set to bow at the Paris Auto Show in September. But, this C-segment concept isn’t a new model, instead a replacement for the Suzuki SX4.
There once was a song written by Johnny Cash about an auto worker who wanted a Cadillac but couldn’t afford it outright. Thus, he took parts off the line bit by bit until he finally had the car of his dreams.
Cars that use little or no gasoline seem to have a bit of a hard time, no matter how badly people want them. 22 states decided to do something unusual: They tell American carmakers to make natural gas-powered vehicles, and the states will buy them for state fleets. Read More >
Mark Stevenson steadfastly remains on his Suzuki Death Watch. “Pfft,” says the company run by the world’s youngest octogenarian Osamu Suzuki, and brings out yet another car Americans can’t have. .
Suzuki will bring out a new version of its best selling kei car, the Wagon R. According to The Nikkei [sub], Suzuki’s new midgetmobile will upset the other midgetmobiles with a “best-in-class 28.8km per liter, up around 22% from the current version of the wagon-type minivehicle.” Read More >
China’s auto market keeps puttering along. In July, total automobile sales in China rose 8.2 percent to 1.38 million, says the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM). For the year, the market has gone basically sideways with a slight 3.6 percent upward bias. The Chinese bubble refuses to burst, likewise, the market does not want to go back to its red-hot former glory. Read More >
Rick Ross, the gastric bypass candidate best known for songs like “Maybach Music” and “Aston Martin Music”, has debuted another video for his latest album “God Forgives, I Don’t” – simply called “911”.
Over the recent years, Automatic License Plate Recognition (ALPR) has come into increased use. What has the American Civil Liberties Union up in arms is that the data are stored and can be used to compile behavioral profiles on innocent civilians. The state of Maryland seems to be in the lead when it comes to centralized aggregation and storage of ALPR data, “which raises significant privacy concerns,” says the ACLU. Read More >
The excitement about battery electric vehicles seems to die down amidst disappointing uptake. Range, weight and cost are in the way. At the same time, dormant interest in fuel cell vehicles is being rekindled. A month ago, we had a new look at the technology from the perspective of the Toyota/BMW linkup. Today, The Nikkei [sub] takes a broader view and says that carmakers are in the final lap of the fuel cell race. Let’s have a look at the contestants and where they stand.
This comes from today’s Porsche Club of America e-mail newsletter. Can you identify the actress in this advertisement for the 996 Carrera? We know this ad was filmed a long time ago, because now the young lady from the clip has become a rather famous adult, and also because there isn’t any heavy oil smoke coming from the exhaust — a sure sign that this 996 hasn’t covered more than, oh, a couple thousand miles. Be aware that any “I’d hit it comments” will receive the same chilly reception that my ex-wife gave me when I uttered the phrase during the fencing scene of 1998’s “The Parent Trap” reboot.
Toyota is serious thinking of breaking a taboo. It is considering moving some production of its Lexus luxury brand from Japan to the United States, says Reuters. The oddest part: The Japanese government might help Toyota to move the jobs out of the country. Read More >
The latest chapter of the Joel Ewanick saga is unfolding courtesy of Bloomberg. Our long-suffering marketing chief appears to have been sacked in part because he committed the heinous crime of buying cheap furniture.
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