If you live in America or Canada, Volkswagen Lupo will tell you not much. In Europe, it will evoke an “ah, the Lupo, haven’t seen one for a while.” Well, that’s because Volkswagen had discontinued the small car in 2005. That’s not a long lifespan for a model that was introduced in 1997. All kinds of theories are floating around why VW stopped building the car. Here is the truth: lack of buyers. People looked at it, saw the price, and said: “For a little more, I get a real car. How about that Polo or Golf over there?” (If you are in Mexico, “Lupo” might sound familiar. But it’s actually a Brazilian Fox that is sold under the Lupo name.) Now would you believe that Volkswagen is resurrecting the ill-fated car? Read More >
A lot of people have little or no respect for car dealerships. In fact, on the TTAC forums, I frequently hear the word “stealership” so much, that I’m herewith petitioning the Oxford English Dictionary to officially put it in our lexicon. I recall the story of a friend on mine who had trouble with a Honda dealership in the UK. His mother bought a brand new Honda Civic and in the final month before the 3 year warranty ran out, the alternator gave up. The mother wasn’t angry that such a failing had happened, she just wanted it fixed. But the dealership had other ideas. They weren’t convinced that it was the alternator and they couldn’t look at it until next month. The mother told her son (my friend) this story and the son though it was a bit of a coincidence that the dealership couldn’t look at the car until next month, which happened to be the month that the car came out of warranty. The son bypassed the dealership and wrote a very strongly worded letter to Honda UK (It could have been “extremely worded”. In the first draft, he threatened to run over their testes with a steam roller). Strangely, a week later, the mother received a phone from the dealership saying that they could look at her car, fix whatever needed to be fixed and throw in a free service. Now that’s a story with a happy ending. Now let’s try one a bit more turbulent, and this one comes from the land of the “stealership”, the United States. Read More >
If you are hoping that the Chinese bubble will burst in no time, putting China back on bicycles, then this story is not for you. If you are worried about little people in Asia using up all the precious hydrocarbons we use for our bigger cars, then we must warn you that reading further could be hazardous to your circulatory system. You have been warned. Read More >
Volkswagen is betting big on China. Volkswagen wants to double their production capacity in China to three million vehicles by 2013/14. That is roughly half of their current worldwide production. To do that, Volkswagen will finally build their long rumored, but often denied second new plant in China. A week ago, Volkswagen had announced that they would build a plant with their northern partner FAW in China’s deep south. Read More >
Our Korean contributor Walter Foreman hipped us to this, one of the first videos of the 2012 Hyundai Elantra taking to the streets [via DaumTV]. Of course, in Korean spec it’s called the Avante, but when it finally gets sold stateside, it’s sure to be known as the “baby Sonata.” Or perhaps “that car that makes the Cruze look so deathly boring by comparison.” Or possibly, “a precisely scaled execution of Hyundai’s fluidic sculpture design language.” Or, if Hyundai’s really successful over the next year or so, people will refer to it as “just the new Hyundai.” It’s amazing how much change people can become accustomed to.
Japanese car makers castworried glances at the thinning calendar: On September 30, Japan will discontinue their subsidies for environmentally friendly cars. That program had provided Japan with China-sized double-digit growth rates. All things must pass, and Japanese automakers are getting ready for a German sized Abwrackprämien-aftershock: Everybody is expecting a run on dealer lots through September and then: Bang. Other than in Germany, where people who never bought new traded in the jalopies for a cheap new car, in Japan there is a huge pull-forward effect. Automakers are preparing for the worst. Read More >
Finally something tangible out of the Toyota/Tesla-hookup: Tesla and Toyota will build an electric version of Toyota’s RAV4 compact crossover. According to a communiqué by Toyota, the two companies signed an agreement to that effect. The E-RAV4 is supposed to be available in the United States in 2012. So fast? Well, it’s as simple as combining the Toyota RAV4 model with a Tesla electric powertrain, says Toyota. The first prototype has already been built and is now undergoing testing. Tesla will “produce and deliver a fleet of prototypes to Toyota for evaluation within this year.” Read More >
President Obama got a chance to check out the Chevy Volt yesterday, as part of his trip to the Michigan battery belt. Unfortunately, he did not confirm or deny whether the Volt will actually get 230 MPG, because the EPA and GM are still “negotiating” a mileage sticker for the Volt. Luckily, GM has provided an important look at how the Volt’s battery system stacks up against key competitors… Read More >
When BMW announced that it would be building a million front-wheel-drive cars, a conflict between the new BMW-branded “Megacity” or 0-Series and BMW’s existing MINI brand seemed inevitable. And though we’ve posed the conflict in terms of an either-or decision, it’s clear that BMW sees no problem with offering small, front-drive models through both its BMW and MINI brands. In fact, BMW will offer its Megacity alongside the MINI Cooper, and, according to Autocar, a new MINI-branded model based on the same platform but slotting underneath the Cooper. MINI promises that the new city car will be no larger than the original Mini, and that it is likely to offer a two- or three-seat interior. This three-cylinder, Smart ForTwo-fighting Mini will be built to pass North American crash test standards, so don’t be surprised if it arrives stateside eventually. And though it returns the MINI brand to its roots, the question of how this sub-MINI will relate to its Megacity cousin remains an open question.
Just when we thought that EVs and hybrids might begin to make our city streets quieter, Congress proposes legislation—so unlikely not to be passed—that would require electrics to announce their presence with an external noise source. Section 109 of this year’s Motor Vehicle Safety Act [PDF here], reported out of the House Energy and Commerce committee in early July, requires new hybrids and EVs “to provide an alert sound” so that pedestrians, notably the blind, can hear them. Fortunately, it could take six years before we’re subjected to this, due to the creaky slowness of the bureaucracy. The secretary will have three years after the enactment of the transportation bill to issue the final rule, and “full compliance” won’t be required until September 1 or later of the calendar year that begins three years after the final rule is issued. Read More >
Automotive News [sub] reports that the Acura RL is about to be canceled in the Japanese market, where it is sold as the Honda Legend. Considering that Acura’s range-topper sold only 872 units this year so far. For comparison, that’s less than even its weakest competitors like the Cadillac STS (2,145 units YTD)… only the Audi A8 (353 units YTD) sells worse in the full-size luxury sedan segment. According to the report, which originated in The Nikkei, Honda will also make its Civic a hybrid-only model in Japan, and will cancel its Elysion 8-passenger van. With Honda announcing its mid-term product plans next week, we’re sure to hear more about this shortly… in the meantime, would anyone miss the RL?
We didn’t make it down to the first meeting of the NHTSA-National Research Council panel tasked with studying unintended acceleration, but apparently we weren’t the only ones. A scan of the MSM confirms that a number of “more study is needed” stories were filed for the occasion, a good two weeks ago now, but we’ve been pointed towards the presentations for that meeting [available for download here, all 128 slides in PDF format here], and we feel comfortable drawing a few conclusions from them. In fact, we’d even argue that this data puts a lot of the controversy over unintended acceleration in Toyotas to rest.
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