Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s vision for his company’s future covers all the automotive bases, from personal vehicles to commercial trucks and transit fleets.
In a blog post on Tesla’s website, Musk spelled out the steps of his “Master Plan, Part Deux” — a long-term update of his previous decade-long business plan. With the Model 3 on the way in late 2017, the old plan has come to an end, so the company’s founder is looking for other things to power with electricity. Read More >
Enthusiast praise for the Mazda3 began before the current-generation compact Mazda arrived in late 2013. Previous iterations benefited from hugely positive reviews. “We’re going to love the 3 once it arrives in America,” Automobile wrote in December 2003. Credit for dynamic excellence was the norm a generation later. “Steering is direct and the suspension is firm enough for spirited driving and equally competent at soaking up bumps,” said AutoGuide in early 2009. I haven’t hesitated to get in on the action, writing in my second review of the latest compact Mazda, “The Mazda3 is still the best compact car you can buy.”
It’s therefore not surprising to see that in a five-way compact car comparison for the magazine’s July edition, Car and Driver named the 2016 Mazda3 i Grand Touring the winner of the test. Car and Driver handed the Mazda 203 points, 44-percent more than the fifth-ranked 2016 Nissan Sentra SL achieved.
Industry observers also won’t be surprised to learn that Car and Driver’s fifth-ranked Nissan Sentra produced 139-percent more first-half sales than the Mazda, while the other three losers all roundly outsold the Mazda, as well. Read More >
Would you be furious if you invested millions to open a dealership, only for the manufacturer to supply just one vehicle with any sort of consistency? Of course you’d be.
That’s the problem some Hyundai dealers in China are facing now, who are in the unique situation of competing with another set of Hyundai dealers in the country. That’s a tall order: the only vehicle Hyundai supplies to those dealers on a regular basis is the Veloster hatchback. Now Hyundai has a Little Problem in Big China in the form of a $135 million lawsuit.
More Americans enjoyed a vacation on the side of the road last year than ever before, according to the American Automobile Association.
Vehicle breakdowns reached a new high in 2015, with 32 million calls logged to AAA from drivers in distress. Of the most common problems, vehicles less than five years old make up a large part of the tally. So, what’s the deal? Are vehicles going backwards in quality? Read More >
It won’t come as a surprise that Volkswagen’s U.S. arm is eager to put all that happy-go-lucky “clean diesel” stuff behind it.
Once the diesel emissions scandal sinks from the headlines like the Deepwater Horizon, the automaker plans to head in a different direction stateside, Automotive News reports, and oil burners won’t be a big part of it. Read More >
Frustrated by congestion and unsafe lane changes, state governments are telling left lane drivers to get the lead out.
Tennessee rolled out a new law on July 1 that dings drivers $50 for driving too slowly in the left lane, joining a growing list of states that want to free up the go-fast lane through penalties. The days of drivers coasting along at (or slightly under) the speed limit in the passing lane are waning, and that’s a good thing. Read More >
Hey you! Yeah, you with the William Fioravanti suit and Allen Edmonds wingtips. Why are you going fishing like a commoner with a lowly Porsche Cayenne? The discerning angler demands a BENTLEY BENTAYGA FLY FISHING BY MULLINER!
If you’re anything like the writers at TTAC, Pokémon Go is a strange and scary thing, like what those teenagers might be doing over there.
We’ve avoided writing about the misadventures associated with the nerdy phone app — grown men falling off cliffs, kids finding corpses, awkward romantic escapades — but a moron in Baltimore tipped our hand.
Two nights ago, a Baltimore police officer’s body camera captured a Toyota RAV4 colliding with his parked cruiser. The young male driver, who clearly couldn’t figure out how to cover his ass, immediately admits to playing Pokémon Go behind the wheel.
Volkswagen diesel owners will be able to spend many happy, polluting miles on the road, even after they request a fix instead of a buyback.
Buried in the automaker’s $15.3 billion U.S. settlement is the expectation that most of the recalled vehicles will still spew twice the allowable rate of emissions after being repaired, according to Bloomberg. A fix for the 475,000 2.0-liter diesels hasn’t been approved, but regulators fully expect any repair plan to fail — and they’re grudgingly okay with it. Read More >
Did you think I would end this column on just any random car? Not only is subject vehicle #100 a real mind-scrambler, but this dramatization is based on a true account from the former owner of this bubblegum Ford Festiva.
Want to feel a real connection to something? Pay cash for it.
Research shows the act of handing over real, honest-to-God paper money and coins for a product has a profound impact on the value a person places in that product. Suddenly, it turns into a possession. Read More >
There’s a product drought coming to Cadillac dealers, and the earth will stay scorched a good two years.
After the recent introduction of the XT5 crossover and CT6 sedan, buyers will have to wait until mid-2018 before the next new model arrives, according to a product update published in Automotive News. Dealers can use the time to learn Cadillac’s new model name strategy, which stays stubbornly alphanumeric. Read More >
Audi is apparently about to embrace electric vehicles with all the intensity of a daughter greeting her father on the tarmac after the war.
According to Reuters, company sources say the automaker plans to make EVs account for 25 percent of sales by 2025 — a move that would erase the environmental stigma of its parent company and challenge Tesla in the fledgling luxury EV field. Read More >
The state of New York wants its pound of flesh from Volkswagen, as well as $450 million.
A lawsuit filed against the automaker by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman alleges widespread knowledge of the emissions-cheating “defeat device” used in millions of diesel vehicles, according to the Wall Street Journal. Read More >
The federal agencies reviewing the country’s corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) targets are pleasantly surprised by the amount of fuel-saving technology in modern vehicles, and hint that the target they decided on back in 2011 is still doable.
Those agencies just released a technical assessment report (TAR) to guide the review process. In it, they figured that vehicles will average between 50 and 52.6 miles per gallon by the target year of 2025 — if gas stays stable and consumers continue buying SUVs and trucks.
That’s not too far off the original target, and judging by the optimistic tone of the report, it’s likely the 54.5 mpg mandate will stay intact. Read More >
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