A few weeks ago TTAC reported how BMW and Daimler revived a long-ago formed  joint purchasing venture in order to help drive down costs for the 2 independent car makers who can’t achieve high volumes of scale. This was seen as quite a big step in a direction few expected. As our resident German put it, “If you think South Korea and North Korea have communication problems, then you should be in a meeting between Daimler and BMW engineers.” He does have a way with words, doesn’t he? But he wasn’t wrong. It’s been a bit of joke to in the industry how Daimler and BMW view each other. As the mustachioed one put it, “Daimler engineers view their colleagues as boorish Bavarian upstarts. BMW engineers think Daimler is a congregation of has-beens.” And you thought relations between GM and Toyota were frosty! At least they had a plant together. Well, it seems that relations maybe thawing between the boys in Munich and the lads in Stuttgart. Kind of… Read More >

[In addition to the the Mitsubishi, here’s another vanup for all you fans of the genre, and a domestic brand at that]

The auto market prides itself on niche marketing. New body styles that we never imagined that there was a need for spring forth from the ever-fertile minds of the industry marketing boffins, and appear out of nowhere, like the “Sports Activity Vehicle” (BMW X6). But there’s one that’s been long overlooked: the van-up. Combining the best of two highly popular segments, the van-up offers unparalleled space utilization and utility. Well, if the manufacturers aren’t going to build one, a person just needs to roll up his sleeves and set to it. It’s the American way: Read More >

As I wrote a few days ago, European car sale figures aren’t looking too great. In fact, for want of a better phrase, they’re bloody awful. (Detailed numbers to follow at around Sept 15.)  The reason behind this drop is the detox from the high of “Cash For Clunkers”. Now that the artificial boost has gone (or is slowly dissipating) the market is coming back down to where it should be. And where it should be isn’t good news for auto manufacturers. In the UK, it’s just as bad. The SMMT reported a drop of 17.5 percent in new car registrations compared to August of last year. This is in line with the SMMT’s prediction that the second half of the year would be tough, to put it mildly. “New car registrations were down 17.5 percent in August and conditions will remain challenging through the rest for the year,” said Paul Everitt, SMMT chief executive, “The industry enjoyed a better than expected first half of the year and despite the difficulties, SMMT is forecasting that new cars registrations will close just ahead of 2009 figures.” Shall we take at look at the winners and losers in the UK market for August 2010? Read More >

When Renault and Nissan signed an agreement to form an alliance, few expected it to work. In fact, according to the book “Shift” (or was it “Turn Around”?), Bob Lutz was quoted as saying that Renault would be better off taking the money they spent on the Nissan stake, putting it on a ship, sailing it into the middle of the ocean and sinking it. Another accurate prediction from the One of Maximum Bullsh*t. The reason that the Renault-Nissan has worked so well so far is, according to Carlos Ghosn, communication. Without communication, how can you expect your partner to understand you? Sounds simple, right? Not to Hyundai and Kia. Read More >

The cow is on my side. (Please don’t tell her I ate her brother for dinner.)

In observance of Labor Day, I stray from my labor work as a Booth Babe and write about something considered unsexy: Minivans. I think by now we’re all well aware of my feelings on minivans. And we’re also well aware how you feel about my feelings on minivans.

I was afraid this was an insurmountable issue between you and me, and that’s sad. Life is too short for such ire brought on by automotive classism, don’t you think? So just for you, I have gone searching for some minivans in which the driver might actually be datable. MIGHT. I am making no promises.

Let’s explore, shall we? Read More >

The Japanese seem to be convinced that EVs are the wave of the future. They are so convinced that they are thinking up schemes to use that big expensive battery in the car for other things if the car is not used for other things. Such as when that new EV is sitting in the driveway while Watanabe-san commuted to work using the JR-train. Nissan, Hitachi, and Orix announced that they will work together on turning those batteries-on-wheels into dual-use technology. Read More >

We can’t pretend to be overly enamored with former “car czar” Steve Rattner, who oversaw the auto bailout before being disgraced for his role in a New York pension fund pay-for-play scandal. Still, the guy was in the thick of things during last year’s negotiations over Detroit’s rescue, so he knows where the bodies are buried. And in his new book, Overhaul, which has been released to select outlets ahead of its October 14 publication, he tells a whole lot of stories about the months of bailout proceedings that led to the rescue of GM and Chrysler. Of course, Rattner has an agenda in all this, namely proving that

so he’s not necessarily an unbiased source. But with grains of salt at the ready, let’s dive into his spilled guts and see if what secrets lie beneath.

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People have a lot of fears with electric cars/extended range electric cars. Will the government subsidies distort the market? Can manufacturers be able to sell them profitably? Are they really that environmentally sound? But the one which gets everyone is “range anxiety”. Will I have enough juice to get me home? It’s an issue which manufacturers are dealing with in their own ways. GM has come up with their own way of dealing with it; they’re trademarking it: With range anxiety being trademarked, someone just dreams the word, and GM’s lawyers will be on top of him, and make him surrender the illicit dream. Read More >

The Japanese “Big Three” automakers all saw significant sales drops in August, thanks to similarly large increases in August 2009 sales spurred by Cash For Clunkers. Toyota/Lexus/Scion sales fell 34 percent, as Camry and Corolla crashed down from insane C4C volumes of 54,936 and 43,061 respectively. Only Avalon, Sienna, 4Runner/FJ Cruiser and Sequoia gained year-over-year last month for the Toyota brand, while lower-volume Lexus models like HS, LS, SC, GX and LX were the firm’s sole luxury gainers. As a brand, Scion sold only 4,012 units. Honda’s Accord and Civic mirrored the Camry/Corolla’s drop, as Odyssey and Pilot were the only Honda-branded gainers. Acura RL, MDX and RDX were all up on the month, and Honda/Acura ended up with a 33 percent decline overall. Nissan saw sales growth from Maxima, Titan, Xterra, Pathfinder, Armada, and Murano.Conversely,  G37 Coupe and FX were the the only Infiniti models failing to outperform August 2009 sales, resulting in an overall 27 percent drop. Full numbers after the jump…

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The third-generation Camaro, so much swoopier than anything else on the road back in 1982, looked more like a concept car than a production car. The throaty V8, though pitifully weak by today’s standards, at the time was easily capable of getting a 14-year-old’s pulse racing. Some critics dinged the car for its impractical packaging, size, and weight, but I didn’t care. I wanted one, badly. Never did get one. By the time I could afford a Camaro, I agreed with the critics. From frenzied test drives in the Toyota Corolla GT-S and Honda CRX I learned the joys of high-revving multi-valve engines and agile handling. GM recently introduced a fifth-generation Camaro. What has it learned in the last 28 years?
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This was the Ooops month, previously called August. Before you get a heart attack from looking at the numbers, keep in mind that they are comparing with “Crazy August” of 2009, U.S. light vehicle sales were driven nearly up to the good old days of 2008 by Cash for Clunkers, only to drop 23 percent the next month. What we see this month is  a flashback of the withdrawal effects of 2009. All of this had (hopefully) been factored-in by analysts, but the numbers are coming in worse than expected.

If you don’t want to be sidetracked by the base effect of one crazy month, look at the rightmost column for the bigger picture: Up a bit for the year, but not by a whole lot.

The following list is complete. All precincts have reported. Read More >

Japanese citizens raced to showrooms in August and bought cars as if they are going out of style. Domestic sales of new cars, trucks and buses increased 46.7 percent from the same month in the year prior. There is a reason to this: Cars will be going out of style in Japan any moment now … Read More >

Once a new car has reached 3 years of age in the UK, it has to undergo a yearly test to make sure the key components of a car are working, and that the car is safe. It’s called an MOT. This is not the drive-it-down-to-your-friendly-gas-station-and-get-a-sticker routine. It’s pretty rigorous. It is anticipated with apprehension.  Anyway, the MOT is reaching its 50th birthday after the test became mandatory in 1960. So to celebrate the MOT’s 50th anniversary, Nationwide Autocentres, a garage group that performs many MOT’s around the UK, conducted a survey (how about taking the MOT out and drinking lager until your head spins? THAT’S a good way of celebrating your birthday!). The survey consisted of the top 10 best selling cars in the UK.  Then they looked at their failure rates after 3 years (some people have far too much time on their hands). Shall we have a look at the results (via the Daily Mail)? Firstly, here are the contenders:

Ford Mondeo, Ford Ka, Ford Fiesta, Ford Focus, Vauxhall Astra, Renault Megane, Vauxhall Corsa, VW Golf, Renault Clio and the BMW 3-series.

All of these cars were surveyed at their first MOT (i.e. three year old). What the surveys doesn’t take into account is how hard they’ve been driven (that pretty much equals out) and it doesen’t say what exactly has failed (it’s not a loose knob of the radio that fails the MOT, it’s usually something expensive …. T’s PASS or FAIL.)

So, who “won” this survey of the highest rate of failure at their first MOT? I’ll give you a clue. Nissan didn’t bring reliability to their alliance. Read More >

It all started back in the late 90s when Brazilian Fiat (possibly inspired by the Volvo Cross Country) decided it would launch a car that looks like and off-road car, but that really doesn’t want to be taken off-road. They called it the Fiat Palio Weekend Adventure (station wagon) and Fiat Strada Adventure. You see, Brazilians are crazy for what we call jipes (get where that comes from?), but SUV type vehicles remain positively out of the range of the average Brazilian wallets. So tack on some plastic cladding, raise the suspension a few inches, maybe throw in some mixed terrain tires, and there you have it. The recipe for what is called in the Brazilian market an aventureiro. Though not restricted to our market, this gimmick has really caught on down here. It’s our creation. It’s our obsession. Read More >

A press release, issued last night by Edmunds, had a devastating effect on Toyota. As the Tokyo bourse opened, the TMC share sunk to a fresh year-to-date low of 2,890 yen. In the afternoon session, it recovered a bit, but not much, to close at 2,941 yen. Ooops. In the beginning of the year, the ToMoCo share traded above 4000. What were the horrible news? Read More >