Mitsubishi burned a lot of what little street cred it had left by taking the name of a once-beloved affordable sports coupe and plunking it onto yet another crossover.
The good news, if there is any, is that the crossover that now bears the nameplate is more than a little quirky.
The bad news – it’s not an affordable, fun-to-drive sports coupe.
Not to mention that the brand may soon be history, at least on these shores.
By now we have a pretty good idea about the facts surrounding the noose that rocked NASCAR, although there is still more to learn.
We know that it doesn’t appear to be a hate crime directed at Bubba Wallace. We know Wallace never saw it (unless at least one of a group including him, an anonymous team member, and NASCAR president, Steve Phelps are lying). We know, thanks to a pic shared by NASCAR that the rope was definitely tied into the form of a noose, and we know it’s been there since at least October of last year.
BMW’s approach to the next frontier of driving propulsion has been an incremental one. First, electrification in a couple of oddball niche cars; then, plug-in hybrid versions of more conventional models. The fully electric vehicles coming down the pipe share their versatile architecture with existing models containing more conventional powerplants.
It’s cautious, and it’s certainly the approach most American automakers would probably prefer to take themselves. Alas, Germany is not America. EU regulators regularly crack the whip, startling execs who built their careers on dishing out gas and diesel offerings. Go green in a big way, now, or be slowly asphyxiated by a blanket of regulation that penalizes builders of emissions-heavy fleets.
It’s no wonder BMW’s works council wants top brass to stop dipping their toe in the deep end and just jump in, already. Read More >
A report earlier this year may have been what many longtime Mazda fans yearned to hear: that the company stands prepared to dump extra horses on its compact 3 sedan and hatch. Floundering since its launch, the little 3 could use a boost — in a number of ways.
Model codes ripped from a dealer’s computer system seemed to indicate a greater level of performance was on the way, and on Thursday Mazda confirmed just that. Read More >
The hazy year of 1981 brought the world many things, among them, yours truly. It was also a year that sent bullets flying through the air towards several world figures; a year that saw interest rates soar to new heights (while horsepower values fell to dismal lows), and brought what was arguably the last year of true classic rock.
In the background, New Wave ominously gathered strength.
Also gathering strength? The Ford F-Series’s popularity, as the model line donned the hat of best-selling vehicle in the U.S. that year. The F-Series traces its lineage to the Truman administration, and we now have a new generation to ooh and aah over. Read More >
Ford Motor Company pulled the wraps off the next-generation 2021 F-150 on Thursday night, revealing a new body and face that’s evolutionary in nature and a powertrain addition that sets its apart from all rivals. Could you call it revolutionary?
Being first in its class to offer something new is key for the F-150, being America’s best selling vehicle and all. In this case, that feature is a hybrid powertrain — one Ford says will make the F-150 the most potent light-duty pickup on the market.
There’s also added inches where it supposedly counts Read More >
Toyota Motor Corp. is recalling roughly 752,000 vehicles due to a presumed faulty hybrid system. Around 267,000 of the affected units are Prius vehicles sold in the United States.
According to the manufacturer, certain Prius (MY 2013-2015) and Prius V (2014-2017) models can fail to enter fail-safe driving mode in response to certain hybrid system faults. While the conditions for this are said to be fairly specific (though not explained by the automaker in any detail), the resulting failure would see the car lose power and stall. Obviously, this represents a safety risk. Read More >
Rivian wants to dazzle you with excessive range and dirt-flinging tank turns. Ford wants you to feel virtuous while behind the wheel of an F-150. General Motors wants to crush things beneath the wheels of the monstrous GMC Hummer EV.
Lordstown Motors’s electric pickup, on the other hand, doesn’t want to be everyone’s best friend. The fledgling automaker, owner of GM’s former Chevy Cruze plant in Northeast Ohio, unveiled its first product Thursday, beating Ford and GM to an electric pickup debut. Read More >
It’s all well and good to reminisce about the good old days but, chances are, we’re looking at another time through seriously tinted rose-colored glasses. Sure, more than a few of us used to bounce around on the bench seat of a station wagon or in the bed of a pickup truck but there’s no way anyone can argue in good faith that it was very safe.
With that in mind, we’ve selected eight different options for new parents seeking to safely seat their recent bundle of joy. There is a mahoosive amount of R&D that goes into these things, including crash testing. One of the most recent advancements is the development of the convertible car seat, which doesn’t endow it with a ragtop but does permit the seat to adapt to the kid’s size as they grow. This, in most cases, saves parents a bundle of money compared to the days when they had to shell out for a new car seat every time Junior grew a few inches.
They beat the heck out of riding around in the box of a tattered GMC Sierra, too.
Unifor hopes to sway the Canadian government toward an automotive strategy centered around the adoption and manufacturing of electric vehicles and a totally revised economic system. On Wednesday, the union released its “Road Map for a Fair, Inclusive and Resilient Economic Recovery” while announcing that corporations have failed everyone.
It’s all part the #BuildBackBetter campaign, which sees the coronavirus pandemic that made 2020 a collective — yet strangely isolating — hell for all of us as a unique opportunity to rebuild society under the banner of economic justice. “Unifor’s plan is designed to build a more strategic and self-reliant economy that can both withstand and prevent future crises,” Unifor National President Jerry Dias said in the initial announcement.
“This is an ambitious road map but I think ambition is what our country and its workers need right now.” Read More >
Having both forward driving lights illuminated after dark is a key element of road safety; one most automakers nailed long ago, at least until their vehicles start really getting on in years. Even then, a new bulb should be all a driver ever needs to keep the path ahead well lit.
Not so for some Kia Sorento owners. Enough consumer complaints have rolled in to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration that the federal agency has opened an investigation. Read More >
The Nissan Altima was once in the mix with the Toyota Camry and Honda Accord in the mid-size sedan conversation.
That’s no longer the case, and hasn’t been for some time.
Nissan is working hard to get back in that mix, and while the 2020 Altima takes the right strides forward, there’s still more work to be done.
No, Tesla isn’t resurrecting an intermediate-sized Mopar muscle car. It’s something far less sexy than that.
According to documents, Tesla aims to build a battery research and manufacturing facility, staffed 24/7, in the dreaded state of California. Read More >
Oh, it’s really official now. The supercharged, off-road-ready sport truck previewed by a concept vehicle four years ago is almost here, and Ram now has a landing page for it.
Appearing for the 2021 model year, the Ram Rebel TRX is a full-size 1500 with a heart transplant from a Dodge Hellcat donor. Squarely in its sights is the Ford F-150 Raptor, a model that’s dominated the niche it carved out for itself for too long. Read More >
Come again? Yes, that’s the finding of J.D. Power’s latest Initial Quality Study, which examines consumer complaints over the first 90 days of vehicle ownership. As you can already see, there was plenty of disruption in the 2020 study.
Tesla, darling of both the tech and green crowds, finished dead last in the study, which ranks brands and individual models by problems experienced per 100 (PP100) vehicles. That finding comes with a caveat, however. Read More >
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