John Muir once wrote, “The world is big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark,” and when you’re pushing 60, as I am, “the dark” isn’t just an abstract concept anymore – it’s quite real.
Almost every automotive journalist and enthusiast I know hates the new BMW grille – the one that took the twin-kidney look and made it as bucktooth as a beaver.
I’ve been living in Colorado for 12 years now, and I’ve found that the junkyards here have plenty of both the rust-free Japanese cars you’d find in California yards and the late-model Detroit machinery of the Midwest yards (the liquor stores here also stock the watery yellow beers of both the Pacific Northwest and the Upper Midwest, great news if you’re throwing a Denver party that requires both Rainier and Hamm’s). The one thing that really sets Colorado car graveyards apart from those elsewhere (besides all the Scouts and edge-case 4WD cars) is the huge numbers of pre-1960 American vehicles that end up in the U-Wrench-It-type yards here. Here’s the latest, a 1949 Plymouth Special Deluxe sedan in a big self-service yard between Denver and Cheyenne. Read More >
Wiper blades are the Rodney Dangerfield of automotive parts. Generally ignored and routinely forgotten, they’re a rarely thought of component … until they wear out or fall apart. Then they’re the subject of foul language and rude epithets as they give up the ghost, reduced to tattered strips of rubber serving only to smear bugs across the windshield.
Once again, it’s time to, and I quote The Simpsons: “Celebrate the independence of your nation by blowing up a small part of it.”
So that means we’re off on the Fourth of July.
But wait, there’s more!
It’s tough to break into an established market where brand loyalty reigns supreme and old habits die hard. Nowhere is that more evident than with full-sized pickup trucks in America, a segment in which the Detroit Three have a stranglehold on sales. Only two other brands of late have dared try to muscle their way into the arena; in the not-too-distant future, there may be only half that number.
The gearheads at Acura have once again tapped their Performance Manufacturing Center – y’know, the place where they birth the NSX – to hand-assemble a few copies of the handsome TLX sedan. This time around, it’s the Type S variant which will pop out of the PMC in Ohio.
Word on the street is that General Motors will be discontinuing its existing full-size vans to make way for electrified alternatives. While the gut reaction may be to recoil in disgust at the very premise that Euro vans would dare usurp the rightful place of one of the most venerable working vehicles in North America, it might be worth remembering that the Ford Transit has managed to supplant the Econoline/E-Series rather effectively.
Last time in our tale of Stutz the company finally realized its dream of a true convertible, the Bearcat II. The original product dream of CEO James O’Donnell, the Bearcat II went on sale in 1987. Though the company’s fate was pretty much sealed by that time, Stutz had its heyday of models circa the early Eighties. Spoilers: Machine guns were involved.
There’s a marked difference between having to wash a car and wanting to wash a car. The former is a chore that is assigned to sullen teens in the wash bays of countless car dealers across the nation. The latter is a task enjoyed by gearheads on a Sunday afternoon. Read More >
In 2020, Hyundai Motor Group unveiled the Prophecy concept EV which everyone immediately noticed had embraced an alternative, almost opposite, design language from the angular 45 concept. The latter model went on to serve as the blueprint for the Ioniq 5, whereas the Prophecy has morphed into the Ioniq 6 you see before you.
We would wager our combined annual salaries – a sum roughly equal to the value of a half dozen donuts from Krispy Kreme – that every single soul reading this website has a story or three about being blitzed with products in a dealer’s F&I office. Vehicle etching, useless warranties (sorry – this paper only covers mechanical fuel pumps), and p-packs up the wazoo are the bane of most shoppers’ existence when trying to buy a car.
Make no wonder some people call it the “Effin’ Eye” office.
This environment may change if the Federal Trade Commission gets its way. According to a report by Automotive News, a new proposal by the FTC would ban finance/insurance coverage and physical vehicle add-ons “that provide no benefit” while also requiring expanded disclosure on such items.
The 350GT was Lamborghini’s first production car, and as we learned in our last entry, was a very rapid adaptation of the 350GTV prototype. And while the GTV was certainly more elegant looking than the GT, the former’s foibles included a hood line that was too low to fit the company’s V12, as well as a general lack of practicality.
Practicality was the word of the day in the 350GT’s development. The 2+1 grand touring coupe brought Ferruccio Lamborghini’s vision to life, as a competitor to the well-established finery from Ferrari. There were just 120 examples of the 350GT produced before its successor joined the ranks. The new car had a larger engine that made more power but looked very similar to its brother. Meet the 400GT.
J.D. Power has released its U.S. Initial Quality Study for 2022 and the prognosis could be better. Automobiles are reportedly becoming less reliable and more expensive. While there are certainly valid reasons for this — ongoing supply chain problems, companies transitioning to novel electric powertrains, and remote working environments making it hard to collaborate on engineering — the bottom line is that the whole industry is blowing it.
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