When we first saw the slide pictured above at Chrysler’s five-year plan, we jumped on it as the only seemingly positive bit of news coming out of that deeply depressing 7-hour presentation. We should have known better. Today Chrysler is reminding us why it always pays to be cynical about everything that comes out of the mouths and powerpoint slides of our friends in the industry: buying into the hype always makes you look like an idiot down the road. Jeep CEO Michael Manley brings the inevitable letdown to the Toledo Blade.
We have no plans at the moment for diesel Jeeps in North America, although one of the things I’ve learned in this business is to never say never. I wouldn’t rule it out, but specifically on Nov. 4, we were commenting on diesel in Europe.
Consumer Reports may have discovered why owners of clean diesel cars might feel a bit suicidal from time to time. They recently took a long-term tester Mercedes GL320 BlueTec clean diesel into the shop to have its urea-based AdBlue exhaust-scrubbing fluid refilled, and the results were… eye opening.
The total bill just for adding AdBlue? A stunning $316.99. We were down to 18% full on the additive at 16,566 miles. It took 7.5 gallons to fill the tank, costing an eye-opening $241.50 for the fluid alone. The labor to add the fluid plus tax accounted for the rest. None of this was covered by the warranty… At the current rate and cost of consumption, just the AdBlue itself (without the labor, which would probably be included as part of the routine service) would cost $1,457.80 for 100,000 miles of driving. That’s a lot of money, knocking about a third off of your fuel savings vs. buying a GL450 V8.
And you thought gas was expensive! From what we’ve been able to dig up, the $32/gallon price is a fairly typical price at Mercedes dealers. Are there any Mercedes or Audi clean diesel drivers in the house who can confirm?
Opel already has big plans for its restructuring, despite the minor issue of being short a few billion dollars. According to an interview with Opel boss Nick Reilly in the print edition of Auto Motor und Sport, only a billion Euros of the €3.3b Opel turnaround plan is going to be spent on restructuring. The rest will be spent on new products like a city car, a “mini offroader,” and new high-tech drivetrains. According to Autocar, one of those high-tech drivetrain options is a a pairing that several firms including VW and Peugeot-Citroen already looked into but have yet to bring to market out of concern for the high cost: the diesel-electric hybrid. GM Europe’s Advanced Powertrain Chief Engineer Maurizio Cisternino explains “if you want the best fuel consumption, you have to go with the diesel-electric hybrid.” But there’s a tiny problem: Cisternino wants to get diesel-hybrid prices down to a €1,000 premium over gas-electric hybrids, a goal Cisternino admits “does not work at the moment.” Now if only GM had some government investment in the technology…
First it was the Prius, now Audi has come out with an ad featuring failed suicide. In both cases, the intended message (our car doesn’t spew poison) gets a bit lost in shuffle due to the fact that consumers of these products are portrayed attempting suicide. So this is what Audi’s CMO meant when he said rational arguments don’t work in the marketplace. Unfortunately, as the California Air Resources Board helpfully points out, diesel fumes contain arsenic, benzene, formaldehyde, nickel, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. So, you know, professional driver on a closed course, and all that. Don’t try this at home, kids!
We have so many facets of VW history to cover, and in the inimitable randomness that defines CC, we’ll do it non-linearly (except for Honda). But the Passat (and that’s what I’m going to mostly call it) plays a very pivotal one. It marks the beginning of VW’s successful entry into the modern world of light, roomy FWD cars, and it presaged the Golf, the mother of its category. But before we give VW too much (any) credit for this brilliant car, let’s not forget that the Passat was nothing but an Audi 80 (US: Fox) with a sloping hatchback rear end. (Read More…)
Not long ago we wondered what the hell Mahindra was up to, as the Indian firm had delayed its US launch seemingly indefinitely. Thanks to Pickuptrucks.com, we’ve learned that Mahindra still has yet to file paperwork for federal standards compliance, and that the launch date for its diesel Pickup has been pushed back to the nebulous date of “middle spring 2010.” Federal testing is complete, but Mahindra won’t submit compliance paperwork to the feds until January. The company reckons this bureaucratic hurdle will be complete by February, clearing the way for a product launch sometime around April. According to pickuptrucks.com, Mahindra will be offering two-door and four-door versions of its pickup at launch, both powered by a 2.2 liter diesel engine. Mahindra intends for its trucks to achieve 30 mpgs and 1.3 ton hauling capacity.
In the good old “SUV” days, GM forged ties with many companies. But since the bubble burst and GM went to the bankruptcy court, those ties are being severed. Fiat, gone. NUMMI, gone. Suzuki, gone. Now, another partner wants out. Bloomberg reports that Isuzu are looking to have talks with General Motors to review and possibly pull out of a joint venture. The joint venture in question is the DMAX diesel engine plant in Ohio, which may operate at 30% capacity next year. “Our venture in North America serves large-size vehicles, and there is definitely a question mark on that market,” Susumu Hosoi, President of Isuzu said. “I want to ask GM what their thinking is.”
Today, on the last day of media access to the LA Auto show, the mystic powers that be continued VAGs green run by selecting the Audi A3 TDi as the 2010 Green Car of the Year (The Jetta TDi won last year). In the running this year were the Audi A3 TDI, Honda Insight, Mercury Milan Hybrid, Toyota Prius and Volkswagen Golf TDI. According to the LA Auto Show,
The Green Car of the Year® award is a program that honors environmental leadership in the automobile field and recognizes vehicles that are readily available to consumers during the award year. Green Car Journal/ editors perform an exhaustive review of vehicle models to identify the five finalists. The winner is ultimately decided by jurors such as Jay Leno, Jean-Michel Cousteau, Carroll Shelby, Matt Petersen of Global Green USA and the Sierra Club’s Carl Pope, along with Green Car Journal editors.
Interesting then that this same bunch of car czars chose the Chevy Tahoe two years ago for getting 1 MPG better than the gasoline version. Anyone feeling some Volt love in 2011?
Autoblog ran this picture purporting to show the locations of future dealers of Mahindra and Mahindra pickup trucks. This piqued our interest because we’ve been curious to see how the Indian firm’s plans to bring diesel-only compact pickups and SUVs to the US market would play out for some time. Over a year ago Mahindra said it would be delaying its US launch (originally planned for Spring 2009) until the fourth quarter of 2009 because, as Mr Mahindra himself put it “my family’s name is going onto this vehicle, and it’s not going to fail.” Well, here we are in the fourth quarter, and Mahindra is still calling the dots on the map “potential” outlets. They’ve also apparently pushed back the launch date again, to the first quarter of 2010. Automotive News [sub] reported way back when that Mahindra’s distributors (Global Vehicles USA) were asking for $200,000 in franchise fees. Maybe finding folks willing to pay that amount for the honor of selling diesel-only compact trucks and utes are hard to come by. Either way, it’s getting to be defecate-or-get-off-the-pot time.
“You’re going to see it of course in the 3 Series,” BMW’s Tom Baloga tells Inside Line, “and the 5 Series is a good possibility. If the performance [of such an engine] is sufficient in the X3, U.S. customers would likely accept it in the X5 as well.” The “it” he’s referring to is BMW’s two liter turbodiesel engine, which BMW hopes will soon make up 10 to 20 percent of its engine mix in the US. And the Bavarians aren’t bringing the diesel four over for mere miserly mileage alone. “We would be focusing to make sure we get the performance that people expect without squeezing every last mile per gallon out of it,” Baloga says. “I don’t think we would ever consciously look at [the VW Jetta TDI’s] numbers and say ‘we have to beat that.'” (Read More…)
Times are tough. Margins are tight. Carmakers are looking for savings anywhere they can. As mechanical work performed by a dealer under a manufacturer’s warranty comes straight off the automaker’s bottom line, it’s not all that surprisingly that we’re getting reports that certain manufacturers (cough Chrysler cough) are dragging their heels on paying for warranty work. In specific, we’re hearing that owners of Cummins diesel-powered Rams are having to stump-up for the cost of engine repairs, as the mothership blames “issues” on driver negligence, poor operating conditions and the knock-out punch “contaminated fuel.” Are you having any trouble getting warranty work on your vehicle(s)?
When I called Las Vegas home, massive towers were going up, traffic was bad (especially on the Blue Diamond Highway), tourists were annoying and gas was cheap. Now, leaving Las Vegas, massive towers are going up, traffic is bad, tourists are annoying and gas is—once again—cheap. But it’s always worth saving a few gallons. After all, that $1 could win you the $1m payout at the Luxor’s giant slot machine. It’s thinking that makes both Sin City and the VW Jetta diesel so great.
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