While You Were Sleeping

While You Were Sleeping: Subcompact Crossover Meth, Rare Cars Are a Drug and Saturn Dealer Wants His Money Back

They’re potent, popular and can’t be stopped. Everyone wants to buy one. Every dealer wants to sell one. Just like the crack-like epidemic of SUVs in the ’90s, the subcompact crossover is the blue meth of today.

Here’s what happened overnight.

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Weekend Roundup: Top Gear Show, F1 Show and New Subaru Blue is All Show

As Richard Hammond and James May wrap up the “lost episodes” of Top Gear sans Jeremy Clarkson, the three are rumored to be heading to Netflix with the unsuspended pair turning down deals worth 4 million GBP.

Here’s what caught our eyes over the weekend.

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While You Were Sleeping: BMW M3 Touring Render, Ferrari Dino Returning and Takata's Quality Chief Gets More Power

As rumors swirl about the eventual release of the BMW M3 Touring, Theophilus Chin has put a couple of renders together of Bavaria’s hot D-pillared automobile.

Here’s what happened overnight (and stories we’ve missed over the last few days).

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While You Were Sleeping: Phaeton Axed in UK, Porsche 911 GT With A Stick and GM Is Down in China

The Volkswagen Phaeton, the pride of former chairman Piëch, has been discontinued in the UK. Don’t worry, though, if you’re one of those people who enjoy such understated luxury. Volkswagen is still planning a next-generation version of the car.

Here’s what happened overnight.

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While You Were Sleeping: Takata Recall Drinking Game Edition

Yesterday evening, I appeared on the CTV News Channel in The Great White North to talk about Takata’s latest recalls. As a consequence, I’ve learned I look like Patrick from SpongeBob SquarePants when I frown.

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While You Were Sleeping: Cadillac Minuses V8 ATS-V+, Volkswagen Picks Boring Font and Ford Releases Patents Into the Wild

The ATS-V+ rumored by Motor Trend is definitely not happening according to Cadillac spokesperson David Caldwell. The proposed new model would encroach too much into CTS-V territory for comfort.

Here’s what happened overnight.

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While You Were Sleeping: Mad Max, Maria De Villota's Mad Family and Mad Funny Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee

Mad Max has been tearing up the box office since mid-May. To capitalize on George Miller’s latest explogasm that’s putting Michael Bay in his place, Warner Brothers has made a video game, too.

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While You Were Sleeping: Cadillac ATS-V+, Holden Monza and Lamborghini Urus Receives Greenlight

This edition of While You Were Sleeping offers up a bit more than usual. Instead of just overnight, we are going to try to cover as many topics from over the long weekend as possible with additional commentary.

Here we go!

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While You Were Sleeping: Toyota Fortuner SUV for Oz, More Airbag Recalls and Stowaways Hide in Maseratis

In addition to the go-anywhere Toyota HiLux, it looks like Australia will get a Fortuner reprise.

Here’s what happened overnight.

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While You Were Sleeping: Mazda Says Driving Matters, New HiLux and Ford F-150 Trailer Backup Assist Revealed

After being stuck in Nashville for an extra unscheduled 24 hours and spending the following 12 hours bouncing from airport to airport, I can easily say that air travel is horrible. Conversely, Mazda is extolling the emotional virtues of driving in a new ad campaign.

Here’s what happened overnight.

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While You Were Sleeping: 2016 Honda Pilot Reviews, Toyota HiLux Leaks (Again) and McLaren 540C Not Coming to U.S.

The first reviews are in for the 2016 Honda Pilot as the Japanese automaker lifts their embargo. Honda’s new SUV will be the most expensive model ever sold in the U.S.

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While You Were Sleeping: Porsche GT Brand Will Wear All The Numbers

It seems Porsche will have more than the GT2, GT3, and GT4 monikers to play with for its range of sports cars and SUVs.

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While You Were Sleeping: Chevrolet Sub-Camaro, Toyota/Honda Best Supplier Customers and Aston Martin's Crossover

As I fly down to Nashville to drive Nissan’s latest iteration of their 4DSC (“four-door sports car”) – the Maxima – we will have all the articles you expect on a Monday.

Here’s what happened over the weekend.

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While You Were Sleeping: Mercedes-Benz A-Class Coupe, Monteverdi Sierra and More Takata Recalls

What will the next Mercedes-Benz A-Class look like? Theophilus Chin gives his take on a coupe version with the render above.

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While You Were Sleeping: Worthersee GTI Meeting, Gilles Sits at Head of Drawing Table and Jeep Wants to Build a Range Rover

Our European correspondent, Vojtěch Dobeš, is at the 34th Annual GTI Meeting in Worthersee this week. Hopefully he will have some interesting stories to share if he isn’t too distracted by Austria’s fräuleins.

Here’s your news from overnight.

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While You Were Sleeping: Viper ACR Pricing, BMW 3.0 CSL Hommage and Turbocharging All The Things

The Viper ACR will be able to take on other track-ready specials for thousands less.

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While You Were Sleeping: Audi RS3 Sedan, Toyota HiLux Reveal and Cameras Are Everywhere

Looking south of the A4 in Audi’s current range of motors, the hottest vehicle in its North American lineup is the current S3. Those of us west of the Atlantic don’t get to enjoy the turbocharged five-pot RS3 Sportback. Thankfully, Theophilus Chin is on the scene to digitally imagine our Ingolstadt desires with this compromise – the RS3 sedan.

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While You Were Sleeping: The K-Car Alphabet, Oil Prices Falling and Belarus Has a New Parade Car

Chrysler has built a lot of cars atop the K platform. BangShift has put together a handy guide to figure them all out.

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While You Were Sleeping: Jeep GC Pickup Render, Brilliance V3 Debut and Jobs, Jobs, Jobs (Or a Lack Thereof)

As trucks ride a heat wave of interest from consumers, I look at this Grand Cherokee render and think, “That’ll do.”

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While You Were Sleeping: Virginia Vs ACLU, Indy 500 Throwback and Helicopter Parents Are Taking Over Cars

Virginia is for lovers of license plate readers.

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While You Were Sleeping: Macan is So, So Hot, BMW M7 Rumors and Jefferson North Update

The Macan has given Porsche its best month ever in America. If this was the Cayenne, I’d be furious. Truth is the Macan is actually really damn good.

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I Keep Forgetting…
…to put this week’s cars in While You Were Sleeping. Sir Dykes is carving corvers in a 2015 BMW M235i. Sir Dobeš is avoiding potholes i…
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While You Were Sleeping: Project CARS Tomorrow, Off-Road Lowrider and the Last Commodore is Almost Here

Almost everything interesting from overnight happened in Australia. So lets talk about video games instead.

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While You Were Sleeping: Cheap Chevy Volt, Tesla and Fisker Do Things Online and Iran Wants F1

Even though the first-generation Chevrolet Volt has had its price slashed every year since its debut, the next-generation range-extended electric vehicle will be priced even lower. This aims GM’s offering squarely at a number of more traditional hybrids.

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While You Were Sleeping: Tesla Is Now Officially In More Than Just Your Garage

This is what everyone in Silicon Valley was waiting for last night: a battery that hangs on a wall.

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While You Were Sleeping: The Unbuilt Beauties of British Leyland

We go down memory lane this morning and look at some of the great cars British Leyland didn’t build.

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While You Were Sleeping: Automated Crash Reporting, Worthersee, and Mad Max

Many optionally available subscription-based services, such as OnStar, offering automated crash reporting could lose their marketing edge in 2018.

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While You Were Sleeping: 137 Shelbys, Eight Cylinder Porsches and One Lost Car

In Los Angeles and Detroit, Ford took the covers off their two track-ready Mustangs – the GT350 and GT350R.

And Ford is only going to build 137 of them for 2015. Ehh?

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While You Were Sleeping: No Holden Volt, Super Troopers 2, and Meeke Gets a Win

The second-generation Chevrolet Volt won’t go on sale in Australia as GM will not convert it to right-hand drive.

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While You Were Sleeping: Oregon To Allow Lane Splitting, Australia Opening Borders and Andy Wilman Quits

After their automotive industry has been slowly devastated over the last decade, Australia may open its borders to private imports of new and like-new cars.

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While You Were Sleeping: "Copy-and-Paste" Design, Dirt Track Racing, Real Fuel Economy, and Butterfly Wings

Come on, China. We know you can design a car on your own.

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While You Were Sleeping: April 22, 2015

Those final episodes of Top Gear will be shown on BBC2 later this year, but there isn’t enough footage for three full episodes.

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While You Were Sleeping: July 16, 2014

How is it that one man can play a Brecker Brothers tune all by himself, but Volkswagen can’t match Kia’s profitability and Acura can’t manage to sell cars? Could it be that the more talented people you put together in a room, the fewer good ideas come out of that room? But if that’s the case, how do you explain the Brecker Brothers in the first place?

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While You Were Sleeping: July 15, 2014

You have to love the auto world. It’s a world where a Cimarroned-up version of the RAV4 is a sure-fire winner and an affordable FT86 competitor is a waste of time. The Russians get cheap Datsuns and we get expensive Volts. Meanwhile, the one-percenter train rolls on, now with additional boost for the V-12.

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While You Were Sleeping: July 14, 2014

A hardcore car disappears, a softcore one is on the way, the bus goes upscale, Red Ink Rick has a fan!

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While You Were Sleeping: July 8, 2014

Bertone took a beating! Someone else might have handed a beating out! Subaru’s on fire, Vipers are cold as ice!

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While You Were Sleeping: July 3, 2014

Don’t you just hate it when you ask people to put on a sweater in the winter, metaphorically speaking, and then your tax on tank tops fails to bring in the cash harvest?

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While You Were Sleeping: July 1, 2014

Another great day in the auto business, and more proof that deconstruction has not been completely der(r)ided in popular culture.

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While You Were Sleeping: June 30, 2014

Rust never sleeps, and neither does TTAC, as we bring you a completely random yet utterly essential selection of recent automotive news.

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While You Were Sleeping: June 23, 2014

Welcome to While You Were Sleeping, a roundup of the auto news from the recent past. We’ll be expanding and changing this report based on reader tastes. To begin with, it will feature just the hits that we didn’t cover with individual articles.

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  • Joe This is called a man in the middle attack and has been around for years. You can fall for this in a Starbucks as easily as when you’re charging your car. Nothing new here…
  • AZFelix Hilux technical, preferably with a swivel mount.
  • ToolGuy This is the kind of thing you get when you give people faster internet.
  • ToolGuy North America is already the greatest country on the planet, and I have learned to be careful about what I wish for in terms of making changes. I mean, if Greenland wants to buy JDM vehicles, isn't that for the Danes to decide?
  • ToolGuy Once again my home did not catch on fire and my fire extinguisher(s) stayed in the closet, unused. I guess I threw my money away on fire extinguishers.(And by fire extinguishers I mean nuclear missiles.)