Volvo’s XC90 may be the oldest Volvo on sale but is it the Swede gettin’ some facelift-love? Nej. Swedish spy photographers over at Teknikens Värld have snapped some shots of the mid-sized S60 being refreshed for 2014. Want to know what they said without grabbing a babel fish? Click past the jump and see how much I remember from my high school Swedish lessons.

Although it’s only four years old the S60 is getting its first facelift. The new sedan will carry the new corporate grille that Volvo will be rolling our in late 2013 or early 2014 on the S60, S80 and XC60 in America. The Swedish sources tell us to expect a wider grille (the same one seen in the Chinese spy photos) with revised LED accent lights and a more aggressive bumper cover. If you click over to the link above you’ll see that Volvo hasn’t covered up the rear of the S60 meaning we shouldn’t expect the same BMW/Lexus aping trapezoidal tail pipes the 2014 S80 is supposedly getting.

Inside the changes seem limited to swapping the corporate gauge cluster used since the 2007 S80 for the new LCD heavy unit found in the Euro-only V40 wagon. The new unit looks inspired by Ford with a large central LCD for the speedometer and two smaller LCDs for other gauge functions.

Teknikens Värld says not to expect anything new under the hood, but they do expect to see some infotainment tweaks and some new active headlamp technologies. (Which I’m sure will never make it to America.) Want to know more? Wait for the Geneva Motor Show.

Just to pre-empt the inevitable; you could go out and buy a 25 year old Honda CRX HF and get superior fuel economy to a CR-Z. You could also wind up having your legs amputated after a fender bender, thanks to the wonderful “light weight” construction of the CRX. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, here’s the new Honda CR-Z. Apparently it makes 20 more horsepower from the electric drivetrain. Then again, it may be a moot point since CR-Z imports have slowed to a trickle, thanks to unfavorable exchange rates.

Refinements Signal Direction for Brand Today, Tomorrow.

Note to Lincoln: the future is not in refinements. If this brand is going to survive, it needs a clean sheet of paper.

[H/T: Our man in Korea, Walter Foreman]

A new Toyota Tacoma is scheduled for release this fall, and pickuptrucks.com reckons this is it. And because this appears to be nothing more than a relatively mild facelift, we believe it. What would have been too surprising to be true: a completely redesigned, ground-up new compact truck from any automaker in the US market. Apparently building all-new compact pickups for the US market went out of style towards the end of the Clinton Administration… so we’ll have to make do with another facelifted 5+ year-old product. It’s OK, we’re gettig used to it. Video here

TTAC’s resident Volvo freak ALex Dykes points us to some first images of Volvo’s updated V70, which boasts a new interior and an updated exterior. There will be new engines for Europe, as well as a few new features like rear-seat entertainment and the City Safety system, but it’s a mild change. Is it enough to get the V70 off of Volvo’s North American kill list? Hit the jump for more pictures, and a graph of Volvo’s March US sales for a look at the challenge Volvo is facing in this country.

Mercedes may have taken a light hand with the exterior design of the facelifted 2011 C-Class, but under the skin some big changes await. According to Auto Motor und Sport, all updated C-Classes will have stop-start-equipped direct-injection engines, as well as the option of upgrading to all ten of the latest driver-assistance systems from the CLS, E-Class and CL. With more power (306 HP) and better efficiency (from about 29 MPG to about 34 MPG, European test cycle) and a touch more life to its classy but somewhat characterless looks, the updated C350 should help spearhead Benz’s attempt to regain the US-Market’s luxury brand crown (just not the wagon version… musn’t hurt the GLK). Of course the C-Class will still probably be beaten silly by the 3-Series, but then everyone’s used to getting beat by the Dreier.

Yes, it’s changed… but could you tell?

We all knew this day was coming. We knew that Maybach would receive one final facelift before disappearing in a puff of garish pretentiousness. And really, we should have been prepared for this last aesthetic update to live up to the Maybach brand’s already-high standards for tastelessness. But could anything have prepared us for this Hyundai Equus-grille’d monstrosity? All of a sudden, the new Phaeton’s terminal subtlety is looking a lot better. After all, would you rather your plutocrat’s chariot be mistaken for a Passat, or a pimp-my-ride nightmare? [via automotorundsport.de]

Despite rumors of Maybach’s imminent demise, or, even more shocking, a sell-off to China’s BYD (a rumor that had been debunked the next day) Maybach is alive and well. Why, we don’t know. But anyway, Maybach will introduce a facelifted model at the upcoming Beijing Auto Show. The car is already in town.

Today, Daimler’s top-of-the-line was spied on Beijing’s streets by TheTycho. Too bad that the front had been removed or taped over. The front is where most of the minor Maybach changes will happening. I guess we’ll have to wait for the show.

Mercedes has released official images of its hinted-at R-Class facelift, which brings the unloved crossover’s looks closer to the brand’s better-selling SUVs. But will it improve the model’s moribund sales? Probably not. Status-seeking family-haulers in the US will keep buying GLs, and sniggering softly when they drive past folks in their Pacifica-like Rs. Sometimes it’s a good day to die, and sometimes it’s a good day to get a facelift. For the Mercedes R-Class, today is the former kind of day.