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.
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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.
Honda is recalling more than 112,000 Ridgeline pickup trucks for gas tank straps that can rust away over time and potentially break loose from the frame, causing a leak or possibly a fire.
Volkswagen has suspended production of the all-electric ID. Buzz model in Hanover, Germany, with local media citing problems with the battery system.
We’ve known for some time that the Bowtie Brigade has been busying themselves with a refresh of their midsize Colorado pickup. With a new Ranger on the way and Nissan’s new (final?) Frontier already here, you can bet Chevy won’t be caught napping in this profitable segment.
To date, we’ve been left guessing as to what styling changes GM has in store for the Colorado in ’23. A teaser video published to YouTube just last week – and the magic of well-timed screenshots – gives us our first clues for what to expect.
A few years ago, the industry narrative was that all-electric vehicles would reach financial parity with their combustion-driven counterparts in 2025. The assumption was that this would gradually occur by way of ramping up battery production and leveraging economies of scale. However, reality had a different take, as the world is now confronting record-setting prices across the board. Manufacturer and dealer hikes have resulted in the average invoice of EVs rising to $54,000 — roughly 10 grand higher than the typical transaction price of gasoline-powered vehicles, according to J.D. Power.
With economic pressures spiking the value of all automobiles, hardly anything is leaving the lot for less than it could have been had for in 2020. But the increases seen on all-electric models are actually outpacing the models we’ve been told they’re supposed to replace. Read More >
As much as I am a news junkie, I do try to disconnect a bit on weekends. Yet, this past Sunday, I had an hour to kill and a smartphone by my side, so I perused the headlines of our major newspapers.
Ford Motor Co. will be suspending end-of-lease buyout options for customers driving all-electric vehicles, provided they took possession of the model after June 15, 2022. Those who nabbed their Mach-E beforehand will still have the option of purchasing the automobile once their lease ends. However, there are some states that won’t be abiding by the updated rules until the end of the year, not that it matters when customers are almost guaranteed to have to wait at least that long on a reserved vehicle.
There have been numerous examples of local dealers appending various and sundry new pickup trucks with paint or a wrap trying to capture the two-tone color schemes of the ’80s and early/mid-’90s. Thanks to the body lines of modern trucks, the results can be varied.
Ford wants in on the action, choosing to celebrate 75 years of trucks with a Heritage Edition of its popular F-150 which attempts to recreate the look
I’ll grant that I’m not a university-trained linguist, but I will forever cringe when I encounter egregious misapplications of the English language. Examples include the otherwise-excellent Alanis Morissette applying the term “ironic” to simple coincidence, and the ever-present misuse of “literally” by my kids when describing a figurative.
In the realm with which I’m more familiar, we can consider the heinous mislabeling of sundry sedans and crossovers as “coupes” due to their sloping rooflines. Another is the haphazard use of the “GT” badge, a violation that most automakers have made over the decades. GT, of course, originally implied Grand Touring – and has been since claimed by various racing series to denote race cars that have been based upon street cars.
I’m not certain which definition was in mind when the 2022 Kia Forte GT was in development.
With the Continental Division dead, a cost-weary and (newly) publicly traded Ford Motor Company headed into the 1958 model year determined to unveil a solid luxury car showing against its primary rival, Cadillac. However, the “Continental Mark III by Lincoln” was a Continental in name only: It wore the same metal and was produced at the same new factory, Wixom Assembly, as the rest of the Lincoln models (Capri, Premiere) that year.
Brass at Ford hoped the Continental name on the Mark III would make customers believe it was something special, like the Cadillac Eldorado with which it competed. As mentioned last time, aside from its Continental name, the Mark III for 1958 used One Simple Trick to lure buyers into its leather seats: a Breezeway window. First up today, pricing problems.
The Mazda Miata has been with us for well over three decades, becoming the best-selling two-seat sports car in history along the way. Miatas were popular as quasi-sensible commuter cars in North America well into our current century, which means that I should have been seeing at least a couple in every junkyard I’ve visited for at least the last 15 years. In fact, I still see many more discarded MGBs and Fiat 124 Sport Spiders than I do Miatas, so this reasonably intact ’93 in Crystal White paint caught my attention immediately (naturally, there was an ’81 Fiat Spider 2000 a few rows away). Read More >
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