#TychoDeFeyter

Volkswagen announced an all-new Santana for the Chinese market, it will debut in 2013. Time to say “zai jian” (“good bye,” but nobody says that anymore in China, they say “bye bye”) to the current Santana, made by the Shanghai-Volkswagen joint venture since 1985. And time for a short history of the Santana. History saw the original Santana, the Santana Variant, the Santana 2000, the Santana 3000 and the Santana Vista. We take a look at all of them. On the picture above is a party in Shanghai when the very first China-made Santana rolls off the assembly line. And when they said “party” in 1985, they meant it. Serious partiers they were.

An angry owner of a Porsche Cayenne staged a massive protest at his local Porsche dealer in Shenzhen in Guangdong Province. He had bought a brand-new Cayenne two months ago for he astounding price of 2.7 million yuan, or $428,000 (at least that’s what he had told MOP.com.)

Unfortunately, the Cayenne owner experienced a lot of trouble. The owner claims that the car’s problems made him almost crash on two occasions.

First Hongqi CA7460 rolling off the line at the factory in Changchun

Hongqi, or Red Flag, is China’s most famous automotive brand. Owner of the Hongqi-brand is First Auto Works, or FAW. Hongqi always was, and sometimes still is, the car for the country’s leaders – communist party bosses, and the car for the very influential. A Red Flag is not for the very rich – they take a red Ferrari, or a simple black Maybach. The Hongqi was strictly government business. Hongqi’s most famous cars are the CA 770-series, and the Audi-based limousines and parade cars.

There is, however, another less well known chapter in Hongqi’s history: a tie up with good old Lincoln from the USA in the 1990′s and early 00′s. This article will show what cars came out of this interesting marriage.

On the first picture is the first Hongqi CA7460 rolling off the line at the factory in Changchun, Jilin province. It was November 10, 1998.

China has 1.4 billion people, and despite rumors to the contrary, it has some 200 million children that have to be ferried to school every day. Since there were no rules for this sort of transport, local schools used whatever vehicles they could find to bring children to class without paying any attention to safety. Because of that, things went wrong now and then, especially in the messy countryside.

Since it was usually about small numbers, one or two children dead, nobody really cared. Recently, three big school bus accidents happened where altogether more than 30 children died. China suddenly woke up and the central government belatedly announced strict rules for school-buses. Sure enough, car companies jumped at the opportunity to earn some good old government money. They came up with brand-new ‘super-safe buses-’In this article, we take a look at three of them.

While on holiday in the great city of Nandaihe in Hebei province, I took a few pictures of a tired, old tricycle. Back home in Beijing, I completely forgot about it until I went through my holiday pictures a few days ago, actually looking for a car completely different. The old tricycle caught my attention again, and this time I decided to research the damn thing. Well, I found this oldie was an old neighbor …

Hongqi is the most famous brand in China when it comes to parade cars. In 2008 however, Chery tried to change that with help from the Chinese army and some astronauts. The Eastar parade car debuted in April 2008 and was used for a very special military parade. Or more like a parade of parades.

Christmas resulted in a lot of toys under a lot of trees. That’s good. If they are Chinese, I will buy them a generation from now. If you keep them in their original box, I will pay you more. I am a fanatic collector of Chinese tin toys. I will show you around in my collection. Today, part 1.

Christmas is over so we go back to war. This is the newest kill-machine of the Chinese army. It is a 4×4 armored vehicle based on the Dongfeng EQ2050 ( thank you America!). The new car seems designed as a hit-and-run fast attack vehicle with a big turret on the roof for a big fat machine gun or rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

Chinese media are going wild because BBC’s Top Gear has landed in China. Jeremy Clarkson and James May arrived in Beijing for filming a new Top Gear episode which will be on TV in next year’s season. Judging from the pictures take on-scene, the shoot seems to center on two topics, and both may make the Chinese car industry lose the ever so important face.

China might be going on a deadly brand binge as Bertel prognosticated. Here is a new brand that at least is worth a look: Qoros. It is a joint venture between Chery Automotive and Quantum LLC from Israel. The joint venture had been approved way back in 2007, but things slowed down soon after that – in 2008. Now they are back, with a very first concept car that looks – well, it looks like a cow.

TTAC readers certainly were fascinated with the fascination with white wall tires on the part of the Chinese military (the white is just painted on, don’t worry, and the paint easily comes off.) Now for something REALLY whacky:

What about pink tires under your pink Ferrari California? In China, this is made possible by Double Star Tires from the great city of Qingdao in Shandong province. Double Star developed a patented process to make tires in any color. Fittingly, this new product is called ‘Rainbow.’ The bonbon-colored tires will hit the market soon and likely with great success. At least in China.

Earlier on, I had written an article at my website about how AM General had helped China develop its Humvee-clone, the Dongfeng EQ 2050. AM General was not the only American company that hand a hand in arming the Chinese army. There was another one: Chrysler.

Beijing-Jeep was a Chinese-American joint venture with Beijing Auto Works (BAW) and Chrysler. The Chrysler-based Beijing-Jeep 2022 shown above later changed its name to Beijing 2022. It now is the most widely used 4×4 in the Chinese army.

How did all this happen?

In China, a “sub-brand” is a brand under a foreign-Chinese joint venture. Examples: Venucia under Dongfeng-Nissan, or Everus under Guangzhou-Honda. ( Bertel insists that “sub-brand” is a misnomer, but TIC, This Is China, and he better get used to it.)

The Chinese central government ordered the joint ventures to start the sub-brands. “Order” is maybe too harsh a word, let’s call it strong recommendation. Resistance by the foreign partner is futile. If the foreign partner would ignore the wishes of the Chinese government, life would suddenly become very difficult. Applications for new factories, new cars, new permits, new visa for employees, etc etc, would suddenly be delayed or outright refused.

Why does the Chinese government want the sub-brands? Two words:

Alfa Romeo debuted as a brand on the Guangzhou Auto Show and they brought… only two cars, and a concept car. Those were the MiTo, the Giulietta and the 4C. Sales are said to begin sometime in 2012. Fiat doesn’t have a working joint venture in China, production at the new Guangzhou-Fiat JV is still at least two years away, so all Alfa’s will be imported and therefore expensive. Will the Chinese buy them?