Indholdsfortegnelse for April 2021 i Car and Driver

WICKED GAMES I loved your December 2020 cover. Brings to mind artist Ralph Steadman’s wild sketches done for Hunter S. Thompson’s books. If you’ve never had a lysergic acid trip, just look at Steadman’s offerings and you’ll have one. —Scott Randle San Luis Obispo, CA I was delighted to see a station wagon on the cover. On behalf of those who prefer wagons—all 47 of us—thanks! —Brad Hunt Albion, NY Clever title: “Evil, Genius.” But perhaps you should have featured a Hellcat or a Demon. —Todd Eddy Paxton, MA BOSS WAGON REDUX I was happy to see Audi’s blazingly fast station wagon [“The Devil in Disguise,” December 2020]. Your comment that the company would increase production “if it could find a bigger crowd of buyers willing and able to trade…

Like Mad Men’s fictional merger of clumsily surnamed ad agencies, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and Peugeot S.A. (PSA Group) have united their agglomeration of brands to produce a new corporation: Stellantis. That name would have Don Draper reaching for his Canadian Club; it’s more redolent of erectile-dysfunction ads than of anything automotive. But in a world with a hard-on for mergers and shareholders, the new company—valued at $52 billion when formed—brings the same old problems. First, what to do about stragglers such as Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Maserati, Lancia, Opel, DS, and Vauxhall. Some of these legacy brands, defenseless against nimbler rivals and electric disrupters, cannot survive. In a press conference on January 19, Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares—a former rally driver and PSA chief executive—insisted that no job or brand…

Travis Pastrana shows up with coffee and doughnuts and then climbs his indoor rock wall and backflips into a foam pit. Then my kids and I strap into a four-seat Can-Am Maverick and he starts cranking Poison’s “Nothin’ but a Good Time” while driving around on two wheels. We drive out into the woods and launch off increasingly preposterous ramps that seem to point straight into the sky. Later he’ll teach me how to pull a wheelie on a dirt bike, and one of my kids will ride in his Subaru WRX STI as he rips donuts, and I’ll ride with him in a Maverick while he rips even faster donuts. Neighbors will show up and start throwing axes, and the kids will race Crazy Carts in the garage and…

If you’re going to have an adventure, you’ll want to be familiar with sunk-cost bias. It’s the idea that if you’ve spent a lot of time, money, or energy trying to accomplish a goal, you’ll be inclined to keep at it even if quitting is the wisest move. You know Green Boots, the unidentified frozen corpse that is a landmark on the northeast route to the summit of Mount Everest? That’s about the worst possible outcome when you’ve got too much invested to throw in the towel. I’ve never been on the kind of adventure that could end with my dead body getting its own Wikipedia page, but I’ve tried to absorb the message. Last year presented plenty of opportunities for well-considered bailing, including the Thanksgiving dinner my family was…

When Hyundai launched the Genesis luxury brand in 2016 with the S-class-wannabe G90, we were impressed but not enthused. Genesis had potential, but its debut vehicle and its follow-up act, the G80 mid-size sedan, stood out mostly for their value. Then came the G70, the first Genesis that wasn’t essentially a rebadged Hyundai. It was a real star that catapulted the marque from the outer tier of automotive luxury subbrands into the white-hot center of the premium market. Last year the launch of the sumptuous GV80 crossover cemented Genesis’s real-deal status. Or at least that’s what should have happened. But we’re still not sure most people know what Genesis is. During the G70’s 18-month stay in our stables, the general public’s most common reaction to it was “What?” We heard…

Fiat Chrysler’s merger with PSA Group created a Franco-Italian-American conglomerate that will sell about 8 million vehicles this year. The new company, Stellantis, promises billions in savings with its immense scale, but first it will have to grapple with its large, often overlapping web of products and brands. Here’s what the world’s fourth-largest automaker looks like based on 2019 sales (the most recent data available) and current models.…

Here is the number of self-driving cars for sale today: zero. And here is the number of privately owned self-driving cars that will be on the road if Tesla meets its goal to make its Full Self-Driving Capability operational sometime this year: still zero. Don’t get sucked into arguments with Tesla fans. They’re already online explaining why Tesla’s model—real-world drivers teaching computer algorithms to do a job that Tesla’s marketing department says the car is doing—is the same as self-driving tech. It is not. Self-driving means the car can make every decision a human can. When a car is in self-driving mode, the driver should be able to climb into the back seat and take a nice long nap. Anything less than that is driver assistance. That’s why Waymo, the…

Let me tell you about my minivan. Oh yeah, I sure did: a Ceramic Gray 2020 Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid Red S Edition. After eight years of faithful service and righteous depreciation, the ol’ Lincoln MKT EcoBoost is gone, replaced by the Pacifica. When I informed one of my colleagues about this development, he responded, “You traded your 350-hp Lincoln for a hybrid minivan. Strange times.” Uh, incorrect, sir! The Lincoln had 355 horsepower. And all-wheel drive. And a tow package. The Pacifica Hybrid has a tow rating of “not recommended.” Oh no, what have I done? The smartest thing ever, that’s what. My oldest kid is now 10, and my only regret is that I didn’t buy a minivan a decade ago. What derangement caused me to think that power-sliding…

1 Position yourself with your weight back on the seat. 2 Give the bike a healthy dose of throttle while pulling on the bars, lifting the front wheel into the air. (If you’ve got a clutch, you can pop it to enhance the effect.) 3 Once up, cover the rear brake with your right foot. If you feel like you’re going over backward, drag the rear brake to bring the front tire down. You can use your toe for this or—if you’ve broken your ankle a bunch and your foot doesn’t like to rotate that way—your heel. 4 Work the throttle to keep the front wheel up. It’s easier on a slight uphill, tougher going downhill. 5 Don’t run into the people throwing axes.…

Honda Monkey The Monkey is the Honda Grom’s retro naked mini-moto counterpart. if that sentence means nothing to you, let’s explain it this way: The Monkey is a small motorcycle with minimal bodywork, a 125-cc fuelinjected engine, and a four-speed manual transmission. With its 12-inch wheels, it looks like an overgrown minibike, but the Monkey is street legal and capable of 60 mph (with a tail wind). Most motorcycles are drenched in menace, but the Monkey doesn’t take itself too seriously. The digital instrument cluster blinks out a cartoonish monkey face when you turn the key, and the color pictured here is Banana Yellow. There’s a bit of a dual-sport vibe, and the wee Honda is happy cruising dirt roads—knobby tires and skid plates are available from the aftermarket if…

The taut ride motions and progressive steering remind me of the brilliant E39-gen 5-series.—RICH CEPPOS The engine is occasionally nonlinear, with a surge or two. It sounds lame, too.—TONY QUIROGA This would be so much better with the V-6.—MIKE SUTTON Genesis should change the font for the controls. It’s so generic and boring. Comic Sans would be an upgrade.—K.C. COLWELL After weeks of not leaving the house because of the shutdowns, the G70 reminded me how much I like to drive.—NATHAN SCHROEDER Someone said they liked my Bentley!?—NATHAN SCHROEDER The four-cylinder more than gets the job done and will save you money on gas and potential tickets.—MICHAEL AARON Kudos to Genesis for building a well-rounded sedan in a world gone utility.—DAVID BEARD This is how you do a touchscreen correctly:…

THE BUSY SEASON ON St. Simons Island, Georgia, typically runs from Memorial Day to Labor Day. But 2020’s tourist boom lasted well into November. A short detour off I-95, about halfway between Savannah and Jacksonville, St. Simons Island is known for golf and saltwater-based leisure pursuits. On one clear and breezy late-fall afternoon, people seeking a reprieve from their couches cruised the palm-tree-lined high street on foot or bikes; others sat on benches licking soft serve while staring at the fishing trawlers and cargo ships in the distance. The lower the sun dipped on the horizon, the more people drifted to the pier in pursuit of the perfect sunset snap. And amid all the smiles and poses, no one seemed to mind the giant shipwreck lurking in the background. If…

The Porsche 911 GT3 changes, but it mostly stays the same. Since the 996-gen 911 began the dynasty in 1999, the GT3 has remained true to its original form with a high-revving naturally aspirated flat-six, a track-biased suspension, and a commendable lack of fripperies and needless ornament. A new iteration of Porsche’s most focused sports car doesn’t need to be different to earn enthusiasts’ attention and respect. Yet the GT3 has also made some major leaps as it has evolved. With the arrival of the 992-generation model, the GT3 jumps to an unequal-length control-arm front suspension. That makes it the first roadgoing 911 to eschew struts up front. The new setup is heavily influenced by the suspension that Porsche pioneered in the 911 RSR race car back in 2013. The…

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When the pandemic spread across the country early last year, vacations were canceled. Restaurants shuttered. Beaches and parks closed to the public. What could we do to chase away the oppressive dread of an invisible, omnipresent scourge? For people fortunate enough to remain employed, an unexpected answer emerged: Buy a boat. Or an ATV or an RV or some other motorized toy that allows us to have fun while social distancing. In February of last year, life was normal. By April, we all wished we owned a chain of stores called Jet Skis and Toilet Paper. In defiance of 2020’s general economic gloom, Americans bought 115,000 new powerboats in May and June, a 30 percent increase compared with sales from those months in 2019, according to the National Marine Manufacturers…

Yamaha WaveRunners Personal watercraft (PWC) are joyful machines. They exist purely for goofing around on the water, and even a 35-mph rental unit will displace your worries with rambunctious entertainment. But faster is always better, and Yamaha’s 1.8-liter inline-four WaveRunners represent the penultimate level of PWC performance. Above them lie supercharged models, and below them … most everything else. So the question is: Do you really want more power than this? It won’t make much difference at the top end. Both the $12,549 GP1800R HO and the $1000-pricier VX Limited HO we sampled max out at 62 mph, close to the 65-mph governor that all PWC manufacturers impose. And they get to that top speed in a hurry. Unless you’re on a quiet lake, your personal speed limit will likely…

iT'S NOT ALWAYS THE PRODUCT ALONE THAT COMPELS PEOPLE TO LINE UP OUTSIDE THE APPLE STORE FOR THE LATEST IPHONE. THE IDEA OF BEING THE FIRST TO GET YOUR HANDS ON THE NEWEST, HOTTEST THING CAN BE NEARLY AS ENTICING AS THE SHINY DEVICE ITSELF. That proved to be true for the new Ford Bronco Sport, which sold out of its limited run of First Edition models even though it’s not the Bronco everyone is most excited for. A smaller unibody crossover stablemate to the body-on-frame off-roader that won’t arrive for a few more months, the Bronco Sport already appears to be a hit. These things are thick on the ground near our Michigan headquarters, and they attract plenty of attention. We needed to find out if the baby Bronco…