Innehållsförteckning för May 2021 från Car and Driver

PERFECT 10 How could you drop the Miata from 10Best [January 2021]? You hurt my feelings. —Daniel Oliver Gainesville, FL This should have hurt your feelings last year—Ed. In the past, I’ve been surprised by the amount of turnover in your 10Best list from one year to the next, with what I thought were solid selections supplanted by choices I didn’t see coming. I find it reassuring that nine of the 10Best for 2021 are the same as in 2020. I’m not surprised that the Genesis GV80 replaced the Jeep Gladiator, a specialized fancy I’d figured was worth only a one-time nod (like, say, the PT Cruiser and second-generation Prius in past years). In any case, it’s good to see this oasis of stability in an unsettled time. —Archie Brodsky…

There’s no good answer when a police officer asks, “Do you know how fast you were going?” Better to make the effort and spend the money upfront to avoid that interaction in the first place, we say. While navigation apps such as Waze can reduce your chances of being caught in a speed trap, radar detectors have never been more effective at sniffing out Smokey. We gathered three heavy hitters for this test. Valentine’s V1 Gen2 is the first major redesign since the V1 debuted in 1992, and at $499, it’s cheaper than the original when accounting for inflation. For a steep $650, the Escort Max 360c is loaded with features, including directional arrows and a GPS antenna. Radenso, a relative newcomer, has garnered a strong following with its top…

Looking at Maserati’s forthcoming twin-turbo 3.0-liter V-6, you wouldn’t know the Italian automaker has been out of the engine-making game for more than 20 years. Set to debut in the MC20 supercar, the Nettuno (Italian for Neptune, a nod to the company’s trident logo) vaults Maserati to the leading edge of internal-combustion technology just as exotic brands are getting serious about downsizing their V-8s. Using a derivative of prechamber ignition, which is common in Formula 1, engineers have squeezed a specific power output of 207.6 horses per liter from the V-6. That makes the Nettuno more power-dense than any current McLaren, Ferrari, Lamborghini, or Porsche engine. Prechamber ignition systems work by sparking a relatively small amount of fuel and air in a tiny cavity at the top of each cylinder.…

I am, appropriately, in the car when Jose Corpas calls. Corpas is the founder and lead instructor at Champion Auto School in Brooklyn, and, rather inappropriately, I take notes against the steering wheel as we talk, which I doubt he would approve of. My meager defense is that Los Angeles traffic is pretty much at a standstill, but I do feel a bit guilty as I steer with my knee and write, “It’s a big responsibility to drive and to teach someone to drive.” Corpas, who used to give road tests at the DMV in the ’90s, has been training beginner drivers in New York for two decades. Six years ago, he started his own driving school, Champion, one of more than a dozen in or around the Flatbush neighborhood.…

A native of upstate New York, Walker discovered her love of photographing cars at age 10 when she aimed her trusty Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action camera at a ’65 Mustang. She’s since moved on to a Nikon D800 and D5, and her personal stable of cars includes a ’97 Land Rover Discovery, a ’93 Toyota Land Cruiser (FJ73), and a ’73 BMW 2002 project. In addition to what she describes as an “extensive houseplant collection that borders on hoarding” and fills her Southern California home, she cares for her eight-year-old dog, Leica, who has a crippling fear of the sound of her refrigerator. If anyone knows why that might be, please let us know. Walker’s photographs from the High Desert outside L.A. appear in “Outrage Machines,” page 42.…

Aston Martin’s gorgeous Vantage could sell on looks alone if it weren’t such a compelling car to drive too. Developed under Ford ownership, the entry-level Aston borrowed a few obvious bits from the corporate parts bin, such as the spindly Jaguar key and the Volvo fob and navigation unit. Yet it still captures nearly all the specialness of the twice-as-expensive DBS and Vanquish. Building each Vantage by hand took 200 hours, and the attention to detail shows in the spectacular leather interior, the swan doors that open with a dignified 12-degree upswing, and the machined-aluminum gauges. Aston Martin overhauled Jaguar’s AJ 4.2-liter V-8 for Vantage duty, giving it a larger bore and a shorter stroke, an additional 80 horses, and a 7300-rpm rev limiter (up from 6200 rpm). The 380-hp…

First it was mom jeans, then the fanny pack. Now it’s the cars of the 1990s that are making a comeback. In recent years, some have performed exceedingly well on the auction circuit. In 2019, for instance, a 1997 Toyota Supra Turbo with 70,000 miles on the odometer sold for $176,000—a substantial increase from that model’s $40,666 base price when new. It’s not just A80 Supras that have caught the attention of collectors. From 2018 to 2020 at the classic-car insurer Hagerty, the number of insurance quotes for ’90s cars increased more than those for cars from any other decade. And demand isn’t limited to enthusiasts who grew up then; boomers and Gen Xers have shown strong interest too. But data from Black Book’s Cars of Particular Interest Collectible Vehicle…

Apparently, there’s something about having a highly anticipated BMW M car that alters the atmosphere in Los Angeles. Months of blue skies and shorts weather ended as soon as our M4 test car arrived. Of course, correlation does not imply causation, but we’re superstitious. A few years ago, a new M2 brought a massive storm during a multiyear drought, and now the M4 brings rain? You’d be a little’stitious too. In a desperate attempt to outrun the storm, this particular six-speed-manual M4 spent hours chasing patches of dryness, mostly in vain. As the miles piled up, we were struck by the ease with which the M4 melts away vast distances. With wipers wiping, we relaxed in the leather-wrapped interior fit for a 7-series and kept Waze up on the 10.3-inch…

“I’m impressed by this Kia’s damping,” said no one ever. Then the Kia Telluride came along, and those words appeared on the very first page of our longtermer’s logbook. Does anyone reading this remember us ever complimenting the way a Kia’s shock absorbers soak up imperfections in the road? Because we don’t. That logbook comment signaled that the Telluride was rewriting how we write about Kias. Since the early 2000s, new Kias have earned our respect with stylish designs, long lists of amenities, and low prices. But praise was often delivered with a caveat: The vehicles were missing the dynamic excellence of their best competitors. Kia consistently came up short in the suspension tuning or the power-steering calibration or the transmission programming—the engineering details that separate the good vehicles from…

The ripple effect of the pandemic has hit the auto industry where it hurts—right smack-dab in the supply chain. The microchips that control everything from your 30-way power-adjustable massaging seat to your engine’s fuel injectors are as scarce as toilet paper was a year ago. That messes things up for automakers, which can no longer build as many cars as they’d like. As we went to press, the chip shortage was stopping production of almost 2 million vehicles globally. For a list of affected North American–made models, check out our piece on page 20. This is not the first time something like this has happened. In 2004, a booming Chinese economy suddenly meant automakers couldn’t find steel. That shortage sent GM to court with two of its suppliers over pricing,…

The same component that’s gumming up the automotive supply chain is inside your house. You probably even have several in your pocket. Silicon semiconductors are the bedrock of the microchips that power video-game consoles, TVs, computers, phones, and vital parts of your vehicle. A year after COVID shut down North American auto plants, a semiconductor shortage has forced several of them to again pause or adjust production. The problem began when new-car sales tanked in April 2020 and automotive suppliers slashed microchip orders. By the time sales rebounded, electronics manufacturers had swooped in and bought enough to satisfy booming demand for their own products. That left automakers short of what they needed to control windshield wipers, power infotainment systems, and keep other electronic systems functioning. IHS Markit estimates the shortage…

Like any normal person with healthy internet habits, I sometimes venture onto Craigslist, type in “Saab,” and see what pops up. Will I find a decrepit 9-5 wagon moldering in the tall grass of an unkempt lawn? Or maybe a 9-3 convertible in that acid green? Perhaps there will be a 900 or a 9000, but probably not, because North Carolina isn’t exactly the heart of Saab territory. Saabs come from the land of the ice and snow, where the synchros fry and the head gaskets blow. So imagine my astonishment when I discover 10 listings—9-3s, 9-5s, even a stray 900—all in the same place. Against all odds and logic, somebody is running a functional Saab dealership a couple of hours away from me. This I have to see. That…

Kia has figured out that giving customers more car than they expect is an all-conquering formula.—RICH CEPPOS Though it lacks a surplus of horsepower, the Telluride is a joy to drive. —AUSTIN IRWIN This vehicle is so comfortable and desirable. —JOEY CAPPARELLA It’s great at hauling people without being ungainly to maneuver and park on city streets.—ANNIE WHITE There’s no good reason to buy any other mid-size SUV. —ERIC TINGWALL Has Kia raised the bar too high? How does it get better than this? adding turbochargers might be the only way.—DAVID BEARD I like it so much, I bought one.—NATHAN SCHROEDER Other car companies have to be saying, “Holy shit! How’d they do that?”—RICH CEPPOS I’ve found a flaw: I need a step stool to reach the center of the…

In April 2004, the city of San Francisco acquired two Honda FCX cars powered by hydrogen fuel cells. Mayor Gavin Newsom held a press conference, and to show off just how clean the vehicles’ emissions would be, he collected condensate from a tailpipe in a paper cup and took a sip. “You are looking, literally, at the future,” he said. Last fall, Newsom, now California’s governor, signed an executive order requiring all new cars and light-duty trucks sold in the state to be zero-emission vehicles starting in 2035, his ambitions buoyed by a growing list of EVs and rising demand. If you want to go electric, the Golden State is a fine place to be. There are, according to the California Energy Commission (CEC), more than 70,000 public and shared…