Innehållsförteckning för April 2022 från Car and Driver

The first automotive mirror is widely credited to driver Ray Harroun, who attached one to his winning car at the inaugural Indy 500 in 1911. The side mirror may have come from engineer Elmer Berger, who applied for a patent on his Cop-Spotter door mirror in 1921. Once race-car technology, today’s modern mirror comes standard and is a power-folding, lane-watching, self-defogging marvel. And, like the vehicles it’s attached to, it’s bigger than it used to be. 1965 Toyota Stout The Stout was the first Toyota pickup sold in the U.S., but it didn’t exactly corner the market. In 1964, the year it debuted here, Toyota sold four. The Stout had fender-mounted looking glass in its native Japan. It came to the U.S. before late-’60s federal mirror requirements, so restored trucks…

The debut of a mid-engine supercar is always an event worth commemorating. Roll out a new car with a gnarly engine mounted somewhere just ahead of the rear wheels, and we’ll be scouring Google Maps for twisty roads quicker than you can say “The C8 Corvette democratized this whole category.” So when Maserati unveiled the 2022 MC20, we couldn’t let the occasion pass without smashing a figurative champagne bottle over the prow. By which we mean bring an MC20 to the most glorious, desolate roads we could find and see how it stacks up against the 2021 Porsche 911 Turbo S Lightweight. “But,” you cry, as your blood pressure skyrockets and your dog runs away, “the Porsche 911 Turbo S is not mid-engined! I reject this premise!” Well, we’re sorry,…

It has 21 windows but is still tough to see out of. The driving position is an enforced slouch, and the front crush zone is two stamped headlight buckets reinforced by tibias and fibulas. The suspension teeters along as if it had been tuned by Christian Louboutin. And yet, it’s a ton of two-tone fun that’s decently quick. It’s a 1966 Volkswagen Type 2 electrified by EV West. Inside EV West’s shop in San Marcos, California, old-car zapifications are in various stages of progress. Outside, the parking lot is full of wrecked Teslas being rehabilitated or mined for parts. This is a place where electric dreams, nostalgia, and lithium ions are soldered into drivable things. Write a big check and EV West will put batteries into any toy. Born in…

THE MOJAVE ROAD is a 147-mile off-road route that starts at the Colorado River just south of Laughlin, Nevada, and ends near the Cajon Pass in California. Historically, beginning in late-prehistoric times, its trails represented a trade route connecting inland and coastal Native American tribes. Later it became a path along the westward expansion, a challenging desert crossing. Today it’s a popular off-road route, one we attempted to travel in a home-built, safari-style Tesla Model 3. We felt like pioneers—though we might’ve been better off in a covered wagon. Ethan Schlussler and Edwin Olding run Grind Hard Plumbing Co., a gearhead collective with a popular YouTube channel featuring their zany mechanical projects. The off-road Tesla started as a salvaged 2020 Model 3 Dual Motor Long Range with front-end damage. The…

Highs: Sharply dressed, energetic acceleration, compliant ride. Lows: Snug back seat, infotainment woes, the VW Golf R exists. They may be out of fashion these days, but lower, smaller automobiles are inherently more responsive and rewarding. As proof, we offer the latest Audi S3. For 2022, Audi enhances its small sports sedan with more power, sharper looks, and a reworked cabin. Sizewise, the S3 recalls the B5-generation Audi S4. Like that car, the S3 has simple styling with a hint of aggression. It’s also better proportioned than entry-level sedans from Mercedes and BMW. The all-wheel-drive S3 is Audi’s least expensive S model. Yet it’s plenty quick, ripping to 60 mph in 4.3 seconds, a 0.2-second improvement over its predecessor. The S3 wrings 306 horsepower from its turbocharged 2.0-liter inline-four—105 more…

1: 2017 NORTH AMERICA Brinkerhoff’s first race in the 356 was La Carrera Panamer-icana in 2013. Two years later, a crash sidelined her ambitions. After spending 2016 rebuilding and upgrading the car, she kicked off Project 356 World Rally Tour the next year by returning to Mexico and winning her class. 2: 2018 AUSTRALIA Unable to pre-run at Targa Tasmania, Brinkerhoff had to keep speeds down. While that frustrated her, the slower pace likely made Redhead’s job easier. “We had no problems there, mechanically,” he says. Again Brinkerhoff claimed a podium spot, second in her class. 3: 2018 SOUTH AMERICA Peru’s Caminos del Inca rally proved to be one of the most challenging. The 356 cleared customs, but the spare parts didn’t. Then the engine struggled in the thin mountain…

when the numbers get too large, our little brains struggle to contextualize. We realize that vehicle development and manufacturing, along with building out a nationwide distribution and dealer network, burns money at a rate that makes trust-fund millionaires look like they’re living paycheck to paycheck. But what does it actually take to start with nothing and end up with a 1111-hp electric luxury sedan? Let’s put it this way: If you stuffed $100 bills into 55-gallon oil barrels, you’d need nearly 300 barrels to contain the $5 billion that Lucid Motors has spent thus far. The cliché that a venture like this is a moonshot is fitting. Actually, it could be many moonshots, as this sum would more than pay for both Bezos’s and Branson’s rockets combined. The fact that…

HIGHS: M3-GRADE ACCELERATION, LIVELY HANDLING, HATCHBACK PRACTICALITY. LOWS: A LACK OF STEERING FEEL, NOT AS EFFICIENT AS LESSER VERSIONS. It had to happen. BMW finally focused its EV development in a direction that should appeal to brand loyalists and certain wistful Tesla Model 3 defectors alike, building an electric 4-series Gran Coupe called the i4. It’s as close as we’re likely to get to an electric 3-series, which is okay because the name i3 was previously assigned to an IKEA-inspired pod that no one could kärlek. Besides, the Gran Coupe is a better electrification candidate because it has four doors and a hatchback that doesn’t look like one until you pop the hatch and see the glass go up. Its longer roofline is a boon to rear-passenger space and cargo…

HIGHS: HIGH-QUALITY INTERIOR, FASTCHARGING CAPABILITY, LIGHT ON ITS FEET. LOWS: TINY FRUNK, COSTS MORE THAN THE CLOSELY RELATED HYUNDAI IONIQ 5. Born from the Imagine concept and kin to the Hyundai Ioniq 5 and Genesis GV60, Kia’s EV6 has its own unique look. Credit design chief Luc Donckerwolke, who placed his team in a remote location in Bavaria and left them with a model of the Lancia Stratos for inspiration. The EV6 offers three powertrains: Light models come with a 58.0-kWh battery and a 167-hp rear motor, Wind and GT-Line models get a 77.4-kWh battery and a 225-hp rear motor, and the all-wheel-drive Wind and GT-Line—the latter is the version we tested—add a front motor for 320 total horsepower. (A 576-hp GT arrives later.) Approach the EV6 and the door…

CARGO VAN BrightDrop EV600 General Motors is selling electric cargo vans to fleet operators through BrightDrop, its commercial-EV subsidiary. The EV600 is arriving first, with a smaller EV410 set to follow. Pricing hasn’t been announced, but BrightDrop says switching from diesel vans can save money thanks to the EVs’ greater efficiency and lower maintenance costs. Walmart and FedEx have already ordered vehicles. COMPACT SUV Chevrolet Equinox EV The current entries in the EV compact-crossover space carry base prices over $40,000, making them far more costly than gas-powered models such as the Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4, which start below $30K. With the new Equinox EV, arriving in 2023 at a base price around $30,000, Chevy is targeting the heart of that market to compete with the big internal-combustion players. FULL-SIZE…

Highs: Strong engine, smooth ride, wider appeal without abandoning Land Cruiser roots. Lows: Sticker shock at the fuel pump, top model has only four seats and a staggering price. The 2022 Lexus LX emerges from its fresh redesign carrying more weight on its shoulders. The Toyota Land Cruiser’s fancy sidekick now flies solo in the U.S. market, so it must satisfy a wider audience. The new LX600 lineup ranges from the $88,245 five-seat base model offering zero options to the Ultra Luxury model we tested, a $127,345 four-seat version with second-row recliners. In between are Premium, F Sport, and Luxury trims with a power-folding third row instead of the previous jump seats. In the new design, body-on-frame construction returns, with the LX now on the TNGA-F platform that also underpins…

Automobile lovers have been steeped in the language of the internal-combustion engine for so long that the inexorable switch to electrification requires a tune-up of our knowledge base. Many of us are familiar with the suck-squeeze-bang-blow rhythm of the four-cycle engine that powers the majority of today’s daily drivers, while the snowmobilers and outboard enthusiasts among us can probably explain the inner workings of a two-stroke. A few nerds may even have a handle on the epitrochoidal machinations of the Wankel rotary, but the average gearhead’s experience with electric motors might just begin and end with the last time their starter conked out. All types of electric-vehicle motors share two major parts. The stator is the motor’s stationary outer shell, whose housing is mounted to the chassis like an engine…

To combat electric-power interruptions, a new solution taps into the batteries in electric cars and trucks. All EVs have enough energy storage to theoretically power a home for several days. The trick is transferring the electrical energy from an EV into useful home AC power. Most EVs accept electrical power only through their charge ports. A handful can output power [see below], but Ford is one of the few that has introduced the components to make powering a home possible. The upcoming F-150 Lightning and its Intelligent Backup Power capability will allow owners to keep the lights on at home. Even with the standard 98.0-kWh battery, the Lightning’s battery capacity is more than seven $10,500 Tesla Power-walls, a common home battery. Look at it this way: At $41,699, a base…

We’re not always keen to drive prototypes, yet there was no way we’d pass up the chance to try the Volkswagen ID.Buzz, even if it’s the Europe-spec version that will launch first. Like the Euro version shown here, our Buzz will be built on the MEB platform that underpins the ID.4, but the U.S. model is still two years out. The rear-engine VW Vanagon retired in 1991, and while the front-drive Eurovan filled the van-sized hole in the lineup almost immediately, it just wasn’t the same. Then, in 2017, Volkswagen showed off the ID.Buzz concept, giving us time to grow our hair long. The prototype we’re driving is a panel van with a bulkhead behind the front seats. The U.S. probably won’t get the panel van; our ID.Buzz will be…

Decades ago, meals looked very different. People would scarf down something called creamed chipped beef, then, without missing a beat, mix canned tuna with Jell-O to create a tuna mold. Considered creative in their time, these dishes would be made today only to test gag reflexes. Time has changed our roads, too, and cars have always been subjected to the same sort of daring experimentation and fashion (which explains the rise and fall of the AMC Pacer and the Chrysler PT Cruiser). Extolling the virtues of hotted-up economy cars fitted with manual transmissions to nonenthusiasts can feel like trying to encourage someone to taste the chipped beef. No matter how hard we try, many folks will never even consider driving these cars. Compact sports sedans are so much fun, we…

Highs: Quickest car we’ve ever tested, probing its lofty limits is easy, 16 cylinders (16!). Lows: The letters we’ll get complaining about the price, an era coming to a close. Money can’t buy more time on earth, but it will buy a $3,825,000 Bugatti Chiron Super Sport. And while 1578 horsepower won’t extend your expiration date, accelerating hard in a Super Sport crams a hell of a lot of living into a short amount of time. You see, the Super Sport’s four new turbochargers compress not only air, but also time. Take, for example, the amount the Chiron Super Sport takes to get to 200 mph. Those 14.8 seconds squeeze in a month’s worth of terror, joy, and comedy. Your life does flash in front of you the first time…

Highs: Roomy rear seat, stunning style, torque-rich engine. Lows: Half-baked infotainment system, ride quality diminished on rough roads, slower than its predecessor. Volvo ought to include a chauffeur’s cap with every S90, because the sedan fills the void left by once-beloved livery vehicles such as the Cadillac DeVille and the Lincoln Town Car. Although the svelte Swede forgoes the stodgy styling of those discontinued American sedans, the Volvo feels like a kindred spirit to both. Credit its rear passenger compartment’s nearly full-size accommodations and a base price ($53,895) that’s in line with mid-size luxury sedans. That said, the Volvo’s back seat lacks the grandiose luxury typical of a stretch job. Save for its capaciousness (its rear legroom bests full-size models from Genesis and Lexus by 2.6 and 1.5 inches, respectively),…