Innehållsförteckning för December 2022 från Car and Driver

IF you want to broadcast your forward-thinking ways with a luxuriously aspirational electric vehicle in today’s preferred SUV body style, the options are scarce. Neither Rolls-Royce nor Bentley makes one, and the Mercedes EQS SUV isn’t on sale just yet. Everything else, including the Genesis GV60, the Cadillac Lyriq, and the Audi e-tron, falls well short of the pricing and performance bar set by the BMW iX and Rivian R1S, the two vehicles we’ve gathered here. Our requirement for conventionally hinged doors meant the aging Tesla Model X got left out. Shucks. At $109,895, the top M60 version of BMW’s futuristic iX features an upgraded rear motor with a 0.8-inch-longer rotor and a stator stuffed with more copper windings. A second inverter feeds sufficient current to increase peak output from 335…

WIDE, WEDGY, AND OUTRA-GEOUS, the Countach wasn’t the first Lamborghini, but Marcello Gandini’s jaw-dropping design created the archetype the company has followed ever since. No new Countach could ever match the original in terms of the awestruck reaction that greeted the vehicle, named for a Piedmontese expletive uttered at the concept car. Which is why Lamborghini’s decision to produce a new Countach, the LPI 800-4, seemed dangerously close to heresy. The question is: Can the LPI 800-4 compare as an experience? To answer it, we drove the LPI 800-4 alongside a historic Countach from Lamborghini’s own collection. This 1990 25th Anniversary Edition is the final original Countach built, and it’s normally exhibited in the factory museum. With just 6000 miles, it’s practically box fresh. As the last version of the first…

Highs: So quiet, so smooth, so big. Lows: So expensive, so much like an S-class. Two-tone cars are the bookends of this automotive journey we call life. Your first might have been rusty brown on the bottom or bleached white on the top. And if you grind hard enough, you too can one day purchase a $185,950 Mercedes-Maybach S580. Of course, if you really want to make a statement, add $14,500 for the livery shown here, seemingly inspired by the Glaser’s Bake Shop black and white cookie. In the transformation from fish-egg Benz S580 to caviar Maybach S580, Mercedes stretches the wheelbase by 7.1 inches, benefiting backs eat space, though the 496-hp V-8 and all-wheel drive remain. The huge rear doors feel so heavy, you’d swear they’re lined with bullion.…

Highs: Perky hybrid powertrain, hushed cabin, it’s finally new. Lows: Unwieldy handling, lengthy braking distance, poorly packaged third row. In forests of giant sequoias, time almost stands still. One could say the same for Toyota’s Sequoia, which just received its first redesign in 15 model years. Unfortunately, it isn’t the massive improvement we expected after such a wait. The Sequoia adopts the hybridized twin-turbo 3.4-liter V-6 from the also fresh Tundra pickup. The powertrain makes a hearty 437 horsepower and 583 pound-feet of torque, launching the 6179-pound top-spec Sequoia Capstone 4x4 to 60 mph in 5.6 seconds and through the quarter-mile in 14.3 seconds at 94 mph. But the rest of the Sequoia’s dynamic behavior makes it feel every bit like the shipping-container-sized SUV it is. The width means it’s…

Can you elaborate on how the Porsche 911 GT3 RS’s drag-reduction system (DRS) “stalls the [rear] wing to reduce drag” [“Air Apparent,” September 2022]? My understanding of aerodynamics is that a stalled wing is not the same as a wing that produces zero lift and thus zero induced drag. I would think DRS is setting the rear wing so it produces as close to no lift as possible. In contrast, a stalled wing produces some lift and enormous drag. —Todd Fry, Beaufort, SC Stalling generally refers to a wing getting to such a steep angle that the air passing over it becomes turbulent and detaches, causing a dramatic reduction in the amount of lift created (as with airplanes) or downforce (on cars). But a secondary aerodynamic device—a movable diffuser, a…

The Hyundai Ioniq 6 attracts a swarm of new fans, page 74. The World’s Heaviest Minivan (Also, Its Fanciest) Highs: Eats interstate miles like a Greyhound, luxury appointments of the new king’s polo closet, will carry two caskets simultaneously. Lows: Gas mileage that’s difficult to countenance, cockpit electronics require a seven-day tutorial in Dallas, roughly as Jeepish as a Bentley. To suggest that Jeep’s seven-or eight-passenger Wagoneer L/Grand Wagoneer L twins are elephantine is to libel pachyderms. Both vehicles boast seven newfound inches of wheelbase and 12.0 bonus inches overall, compared with what we now quite inadvisably call their short-wheelbase kinsfolk. We are here to make you smile. Ladies and gentlemen, behold an SUV that, in latest limo guise, requires a 19-foot parking space. Somewhere beneath the Grand L’s 6428-pound…

Highs: Roomy interior, comfortable and quiet around town. Lows: Lazy acceleration, polarizing looks, pales next to more exciting competition. We get it. Your letters say it all. The rise of EVs doesn’t sit well, but the industry’s push toward an exhaust-free future has us pinned under an influx of electric utility vehicles. We’ll admit that we love reporting the euphoric effect of a 5000-rpm launch-control start and the internal organ-displacing sensation of 1.20 cornering g’s. But Nissan’s all-new Ariya doesn’t inspire any such words, at least not yet. Since the launch of the 2011 Leaf, Nissan has sold nearly 600,000 EVs globally—Nissan hopes the Ariya will build on that success. It comes with a single-motor front-wheel-drive or dual-motor all-wheel-drive setup. The base Engage models use a 63.0-kWh battery, while others…

Nobody ever argued over the Toyota Avalon, which was universally described as perfectly nice. But Toyota, in case you haven’t noticed, is no longer content with inoffensive competence. So it has replaced the Avalon with the Crown, a jacked-up four-door coupe-roof sedan that looks like a 1999 Subaru Legacy SUS and a Local Motors Rally Fighter had a baby. The fact that this thing succeeds the Avalon reveals a lot about Toyota corporate culture right now, which we imagine as Rumspringa in Japan. What will Toyota build next, and will it be the result of a dare? The Crown, whose name dates to 1955 in Japan, is 3.7 inches taller than an Avalon and twice as extroverted. Available 21-inch wheels look conceptcar enormous on a vehicle this size, and the…

It was only 20 years ago that the Porsche Cayenne shocked the automotive world. An SUV from the preeminent sports-car maker seemed wildly incongruous in 2002. Today it’s easier to list the few automakers that don’t offer one for sale than those that do. Sure, there are exotic dream weavers, such as Pagani and Koenigsegg, that ignore the sales siren of the ute. But of brands that produce more than 500 cars a year globally, the only ones without a sport-utility either on sale or on the way are Chrysler (though it has made SUVs in the past; remember the Durango-based Aspen?) and fellow Stellantis subsidiaries Abarth and Lancia; Alpine (Renault’s sports-car division); and McLaren and Morgan in the U.K. While some automakers tried to hold back the tide, cold,…

THE CHAOS OF UPHEAVAL CAN CREATE OPPORTUNITY. Take the dawning EV revolution, which has already seen a startup car company rocket past century-old competitors to become the most valuable automaker on earth. In the latest upset, a Korean brand best known for low prices, long warranties, and liberal financing has created a machine with performance that rivals the most revered Germans. In nomenclature, the difference between the Kia EV6 GT and the lesser EV6 GT-Line models is slight. That Kia denotes the top-performing version of its mid-size EV by reducing rather than adding to the nameplate is something of an undersell, but the GT’s hardware shows the intensity of this effort. The headline achievement is the powertrain. Other dual-motor, all-wheel-drive EV6 models serve up 320 total horsepower; the GT, presumably…

Once it was established that high-performance SUVs were not an oxymoron, there was only one direction to go: up. More speed, quicker acceleration, greater grip, more tenacious braking, and—most of all—higher prices. At Porsche, the progression of high-test versions with more horsepower and compound badge extensions has led to the 2022 Cayenne Turbo GT, a veritable sport-utility weapon capable of amazing things on the track, up to and including the vaunted Nürburgring. Other high-end carmakers have joined in—even Ferrari with its upcoming Purosangue. Aston Martin entered the fray a couple of years ago with its DBX. We’d surmise, however, that the beastly 2023 DBX 707 was in the model plan from the outset. These Cayenne and DBX models make an excellent pairing, and not just because our samples were painted…

Highs: Greater driver engagement, nearly as quick as the automatic, no additional cost. Lows: Not offered with the base four-cylinder, EPA fuel economy takes a hit. As soon as the current Supra arrived for the 2020 model year, calls for a manual transmission version flooded Toyota’s PR desk. Such a legendary nameplate—at the top of the brand’s Gazoo Racing–developed lineup—made available only with an automatic didn’t sit right for many enthusiasts. Fortunately, Toyota heeded the call to save the manuals and introduced a stick-shift Supra for 2023. It’s as good as we’d hoped. Available as a no-cost option paired exclusively with the Supra’s 382-hp turbocharged 3.0-liter inline-six, the manual setup carries a starting price of $53,595. In packaging the six-speed stick, Toyota widened the center console and moved the infotainment…

The Hyundai Ioniq 6 is a tall car but doesn’t look it. As smooth as a river rock, this EV is a roadgoing cueball with a spoiler. On the standard 18-inch wheels, with the active air flaps closed and camera side mirrors, the Ioniq 6 has a claimed drag coefficient of 0.21. Underneath, you’ll find a structure similar to the Ioniq 5’s, with a two-inch-shorter wheelbase. As with the 5, Hyundai will offer two batteries for the Ioniq 6, a long-range 77.4-kWh pack and a standard 53.0-kWh unit, matched with either a single-motor, rear-wheel-drive setup or dual motors and all-wheel drive. We drove the long-range, dual-motor variant with the larger battery and 320 horsepower. Hyundai says the all-wheel-drive Ioniq 6 gets to 62 mph in 5.1 seconds, but we expect…

Ford’s performance-focused Special Vehicle Team (SVT) made its debut with two 1993 models: the SVT Mustang Cobra and the SVT F-150 Lightning, a souped-up pickup that immediately divided the Car and Driver staff into “Why?” and “Because!” camps. Enough buyers fell into the latter for the F-150 Lightning to get a sequel with a big bump in power for the 1999 model year. From 1999 to 2004, Ford produced just over 28,000 second-gen SVT F-150 Lightnings clad in the love-it-or-hate-it aero body (and Flareside bed) that arrived with the ’97 truck. Not enough to make them common, but enough to build a cult following such that, even today, owner forums thrive and enthusiast meetups occur around the country. Models from 2001 forward got a revised Triton 5.4-liter V-8 with more…