Innehållsförteckning för September 2011 från MotorTrend

With June about to wrap up, there are four new campaigns on the chart. BMW’s entry depicts a 1M zooming through cloned cutouts in concrete walls. Fiat’s 500 blends high class with cool to the soundtrack of a Vivaldi remix. Ford’s campaign responds to “Facebook Questions” about the new 2011 Explorer. The most viewed of the response videos features the JabbaWockeeZ performing a dance-off. * First appearance on chart ** Back on chart Source: Visible Measures (www.visiblemeasures.com) The Motor Trend Top 10 Online Video Auto Ads Chart focuses on brand-driven viral video ads that appear on online video sharing destinations. Each campaign is measured on a True Reach basis, which includes viewership of brand-syndicated video clips and viewer-driven social video placements.…

PEUGEOT intends to make a true successor to one of the great legends of the European hot hatchback scene in the 1980s-’90s, the light, fast, sweet-handling, pretty 205GTI. The company’s subsequent hot hatches have all been flabbier. Engineers and designers recognize it and wish to counter VW’s forthcoming supermini, which will be lighter and more compact than the car it replaces. The hottest Pug’ will use the codeveloped engine seen in the Mini Cooper S JCW, a 1.6-liter turbo making about 200 horsepower. Under a new design chief, Peugeot’s style has been getting more elegant and less baroque, both in its concepts and production cars. Peugeot’s race cars lost out by seconds to the lone surviving Audi at this year’s Le Mans, though the brand has beaten Audi 13 out…

“I SPENT A WEEKEND WITH THE PRIUS’ NEW BIG LITTLE BROTHER, THE PRIUS V, AND CAME AWAY TRYING TO CONVINCE MY WIFE SHE NEEDS ONE.” TOYOTA INTRODUCED the original 2001 Prius to the U.S. in Y2K, nearly a dozen years ago. Since then, Japan’s behemoth automaker has sold a cool two million of its shovel-nose gas-electric, with half that tally being consumed in the United States. In Los Angeles, the Prius is conspicuously common and comprehensibly cool—about as ubiquitous as a Hollywood wannabe yet as special as a Hollywood star. That it took Toyota well over a decade to give its haute hybrid a sibling brings one thought to mind: What took so long? I spent a weekend with the Prius’ new big little brother, the Prius v, and came…

After its misadventure with the Malibu Maxx SS, Chevrolet issued an edict that only true performance cars could wear the storied badge. Thus, Cruze RS, but not an SS. What about the new Malibu? “We’re studying that now,” says Mark Moussa. GM has proper engines. The 220-horsepower, 2.0-liter Ecotec Buick Regal CXL Turbo engine would be perfect for a Malibu RS. A Malibu SS would require the Regal GS’s high-output 2.0-liter turbo, which makes 270 horsepower at 5300 rpm and 295 pound-feet at 2500-4000 and gets a respectable 19/29-mpg with the optional six-speed manual. “I’d say, stay tuned,” Moussa hints. “You may be pleasantly surprised in the future.”…

OKAY, EVERYONE, get it out of your system. “Oh, look! A new 911 that looks just like the old 911!” For fans of the 911, we celebrate the fact that every new 911 still looks like a 911. The first car was a near-perfect design for its time, and all Porsche has had to do over almost 50 years of production is modernize it with each new generation. What really matters is what’s under the skin, and the 2012 911 (chassis code 991) has plenty going on. To start, the dimensions have changed more in one fell swoop than ever in 911 history. The wheelbase has grown by almost 4 inches, while the overall length has only grown by 2. This may not seem significant, but the 911 has always…

LIKE THE C63 AMG Coupe to the M3, the Mercedes-Benz C-Class coupe enters the market when the standard BMW 3 Series is at its most vulnerable. The Mercedes coupe goes on sale this fall, about half a year before a new 3 Series, just when many of the BMW faithful wonder whether their brand is losing its way. While that BMW will be all new, the C-Class coupe is a variation of the C-Class sedan, updated with a face-lift of the W204 C-Class launched here for 2008, and it shares the sedan’s wheelbase and overall length. Coupes tend to enhance a compact or midsize sedan’s personality, and the C-Class coupe’s styling emphasizes the design’s upright, pedestrian-friendly hoodline and the newly rhinoplastied nose. By trying to not directly copy the BMW…

IF YOU READ to the end of this comparison, you’ll note a glaring shortcoming with all three cars. They’re too slow! In 2011, the epoch has finally dawned where sedans that run to 60 mph in less than 5 seconds are the standard cars, not the performance variants. The monstrous CLS 63 AMG hits 60 mph in 3.9 seconds, while the long-wheelbase XJL Supercharged takes 4 flat. And that’s the slow super kitty, as the XJL Supersport has 40 extra ponies and 37 more pound-feet of torque. Audi needs to do something to keep up. Meet the soon-to-be-here Audi S7. What’s under the hood? Not much, save for a small-displacement (most signs point to a 4.0-liter) twin-turbo V-8 that will produce in the neighborhood of 475 horses and about that…

HYUNDAI’S new Accent benefits from the Elantra and Sonata’s“hey, we’ve discovered styling” fluidic design language, though its expressiveness is toned down, fitting its smaller size and visually indicating its low-rent lot in life. High- and ultra-high-strength steel account for 58 percent of the Accent’s mass. A new 1.6-liter aluminum Gamma gas direct-injection four is 40 pounds lighter than the old iron-block Alpha engine, though the Accent is slightly heavier overall. Class exclusives include four-wheel discs and a front-center sliding armrest. The insides of the A-pillars are covered with a plastic, fibrous tissue and volcanic rock, saving weight and simulating a“cloth look.” It’s not that convincing, but it’s part of an interior design that manages to make the common economy-grade plastic look good and tightly assembled. Hyundai eschews bright cheap and…

PLENTY OF OUR experience with the TSX has been sound-related. As is typical with minivans and wagons, this one has a booming noise that sources from the car’s rear cargo hold, and is most pronounced when driving over bumps or potholes. It’s the type of noise that you can almost feel inside your eardrums. It’s not painful, or overly distracting, but it’s there, and isn’t going anywhere. Most likely this acoustic imperfection does not exist in this car’s sedan counterpart. The Bluetooth system has difficulty trying to sort out whether to send a sync'd incoming call to the speaker or the handset. iPhones more often than not receive calls to their handsets and not through the handsfree speaker/mic of the car. Even when I’d ask the phone to switch the…

“THERE’S NEVER THE SENSE THAT GIGANTIC REAR TIRES ARE LEVERING A MASSIVE ENGINE AROUND AN APEX IN THIS CAR.” I’VE NEVER wanted toownaPorsche 911, though they are great fun to drive. They’re even wilder to ride in with a pro like Walter Rohrl flailing away at the helm. Such rides sometimes make me wonder if the “laws of physics” are open to creative interpretation like our Constitution. But two mechanical engineering degrees tell me they’re not, hence, in my mind no proper racebred chassis should have its engine cantilevered off the rear axle (or the front). Yes, the 911’s setup loads the rear tires for better launch acceleration and provides slightly better weight distribution under hard braking, but if this arrangement is superior, why doesn’t anybody else in racing use…

ONCE UPON a time, foreign midsize cars—compacts by modern standards—came with four-cylinder engines only. Then they got V-6s, with Honda reluctantly complying last among the major competitors with its Accord in 1995. The tide turned last year, first with the Hyundai Sonata, then its platform sibling, the Kia Optima, which each launched only with four-cylinder naturally aspirated and turbo engines. Chevrolet’s 2013 Malibu will come with four-cylinder engines only when it goes on sale early next year. It wouldn’t be surprising to see the next Ford Fusion follow suit with naturally aspirated and EcoBoost four engine options. The 2.0-liter TSI four far outsells the V-6 version of the premium Audi A4, which grew to a midsize car in its latest iteration. So it’s impossible to avoid the term “out of…

If the standard C63 AMG’s 451 horsepower isn’t enough, order AMG’s Development Package, which incudes the SLS AMG’s lighter pistons, rods, and crankshaft, adds a higher engine speed limit, and subtracts weight. AMG estimates 0-62 mph in 4.4 seconds for the “base” C63 coupe, and 4.3 seconds with the package. The C63’s sport suspension replaces the standard front MacPherson struts with a three-link suspension. It has a reinforced multilink rear suspension, wider front and rear tracks, speed-sensitive sport-tuned power steering, and a 13.5:1 direct steering ratio to improve on the C-coupe’s already impressively precise and communicative rack-and-pinion hydraulic power steering. There are the usual body and interior trim pieces, including LED daytime driving lights, side air outlets, powerdome hood, carbon-fiber rear lip spoiler, and snug Recaro front seats. (U.S. models…

What Matters to You? Today, America needs fresh leadership to lead us as a nation out of this economic crisis. Leadership must come not only from our political leaders but also from the average citizen. The exporting of American jobs is a trend that must be stopped and reversed. When I walk into my local hardware store, I typically find 85% of the goods for sale are manufactured 7,000 miles away. Recognizable American brands have been forced by shortsighted management and buyers at large national chains to build factories overseas just to save a lousy $.50 on a tape measure. To these ruthless buyers, it is all about the money. Rarely are product quality, the political system, human rights, animal rights and environmental costs to the planet considered, not to…

FOR MOST CAR LOVERS, a garage is not just a place to keep the car. It’s a place to hang out with your car, lavish attention on your car, fix your car, talk about cars with your buddies, and keep all your car-related stuff in one well organized place. Whether it’s attached to the house, under the house, or freestanding, a garage is a special place. Herewith, we present a menu of ideas that anyone can use to make the garage a better, safer, easier place to store stuff, work on the car, and hang out. Flooring. The foundation for any good working garage is a skidproof concrete floor. The last thing you want is for you, a family member or a car buddy to slip and fall on your…

NO SOONER had we said goodbye to our Volkswagen Routan than a new 2011 Honda Odyssey joined our garage. It came loaded with the Touring Elite package with leather interior, navigation with voice recognition, rear-seat entertainment system with a 16.2-inch split screen, and a cool box in the center stack. At the test track, the 248-horsepower, 3.5-liter V-6 gave us a 7.4-second 0-60-mph run, and it is expected to return 19/28 mpg city/highway. The family-hauler’sall-new exterior styling has received mixed reviews, especially for its “lightning bolt” beltline and gaping sliding door channel. So why would the Motor Trend staff—especially the photographers—be excited about getting a minivan, of all vehicles? Mostly utility. Pull out the second-row seats, fold down the third-row Magic Seat, and it can hold two photographers, half-a-dozen coolers'…

THE VOLKSWAGEN Routan isn’t like every other minivan on the market today—it’s like two other minivans. With the structure of the Dodge Grand Caravan/Chrysler Town & Country beneath its shiny new skin, the Routan is a mixture of Teutonic ingenuity and Canadian build quality. The result is a baffling vehicle with both eye-popping improvements over the Chrysler duo and forehead-slapping oversights. Whether or not you agree with VW’s decision to restyle its competitor’s minivan for the U.S. market rather than build its own from scratch, the German brand did manage to get at least one thing right about the Routan: This people-mover is better-looking than either Chrysler product. Staffers praised the improved interior materials and seats. Still, the basic Chrysler interior layout is nearly identical (though Stow 'n Go seating…

OR, WOULD YOU BELIEVE, “The world’s number one fun car” as claimed by the International King Midget Car Club. The group makes another interesting claim, that the King Midget was the only small car continuously manufactured for nearly a quarter of a century, 1946-1970. (We're not sure we agree with that, as the VW Beetle covered that many years, and more. But then, the Beetle was positively midsize compared with the King Midget.) “The pride of Athens, Ohio,” the King Midget Motors Corporation was formed just after the end of World War II by civil air patrol pilots Claud Dry and Dale Orcutt. Their first “production model” was conceived and sold as a single-passenger kit car into which nearly any single-cylinder engine could be installed. Beginning in the late 1940s,…

OUR INTREPID, very undercover spy photographer (so undercover, we can’t reveal his name) caught what appears to be the much-anticipated small Jaguar sports car. Paul Horrell reported in August that the car, codenamed X152, will indeed be called the F-Type, though the name XE also has come up. Note the long hood and very short deck. Jaguar originally considered a mid-engine layout for its small sports car, designed to compete in price and placement with the Porsche Boxster. Instead, Horrell reports, it will be the first built off a new front-longitudinal engine/rear-drive platform that also will spawn a compact sedan slotting under the XF, and a new crossover utility vehicle launching later in the decade. The base engine in the F-Type is expected to be a V-6 of about 3.8…

FORD’S announcement that it will offer the Focus-based C-Max multi-purpose vehicle in the U.S. exclusively with hybrid and plug-in hybrid drivetrains was revealing for what the company did not say. It will not sell the conventional internal-combustion model here, so Ford brass has come to realize that Americans still like American-style cars and trucks. The three-row, seven-passenger Ford C-Max, the only version initially planned for the U.S., will not be imported here. The hybrid versions we will be able to buy will have a two-row, five-passenger configuration. Ford showed the C-Max last January at the Detroit auto show. The Blue Oval may not have received the public reaction it was expecting. Ford may have discovered that non-traditional models are a hard sell in the States. It has touted the “success”…

IF THE VOLT is the small-batch bourbon in General Motors’ liquor cabinet, the Chevy Malibu is Pabst Blue Ribbon—once as popular as the hightrim Chevelle of the 1960s, but watery discount liquor store stuff by the time the Corsica/Beretta replaced it in the ’80s. The Malibu’s return for ’97 was not pretty, but that prosaic model couldn’t prepare Chevrolet loyalists for what followed: the 2004 Malibu/Maxx. Right now, GM designers, engineers, and execs are shrieking in horror over its mention in a story about their handsome new model. Please calm down. There’s a method behind this history lesson. The shift from Malibu/Maxx to its ’08 successor represents the greatest design turnaround in GM’s history, and one of Bob Lutz’s biggest successes during his second tenure at the company. What do…

AFTER ATTENDING A press launch in the green-car-crazy California Bay Area, senior editor Jonny Lieberman made his way home to Los Angeles in a new 2012 Toyota Prius v. During his drive back, Señor Lieberman put the puffed-up Prius through its paces on highways and windy roads from San Fran to the City of Angels with foot firmly glued to the accelerator. He returned enlightened, extolling the virtues of the Prius v’s driving experience, proclaiming it better than that of any previous Prius after some 400 manic miles behind the wheel. But that was merely the beginning. Before staffers could sample the Prius v on their customary commuting routes, the road-test team set out to explore the finer points of the factory-shod Yokohama BluEarth eco-themed tires and the MacPherson…

ABOUT A DECADE ago, I knew this German guy—let’s call him Jens—with a clothing business that sold items to people like Alanis Morissette and Anthony Kiedis. He needed a ride to the American Apparel factory in downtown Los Angeles. Once inside, he purchased a trash bag full of imperfect T-shirts for about $4 a shirt. Back at his shop, he cut off the tags and screen printed each shirt with a highly stylized something or other. The one that sticks out in my mind featured an AK-47. The price after Jens and his partner made their alterations? $400 a shirt. It’s an age-old problem. How do you increase the price of an item while still selling basically the same old item? One solution is to add style. Meet the automotive…

AFTER nearly two years of teasing, Mini finally let us get a small taste—albeit a small one—of its all-new Mini Coupe. Having driven many a Mini since its introduction in 2001, I had certain expectations: a nimble chassis, crisp and responsive steering, peppy engine, and mild lift-throttle oversteer. But the Coupe definitely is different. It weighs about 55 pounds more than the hatch, and the center of gravity has been shifted slightly forward. There are a few reasons for the weight gain and CG shift. First, the Coupe shares its chassis with the Cooper Convertible, which uses a reinforced structure to maintain rigidity that also adds weight. Mini also added reinforced side sills, and a structural torsion wall replaces the rear seats and the rigidity they provide. Since this is…

WE’VE STARTED a new evaluation process for our long-term vehicles here at Motor Trend, whereby individual editors will effectively “own” the vehicles for all or most of the time we have them in the fleet. The idea is to improve the quality of our long-term reports, to get beyond what can often boil down to a series of impressions, and get to the nitty-gritty of what it’s actually like to live with the vehicle under test. "Owning” our new Porsche Cayenne long-termer might not seem like taking one for the team, but bear with me. I could have ordered the Turbo. After all, a 500-horsepower SUV that’ll nail 0-60 in the low 4s and has a claimed top speed of 172 mph sounds wickedly entertaining. But, no, in the interests…

IN A LANDSLIDE vote, the staff has declared the Accord Crosstour an ugly vehicle. The staff later declared that tires are round and proper martinis are made with gin. All foregone conclusions, yes, but each equally worthy of our consideration. In truth, the Crosstour’s appearance was discussed more than any other aspect of the car. Nearly every log entry mentions it, and the entries are rarely flattering. Whether it’s the Zamboni nose or the tucked-up tail, or the fact that those two don’t work together at all, the staff had plenty to say about the Crosstour’s sheetmetal. So there, we’ve made our case. There’s far more to a car than its outward appearance, and, once our editors stopped carping about the design, they found a few things to like about…