Innehållsförteckning för October 2012 från MotorTrend

CAR AND LIGHT TRUCK sales in the U.S. were up 15 percent for the first half of 2012 compared with the first half of 2011, Automotive News says. Midsize cars were stronger than ever, with the five best-selling models in this category up 23 percent to 804,468 for the period. Dealers used heavy incentives to clear their lots of models replaced this fall, including the Honda Accord, Nissan Altima, Chevrolet Malibu, and Ford Fusion. Even with gas prices peaking above $4/gallon early in the year, sales of the top five-best-selling compacts rose 11.6 percent for the first half of 2012, to 656,984 units. What about niche models? Online reader gt500 asked about sales of the Nissan Juke and Scion xB on a recent sales analysis blog at motortrend.com. It’s the…

The son of Carrozzeria Pinin Farina founder Battista Pininfarina died July 3 in Turin, Italy. From 1961 to 2001, Sergio Pininfarina led the company that became known as “Ferrari’s tailor.” More of an entrepreneur than a designer, Sergio expanded Pininfarina’s breadth and built up its own bodyshell production capabilities. As a kind of design editor, his job was similar to Harley Earl’s after Earl staffed General Motors’ Art & Colour department. Battista established Pinin Farina in 1930. In 1961, Italian President Giovanni Gronchi changed the name by decree to Pininfarina. Sergio Pininfarina was born September 8, 1926, in Turin. He earned a mechanical engineering degree from Turin’s Polytechnic University in 1950 and joined the family business. Sergio became the firm’s managing director in 1961, taking over for his father. By…

MUSTANG AND CAMARO. For four and a half decades, these two flag-waving, tire-shredding, all-American musclecars have met countless times on the street, the strip, the track, the newsstand, and the Internet. Enthusiasts willing, they’ll continue to do battle for decades to come. Today, it’s down to this. We have been tasked with determining which of these two titans—each arguably the greatest of its lineage—is the better car. We took them to the street, the dragstrip, and the racetrack to choose a winner. At each venue, the two heavyweights squared off, and while each corner may have expected a knockout, we were treated to a true competition far closer than even we expected. THE STREET No matter how many of you regularly drag or track your car, the majority of your…

Lt. Jim Flagel and Sgts. Matt Rogers and Ron Gromak could be competitive SCCA racers, though they’ve never been on a racetrack. They learned performance driving in the program they now instruct, the Michigan State Police’s Precision Driving Unit. It’s one of two authorities in North America —the other is the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department—that annually evaluates every police car, truck, and motorcycle sold in the U.S. and Canada “We send roughly 30,000 copies of our vehicle test book around the country and to Canada for law enforcement communities to make good, informed decisions about which police vehicles meet the needs for their departments,” Flagel says. The Driving Unit was established in 1974 at the Fort Custer Army National Guard base in Augusta, Michigan, and moved to its Lansing…

“It’s not a Taurus,” Lisa Teed, Ford marketing manager for the North American police fleet, bluntly responds after our third such reference to the sedan in 10 minutes. Teed is adamant that this car is a Police Interceptor, a distinguished model in the Ford lineup and miles away from the civilian-issue Taurus on which it is based. Developed over three years with plenty of millions of dollars, the Police Interceptor Sedan (it’s important to distinguish between Sedan and Explorer-based Utility) does retain the basic components of its family-hauling cousin, but nearly every aspect of the car has been reassessed for police duty. The new Police Interceptor, rather unconventionally, is either FWD or AWD. The sheetmetal is largely the same as that of the Taurus, and so are the 3.5-liter V-6s.…

THE AUTOMOBILE has come a long way in the past century and a quarter, and a common refrain in automotive circles these days is that there simply aren’t any bad cars. Some aren’t as good as the competition, but, even at their worst, they’re a far sight better than cars of yesteryear. In some cases, such as this one, the cars in a competitive set have gotten so good that finding and weighing faults becomes nearly academic. With this group, that wasn’t an easy task. By their nature, convertibles are a compromise, and these are supposed be sporty and luxurious. Those priorities don’t always play well together, and to make our lives even more difficult, each of these three cars takes a different approach to balancing the compromise. In the…

1ST PLACE 2013 Porsche 911 Carrera S Before we left the office, but after hearing who the judges would be, senior features editor Jonny Lieberman joked rather loudly that we were just going to give it to the Porsche. It made me want to prove him wrong. I couldn’t. The Porsche won us all over by playing to our emotions. It was, without question, the most fun to drive. Where I was nervous about pushing the BMW to the limit, the Porsche seemed to have no limits, or at least, none I was willing to explore on a public road. The combination of sticky Pirellis, sport-tuned suspension, and an army of computers made the 911 unstoppable, even in wet conditions. While we still don’t like the less-tactile electric power steering,…

The Veloster Turbo will presumably stick around for a bit, and we may still have a few years with the Clubman series before we see its successor. But the Volkswagen GTI as we know it is ready to turn in its shield. Why mention it in this story? Well, as one of our highest-ranked, front-drive hot hatches on sale today, and of comparable price to the two featured cars, the tenured VW would inevitably be dragged into the bench-racing fracas. Next year, the new seventh-generation GTI, expected to be lighter and more efficient, will inevitably be baptized by fire. We’ll have lofty expectations when we get our mitts on it. The new GTI will ride on VW’s new, scalable MQB architecture that’ll be a key element in expanding the brand’s…

WAY BACK in 2006, customers could walk into a U.S. Audi dealership and choose between an A3 five-door hatchback, an A4 Avant, an A6 Avant, and the A6-based Allroad. But in spite of journalists’ best efforts, wagons and hatchbacks still aren’t flying off the lots like pfannkuchen. First the Allroad disappeared, and now the A4 and A6 Avants and A3 hatchback are going away next year. Luckily for the non-SUV-inclined, Audi is bringing back the Allroad for 2013. Although it’s based on Audi’s smaller A4 platform, the 2013 Allroad is slightly bigger than the 2006 A6-based car. It has a far more fuel-efficient but less powerful engine. Previous Allroads were equipped with either the famous 250-hp, twin-turbo 2.7-liter V-6 or the 300-hp, 4.2-liter V-8. The 2013 version is powered by…

IT’S A FAMILIAR tactic with niche sports car makers: Spend big for a redo every six or eight years, then keep folks interested by dribbling out variants with rearranged options, styling, and/or power. A favorite such Porsche variant is the naturally aspirated GTS, which the 958-gen Cayenne gets in its third model year. Cayenne cognoscenti will recognize the Turbo model’s front clip and taillamps. The gloss-black trim, side skirts, wheel arches, and roof spoiler are optional on lesser Cayennes. The only trim bits you can’t get on any other Cayenne are the black tailpipes and tailgate finisher. (Emotion: pride?) Inside are GTS memory seats and Alcantara seat inserts, console, door panels and headliner. The Sportdesign paddle-shift steering wheel with audio controls is also standard. Ordering an S optioned like a…

“Our VW Passat TDI achieved an indicated 52.8 mpg with the air-conditioning on full blast.”@MT_Lassa Service life / 5 mo / 8923 mi Avg CO2 / 0.54 lb/mi Energy cons / 90 kW-hr-100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $0 Normal wear cost / $0 EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 31/43/35 mpg Average Fuel Econ 41.0 mpg AFTER TECH director Markus, his partner, and I drove a round trip to the New York auto show in just two fill-ups, we lent the VW Passat TDI to a co-worker, a non-editorial, non-Motor Trend employee, for his business trip to Pittsburgh. Just outside Toledo, our colleague missed a fifth-sixth upshift and grabbed second by mistake. A call to Volkswagen’s free roadside assistance had the car towed to the Ed Schmidt…

“The Countryman’s mpg isn’t bad, but range can be an issue. You’re lucky to get 280 miles to a tank; you drive a lot, you stop a lot.”@MT_Floyd Service life / 12 mo / 23,936 mi Avg CO2 / 0.80 lb/mi Energy cons / 140 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / Occasional acceleration stumble Maintenance cost / $0 (oil change, inspection) Normal-wear cost / $0 (front brake pads/sensors; thermostat) EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 23/30/26 mpg Average Fuel Econ 24.1 mpg SOME OTHER folks in the office have had a chance to drive the Countryman for a couple of extended jaunts recently. Several of the observations are along the lines of what I’ve called out during my time in Big Min (its often jarring ride is the common thread), but there…

“For under $3000, the S60 has improved its performance markedly.”@Rory_Jurnecka Service life / 12 mo/20,168 mi Avg CO2 / 0.95 lb/mi Energy cons / 165 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $0 (2-oil change, inspection, 1-cabin air filter) Normal-wear cost / $1188.16 (tire rotation, 4 Toyo Proxes T1-S, mounting, balancing) EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 18/26/21 mpg Average Fuel Econ 20.4 mpg A COUPLE months ago, I dropped the S60 off at Power Volvo Irvine for a little 25-hp, 30-lb-ft pick-me-up in the form of a Polestar ECU reflash. Following the upgrade, the car did feel a bit peppier on the freeway, but to be certain, we planned to bring the car back to our testing venue for another round of number-crunching. Before we got a chance,…

EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 20/24/21 mpg Avg fuel economy 19.9 MPG “I can’t get over how cool it is to “sail” down the freeway at 70 mph with the engine off in the Cayenne S Hybrid.” Service life / 12 mo/26,909 mi Base price / $68,675 Options / Premium Package Plus ($11,650: air suspension, rearview camera, heated and cooled seats front seats, heated rear seats, Lane Change Assist, rear side sun screens), Burmester High End Surround Sound System ($5690); Sand Yellow Paint ($3140); 20-in Cayenne SportDesign II Wheels ($2730); XM Satellite Radio ($750); Trailer Hitch ($650) Price as tested / $93,285 Problem areas / None Maintenance cost / $1096.21 (2-oil change, inspection; 1-cabin-air filter) Normal-wear cost / $2532.05 (4 Michelin tires, installation, allignment) 3-year residual value* / $38,250 Recalls…

LAST MONTH, we showed you the 2014 Chevrolet Impala, on sale early next year with a standard 2.5-liter four. While the Chevy becomes the first full-size car sold in the U.S. in recent years to be available with a naturally aspirated four with no electric assist, the ‘13 Ford Taurus is in showrooms now with an optional 2.0-liter EcoBoost. The turbocharged, direct-injected four’s 270 lb-ft of torque is plenty for moving the 2-ton sedan into traffic safely. Peak comes early, just under 2000 rpm, though throttle response is a bit soft. The retuned Taurus chassis feels stiff for this sort of car on bumpy roads. Big car buyers seeking good fuel mileage won’t necessarily look for handling, a quality this short drive didn’t allow to be evaluated. The suspension retuning…

FORGET IDRIVE, Cadillac User Experience, or MyFordTouch. The in-car entertainment we want is the Fiat 500L’s espresso maker. The 500L is Fiat’s multipurpose vehicle that will share North American showrooms with smaller-platform siblings 500 hatchback and cabrio in early 2013. The L is about 2 feet longer and 6 inches wider than the 139.6-inch-long, 64.1-inch-wide 500. The 160-hp, 184-lb-ft turbo 1.4-liter used in the 500 Abarth and Dodge Dart seems the right choice for the U.S. market. The rear seats fold flat into the floor, and Cargo Magic Space allows you to separate dry from wet, or fragile from heavy, items. The L will be available with Chrysler’s UConnect infotainment, and navigation. A panoramic glass roof will be optional. It’s the espresso maker that captures our attention. Fiat worked with…

RUMOR and speculation say that Pininfarina’s 2010 Geneva auto show concept, the Alfa Romeo 2uettotanta, prompted Fiat to find a strategic alliance partner that would supply a small rear-drive platform for a 21st-century Duetto Spider. Mazda and Alfa Romeo have announced that a new, small Alfa roadster will be built off the next MX-5 Miata platform. The next Mazda Miata is expected in the 2014 model year, while the Alfa, with unique sheetmetal, interior, and a Fiat-supplied engine, will go on sale in the ’15 model year. The Alfa almost certainly won’t be this car, though some of its design cues might be applied. The 2uettotanta’s proportions are a bit off, with a hood and dash-to-axle that’s too long for the next-generation Miata. More important, Alfa Romeo’s design staff isn’t…

FERDINAND PIËCH completed Volkswagen AG’s takeover of Porsche SE with a 4.46-billion euro (U.S. $5.48 billion) purchase of the sports car-making business. The structure of the Porsche deal allowed VW to lower its tax burden from 1 billion euros to about 100 million euros, Bloomberg reports. Piëch’s takeover of Porsche brings the number of VW brands to 12, including Ducati, which Audi AG purchased earlier this year. OPEL has announced its latest reorganization effort. GM Europe’s loss of the equivalent of $582 million for the first three quarters of 2012 could be attributed in part to the European Union’s economic crisis, which has hit the entire European auto industry hard, though GM Europe has lost a total of $14.7 billion since 1999. Key points of the Opel reorganization are investments…

“AT $110,000, THE C BLACK IS NOT ONLY CHEAPER THAN THE CLK BLACK, BUT ALSO NEARLY MATCHES—AND OFTEN SURPASSES—THE SL BLACK ON THE TEST SHEET.” PRIOR TO this year, the last Mercedes-Benz AMG Black Series I drove was the ridiculous $299,000, 661-hp 2010 SL65 coupe (yes, this fixed-roof SL jettisoned its roadster title) that, oh, yeah, also unleashed 738 lb-ft of pavement-pulverizing torque. Translation? Floor the throttle—at any speed—and the rear 325/30R20 Dunlops would break loose like Ozone and Turbo in “Electric Boogaloo.” That’s what happens when you give power-obsessed engine builders in Affalterbach, Germany, free rein to bolt two big turbos onto 12 fire-breathing cylinders. But with proper tire management and a judicious right foot, the SL65 Black Series was a controllable beast capable of fast and ferocious numbers:…

Ford Police Interceptor Chevrolet 9C3 Detective Caprice Dodge Charger Pursuit PICTURE THIS: You’re tearing down the local highway on your way home from a long day. You know from experience that those lights in your review mirror aren’t the telltale Ford Crown Victoria lights, so you continue on your way. Parked roadside two minutes later, you’ve got some ’splainin’ to do. The new breed of police vehicle is here. From the ashes of the retired Crown Vic, Ford brings us a new Police Interceptor more advanced than ever. Chrysler and General Motors are the competition with the new Dodge Charger Pursuit and Chevrolet Caprice PPV. We tested all three, and here are our impressions. MOTOR TREND Carroll Shelby's untimely passing bumped this cop car story out of the rotation and…

Start with a rear-drive, full-size sedan; add a big, honkin’ V-8 engine; beef up the suspension; simplify the interior; then slap some badges and lights on it. Good to go. Our tester was a 9C3 Detective version with a 6.0-liter, 355-hp, 384-lb-ft V-8 paired to a six-speed automatic transmission (a 301-hp, 3.6-liter direct-injected V-6 is standard). The Detective unit varies slightly from the standard Police version in that the center console-mounted shift lever isn’t offset to the side. The Chevy was the only car of the bunch to not move the shifter to the steering column. Otherwise, the Detective version receives the same technical enhancements as the Patrol Caprice PPV. As in the other cars here, the suspension and brakes have been uprated with durable police-duty components. Chevy also tuned…

CADILLAC HAS been running its mouth for some time now about the new ATS, with Nürburgring videos and talk of benchmarking not the new 3 Series, but the “best one,” the E46. BMW, meanwhile, simply rolled out the best 3 Series yet and swept the field (“The More Things Change…”, May 2012). The singular question, then, is whether Cadillac can back it all up, and the answer is yes. In fact, here are the only four things I don’t like about the ATS: the instrument cluster is boring and uninspired; the shift paddles on the steering wheel are too far from your fingertips; the back seat is too cramped; and the 2.5-liter base engine doesn’t belong. That’s it. But does that make it better than the 3 Series? I drove…

3RD PLACE 2013 Mercedes-Benz SL550 Roadster The new SL is like the best personal assistant or butler. He’s always on time, always there when you need him, always prepared, and always ready to serve. But you don’t (usually) marry your butler. The SL is smooth, powerful, luxurious, and eminently capable. It just doesn’t create an emotional connection. It’s more of a business relationship. Associate road test editor Carlos Lago agrees. “I don’t love this car, and it’s not for any rational, empirical, or concrete reason. I simply get this clinical feeling—there’s little in the way of emotion,” he wrote. That’s not to say there weren’t parts of the SL we loved. With its blacktop-twisting 516 lb-ft of torque and thunderous exhaust note, the twin-turbo, 4.7-liter V-8 made friends easily. That…

YOU’VE SEEN THIS MOVIE before. Ford SVT introduced its hot, 170-hp version of the Focus two-door hatch 10 years ago to much ballyhoo. Although it was priced at a $5K premium over the common, 130-hp Focus, buyers lined up to pay nearly $20,000. But a year later, the cars were lingering on dealers’ lots, discounted to $13,000. This time, everything’s different. One Ford global development guarantees ST production for the rest of the Focus’ life cycle. If every North American who wants a Volkswagen GTI hatchback competitor for $25,000 to $32,000 buys one in the next year, there still will be demand in Europe, where 252-hp, front-drive fourdoor hatchbacks are their Mustangs and Camaros. This time, North America’s hot Focus is pretty much the same as Europe’s hot Focus, though…

BIG ENGINE + little vehicle = marketing pay dirt. Jim Wangers helped prove this theorem when Pontiac jammed a Bonneville 389 into a little Tempest back in the “Mad Men” era, before the safety/emissions bogeymen crashed the car party. BMW is dusting off this formula by bringing the tiny, strong-selling global subcompact X1 to the U.S. and wedging its beloved 300-hp/300-lb-ft turbo-six under the hood. No other market gets this dragstrip drivetrain, and this market offers no direct competitor to the X1 at the moment. The 1 Series-based newcomer is roughly Jeep Compass/Kia Sportage/VW Tiguan-sized, on a wheelbase some 5 inches longer (108.7) with slightly more ground clearance (7 inches) and a roofline 5 or 6 inches lower than almost any other CUV’s (60.8). BMW is following Range Rover’s Evoque…

LAST YEAR, for the first time in 11 consecutive years, Lexus was not the best-selling luxury brand in the U.S., due primarily to the 9.0-magnitude earthquake and subsequent tsunami that devastated Japan and its commercial industries in general, and Lexus’ manufacturing capabilities specifically. The brand, some surmised, was down for the count. But, like all underdogs whose true strength lies in their indefatigable spirit, Lexus has made it clear it intends to defy all odds. Intent on addressing the previous models’ shortcomings, the company has its sights set on resurgence with the introduction of the 2013 LS 460. The new LS is what Lexus deems “a significantly redesigned version of the current fourth-generation LS.” How significant? Roughly half of the flagship’s 6000 parts have been upgraded. With this reengineered platform…

Base price $41,760 Price as tested $49,735 EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ 15/21/17 mpg “It’ll be interesting to see how the L-T F-150 fares. We know it’s fast and capable, but is its mpg as good as the EPA numbers suggest?@TruckTrendAH We will admit that at the 2012 Truck of the Year event, some staffers were skeptical about the EcoBoost engine. Could it really match the performance of a V-8, or outwork a comparable eight-cylinder engine? But we were so impressed by the way the truck handled work duty; its range of interiors; the performance of all four engines; and its breadth of offerings, including beds, cab sizes, wheelbases, axle ratios, and more, that we awarded the F-150 our Truck of the Year honors. As is tradition, we get to…

“Thanks to Tire Rack for setting up our long-term Nissan GTR with new shoes: Dunlop SP Sport MAXX run-flats!”@EdLoh Service life / 5 mo/11,182 mi Avg CO2 / 1.50 lb/mi Energy cons / 261 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $212.00 (oil change, inspection) Normal-wear cost / $0 EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 16/23/19 mpg Average Fuel Econ 12.9 mpg OUR BABY has been out dancing a lot lately and needed new shoes. So we contacted our partners at Tire Rack for a set of direct replacement Dunlop SP Sport MAXX GT 600 DSST CTT run-flats. They aren’t cheap at $529 for each front tire and $575 per rear. They’re inflated with nitrogen at the factory, a service that GT-R-certified dealers are supposed to provide. Theoretically, pure…

EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ 18/28/21 mpg Average Fuel Econ 18.7 mpg “Cars are expensive to repair because they’re designed to sacrifice themselves to keep you alive.”@Angus_MacK Service life / 8 mo/13,025 mi Avg CO2 / 1.04 lb/mi Energy Cons / 180 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $0 (oil change, inspection) Normal-wear cost / $0 DAMN! The Audi’s back in the body shop. But this time it’s not my fault. I wasn’t even in the car. My boss was. And it wasn’t his fault. When I told Source Interlink Media president Chris Argentieri I was going to be out of the office for a stretch, I tossed him the key—or whatever you call that electronic gizmo these days—so he could spend some quality time in Audi’s…

“328’s driver’s seatback started squeaking whenever I shifted my weight, then it went away just as quickly. Will monitor.”@MT_Evans Service life / 3 mo/7671 mi Avg CO2 / 0.69 lb/mi Energy cons / 120 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $0 Normal-wear cost / $0 EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 23/34/27 mpg Average Fuel Econ 28.0 mpg THE COMPUTER says I’m still 5000 miles from the first scheduled service, but I had to take the 328 into the dealer early to deal with faulty parking sensors. One day, with no warning, the sensors went berserk, showing that the car was fully boxed-in and beeping constantly. According to the manual, this means one or more sensor is obscured and the problem should self-correct once the obstruction has been…

FORD WILL OFFER its 1.0-liter, three-cylinder EcoBoost engine in a North American product in 2013, global product vice president Raj Nair says. While he didn’t indicate which model will get the engine, already on sale in Europe, it’s clear it will be in the North American Focus first, then maybe in the Fiesta. The Focus EcoBoost three has been on sale in Europe since late 2011, and was recently named Engine Technology’s International Engine of the Year. Ford offered very short drives of a Focus with the engine at its 2013 model year product launch in Dearborn, limited to a portion of the company’s test facility that didn’t allow speeds for upshifts past third gear among the car’s six. Even with its stop/start feature, the 123-hp turbo three-banger is no…

WHAT SHOULD Lincoln become, and how should Ford Motor Company achieve it? The automaker is in the middle of a program to assess its luxury brand’s future. Consensus, at least among outsiders, is the 2015 Mustang’s rear-drive, independent rear suspension platform should be lent to a Lincoln sedan. Why not? Ford’s crosstown competition is planning essentially the same thing with its 2015 Chevrolet Camaro and 2014 Cadillac CTS on long-wheelbase versions of the Cadillac ATS’ RWD platform. The ’14 CTS (pictured), originally expected for model year ’15, apparently has been expedited. A smaller two-door coupe based on the Chevy Code 130R concept will share the ATS’ 109.3-inch wheelbase. Worry within the company is that it could compete with Camaro, much as Malibu and Impala have been competing with each other…

IMPRESARIO and car collector Martin Swig believed the advent of the disc brake was the beginning of the end of Western civilization. Before discs, drivers took responsibility for their actions. He expressed this on a popular bumper sticker: “Peace and Prosperity with Drum Brakes.” Swig held his first Anti-Football Drive on New Year’s Day, 1990. It was a motorhead’s antidote to January 1 bowl games, involving a drive from Sausalito, California, where Swig lived, to Tomales, and back. An Italiophile with a weakness for Alfa Romeos and cappuccino, he drove with Road & Track’s John Lamm in the Mille Miglia revival as the only American team in 1982, and returned every year through the end of the millennium. The Mille Miglia inspired him to organize another event beginning in 1991.…

Lest you think the new breed of cop car has become uncool, rest assured that any one of us would have happily ditched our early evening photo shoot to run the Charger up and down Detroit’s Woodward Avenue for a couple hours. The Pursuit, with its rortin’, snortin’ Hemi V-8, chiseled musclecar styling, and sinister black paint and wheels, was the undisputed bad boy of this group. Heads turned not only for its looks, but also its growl every time it made a dragstrip pass at our test venue. For police duty, Dodge adds bracing to the Charger’s roof and doors, and the heavy-duty brakes and suspension are designed to withstand considerable abuse. Revisions inside include wider seats designed to accommodate officers wearing utility belts, and a column-mounted shift lever…

General Motors president and CEO Rick Wagoner hired Bob Lutz in 2001 to be his right-hand car guy. Lutz quickly set about figuring out how to bring Australia’s rear-drive platform to North America. Three years later, voilà! the 2004 Pontiac GTO arrived—basically a Holden Monaro with a split grille and left-hand drive. After three years of production, Lutz & Company replaced the GTO with the 2008 G8. In the 2009 bankruptcy-restructuring, Pontiac got chopped with Saturn and Hummer, as did Rick Wagoner. His replacement, Fritz Henderson, clashed with Lutz over plans to keep a version of the Holden Commodore/Pontiac G8 in U.S. showrooms. Lutz wanted to make it a Chevy. The compromise, even as Henderson and then Lutz left GM involuntarily, was to build the Chevy Caprice PPV for police…

VOLVO’S OFFICIAL RACING and tuning partner’s first entry in the concept car business was a rather extreme C30. Polestar’s little flared hot-hatch cranked out 400 hp fed to the ground with all-wheel drive. It caused quite a stir in the Volvo community, and a flood of requests to the home office. Sad to say, the writing was already on the wall for the C30’s demise, and the project didn’t go much farther than generating interest. But it wasn’t a complete loss, because all that interest turned into motivation for the S60 project you see here. While it is tough to classify this S60 as any less extreme, it’s based on Volvo’s bread-and-butter sedan, which gives it a better chance at a life beyond a one-off concept. The basic concept of…

2ND PLACE 2012 BMW 650i Convertible When I asked the testers for their final rankings, associate online editor Nate Martinez noted the SL was only a step behind the other two, and Lago’s rankings went “First, second, almost second.” The BMW barely slipped ahead of the Benz. The BMW’s biggest advantage was its handling. While the SL had a stiffer chassis and softer ride, the BMW was more composed in the corners and more fun to drive. Many automakers fit Sport, Comfort, Eco, etc. modes to their cars’ computers, but BMW is one of the best in clearly distinguishing among the modes. The BMW’s ride quality was not too far behind the Benz’s. Flick it into Sport or Sport+, and ride, handling, throttle, and shifting firm up the higher up…

ONE IS A HOTSHOT upstart eager to make an impression. The other is a warhorse with a pedigree. When the two meet, you can expect the conflicting personalities to clash and then gel for our viewing delight—the old “opposites attract” precept never fails, right? It worked for Messrs. Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt. Based on those two archetypes, you can guess where this comparison is going. Let’s ID our vehicular contestants. Suspect 1: baby-faced Hyundai Veloster Turbo in arrest-me Boston Red. Suspect 2: a seasoned Reef Blue Mini Cooper S Clubman with stripes over a fair portion of its body. But unlike in the movies, there’ll be no buddying up today. Need back stories? The Veloster Turbo is straight out of its South Korean academy, the upgrade for a still-fresh,…

For X1 xDrive 35i money, you could have sublime 3 Series chassis dynamics, with exclusivity thrown in free of charge! Wagons are not a growth segment, accounting for a steady 4 percent of the total car market. Relative to its predecessor, this new F31 variant raises the roof 0.7 inch to boost rear headroom by 0.7 inch and cargo space by 8 percent to 25/61 cubic-feet (seats up/down), the lift-over height is lower, and the hatch opening is wider. Standard features like a 40/20/40-percent folding rear seat, cargo/dog net, aluminum cargo divider, two bag hooks, 12-volt outlet, and underfloor storage bin make this the Boy Scout of the sport wagon class in cargo preparedness. There’s no manual trans. Hence, the slushbox is de-slushed to transmit more torque during swifter shifts…

INSTEAD OF fawning over the Hyundai Elantra GT’s practicality and bang for the buck, I’d rather examine why it embodies Hyundai's commitment to steadily improving its vehicles. The GT does share many parts with its four-door sibling, but there is no shortage of modifications. I’ll begin with the steering, which is regarded around the office as an Elantra weak point. The GT, one of few vehicles out there that isolates the steering for driver adjustment, incorporates a Driver Selectable Steering Mode setup. The choices are Comfort, Normal, and Sport. Each alters on-center tension and effort weight when you pull the wheel off-center. This Elantra’s ramp-up and feel in any mode demonstrates more honesty than any recent predecessor. Hyundai claims the chassis is almost 34 percent stiffer than the final-gen Elantra…

Service life / 4 mo/6276 mi Avg CO2 / 0.71 lb/mi Energy cons / 123 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $0 Normal-wear cost / $0 “The shuffle function kept choosing quiet, ambient music on my iPod. We took care of that and made Ill Communication our official theme music. @MT_Royer EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 27/36/30 mpg Average Fuel Econ 27.4 mpg DURING our first week of stewardship, we took the Impreza to Phoenix to catch four spring training games in three days. After the first game in Goodyear, Arizona, we took the road east some 28 miles to Tempe. On the way, we had a run-in with the navigation system, which wanted us to exit, although common sense told us to stay on the current…

“After a month away from the office, the driver’s seat feels more comfortable than I remembered.”@Emiliana505 Service life / 9 mo/11,905 mi Avg CO2 / 0.59 lb/mi Energy cons / 103 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $0 (2-oil change, inspection; 1-tire rotation) Normal-wear cost / $0 EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 30/38/33 mpg Average Fuel Econ 32.7 mpg EVERYONE KNOWS you should never, ever, text or talk on the phone while driving, but that’s even more important if you have a manual transmission. The Fiat’s Bluetooth connection lets me keep my hands on the wheel and the shifter, and, while it’s 80 percent great, it’s 20 percent buggy. Setup was really easy, thanks to a short and helpful official Fiat YouTube video. You dial the phone…

“My birthday came early! Summer tires have arrived and will soon be improving the Civic’s performance. I hope.”@MT_DubDub Service life / 7 mo/11,905 mi Avg CO2 / 0.79 lb/mi Energy cons / 136 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $63.46 (oil change, inspection) Normal-wear cost / $0 EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 22/31/25 mpg Average Fuel Econ 24.7 mpg THE TIRES on our 2012 Honda Civic Si have been a point of frustration. If you want navigation, your only option is all-season rubber. Our Civic came shod in 225/45R17 Michelin Pilot HX MXM4s, and, despite the fact that they’re decent all-season tires, I knew there was a better option, in the form of four brand-new Michelin PilotSport3 tires, at $193 each from our partners at Tire Rack.…

“Few Start/Stop systems operate more coarsely than the 528i’s. Is it worth the fuel and CO2 savings and aggravation?” Service life / 6 mo/11,706 mi Avg CO2 / 0.78 lb/mi Energy cons / 135 kW-hr/100 mi Unresolved problems / None Maintenance cost / $0 Normal-wear cost / $0 EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 23/34/27 mpg Average Fuel Econ 25.0 mpg IT’S BECOME a bit of a game for me. Whenever I’m accompanied by a first-time passenger in our long-term 528i and we stop for the first red light, I wait…for 2 seconds. Suddenly, the BMW’s Start/Stop system halts the engine—usually with an abrupt, head-wobbling ka-lump—causing my passenger to shoot me a look. “What just happened?” “Why, that’s the Start/Stop,” I smile. Adding, “It’s saving fuel,” as my smile melts. Wobbling aside,…

EPA City/Hwy/Comb Fuel Econ: 23/34/26 mpg (gas) Average Fuel Econ 23.7 mpg “This sporty sedan puts an end to the days when Kias were considered boring cars.” Service life / 12 mo/23,804 mi Base Price / $26,690 Options / SX Premium Package ($2150: Panoramic roof, power front passenger seat, driver seat memory, heated and cooled front seats, heated rear outboard seats) Technology Package ($2000: Navigation w/ back-up camera, Infinity audio system) Price as tested / $30,840 Problem areas / None Maintenance cost / $240.43 (3-oil change; 2-inspection; 1-engine-air filter, cabin-air filter) Normal-wear cost / $26.40 (wiper blades) 3-year residual value* / $15,480 Recalls / None *Automotive Lease Guide NOT that long ago, Kias were the butt of many jokes. But times have changed, and in just a few years,…