Innehållsförteckning för April 2021 från MotorTrend

@markrechtin The automotive industry pundits. Analysts. Tech bloggers. Fellow car journalists. They chided, they derided, they scolded. How could MotorTrend have gotten it so wrong? The idea that Apple would outsource the manufacturing of a self-driving electric vehicle, rather than build a proper car for actual drivers? What daftness. This magazine’s June 2016 cover story, “Hello. Are You the Apple Car?” blew up the internet. In our report, we talked about an “inside-out” car with a focus on convenience rather than dynamics. In other words, the exact model every other automaker is now pursuing in developing their autonomous creations. We also forecast, “Apple will probably contract it out, outsourcing the manufacturing intricacies overseas and avoiding U.S. taxes that could take upward of a 40 percent bite from its overseas war…

The fifth generation of the Jeep Grand Cherokee has been expanded—literally—by introducing a stretched seven-passenger version called the Grand Cherokee L, going on sale now. A two-row version comes later this year as a 2022 model. Why add a third row to the unibody SUV now? Customers asked for it, and three-row models make up 70 percent of sales in the segment. The unibody Grand Cherokee L is to the Ford Explorer and Chevy Traverse what the body-on-frame Wagoneer will be to the Ford Expedition and Chevrolet Tahoe. It rides on a new purpose-built architecture, but execs can’t confirm the new chassis is borrowed from the Alfa Romeo Stelvio, which has sublime road manners. The L is 14.0 inches longer with a wheelbase that grew by 7.0 inches relative to…

You wriggle over the side brace for the rollcage and into a simple, fixed racing seat. You then buckle a six-point Momo racing harness. Straight ahead, behind the perfectly sized Momo Prototipo three-spoke steering wheel, is a binnacle with a large tach on the left and a speedo on the right flanking a tiny vertical element with water and oil temperature displays. Three smaller dials—fuel gauge, oil pressure gauge, and an analog clock—march across the dash. At first glance, the instruments look as though they’ve been lifted from an old Volvo P1800. Then you notice the tach is redlined at just under 8,000 rpm, and the speedo reads all the way to 260 kph—162 mph. Yes, the P1800 Cyan is a Volvo, built from an original P1800 by Cyan Racing,…

Many Americans still think of “mom” and “station wagon” in the same sentence, ignoring that the ubiquitous modern SUV is essentially the 21st century’s Wagon Queen Family Truckster. But in Europe, wagons are still cool, still the preferred utility vehicle for people with sporty lifestyles. And the faster the wagon, the cooler it is. Which makes the 2020 Mercedes-AMG C 63 S wagon about as cool as long-roof load luggers come. The C 63 S is of course the E 63 S wagon’s little brother, 11.5 inches shorter, 3.8 inches narrower, 1.3 inches lower, and rolling on a 3.9-inch-shorter wheelbase. It’s powered by the same 503-hp, 516-lb-ft version of Daimler’s versatile 4.0-liter twin-turbo V-8 as the AMG GLC 63 S Coupe sold stateside, rather than the 603-hp, 627-lb-ft engine of…

Armored cars have come a long way since Colonel T.E. Lawrence’s fleet of Rolls-Royce Ghosts prowled the Arabian Peninsula during World War I. These ironclad beasts have gone from machines of war to defense vehicles for everyone from politicians and the well-heeled to mafiosi and oligarchs. And business is booming. With armored car sales up over the past few years, automakers including Audi, BMW, Land Rover, and Mercedes-Benz have joined with small, specialized manufacturers to offer a wide variety of bulletproof and even mine-resistant cars, trucks, and SUVs. So what does it take to build a world-class armored car? We caught up with the folks at Alpine Armoring to find out. Headquartered in Chantilly, Virginia, just outside of Washington, D.C., Alpine started building armored vehicles in 1997 to meet ever-increasing…

Car designers spend a lot of time daydreaming. Sometimes it’s merely sketching on a notepad. Others, it’s creating a full-size scale model. Occasionally, though, an idea turns into a running prototype or makes its way out of the design studio and onto the stage at a public event. These concept cars often pave the way for future products, but that’s not always the case. Sometimes these vehicles are just an exploration of an idea. Porsche affords its design team, led by chief designer Michael Mauer, the freedom to dream. Over the past two decades, team members have penned exciting vehicles inspired by the automaker’s past, wild variants of existing production Porsches, and extreme looks at what might come from the German sports car brand in the future. Much of the…

By the end of this decade, you won’t be able to buy a new Bentley with an internal combustion engine. From 2030 on, all new Bentleys—the successors to the raffish Flying Spur sedan, the sporty Continental GT coupe and convertible, the brawny Bentayga SUV—will have battery electric powertrains, CEO Adrian Hallmark says. As a result, the automaker’s trademark imperious thrust will be accompanied by a whispering whirr of a brace of motors and no longer the murmuring hum of a turbocharged W-12 or the muted rumble of a turbocharged V-8. “We believe electrification isn’t an option,” Hallmark said. “It’s an obligation, because the technology is there. We think making everything that we do sustainable is a major potential advantage for us as a company.” Even so, it’s a big bet…

Segment-straddling versatility isn’t new territory for the Sorento; the 2021 model simply presents a more effective case for itself. That’s because there’s more of almost everything (except length). Kia stuffs the slightly wider three-row Sorento with more standard safety tech, more power from the base engine, more efficiency in every configuration, more engine options, more interior space, and—as a result of all this more-ness—more money for a base model. The previous-gen Sorento’s L trim is gone, leaving the 2021 Sorento LX as the entry-level offering. Coming in at $30,560, the new Sorento LX is about $1,300 more than before. That once again makes it one of the most affordable three-rows in the industry. The SUV comes in $2,600 less than a 2021 Telluride LX, and compared to the Sedona minivan…

Drawing on Porsche’s especially legendary rally machines, such as the 911 SC/RS, 953, and 959, the Singer All-terrain Competition Study (ACS) forges its path through … well, whatever lies in front of it, from the looks of it. Singer worked with Richard Tuthill—a man to whom “Porsche rally specialist” doesn’t quite do justice—to build the ACS on a client request. Tuthill has prepared Porsches for race duty for decades, at times in partnership with Prodrive and for Porsche itself. The goal wasn’t just to build a vehicle with rally-raid capabilities; the intent was to produce a vehicle that could conceivably compete in real rallies. That means a mere “safari” look wouldn’t cut it. Singer’s ACS needed to have pace, reliability, and ruggedness necessary to carry it over the line. Obviously,…

General Motors has now sold more than a million engines with Dynamic Fuel Management. This riff on cylinder deactivation can shut off any and all cylinders in the V-8 engines powering everything from Chevy Silverado pickups to Cadillac Escalade SUVs. This concept, developed by Tula Technologies and covered here in May 2014, intriguingly can be applied to electric motors—which use neither spark plugs nor valves—and could unlock the potential of cheaper, more sustainable rare earth–free motors. The concept for both DFM and Tula’s new Dynamic Motor Drive is that whenever a powertrain operates at lower efficiency—say, eight cylinders doing the work of two while loafing along—you’re better off making two cylinders work harder and giving the rest a break. With two cylinders at wide-open throttle and the rest bouncing along…

It’s hard for a reader to be “on location” in the middle of a pandemic, so Phil E. VanSwoll of Columbia, California, dug through some old pictures and found this photo. “I found this shot from 2009, taken just before my ride on the maglev train in Shanghai. I don’t remember ever seeing a photo in your magazine taken at this location, yet it is one of the most exciting concepts of getting people from one place to another I’ve ever experienced. More than 250 mph! Odd that it has never become a mainstream solution to mass transit over long distances. I have been subscribing to MotorTrend since the 1950s and enjoy it today as much as when I was young.”…

How do you do, fellow kids? Yes, we know, it’s really hard to adult these days. Jobs are scarce, and America is hemorrhaging employment every month. Meanwhile, there are mountains of student debt to pay off. Things seem pretty grim; making a monthly new car payment must seem like a fantasy. However, for those in the work-at-home-office brigade doing well enough to entertain the possibility of dismissing the used car blues and getting something sparkly and new, we present three cheap, sporty-looking, kinda-sorta SUVs that deliver good looks, capability to haul a couple (quarantined or vaccinated) friends, and your stuff while making a decent value play. These aren’t really SUVs in the purest, or purist’s, sense. Sure, they offer all-wheel drive and slightly better ground clearance than a sedan. But…

Boho Camper Conversion Boho Camper Vans is chill. Like, super chill. So chill, in fact, it doesn’t even specify “models” or “trim levels” for its creations. Bring the company money and a van—or let it pick one for you—and the outfit will use the former to turn the latter into a wood-lined cabin on wheels. Pricing starts at $29,000 for the conversions (van not included), but early in 2021 Boho is only churning out its Ram ProMaster–based “tall” models. Crushing demand during the pandemic caused the company to streamline its offerings. ProMaster conversions start at $36,500, and the donor van runs another $36,000 or so for a 136.0-inch-wheelbase Ram ProMaster 1500 with a high roof. Contact: boho.life Caravan Outfitter Backroad Similar to Mercedes-Benz’s semi-homegrown Getaway, the Caravan Outfitter Backroad uses…

Hennessey has released final photos, specs, and information of its all-new Hennessey Venom F5 hypercar. And although we may have become jaded after the numbers put out by the likes of the Bugatti Chiron, SSC Tuatara, and vehicles hailing from Italy and Germany, you have to admit Hennessey is making a pretty strong statement. The basic ingredients make for astounding reading. The 6.6-liter twin-turbo V-8 produces—wait for it—a claimed 1,817 hp at 8,000 rpm and 1,193 lb-ft of torque at 5,000 rpm. Hennessey calls its mighty motor the Fury and says it’s the most powerful production road car engine ever produced. MotorTrend was recently granted exclusive time with the new monster to see it in the raw carbon and to hear the, ahem, fury of its mighty twin-turbo V-8 blasting…

It’s pretty easy to dismiss the Maybach GLS 600 as just a gaudy, gussied-up Mercedes GLS. Bathed in pinstriped two-tone paint and festooned with chrome, gill-like vents, and pizza pie–sized wheels, though, this 17-foot, three-ton super-luxury SUV certainly won’t be mistaken for anything but a Maybach. A key feature unique to the Maybach GLS is its Maybach drive mode. Aside from flattening the acceleration curve, starting in second gear and reducing gearshifts, and turning off the stop/start system, it also adds E-Active Body Control air suspension. Outside of Maybach mode, the GLS 600 blends the best of the Mercedes and AMG GLS models into a new, more luxurious form factor. The AMG-built 550-hp, 538-lb-ft twin-turbo V-8 is just the kind of engine you’d want in a luxury SUV. It offers…

Small changes sometimes bring big improvements. Just ask Lexus. The 2021 Lexus IS didn’t start from a blank piece of paper; instead, the sedan continues on the same platform it’s been on since 2013 but receives small upgrades to make it better. Our example came in the rear-drive configuration with a 311-hp 3.5-liter V-6 with 280 lb-ft of torque and an eight-speed automatic transmission. All-wheel drive is available, though you’ll get a six-speed automatic gearbox instead. It sprinted to 60 mph in 5.7 seconds and completed the quarter mile in 14.2 seconds at 100.1 mph. Compared to the last rear-drive Lexus IS 350 F Sport we tested (a 2014 model), the 2021 model was 0.1 second slower to 60 mph but 0.3 mph faster through the quarter mile. That’s not…

When was the last time you saw a Toyota Land Cruiser? You can’t go a block without seeing multiple 4Runners, Highlanders, Tacomas, and RAV4s—or even the occasional Sequoia—but spotting any generation of Land Cruiser is a rarity. For all its name recognition and iconic history, there just aren’t that many running around the U.S. And after the 2021 iterations are built, there will be no new ones sold here, either, at least for a while. We first heard rumblings of the Land Cruiser’s U.S. demise more than a year ago when multiple Toyota sources hinted that the Land Cruiser was in trouble. At the time, Toyota PR denied any such possibility existed, but the automaker has finally acknowledged its legendary nameplate is leaving American dealerships soon: “The Toyota Land Cruiser…

“WE’RE INVESTING LIKE NEVER BEFORE INTO NEW TECHNOLOGIES.” Ola Källenius took over as Daimler AG’s chairman of the board of management in 2019. His tenure has been marked by the launch of high tech within vehicles, the need to cut fixed costs, and a pandemic that could have easily thrown everything off course. In his first media roundtable of 2021, Källenius focused on the premiere of the massive MBUX Hyperscreen that constitutes the dashboard of the new 2022 Mercedes-Benz EQS flagship electric vehicle. Mercedes largely designed the EQ vehicle family around the massive screen, and the digital services such a screen makes possible are seen as a vital revenue stream going forward. After the Hyperscreen launches on the EQS, will it roll out across the lineup? The EQS will be…

I’ve been waiting my whole career to write this story. See, I love station wagons, and the more powerful, the better. I’ve spent much of my career championing them as the perfect vehicle—some say too much, though I say not nearly enough. Such is my rep, a man from AMG told me he figures I was personally responsible for half of all E 63 wagon sales. (It’s not a large number.) I hit the wagon jackpot when I first worked for MotorTrend, as I was assigned chaperone duty for our long-term Cadillac CTS-V wagon. Let’s say I enjoyed my time with that 556-horsepower manual station wagon. I was able to compare it to a brown Mercedes E 63 AMG wagon—as it was then called—but then Caddy killed off its best…

Time is a flat circle. Many folks will recall that line uttered by Matthew McConaughey in the climax of True Detective, but it was 19th century philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche who first wrote those words, with the implication being “everything we have done, or will do, we will do over and over and over again—forever.” Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence rang through my head as I admired the four hulking luxury three-row SUVs from BMW, Cadillac, Lincoln, and Mercedes-Benz as they sat in the cool morning marine layer of Los Angeles’ ritzy Palos Verdes Peninsula. Five years earlier, just across the peninsula in the Port of Los Angeles, we conducted almost the exact same test where we crowned the then-new Cadillac Escalade the winner over the Mercedes GL, Lexus LX, Land…

I’m riding alongside Porsche GT boss Andy Preuninger in a lightly disguised 2022 Porsche 911 GT3 prototype as we proceed through the gently rolling farmland towns that surround Stuttgart. This is not the coolest thing that I will do today. We turn off the road and head into the parking lot of a nondescript industrial building tucked away up a quiet side street. There is no hint as to what resides here. A single roller door opens as we pull up. Preuninger guides the black-wrapped prototype into what looks like a holding area. There’s another wall and another roller door. “You want to see?” he asks. What resides on the other side is a secret facility stuffed to the brim with some of the most extreme Porsche 911s ever built—cars…