2011 Citroën C4 – Click above for high-res image gallery
You’d think a term like “all new” would be fairly absolute. But not when it comes to new cars. Take the new Citroën C4, for example. The French automaker calls it “all new”. But it’s still based on the platform of the outgoing model. That said, the sheetmetal is fresh, the dimensions have grown some and the hatch is packed with all manner of gizmos, solidifying the chevron brand’s place as a technological powerhouse.
What sort of tech are we talking about? How about adaptive headlights, lane departure and blind-spot warning systems, user-changeable backlighting in the cabin (along with ringtone-style chimes and alerts) and a new system called eTouch which monitors driving patterns and offers suggestions on how to improve fuel economy. Engine options will likely remain the same, with the addition of the new e-HDi hybrid diesel/electric drivetrain, and we’ll be looking for the new C4 to debut in Paris this Fall before sales begin overseas early next year.
The three-door model isn’t expected to continue into the new generation, leaving the five-door to go it alone against the likes of the and . The is expected to be based on this model, but as a crossover it’ll be further differentiated than the narrow gap between the smaller and hatchbacks. Details in the press release after the jump, with initial images in the gallery below.
2010 Chrysler 300C SRT8 – Click above for high-res image gallery
If the economic downfall of 2008 had happened just a few years earlier, the probably wouldn’t exist. Think about it: when the nation was on the verge of $4.00/gallon gasoline and people were doing everything possible to get out of their fuel-sucking SUVs and into smaller, more efficient vehicles, a 425-horsepower flagship sedan with a free-breathing 6.1-liter Hemi V8 doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. But then again, did it ever?
The 300C SRT8 is the product of a pre-castrated . This was a time of -powered , Hemi-powered and SRT-badged Neons. “You want it, you got it.” Chrysler wanted the 300C SRT8 to start a new trend of muscle sedans – a land where quarter-mile times reigned supreme, and booming exhaust notes were all that mattered. This trend never really caught on (save the , which has been honed to be one hell of a machine), and at the end of the day, Chrysler was left with a big, heavy, powerful sedan that didn’t offer much in the way of refinement and carried a near-$50,000 price tag.
But despite its flaws – and there are quite a few – we still think of the 300C SRT8 as a guilty pleasure. It has all the ingredients of an American muscle car wrapped in a four-door, luxury(ish) package. We’d probably never buy one or recommend buying a new one to a friend, but if we’re totally honest, there’s still something about the SRT8 that gets us all giddy when one comes through the Autoblog Garage. Make the jump to find out why.
Gallery:
Photos by Steven J. Ewing / Copyright (C)2010 Weblogs, Inc.
: 2010 Chrysler 300C SRT8 remains a guilty pleasure
Mercedes-Benz automated test driver setup – Click above for high-res image gallery
Working on autonomous vehicle systems is all the rage lately, and is no exception. Most of the work has been going within research groups and as part of competitions like the DARPA Urban Challenge. Mercedes-Benz has moved its automated driving work over to driver-assistance test groups. It’s using the automation technology to evaluate crash avoidance systems without putting test drivers and engineers at risk.
By using its autopilot systems, the test maneuvers can be reproduced much more consistently. This isn’t the first time that such systems have been employed in testing. built an at its Chelsea Proving Ground in the mid-1990s. The ADR used robotic drivers for accelerated durability testing over extremely difficult surfaces.
In both cases, the automakers can do far more extreme testing than would be possible with human drivers. Among the things Mercedes will be testing for is unintentional airbag deployments when driving over curbs, and detection of high-speed merging traffic or sudden braking.
For anyone looking for a very rare future vintage race car, a seller in Ohio has a deal for you! The seller has two of the three Northstar LMP02 race cars that were built and campaigned by Racing in 2002. One or both are available with a Buy it Now price of just $355,000. The cars are apparently fully functional with the Bosch and Pi electronics packages in place.
These were the second-generation cars that were purpose built by Cadillac for its third season of LMP1 competition. Modified Riley and Scott chassis were used for the first two years with only limited success; the newer car was designed by Nigel Stroud and was powered by a twin-turbocharged 4.0-liter Northstar V8.
That 600 horsepower mill was based on the unit used in the Indy Racing League and by in the German Touring Car Championship. Caddy’s LMP02s finished ninth and twelfth at Le Mans in 2002 and had a best finish of second in the Miami ALMS race. The Cadillac program was canceled at the end of the 2002 campaign after realized it couldn’t compete with the resources that was willing to put into its Le Mans program. A tip of the hat to Ryan!
We’re expecting awfully big things from the new 2011 Jeep Grand Cherokee, which is rumored to . This will be the first totally new design to roll out of design and engineering departments since America’s number three automaker was bailed out by the federal government and Italy’s Fiat, so it had better be good.
And if a new is good and the expected 5.7-liter Hemi V8 is better… well then, a suitably enlarged 6.4-liter version of the well-liked Hemi would be best of all, right? According to the Car and Driver crew, just such a beastie is currently in development, though Chrysler is reportedly neither confirming nor denying its existence in the product pipeline.
If true, C/D’s currently imaginary would get an unadulterated and naturally aspirated power figure that’s well over 500 horsepower and possibly a tad more than the BMW X5 M’s towering 555-horse rating. Rumor has it that wants its SRT8 to be the quickest SUV on the market, which would mean besting the aforementioned German’s 4.0-second run to 60.
Also on the menu would likely be fully adjustable air suspension to keep things planted when the going gets twisty and an appropriate steroidal injection to the standard 2011 Grand Cherokee’s already attractive sheetmetal. If it’s indeed coming to market – and we have reason to believe that it will – we wouldn’t expect to see the GC SRT8 before 2012 at the earliest.
Video: Robert Llewellyn's Gearless looks into quick
charging for his i-MiEV on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/04/08/video-robert-llewellyns-gearless-looks-into-quick-charging-for/">Video: Robert Llewellyn’s Gearless looks into quick charging for his i-MiEV
At least he got to eat a bacon sandwich.
Nissan gives Plug In America $25,000 grant for more
education and outreach on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/04/08/nissan-gives-plug-in-america-25-000-grant-for-more-education-an/">Nissan gives Plug In America $25,000 grant for more education and outreach
: Tiny Spin in the Amp’d Equinox all-electric SUV
Another step completed for the Midwest EV company, some more to go.
Benz’s small car gets a boost from Renault-Nissan.
New York this weekend and then
on to Detroit on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/04/07/honda-u3-x-comes-to-america-new-york-this-weekend-and-then-on-t/">Honda U3-X comes to America, New York this weekend and then on to Detroit
Who needs a Segway-like unicycle? We don’t know either.
Other news:
Mercedes decision to hybridize
S-Class on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/04/07/dealers-not-pleased-with-mercedes-decision-to-hybridize-s-class/">Dealers not pleased with Mercedes decision to hybridize S-Class
electric car, including
specs and pricing on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/04/07/more-on-the-croatian-dok-ing-xd-electric-car-including-specs-an/">More on the Croatian Dok-Ing XD electric car, including specs and pricing
cars today meet new CAFE regs? More than you might
think on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/04/05/what-cars-today-really-meet-the-new-cafe-regs-more-than-you-mig/">What cars today meet new CAFE regs? More than you might think
As you may have guessed by now, we’re over the prospect of a reinViggenated . Our thinking is, now that Trollhattan is free of General Motors, it will get back to the business of making niche three- and five-door hatches coveted by post-grad Ivy League types with mega-potent turbos blowing into longitudinal, slanty I-4s spinning the front wheels. Even if our entire Saabian wish list isn’t fulfilled, a fully independent Saab can only result in better focused cars. For instance, the 9-7X SUV will stay dead and buried.
Of course, even if the 9-7X was something of an abomination, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t Saabophiles out there that seek the all-weatherness of all-wheel drive combined with a lot of cargo hauling capability. While we suggest those people first seek out a , Saab’s thinking different. Badly translated reports are fluttering that not only is Saab building a 9-5X (Saab chose to brand their AWD vehicles with XWD, or “Cross-Wheel Drive” – a fancy way of saying ) that will presumably be a performance variant, but they’re also apparently set to build a XWD-equipped 9-5X SportCombi (station wagon) that will do battle with up-armored station wagons like the Audi Allroad and Volvo XC70.
The 9-5X SportCombi will be separate from the apparently still forthcoming , an actual SUV-looking CUV built on the same platform as the . It looks as if the 9-4X will be the only new Saab product not built in Sweden. One more little tidbit: As Saab wrestles itself back to its former glory, they might just be dropping the hyphenated names. Meaning that the next 9-3 might actually be billed as the Saab 93, and that this whole time we’ve been talking about the new 95X. Time will tell.
Incentives push Toyota up 41%, Buick sales skyrocket up 76%
Why “Get Off My Back”? Because over the past few months as automakers like and have begun the process of selling off or shutting down their under-performing brands, it’s become increasingly difficult to determine how well the healthy parts of these companies are doing. These doomed or waiting-to-be-sold brands have weighed each automaker down like a backpack full of lead, so it’s time to get them off their backs.
In this month’s edition of By the Numbers, we’ve included results for General Motors as a whole as well as just its four core brands of , , and , and for Ford we’ve included a separate result that doesn’t include . This is how these two major American automakers will be viewed going forward, and as you can see, their healthy parts took a shot of steroids in the right cheek during the month of March 2010.
GM’s core brands saw sales collectively rise by 43.3 percent versus March 2009. Likewise, without the weight of Volvo and its 17.6-percent drop in sales last month, Ford Motor Company sales were up 42.7 percent. Chrysler Group, which is essentially the same company selling the same vehicles it was before bankruptcy despite now being run by Fiat, managed to only fall 8.3 percent in sales versus 2009, which for them is practically a win.
Of course, is the hottest topic amongst last month’s sales results. After watching sales fall in February by 10.1 percent due to all the negative PR surrounding its sudden acceleration recalls, the beleaguered Japanese automaker fought back in March with its most aggressive sales incentives ever. The result: Customers came back and sales for the brand were up 40.5 percent versus the same month last year.
*Brands and companies are displayed in descending order according to their percentage change in volume sales. There were 26 selling days in March 2010 versus 25 selling days in March 2009, so the change in monthly sales volume will be different than the change in the average daily sales rate (DSR) for each brand/company.
New York 2010: The inside story of the Nissan Leaf price on
Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/03/31/new-york-2010-the-inside-story-of-the-nissan-leaf-price/">New York 2010: The inside story of the Nissan Leaf price
There was a target price, and Nissan met it.
Obama says “Yes we can.”
Mitsubishi responds to Leaf pricing by cutting i-MiEV price
by $6,700 in Japan on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/03/31/mitsubishi-responds-to-leaf-pricing-by-cutting-i-miev-price-by/">Mitsubishi responds to Leaf pricing by cutting i-MiEV price by $6,700 in Japan
So it begins.
Other news:
Microsoft announce Hohm electric
vehicle charging partnership on Autoblog Green" href="http://green.autoblog.com/2010/03/31/new-york-2010-ford-announces-hohm-electric-vehicle-charging-par/">New York 2010: Ford and Microsoft announce Hohm electric vehicle charging partnership
Even when McLaren makes mistakes, it makes money. putting a little a lotta extra temperature into the tires of a loaned to him during his stay in Melbourne for the . The car was impounded by the Victorian State Police, Lewis paid a fine to remedy his deed and McLaren paid to get the car out.
Turns out there are so many buyers interested in owning said car that Mercedes dealers are bidding to win the car so they can re-sell it. Tips suggest the dealers will have to pay a healthy slice more than the $AUD 148,900 ($136,198 USD) MSRP, and Mercedes will donate any amount above market value to charity. The eventual retail, however, will add another premium above what the dealer paid, and it’s a good guess that the dealer won’t be donating that money to charity. For that extra dough, the retail buyer will get a surprise “special item” to help tell the story… and maybe justify a markup likely to be on the far side of absurd. Great tip, Andrew!
To many, the terms “Mustang” and “high technology” are as mutually exclusive as “China” and “transparent, open society.” After all, the first rolled off the assembly line before the Vietnam War got under way, and in the minds of most people it hasn’t changed all that much in the 4.5 decades since. Sure, every once in a while will bolt a fairly high-tech motor into a special edition ‘Stang (SVT, Cobra, ), but for the most part the original pony car represents exactly that: the origin of the species. Especially when it comes to the base model, the until now lowly – some might say primitive – V6 iteration.
For seemingly ever, Ford has been content to let its low-hanging fruit edition Mustang rot away in irrelevance. Nothing seemed to make the Blue Oval boys happier than stocking every rental car fleet in the nation with soft-riding, underpowered has-beens. Let’s make that never-rans. So for the performance minded buyer, the V6 version of the Mustang never even entered the picture. Worse, do you know what car people interested in a V6 Mustang cross-shopped the most? Pat yourself on the back if you said Honda Accord Coupe. In other words, the V6 Mustang was never a sports car.
Now, along comes the 2011 model year and you can throw everything you thought you knew about Ford’s entry-level pony car out the window. It simply no longer applies. Gone is the archaic, universally unloved and soon to be totally forgotten 4.0-liter V6. In its place is a very high-tech version of Ford and Mazda’s 3.7-liter 60-degree V6. With it, the 2011 Ford Mustang V6 produces 305 horsepower, 280 pound-feet of torque, and yet returns 31 mpg on the freeway according to the EPA. In fact, as Ford was happy to tell us (quite a a few times), the 2011 V6 is the only car ever to produce 305 hp and get 31 mpg. Fabulous numbers no doubt, but they only tell part of the story. In our opinion, the Mustang V6 could be the most significant car released this year. Follow the jump to learn why.
Three generations of Porsche RS models – Click above to watch the video
The new 911 GT3 RS might just be the most potent track car ever built for the street by Porsche, but that doesn’t mean it’s the first. The RS line goes all the way back to 1973 with the 911 2.7 RS when Porsche first combined an extra boost of power with the benefits of reduced weight. The original RS had impressive numbers for 1973: 210 horsepower, 0-60 mph in five and a half seconds, and a top speed of 152 mph.
The RS line continued through the 964, 993 and 996 model years, all the way to today’s introduced at the Frankfurt Motor Show last year. The 2010 911 GT3 RS might have significantly more performance than the 1973 911 RS – 450 horsepower, 0-60 mph in 4.0 seconds and a top speed of 193 mph, to be exact – but the inspiration remains the same as the original.
Porsche of UK has created a video highlighting both past and present RS models, featuring the 1973 911 RS and the 996 and 997 911 GT3 RS models on track. Needless to say, there’s a lot of oversteer involved, and it’s an informative and entertaining seven and a half minutes. You can watch the video .
Should other drivers be aware that the vehicle they’re tailing is piloted by someone under the age of 21? New Jersey thinks so and has become the first state to enact a law requiring drivers under 21 to affix a red sticker to both their front and rear license plates.
The law, called Kyleigh’s Law in memory of a young driver killed by another young driver, will go into effect beginning in May, and the stickers can be purchased from the local motor vehicle department for $4.00.
The sticker program is not without its challengers. Some believe that it will call out undue attention to teenage drivers while others believe that teenage drivers could become the target of criminals or even sex offenders.
According to the state, the stickers will help local police to enforce the state’s 11 o’clock curfew for young drivers and to enforce other laws specific to restricted license drivers.
Similar systems have been instituted around the globe – from the UK to Japan – for years, with varying levels of effectiveness. Whether the sticker solution will be widely adopted across the U.S. remains to be seen, but feel free to posit your own opinion in the comments below.
UPDATE: Drivers who have completed the 12-month provisional-license period will not have to display the decal even if younger than 21. Only those with provisional licenses or learner’s permits will be required to display the red sticker. Once the driver obtains a regular driver’s license, the sticker can be removed.
Right now our man Jonny Lieberman is bombing around Southern California in both the and . Both cars have received major mechanical upgrades for model year 2011 in the form of two new engines: The return of the fabled 5.0-liter V8 for the GT and a new 3.7-liter V6 for the base model.
Jonny’s not allowed to talk about his experience behind the wheel of either car until early next week, but that won’t stop us from giving you a sneak preview of the Mustang V6 and its upgraded motor. The 3.7-liter V6 has already been used in such everyday fare as the , and . It’s also destined for duty in the . The 2011 Mustang V6, however, will give this work-a-day engine an opportunity to shine.
Producing 305 horsepower and 280 lb-ft of torque, the Mustang’s version of the 3.7-liter V6 will be the most powerful available. Paired with a six-speed automatic, it will also make for the most fuel-efficient muscle car on the market with a highway rating of 31 mpg. But we’re not interested in fuel economy today. We’re interested in evidence of how much better the new V6 model will be compared to the current one, which has used the 210-horsepower “Cologne” 4.0-liter V6 since 2005. We think the image above is all the evidence we need. Stay tuned for our full First Drive reports of both models early next week.
Check out what a very cold spy photographer snapped some pictures of. This car could very well be the upcoming . Of course, as the car in the photos is totally unmarked, this could just be another variant of the big . We’ve suspected for some time that a new S8 is coming, and we hear that it’s most likely headed over to our shores. However, we’ve know next to nothing about what type of terror resides under the hood. Until today.
Unlike the last (frankly underpowered) , this new big-fast sedan is dropping the choked-off, Lamborghini-derived V10 in favor of a new twin-turbo V8. The good folks at are claiming the unit will displace 4.0-liters. Our source at Audi wouldn’t confirm that displacement explicitly, but did say that C/D is, “on the right path.” This same source noted that BMW’s been using a smallish displacement twin-turbo V8 (4.4-liters) in the for the past year and that Audi intends to stay competitive.
Our Audi source also noted that the new V8 will be offered in many flavors, and will allow Audi to meet all the emissions and mileage standards coming down the pike in the next five years. We’re told to expect a wide range of configurations, similar to what Audi/Lamborghini did with their shared V10. That means different states of tune for different cars, as well as naturally aspirated and force inducted version. As for power, our source once again confirmed that Car and Driver knows what they’re printing. Meaning that the 450 horsepower/450 pound-feet of torque neighborhood isn’t a bad guess, though the final numbers could be higher.
Back to the car in the heavily cropped photograph (check out ), we’re still not 100-percent sure it’s the S8. First of all, there are no visual cues to distinguish this black car from a regular , save for the requisite four tailpipes. However, as Autocarnotes, the new S8 is said to have bold new bodywork to set it apart from the standard car. Also, examine the brakes. They appear to be larger diameter than the standard brakes, yet they aren’t drilled or slotted. One would think (and we would agree with him) that an S vehicle would have a more serious set of stoppers. After all, even the has fancier discs. Of course, maybe these are just placeholders used during cold weather testing. Yeah, we’re pretty sure this is the new Audi S8.
As you may have guessed by now, we’re over the prospect of a 
Why “Get Off My Back”? Because over the past few months as automakers like and have begun the process of selling off or shutting down their under-performing brands, it’s become increasingly difficult to determine how well the healthy parts of these companies are doing. These doomed or waiting-to-be-sold brands have weighed each automaker down like a backpack full of lead, so it’s time to get them off their backs. 
Check out what a very cold spy photographer snapped some pictures of. This car could very well be the upcoming . Of course, as the car in the 
