Edmunds has taken a closer look at which vehicles are most heavily favored by the federal government by evaluating percentage of model sales in 2011. Not surprisingly the topped off the list with a whopping 79.2 percent of sales going to government agencies, while the out-to-pasture Ford Crown Victoria took second with 57.2 percent of total sales. But that’s pretty much where the predictability comes to a close. The van takes a distant third with 10.7 percent. Like the , which came in fifth at 9.2 percent, we imagine that has more to do with the number of civilian models sold each year rather than any great number of government service vehicles on the road.
Other notable models include the in seventh place, the in eighth and the in ninth. Even the old made the cut with 5.3 percent of its sales heading off to government duty. That’s good enough to nab the machine 10th place. Head over to Edmunds to have a look at the .
Setting the fastest lap on any race track is worth its share of bragging rights, but some are worth more than others. Like the Nürburgring Nordschleife, for example. Or the Top Geartest track. Or, on this side of the pond, Laguna Seca.
The Mazda Raceway near Monterey, California, is one of the most challenging circuits in the world. It’s got a double-apex hairpin at the start, an off-camber sweep to the left and of course the dreaded Corkscrew that drops five and a half stories with tight turns at top and bottom. Little wonder, then, that its lap record is a subject of such contention.
The record was set at 1:07.722 by Helio Castroneves in 2000 behind the wheel of a Penske Champ Car. And that remains the fastest official time since the ones that followed were not set during an officially-sanctioned race weekend. But, in 2006, Ricardo Zonta drove the TF106 there to an unofficial new record of 1:06.039. Sebastian Bourdais took it back for the Champ Car series the following year at 1:05.880. But now has taken the unofficial crown at 1:05.786.
The record lap was set during the Ferrari Racing Days event by veteran scuderia test driver and Le Mans winner Marc Gené, behind the wheel of the Ferrari F2003-GA, the car named for the late Fiat chairman Gianni Agnelli with which Michael Schumacher and Rubens Barrichello took seven grand prix wins and both titles in the 2003 Formula One World Championship. And now it can go down in history with another accolade to its history. for the official announcement.
Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile has been jettisoned from the dwindling pool of bidders for after for the whole kaboodle. Exact reasons weren’t given for Youngman leaving the table, but according to a report in Autoweek.nl, “Chinese bureaucracy” was partially to blame and there apparently wasn’t complete confidence in the Chinese company’s finances.
Reports say the bidding is meant to close in the next week, but we still don’t know who all the bidders are – India’s Mahindra & Mahindra, China’s Geely/ and at least one as-yet-unknown entity are after the whole company or select assets. Swedish media was hinting at another bidder with electric car knowledge, not from China, to take control of Saab. And if that same Autoweek.nl story is correct, Spyker’s Victor Muller didn’t leave the premises empty-handed, as “Spyker would be the licensing agent of the and continue to be paid for its use.”
Good news, Le Mans fans. Audi has released its “” documentary as a free download on iTunes. As with the first film, this sequel is narrated by none other than Jason Statham and details the Audi battle for its tenth win at the 2011 24 Hours of Le Mans. As you may recall, the race was a nail-biter for the race team. After seeing its sister entries removed from competition, the #2 R18 TDI went on to take the checkered flag by fighting off three rival Peugeot entries.
But the story was about more than the drivers and the cars. Team engineer Leena Gade officially became the first female in history to lead a Le Mans team to an overall victory.
Audi also made another documentary about the U.S. Ski Team called “Truth in Motion,” and all three films are available for free on iTunes. Check out the below for more information.
If you thought it seemed a little odd that Poland – a country without much of a history of producing exportable cars – would suddenly come out with a high-performance supercar, well… we’re afraid you may be right. Because the latest reports out of the Eastern European country suggest that the Arrinera project is nothing more than a reclothed replicar.
Arrinera, as you may recall, is a project to build a supercar in Poland. Specifications recently hit the interwebs, indicating a $160,000 list price and a 6.2-liter V8 with 650 horsepower driving the rear wheels through a Graziano gearbox for a 3.2-second sprint to 62 and a 211 mph top end.
Now reports coming out of Poland – citing a certain Jacek Balkan who seems to be the Slavic version of Jeremy Clarkson – are calling the whole project into question. According to the word on the Warsaw boulevard, the people at Arrinera took a Lamborghini replica made by another Polish outfit called Bojar Tuning and gave it a new skin. Interior components were reportedly borrowed from the Opel Corsa and late-90s , all in an effort to raise funds on the stock market.
The question we’re left with is, if the project started as a replica but now has its own design and identity, should its humbler beginnings matter? If the specs are right and legendary chassis tuner Lee Noble is involved, the Arrinera could still emerge as a winner. Of course, we’d have to drive it in order to tell for sure, but we’ve got some openings in our calendar coming up…
California is on its way to taking a ride with the autonomous car. By a vote of 37-0, the State Senate approved Senate Bill 1298 (you can read it ) that begins to establish how guidelines on and oversight of self-driving vehicles will be handled.
The bill charges the Department of the California Highway Patrol and the Department of Motor Vehicles with providing recommendations to the legislature on “the safe operation of autonomous vehicles on California’s public roads” with and without a licensed driver present. However, the driverless provision can’t come into effect until the draws up federal guidelines on autonomous cars without drivers.
The bill is being championed by Senator and MIT graduate Alex Padilla, who envisions “a future that includes self-driving cars” because, “Autonomous vehicles have the potential to and injuries.” California is the second state after Nevada to make genuine progress on the road to autonomous vehicles, and four other states are considering legislation. The CA bill goes to the State Assembly next and is expected to pass.
While there are some specialty machines that are capable of relatively high velocity, your average run-of-the-mill helicopter can’t sustain speeds much higher than 100 miles per hour. That said, because of the heli’s ability to climb high into the air with cameramen packing extreme telephoto lenses, actually managing to trick a chopper pilot into losing you – in scenes sure to be played out monthly on national news channels – is another matter entirely.
So, what would it take to actually outrun a helicopter? As demonstrated by professional racer Guy Martin in the video , a modern superbike has more than enough speed to do the trick. In the case of Martin’s modified Suzuki GSX-R1000, which boasts a terminal velocity in excess of 200 mph, all you’d need is a road straight enough to pin the throttle for a dozen seconds or so…
All of which brings us to the Isle of Man, nestled away in the Irish Sea. Every year, legions of racers and fans line the 38-mile-long Snaefell Mountain Course to watch racers like Guy Martin test the depths of insanity as they seek to outpace their rivals on what basically amounts to closed surface streets. See what it looks like as a helicopter does its best to follow the action in the video pasted .
What’s a fresh face worth? A lot when you’re talking about NASCAR. Because the styling is about all that links a stock car to the production vehicle it’s made to mirror. And for , the latest is the new .
The Blue Oval automaker the race car “based” on the new Fusion back in January. But at the Roush Fenway Fan Day in Concord, North Carolina, this coming Thursday, fans will get their first chance to see the new stock car in full race livery.
The paint scheme in question bears the red and white colors of Motorcraft, Ford’s spare parts division, as it will be raced by the Wood Brothers team in this year’s Sprint Cup. But if you can’t wait that long and aren’t going to be near Concord this week, you can check out the full-size clay mock-up put together by the Ford Design Center in Dearborn in the pair of high-resolution images below.
may have once been a form of motorsport in which only domestic automakers competed. And that’s largely still the case, with one notable exception: . The Japanese automaker faced some difficulty breaking into the Good Ol’ Boys racing series, but though some purists may still malign it, Toyota is in NASCAR to stay. And this is its latest car.
“Based”, in design anyway, on the latest , the new stock car from Toyota Racing Development is set to compete in the Sprint Cup next season, alongside the new (among other competitors from and ). The result of “an aggressive redesign”, the new racer was developed with input from the company’s Calty Design studio to look more like the road-going Camry than ever before.
Yes, it does bear a resemblance to its road-going cousin, especially in the fascia. That said, it’s still a composite body over a tube frame powered by a V8 engine driving the rear wheels. In other words, this is a Camry in name only.
Of course it doesn’t hurt Toyota’s case that the Camry is built in America with more American components than most “domestic” vehicles, and now the stock car looks more stock, too. Keep reading for the full press release.
Anyone considering a German-built car might want to buy it now. It could be a long summer.
Europe’s largest industrial union, IG Metall, is taking a tough stance against some job rules German carmakers want to enforce, potentially creating the possibility of a strike, according to .
“Talks are resuming, but so far five rounds of negotiations have produced little movement and a round of warning strikes earlier this month at several companies, including , and Daimler, suggest that the powerful union is gearing up for a confrontation,” the Bureau reported earlier this week.
The union wants a 6.5-percent pay raise for its workers and a limit in how many temporary workers the carmakers can use. Around the world, carmakers use temporary workers as way to increase production without increasing union membership and save money.
The union was offered a 3-percent pay raise, but that offer was rejected. Currently, German auto workers are some of the highest paid in the automotive world. And while parts of Europe remain in economic turmoil, Germany has shown signs of slow growth, which might be one reason some government officials are backing IG Metall.
All of this doesn’t bode well for General Motors’ German-based Opel. GM was hoping to get some concessions from the unions representing its workers as part of its restructuring. But if other carmakers are paying more for its workers, it’s unlikely the troubled Opel would be able to squeeze much of its people.
We’ve noticed that 2013 has been updated with dollar values for each of its four models, however, we’re not so sure the pricing is that black-and-white. has also updated the disclaimer at the bottom of the page, to read, “Prices and features are for survey purposes only and are subject to change and features may become unavailable at the time of vehicle introduction.” In other words, don’t get too fixated on the numbers, as they’re not locked down yet. And by playing with the configurator, you’re likely serving as a FoMoCo lab rat – after all, this is the company that never met a focus group it didn’t like.
It’s worth noting that Ford has not issued an official press release on pricing yet. But for now, it seems like the base Fusion S will start at $22,495, though we’re not sure whether that includes destination or not. Stepping up to the SE at $24,490 will upgrade the steel wheels to alloys, add heated, lighted mirrors with turn signal indicators, and get you body color rocker panels. Inside, the SE has a power driver’s seat and a better stereo, and backseat passengers get an armrest and their own HVAC ducts. The SE also allows you to order other stuff, including navigation and start/stop, or opt for a different engine than the base-spec 2.5-liter four-cylinder with automatic transmission.
The 1.6-liter EcoBoost four-cylinder is available with a manual or automatic on the SE for $25,290, while the start/stop-equipped version (automatic only) is $25,585. The 2.0-liter EcoBoost with automatic is $26,745 when ordered in SE trim. Ford lists a number of different packages and options, but they seem to be offered on a sliding scale, such that the packages are more expensive on the lower-priced models. For instance, the Luxury Package with leather and heated seats, among other equipment, is $1,505 on the 1.6-liter EcoBoost but only $1,050 on the 2.0-liter EcoBoost.
On the SE Hybrid, which starts at $27,995 and is equipped with a non-EcoBoost 2.0-liter four-cylinder and a CVT, the same Luxury Package is listed at $2,000. Apparently if you’re saving all that money on gas, you can afford to pay double the guy with the most powerful engine.
At the top of the Fusion price list, of course, rests the Titanium, which offers a lot of the optional stuff standard for $30,995. It’s also the only way to get all-wheel drive, which will set you back $32,995. Note that the Titanium is exclusively powered by the 2.0-liter EcoBoost and is not available with a manual, so you won’t be configuring your Fusion as a dual-use weekend rally car.
But then again, Ford will likely change this all tomorrow.
The day has finally arrived. cars have returned to the Forza Motorsport series on XBox 360 with the of the Porsche Expansion Pack for Forza Motorsport 4. Pony up 1600 Microsoft Points ($19.99 in real world money) and you’ll get 30 new cars, 20 new events, 10 new achievements and a Porsche-only Rivals Mode. Developer Turn 10 says that seven of the cars ( for a full list) are all-new to the Forza series, which brings the game’s fourth installment – including all of the vehicles released via downloadable content – to a grand total of 625 cars.
We know what you’re thinking. Twenty bones is a lot to drop on a single chunk of downloadable content when you’ve already paid $60 for the game itself and another $30 for the Season Pass, the latter of which has already filled your virtual garage with dozens and dozens of extra cars to drive. That’s all true, and no one would blame you for passing on this Porsche DLC, especially considering that Porsches were included with the price of the game in Forza 1, 2 and 3.
Consider this: 959, 962, 911 Sport Classic, GT2 RS … Those are just four of the thirty cars from Stuttgart that you’ll be passing up the opportunity to drive (digitally) if you say no to the Porsche Expansion Pack. So now that you’re armed with all of the info, you can make the decision that’s right for you while we go download our decision.
to check out the official gameplay trailer that shows all 30 vehicles in action, as well as the full list of all 30 vehicles included in the Porsche Expansion Pack.
The good old boys at Motor Trend got their hands on not only a , but a Ford Police Interceptor and a Dodge Charger Police Pursuit, as well. Like any good, upstanding group of hooligans, the crew set to playing cops and robbers in the shadow of Detroit’s vacant factories. With the big 662-horsepower, supercharged V8 Mustang left with no long spans of asphalt to stretch its legs, the two pursuit vehicles have a clear advantage. Watching the three go at each other is a decent way to blow five minutes of your work day.
Of course, this reminds me of a pearl of wisdom served up by my grandfather on the subject of evading the long arm of the law. He always said, “You can out run one, you might even out run two, but you’ll never outrun that radio.” Amen.
In the latest release of its BrandZ Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands study, market researchers Milward Brown have given the highest ranking of any carmaker, according to Automotive News. – last year’s winner – finished second, followed by , and , according to the report.
BMW had last finished atop the rankings in 2010, according to the report, with Toyota taking the crown from 2006-2009. The highest-ranked American brand was at seventh, trailing sixth-place . The top ten was filled out by , and . Toyota’s drop was attributed to its production interruptions due to the natural disasters that affected all of the Japanese automakers last year, according to AN.
BMW’s win among auto manufacturers was only enough to place it 23rd in the overall brand ranking, with an estimated brand value of $24.6 billion. Apple, the overall winner, according to the report, had a $182.9 billion valuation, ahead of IBM ($116 billion) and Google ($107.9 billion). Toyota’s valuation was $21.8 billion, with Mercedes-Benz and Honda far behind at $16.1 billion and $12.7 billion respectively. No other carmaker had a valuation over $10 billion.
The fourth installment of Ken Block’s Gymkhana series was aptly subtitled We know Ken needs to sell some to pay for these lavish drifting productions, but the sales pitch stole the spotlight from the action in Gymkhana 4. Ever wonder what the video would have been like without the special effects and clothing commercials?
It took them the better part of a year, but DC Shoes has finally released a bonus edit that removes the “Hollywood” parts of the video, leaving just the gymkhana parts that we all clicked Play to watch in the first place.
Cutting out the special effects and infomercial aspects shortens the video from a weighty 9:16 to a lithe and focused 5:11. The difference between the two vids is most apparent by comparing when the Ford Racing rally Focus leaves the starting line. Original video: 1:25. New edit: 0:09. Over a minute was saved just by cutting the clip of Ken Block on fire and nixing the opening credits for his wardrobe. Another two minutes was saved at the end by leaving the Bollywood dance on the cutting room floor.
to watch the new bonus edit that lets the viewer better appreciate the skill required to perform such stunts, as well as the original version. You can also to watch a YouTube Doubler of the videos playing side-by-side.
Reimagining An Iconic Sports Car With Some Modern Parts
We first placed our hands on Singer’s “reimagined Porsche 911″ nearly three years ago when it made its world debut at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. Shortly thereafter, we in the Los Angeles basis. While we were both intrigued and impressed with the sports car at the time, full disclosure admits that we were very skeptical about the start-up back in September 2009. Sadly, we’ve watched this industry shatter far too many dreams.
But Singer has prospered. Very well, it appears.
Rob Dickenson, the creative genius behind the vision, recently invited Autoblog to Singer’s headquarters in Southern California’s San Fernando Valley for an extended ride in the company’s latest offering. After a detailed tour of the facility where we saw other vehicles in production, we dropped into the passenger seat to see what the “Porsche 911 restored by Singer” was all about – only bummed as it was a customer car, meaning we still weren’t allowed behind the wheel.
It seems like it was just a few years ago that car manufacturers used to laugh at us when we’d ask why a new model didn’t get any better fuel economy than its outgoing predecessor. “Car buyers don’t care about fuel economy,” was the refrain, ““
A few years of three- and four-dollar-per-gallon gas has apparently changed that attitude. According to a new study by Consumer Reports, 37 percent of respondents said fuel economy was now their leading consideration in car shopping, topping all others by a landslide. Quality was the second-most-important factor at 17 percent, while safety was mentioned by 16 percent, and value by 14 percent of shoppers. Two-thirds of respondents said they expected their next new vehicle to beat their current one on fuel economy. And yes, it is the economy, stupid, as 90 percent of those surveyed said high gas prices were the reason why they wanted a more fuel-efficient vehicle.
None of this is too surprising, given what has been going on both in the auto industry and in the larger economy since the economic meltdown of 2008. But we still kind of wonder how performance managed to rate number one with just six percent of those surveyed? Is that it then, there are six times as many tee-totalers than auto enthusiasts out there in the world?
CR says that it called 2,009 people across the country to get its results, obtaining 1,702 responses from adult car owners. to read the full press release.
It looks like we weren’t the only ones to get our hands on the . Jamal Hameedi, SVT chief nameplate engineer, recently stopped by the Big Dog Garage to show off both the and the GT500. It’s no secret that Leno has always been a fan, and with the ridiculously powerful supercharged 5.8-liter pumping out more grunt than the comedian’s own Ford GT, the 2013 Shelby has earned itself another proponent. Leno takes the big horse out for a ride around town, including over some of the more punishing stretches of Los Angeles freeway before heading home.
Of course, it wouldn’t be an episode of Jay Leno’s Garage without a proper burnout, and the clip doesn’t disappoint. to us. Now the only question is whether Leno will add one of these machines to his own personal collection. to watch the video, which concludes with a little tribute to the recently deceased .
There have been rumors of an Apple iCar for much longer than five years. But it was five years ago that there was enough heat under them for that Steve Jobs and CEO Martin Winterkorn had met to discuss the idea. A year later another German outlet printed a (pitured) alongside an iPhone, and a columnist in the New York Times kindly .
But did the iCar ever really exist as more than an idea? Mickey Drexler is the CEO of J. Crew and sits on the board of Apple Computer, and at a recent conference in New York he said that Steve Jobs’ “dream before he died was to design an iCar.” Drexler doesn’t say when Jobs had this dream, whether it was just before he died or so long ago that it could substantiate the ancient rumors. No matter, Drexler said “He never did design it.”
The edited video of Drexler’s comments is posted . And know that this doesn’t mean the rumors, nor the iCar itself, are dead.
While we get the , other markets get this: the Golf GTI Cabriolet. We had a under the lights of the , and now has dropped a slew of photos of the convertible in its natural environment.
Under the hood is a 207-horsepower, 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder, mated to either a six-speed manual or dual-clutch gearbox. The car’s feminine aspect has been mentioned, but VW would like to focus people’s attention on the 0-to-62 time of 7.3 seconds, making it the fastest GTI convertible ever, the top speed of 147 miles per hour, and it being “the most economical model in its class.” And the man at the wheel in the press photos.
You can have a good, varied look at it in the gallery of high-res photos, and check out the press release by .
In the latest release of its BrandZ Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands study, market researchers Milward Brown have given the highest ranking of any carmaker, according to Automotive News. – last year’s winner – finished second, followed by , and , according to the report.
