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2009 Kia Soul Debuts In Seoul, Korea…How Cute

On Monday, September 22, 2008, Kia Motors debuted Scion xD look-alike, the 2009 Kia Soul, at the Seoul Motor Show in Seoul, South Korea. Intended to be the flagship vehicle for Kia’s brand new design direction, the Kia Soul illustrates the heavy influence of newly hired head designer, Peter Schreyer, formerly of Volkswagen.

Intended to hit dealer showrooms in the U.S. next spring, the Kia Soul’s most distinctive feature is its redesigned grill, which will be used as the “seal” for each redesigned vehicle in Kia’s line-up. Described as an “urban crossover”, the Soul is powered by either an 124-hp 1.6L or 142-hp 2.0L engine and is expected to be extremely fuel efficient. Although official details will be withheld until its grand entrance at the Paris Auto Show in October, the Kia Soul Hybrid concept reportedly averaged 50 mpg, which experts predict will translate to about 30-40 mpg for the production version. Pricing for the U.S. has yet to be announced, but the 2009 Kia Soul is listed in Japan for 14 million won, or approximately $12,600.

[Source: Edmunds]

Super Sleeper Volvo 850 T5 Makes For One Helluva Grocery Run

The witty commentary of the filming trash talkers is immediately silenced by the incredible burnout, and I love the 5 seconds of utter silence save for the screaming of the tires as the camera follows the Volvo around the corner. Ultimate Favorite Aspect of Video: the only word that doesn’t need to be translated and perfectly sums up the entire footage, “Oh shit.”

Hyundai i10

Hyundai i10: Not Ready for the U.S.

I’m not sure if news of the Hyundai i10 not coming to the U.S. will be met with any outrage by potential buyers. Without significant re-engineering the i10 does not meet certain standards, mostly regarding safety, to be sold in the U.S. But as lackluster as it may appear to look at, the i10 has gained quite a lot of positive comments since its release.

i10 poses for pictures

Hyundai has so much confidence in the Indian-made i10, that they predict sales to double in the coming year. Despite the fact that it is extremely small (slightly less than 8 ft long) in comparison to its main competition it is considered roomy and is configured with 5 doors and 5 seats. (I said that with a straight face) The i10 is or will be sold with several different powerplants including a three-cylinder turbocharged diesel engine that produces 75 horsepower. A manual version of the 1.1-litre gas engine averages 60 mpg.

Hyundai i10 Interior

The higher-end (again with a straight face) Hyundai i10 with the “style” package of options includes air conditioning, sunroof, power mirrors, fog lights and alloy wheels. All Hyundai i10’s have power steering, remote control, four airbags and a CD player. Although it claims seating for five, like anything of this size and in this class, the i10 is suited for quick trips to the store or driving in a city and not for long road trips. The thrifty engine and small dimensions would definitely be too much for any great lengths of time on a highway.

Unfortunately, or fortunately if you hate it, even with upgrades to emissions and safety, because the dollar is so weak right now, the super-affordable i10 is cheap but not cheap enough to sell here in the U.S. The British version would cost $11000 if it were sold here right now. Perhaps that’s a good thing. The i10 is not especially exceptional in style or performance, which you would have to be to sell here. Plus small cars that are already available, like the U.S.-made Aveo aren’t exactly flying out of showrooms. Until there is a consistent market demanding super-compacts automakers will not bother trying to introduce these types of new cars here.

Shag Carpet for Your Car, But Not on the Floor

Covering the bald spot on your dashboard

So I’m reading the paper this weekend and see an ad touting new accessories offered for the Nissan Cube. Wow.

The Cube is, in my opinion, the most homely of the box-shaped cars. Even the Honda Element looks sexier than the over-funked-out Cube. (If I had to choose the best looking of the bunch, my vote would go for the Kia Soul.)

In its apparent quest to create the weirdest car accessory ever offered by a manufacturer, Nissan now offers a toupee for your Cube’s dash – a round piece of shag carpeting that sits front and center that serves no purpose at all. The CarTech blog even said,

The dash-topping shag rug may serve as a conversation piece, as one Nissan spokesperson explained it, but there probably would be even more to talk about if the rug were able to grip the personal electronics that don’t really have a home, like cell phones, iPods, and those keyless keys that are still required for push-button ignition.

So, we have an accessory that looks idiotic and doesn’t even do anything. Sweet.

I also started noticing that it’s cars like the Soul, Cube, and Scion xB that offer a huge array of accessories, ranging from headlight eyeliner for your Soul to 20-color LED mood lighting for your Cube.

We’ve already covered the absolute worst aftermarket mods people make to their cars… now tell us what you think of accessories that are coming straight from the manufacturers. Cube owner or not, would you buy shag carpeting for your dash?

-tgriffith

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Nummi Is No More

A Pontiac Vibe rolls off the line at Nummi

Maybe you’ve never even heard of New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. After all, it has kept a fairly quiet public profile since its 1984 debut.

I guess GM and Toyota didn’t want to make a huge deal about the two fierce competitors working together. But the Nummi plant in Fremont, California, has quietly built more than 6 million vehicles, including the current variations of the Toyota Corolla, Toyota Tacoma, and Pontiac Vibe.

The partnership gave Toyota a head start on the American market in the mid-’80s and gave GM an up-close view of Toyota’s efficient, lean production strategies. Guess who benefited most from that partnership!

At the time Nummi began, GM had a stronghold on the title of world’s number-one automaker. Toyota was just an upstart in America. In the years since, Toyota has nabbed the #1 title, while GM never implemented Toyota’s lean manufacturing strategy.

On Monday, GM finally said it was done.

Now the 4,700 employees at Nummi find themselves in an uncertain situation, as they wait for Toyota to decide what it will do with the plant. It’ll either be closed, converted to a Toyota-only plant, or use a substantially smaller amount of its capacity.

Since the plant uses UAW labor, I think Toyota should close it before the company gets saddled with union contracts. Toyota is smart, though, and knows the potential backlash for eliminating union jobs could include some really bad PR.

But a few months of bad PR would be better than years of binding and expensive union contracts. Nummi has served its purpose, and it’s time to move on.

Had you heard of Nummi before this news? Should Toyota keep the plant running or close it forever?

-tgriffith

These Cars Never Seem to Fail (and Get Over 30 MPG!)

Why is it so difficult for modern vehicles to approach 40 mpg? For some reason it takes complicated and expensive hybrid systems to deliver that kind of mileage now, when cars of the 1980s easily and consistently topped 30 miles per gallon and often approached 40.

Yes, there’s the issue of a modern car’s weight and safety equipment, which no doubt have impacted fuel economy. But come on - 20 years of development, and we’re struggling to get 25 mpg? That sucks. So with that in mind, here are some of the cars from the past that have proven themselves by easily topping 200,000 miles and burning very little fuel:

Just count how many of these you see on the road in the next week. They’re EVERYWHERE, probably because they get 30-40 mpg, are cheap to buy, cheap to maintain, and simply don’t die. You could drive one of these cars for 5 years, forget to change the oil even once, and still know you could drive across the country. Twice.

You may not look or even feel great driving one, considering even the deluxe versions lacked power anything, but you’ll get over 40 mpg on the highway and be able to laugh at all the Prius owners getting the same mileage, but with a $600 monthly car payment.

Hey, I’m not making this list because the cars are fast. I’m making it because they last. That’s why this Subie gets added. My mom had one with 250,000 miles on it, and it ALWAYS started and went where she wanted it to go. I won’t mention the part where flooring the accelerator was necessary to climb even the smallest incline, but that little 1.6-liter hatch consistently got over 30 mpg and refused to die.

1984 Toyota Pickup (or any Toyota with the famous 22R engine)

Got 150,000 or even 200,000 miles on your 22R engine? Relax, she’s hardly broken in! The team at Toyota who came up with the four-cylinder 22R really hit one out of the park, creating an engine that goes down in history as perhaps the most reliable ever built. Look for it in model years from 1981 to 1995. Yeah, 15 years. It was that good.

Do you have any stories of cars that refused to die?

-tgriffith

Ta-Da! GM Bondholders Relent

At least some of them did, and they’ve agreed to take the 10-percent stake the company offered, plus warrants (permitting them to buy stock at a low price) for up to 15 percent more. Some of the largest bondholders have now come on board, but the Treasury still needs acceptance from more of the unsecured creditors, who could otherwise tie up bankruptcy proceedings for years. These small investors are looking at big losses.

Altogether, GM has some 35 percent of its bondholders now agreeing to the deal. That’s not enough, so the death watch will continue, at least through Monday. Don’t, however, hold your breath, since bankruptcy is still the most likely outcome, which may take at least 60-90 days. However, last night’s deal might speed up the process.

In a not-so-favorable development, GM’s Opel-Vauxhall talks in Berlin hit the fan last night, with no agreement on a crucial bridge loan to keep GM-Europe going during the parent company’s presumed bankruptcy. Apparently, the GM and Treasury representatives may have torpedoed the working agreement by suddenly announcing the company needed $415 million more in short-term financing (beyond the $2.1 billion Berlin had offered).

Shocked, the Germans called this demand “bizarre” and “impertinent.”

Klaus Franz, head of Opel’s works council, echoed the accusations of amateurish strongarming: “The German government is right in not allowing General Motors to blackmail it. It demands from GM to either pay for the additional financing need[ed] or to give a guarantee to cover it. General Motors has to know that Europe is no casino for gamblers. It is solely for General Motors to bear the blame, as they wanted to make us a puppet in the poker game about their bankruptcy.”

The talks did reduce the number of potential partners to two, Fiat and Magna, and another meeting was scheduled for Friday. If that one also goes down the tubes, Opel will be headed for bankruptcy, some 25,000 Germans will lose their jobs, and there will be, you can bet, big political repercussions.

Do you think there’s a way to bring the remaining 65 percent of GM bondholders (or a good portion of them) on board? Should the government sweeten the deal?

—jgoods

The Pot Is Boiling in Formula One

Ferrari, always the big gorilla in motor racing, threw a monkey wrench into Formula One yesterday. The company threatened, indeed promised, to pull out of next year’s events unless the folks in charge (Féderation Internationale de l’Automobile, or FIA) recant on their bonehead idea to change the rules and effectively create a two-tiered racing system.

FIA says it will institute a £40 million budget cap on teams to curb costs and attract new participants. Those who spend more will compete at a big technical disadvantage: Apparently, they won’t be able to use adjustable wings, and there are other “arbitrary” restrictions that have most of the constructors and teams hopping mad.

Today, Renault, a former F1 champion, followed Ferrari’s suit. Toyota and Canada’s Red Bull racing teams are also boycotting, and there are threats from BMW-Sauber and McLaren-Mercedes. In other words, it’s becoming a big flap. Ferrari has been part of the world championship events since they were organized in 1950 and is always the big draw. Michael Schumacher won five championships for them in nine years.

Max Mosley, FIA’s head, has vowed to stand his ground. He’s an interesting guy who, some claim, has done motorsport a lot of good. Others call him a tyrant. Still others call him a proto-Fascist. Max is the son of Oswald Mosley and Diana Mitford, both Nazi sympathizers during WW II (their marriage ceremony included Josef Goebbels and Adolf Hitler). He was accused last year of participating in a bizarre sex orgy, which had

Mosley engaging the services of five prostitutes in London to stage a perverse reenactment of a Nazi concentration camp in which Mosley plays both victim and oppressor, alternately receiving lashes from a dominatrix and barking orders in German to the prostitutes dressed in pseudo-Auschwitz uniforms.

Hey now, that sounds like fun! Max’s full story can be found here, along with his reign at FIA. Let’s just say his tenure has been a stormy one. He’s had a close relationship with Bernie Ecclestone, a Jew, who is the sport’s leading promoter and defends the FIA’s recent decisions. A week ago, Max’s son Alexander was found dead of a suspected drug overdose.

Well, aside from all this soap opera, why should anyone care about Max or Formula One? Because, I think, it represents the pinnacle of motorsports and has an enormous number of fans worldwide. It is a fiercely expensive game to enter (which is what FIA wants to change), but the kind of cost-no-limits engineering required to compete is what makes it the pinnacle—with all its drama.

Do you watch or follow F1 racing? How do you think the FIA flap will be resolved?

—jgoods

The 10 Best Used Car Deals!

Kiplinger.com has released its list of the 10 best used car deals available in 2009, and by the looks of it, they found some great deals available on some great cars.

I can break their list into three categories: the obvious, the surprising, and the flat-out wrong. I won’t repeat the whole list here, but if you check out Kiplinger’s slide show you’ll see each car’s original MSRP, dealer retail pre-owned price, and certified price. Good stuff.

First, the obvious choices on their list:

2005-honda-civic Honda made the list with three different vehicles, the 2005 Civic, the 2007 Pilot and the 2006 Acura TL. Kiplinger got these spot on - you just can’t go wrong with a pre-owned Honda (unless of course you’re me… my 2002 CR-V was a lemon).

I also put the 2005 Toyota RAV4 on the list of obvious choices; it’s a nice little ute that should last forever! Not all of us want obvious choices, though - some of us want to stick out from the crowd a little and might opt for…

The surprising choices:

2006-infiniti-g351 The 2006 Infiniti G35 sedan easily reached into the mid-$30s when it was new. Now you can pick up a certified pre-owned version for about $21K and have all the clout and performance that goes with it.

If it’s pure luxury you’re looking for, look at the 2005 Lexus LS 430. At $60,000 new, it’s out of reach for a lot of us… until now! You could snag one of these deluxe Lexuses for less than half the original cost. Can you say booyah?

2007-ford-five-hundred Before I go into the flat-out-wrong category, I want to say that I love Ford. Their new Taurus is a game changer. The Fusion kicks butt. The Fiesta is cute and cool all in one. But the 2007 Ford Five Hundred really shouldn’t be on any best-of lists. Apparently Kiplinger felt otherwise. Yeah, it’s cheap now, but I’d recommend waiting for a certified pre-owned 2010 Taurus instead.

Kiplinger’s choice to add the 2006 Pontiac Vibe falls into the same category. Instead, buy a 2006 Toyota Matrix for the simple reason that Toyota still exists.

What are some of the best used-car values you’ve seen lately?

-tgriffith

Fabio’s Ferrari Wreck

Photo from TMZ

Maybe he couldn’t get those famous long locks out of his eyes.

Whatever the reason, Fabio has got to be looking at the $300,000 Ferrari 599 he crashed and thinking, “I can’t believe it’s not totalled.”

According to TMZ, Fabio crashed the car, which he rented from World Class Driving, along California’s Mulholland Highway. Now that the press has gotten hold of the story, Fabio has no hope of returning the car without them noticing.

Feel free to make your own Fabio driving jokes! Just let us in on them.

-tgriffith

Maxximus G-Force—World’s Fastest Car—for Sale: $3 Million

The story goes that David B. McMahan, a wealthy philanthropist from Indianapolis with an interesting past, was being chauffeured by a car freak named Marlon Kirby and they got to talking.

McMahan and Kirby (right)

“Building a record-breaking performance car is something I always dreamed of as a kid,” says David. Marlon: “Hey, I’m your guy. I’ve got a car tuning shop, and I used to wrestle competitively.”

Speed nuts have their own affinity. Anyhow, the Maxximus they created together is a glorified kit car that, thanks to Marlon’s ingenuity and David’s money, has claimed the title of world’s fastest street-legal car.

It is indeed an accomplishment, though you can question whether a one-off car that could in no way meet DOT crash tests or emissions standards is “street legal.”

Over the course of four years, Marlon was able to stuff a 1,600-bhp Chevy small-block V8 with twin turbos into the British Ultima, whose low volume and kit-car status enable it to be registered for street use. Add a three-speed sequential paddle-shift gearbox, six-piston calipers surrounding 14.2-inch discs, and a 2,700-pound frame, and you get 0-60 mph in 2.1 seconds (the Bugatti Veyron does it in 2.8), 0-100 in 4.5 seconds, and 0-100-0 in 8.9 seconds. The latter figure is particularly amazing.

Even though lots of bloggers are calling it ugly (one said it looks like a Porsche 911 with Down’s Syndrome), the G-Force is getting great PR, it’s all over the Web (photos and website here), and you can have it for your very own if you quickly call David and fork over $3 million for the only copy. Rumor is, though, that you’ll be competing with some Middle Eastern buyers - or at least that’s what he’s telling the press.

On the other hand, consider this: Tthe Ultima GTR, on which the Maxximus is based, goes almost as fast and is a veritable bargain compared. Again with the small-block V8, the factory GTR ran 0-60 in 2.6 seconds, 0-100 in 5.3 seconds, and 0-100-0 in 9.4. The Maxximus took more than twice the horsepower to do not that much better.

The complete GTR kit is around $89,000, plus drivetrain, so you could put one together for around $200,000. I don’t know if the factory is still offering pre-builts.

Have you ever built a kit car? How fast did it go?

—jgoods

When the Moment is Right, Will You Be Ready?

To step forward and buy that used car, we mean. If you want a practically new Maybach (and who doesn’t?), they’re depreciating 60% by the end of the first year. So you can buy that gorgeous $490,000 Maybach 62S, according to Parker’s List (and leftlanenews), for a mere $182,500. BMW 7-Series owners, looking at a 51% drop that first year, will likely be too proud to sell.

Yes, timing is everything. And there’s no time like the present to look not only at German cars—which dropped bigtime last month, though not as much as Toyotas and cars from the Big Three—but all the iron out there, used and new, that isn’t selling. February was always the best month to buy a new car, and it’s still true.

Zero-percent financing is everywhere; incentives, rebates, and discounts are the order of the day. Says U.S.News, “Automakers are no longer just concerned about slumping car sales. They have finally moved into all-out desperation.” Take a look at their article for a listing of recent offers that will amaze you. For instance, buy the ’09 Mazda3 or 6 for 0% APR for 36 months plus $1,000 cash back and no payments for 90 days. It’s Santa Claus in February.

Okay, credit is tight, and you can’t afford to buy. There are also good leasing alternatives, from Volkswagen and Honda in particular. Leasing always makes sense if you don’t have the cash and your credit is okay. It’s also a way to beat the depreciation devil and laugh at Maybach owners.

If you want to find out what’s happening in the real world of used cars, you need to go local. That’s what we did, courtesy of the Web, in this video report from Albany, Georgia.

So folks are coming into dealers with tax returns in hand. That means dealers have to become accountants to avoid getting screwed: “Let’s see, ma’m, your office deduction looks a little bit rich to me.” Well, as they say, any way to move iron. We wish Billy Chambers luck.

Is the auto market tempting you this year? Used or new?

—jgoods

A 55 mpg Volkswagen diesel?

It’s not a hybrid. It’s not electric. It’s not even a thrifty four-cylinder. It’s a diesel, which shows you just how far the technology has come in the last few years.

VW BlueSport concept

Now, at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, V-dub is showing off a concept called the BlueSport, which if it lives up to its claims of 0-60 in 6.2 seconds and 55 mpg on the highway, just may prove to diesel-wary Americans that this technology is for real.

But what exactly IS diesel, and how does it work?

Both gas and diesel are refined from petroleum. While gas is a liquid, diesel is closer to the consistency of oil and has a higher combustion point. It also requires less refining, which is why it was cheaper than gas until demand for it increased. Since diesel fuel is more dense, it delivers fuel economy about 20 to 30 percent better than gasoline.

In gas engines, gas is mixed with air, compressed by pistons and then ignited by spark plugs. In a diesel engine, the air is compressed by pistons first and then the fuel is injected. Since air heats up when it is compressed, the fuel ignites. Diesel engines don’t use spark plugs and have fewer moving parts, so they require significantly less maintenance and generally last longer.

The historical drawbacks of diesel have been dirty exhaust and lackluster acceleration, but these two issues appear to have been put to rest by Volkswagen’s Jetta TDI and BlueSport concept.

Then there’s biodiesel, which isn’t a petroleum based product. Biodiesel is made from plant or animal oils that have been altered to fuel diesel engines. Wired’s Autopia goes into some detail about British ultra-luxe carmaker Bentley and its plans to develop a biofuel vehicle and debut it at the Geneva Auto Show in March.

Would you consider buying a diesel vehicle? Do you think biodiesel has a future, or would you rather go electric? Let’s talk about it in the comment section!

-tgriffith

Like we didn’t know this already, but Europe is getting all the cool c ...

Like we didn’t know this already, but Europe is getting all the cool cars.

Here’s what surprised me though: They’re getting a lot of those cars from the Big 3 U.S. automakers.

Did they think we wouldn’t notice?

Well let me tell you, Big 3, the gig’s up!

Europe already has some pretty darn exclusive auto brands. Audi. Porsche. Mercedes. BMW. I took an odd pride in knowing we Americans had Ford, GM and Chrysler trying their hardest to provide us with top quality engineering and economy.

But no, friends, it’s not true. At least not anymore. Want a 63 MPG Ford economy car? Go to Europe. Want a 36 MPG Ford all-wheel-drive crossover? Go to Europe. How about a 32 MPG Chevy SUV? Yeah. Europe.

Umm… hello? Anyone else find it horribly ironic and feel a bit deceived that our own automakers seem to be sending their cream of the crop across the pond, while we’re left with the 24 MPG Ford Flex?

It seems automakers are beginning to get the idea, evidenced by Ford’s plans to begin bringing popular European models to our side of the Atlantic. Even with those plans in place, we won’t have our first shot at them until at least 2010.

Maybe it’s just time to hope that our Big 3 go belly-up, and make room for more of the world’s fun, economical automakers to enter America. Renault and Alfa Romeo, anyone?

As we wait to find out if and when that ever happens, here are some attempts to appease us Americans with a little taste of Europe:

The Saturn VUE is almost identical to an Opel Antara. Saturn’s Sky and Astra cars are also rebadged European Opels.

Pontiac’s G3, essentially a Pontiac-badged Chevy Aveo, will be available in 2009 as either a 4-door sedan or a 5-door hatchback.

The European iteration of the Ford Fiesta is coming in 2010.

The Ford C-Max, a 5-seat Multi-Activity Vehicle based on the Focus, should arrive in 2011.

The Ford Kuga, likely to appear as a new Ford Escape, should be in showrooms in 2012.

Will these cars arrive in time? Or by the time they hit the market will we already have been introduced to more of Europe’s finest automobiles, following the path of the Mini Cooper and Smart Car?

No doubt the United States’ auto market is changing.

The question is, will our automakers respond fast enough to offer us their best?

Tell us: What European autos would you like to see available in the US?

- tgriffith

But since StreetFire won’t even let me have scissors on my desk, ...

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