New Cars for the week of February 12th, 2018

Geneva Cars Coming Early

Honestly, I’m not sure why we have car shows anymore. I’ve talked a little about their obsolescence before, but it seems like automakers are starting to embrace it. The Geneva Motor Show is coming up next week, but we’ve pretty much already seen all the actually new cars we think are going to be announced there. And it’s not like they’re being leaked, either. The automakers themselves are blowing the lids on their new cars, sending information to the press without making a big splash at a show like they used to. So what do we know about already?

There’s a new BMW X4, which is great for fans of jacked up sedan/SUV bastardizations that are worse at everything than either of the vehicles combined to create them. And if you think the X6 is useless because it’s not as spacious as an SUV and lacks cargo, but the stilted ride height makes the car stiffer and handle worse, first of all, you’re right, second of all, the X4 is even worse because it’s like an even smaller, more useless X6.

We also got a refreshed Mercedes C-Class, which gets a slightly revised exterior and is infused with some self-driving technology from the E-Class. Unlike the BMW, this is a totally useful vehicle and will be enough car for virtually everyone, but since it’s a sedan, people won’t want anything to do with it.

Mercedes also unveiled an updated version of their Maybach S Class, which essentially takes a $150,000 top of the range car with the latest in every conceivable technology and increases the “fancy”, charging more than twice as much for it because rich people are rich and can afford it.

There were several other sort of minor announcements, but we’ll keep an eye on the show next week, maybe it’ll surprise us. 

Chicago Auto Show

Speaking of surprises, the Chicago Auto Show was last week. And I don’t mean that in terms of like “there were a bunch of great surprising new cars unveiled in Chicago” but more as a “you probably didn’t hear about the Chicago Auto Show because nothing happened at it, so surprise to you that it has actually occurred.”

Really, we got some lifted Toyotas and Nissans, some faster versions of a Hyundai, a GMC and a Fiat, a Volkswagen we’ve already seen, a bunch of customized vehicles and a Nissan giveaway that looked like a breast implant. Swear to god. It’s apparently a hand warmer, but look at it. Tell me that’s not a boob.

Faraday Future Small SUV

Their FF91 still isn’t a real vehicle, but that doesn’t mean nothing’s going on at Faraday Future headquarters. They have actually been very busy, not on building a real car but in sketching another potentially real car. They released last week a sketch for a smaller SUV that could slot in below the FF91 which, of course, presumes the FF91 ever actually gets made. To me, Faraday Future is like when you see a dog using a pillow or sitting up in a chair and you’re like “aw, it thinks it’s people,” but in Faraday Future’s case it’s like “aw, it thinks it’s real.”

Toyota Supra

I normally try to steer clear of speculation, especially in the new car section because so much can change and so much rumor tends to be either wrong or underwhelming, but as a guy who grew up with a poster of a Toyota Supra on my wall, it’s hard for me to temper my own excitement about the forthcoming Supra. Toyota themselves released a teaser image of the rear end this week, which showed little except a big wing and a double bubble roof. Then that same day, scans of Japan’s Best Car magazine were posted on a forum which revealed some more details about the car set to debut in Geneva. The specs seem to indicate it’ll have 335 horsepower, be relatively lightweight and, somewhat incredibly, sprint to 60 miles per hour in less than 4 seconds. With just 335 horsepower!

I’ve seen the leaks posted on several sites and although the reaction has generally been split between domestic and foreign fanboys, there have been several comments I’ve seen bemoaning the fact that it doesn’t have more power and won’t challenge the Nissan GT-R for ultimate Japanese super car supremacy. And I think that’s actually part of the reason why I’m so excited about it! The original Supra cost about the equivalent of $45,000 in today’s money, which is less than half of what Nissan charges for the GT-R. With that amount of power and performance, I have to think Toyota is still aiming at the same sort of price range for the new Supra, which means, unlike the GT-R, it’s actually going to be a Japanese sports car people can sort of afford! The only things that really get me down on this car are the styling that we’ve seen so far and the engine. I don’t think it’s very attractive and the drive train is derived from BMW, which one might think is a good thing until you remember that German engineering is the greatest lie ever perpetuated in automotive history. BMWs are notoriously unreliable, especially the more modern ones, and reliability was part of what made the original Supra so great. You could drive it every day, experience the thrill of ownership and not have to worry about it breaking down. Unless Toyota has had a pretty thorough revision of BMW’s motor, I’m afraid we’re about to experience the most unreliable Toyota in history.

Alfa Romeo Stelvio Quadrifoglio

In other pre-production car news, Alfa Romeo stayed true to its Italian roots and left drivers of a nearly production-ready Stelvio Quadrifoglio stranded after the SUV broke down in the middle of Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles. Now, having lived in LA, I know that having a flashy car there is a high priority, and being able to park in high visibility areas to attract attention is usually pretty desirable, so I’m not completely ruling out the fact that this was an elaborate awareness building marketing campaign, but if it is, advertising the complete unreliability of your brand new cars seems like a really strange tactic. Then again, it could totally appeal to the vapid, flaky demographic of many Angelenos. There’s a reason I don’t live there anymore.

New Lancia Stratos

In case you weren’t alive in the 1970s, you may never have heard of the Lancia Stratos. Long story short, it’s an awesome little two door sports car with an engine in the middle that puts out a lot of power and was used extensively and successfully for rallying because of its short and wide wheelbase. Well, a small manufacturer is bringing the Stratos back with an updated look and updated technology. They’re only going to make 25 of them and they’ll cost $615,000 apiece. Oh, and you’ll need to provide a Ferrari F430 to the company because that’s the car on which they’ll base the new Stratos. So all in, you’re looking at close to $800,000 at a minimum for a 600 horsepower body-kitted Ferrari. Or you could spend half the amount on an original Lancia Stratos when they come on sale and get the real rally car. Or you could spend one tenth the cost and buy a new Supra and get to 60 in about 0.3 seconds slower. 

Authored by
Devlin Riggs

New Cars for the week of February 5th, 2018

McLaren MSO X

It seems like every month or so we’re getting a new vehicle from McLaren, which is definitely not a bad thing. They said that their Senna is able to beat the P1 around any track in the world, which makes sense, it should, it’s a faster and more expensive car. But this week they took the baby McLaren, the 570S and handed it over to McLaren Special Operations, the customization division for their road cars, who churned out the MSO X, which is essentially a road-going version of their 570S GT4 race car.

It has all the same aero, producing 220 pounds of down-force at speed and a fairly Spartan interior that has been rendered in bare carbon fiber and includes no cup holders, but there is a place behind your seat to stow your helmet, because you’ll feel the need to wear one even if you’re not on a track in this thing. They’re only making ten of them... and they’re gone. Totally sold out even before it was announced. And this is becoming a thing, which makes me think that these cars are only being announced so that, on the rare occasion one special edition is spotted in the wild, we know what it is and how rare it is so we can be even more jealous of the car’s owner than we would be if we just thought “hmm, that’s a racy-looking 570S."

 Rezvani Beast Alpha X Blackbird

Apparently coach-built versions of existing cars are a thing this week because we also have the ridiculously named Rezvani Beast Alpha X Blackbird. The last time we heard of Rezvani was when they took a Jeep Wrangler and made it into a tank-inspired off-roader and tacked a shit ton of zeroes onto the end of its price. Well, this time they’ve done essentially the same thing to a Lotus Elise, but used the Lockheed Martin SR-71 Blackbird as their inspiration. They didn’t just leave the changes aesthetic though. This thing pumps out 700 horsepower and will hit 60 in 2.9 seconds while maintaining the agile nature of the Elise and the fun wind-in-your-expensive-hairpiece feeling of a Targa top. What’s most ridiculous about this car isn’t the $225,000 base price, it’s the fact that Rezvani managed to squeeze 700 horsepower from a 2.5 liter four cylinder. I wouldn’t want to be the head gaskets on one of these things. But I dig it. Way better than their Jeep thing. I’d take one in a heartbeat.

Fisker Latigo

On the other end of the spectrum is the BMW M6-based Fisker Latigo, which is, to be blunt, just very, very ugly. Good thing there’s only one of them. Fisker really knows how to design a shit looking car with a nasty mustache-looking grille. 

 

Mercedes Sprinter

Like coach-built versions of other cars, it was also a really great week for new cars if you like vans. Mercedes unveiled their all-new third generation Sprinter, which you are free to mock right up to the point where you ride in one and think, “Wow, I’ve never been in an airport shuttle this nice.” Apparently the new Sprinters can do way more than ferry people around to Missouri wineries. The new version is more adaptable than ever and can be had in 1,700 different variants for different purposes or needs. These things are way more common to see in Europe, but Mercedes, and me, are hoping these catch on stateside. It’s a pretty excellent van for pretty much every need, plus it’s plush and comfy.

Ford Transit Connect

Also this week we got a new version of the Ford Transit Connect, which is sort of like a smaller, slightly less capable, less plush and comfy but still decently plush and comfy Mercedes Sprinter. Outside it’s been styled to look like a Ford Escape. Inside it’s been styled to look like a cargo van with seats, but those seats apparently now have more cushioning. This may not be the most exciting new vehicle segment ever and honestly, we could cover the performance specs but they don’t really matter. Just know there’s a new option you can rent instead of a minivan that will do the job just as well.

Nuro

A couple of former engineers from Google’s self-driving company Waymo got together and formed a new company called Nuro, which has developed an innovative new delivery vehicle. It is completely driverless and passengerless and instead of space for people, the vehicle features compartments that can be customized to hold any number of kinds of items, from parcel lockers to shopping bags to warming ovens or dry cleaning clothing racks. These compartments sit above the batteries and drivetrain of the vehicles, but we don’t have any details on performance or range. These are apparently designed for either fully-autonomous operation or remote operation in case it runs into trouble and needs human help. The company has approval from California to test on public roads and it hopes to have a limited number of prototypes in service by the end of the year, but this looks like it could be a great option for companies looking to replace delivery drivers. 

Nissan 370Zki

You guys remember 2009? The financial markets were melting down and jobs were scarce. Pay sucked (and it still does) but Obama was just beginning his first term as president and the country was filled with hope for change, and Nissan was there with the change where we needed it most; sports cars. In 2009, they introduced the 370Z to replace the 7 year-old 350Z. Now, almost ten years later, here we are with the same 370Z and no replacement on the horizon. According to Nissan’s chief planning officer Phillippe Klein, they are working on it but don’t know what direction to take it. The market for small, inexpensive sports cars is apparently down and Nissan is facing stiff competition from the best Mustang and Camaro ever made. With SUVs and crossovers all the rage currently, do they pull a Mitsubishi, spit in the eyes of their enthusiasts and make the Z a crossover like the Eclipse has become? Or do they try to weave in a bit of future proofing and make it a hybrid or electric vehicle?

While we wait on a more permanent answer to the Z’s future, Nissan has decided what the Z’s present needs is more snowmobile. So they took a convertible Nissan 370Z, lopped off all four wheels, fitted some skis up front and put modified tank treads in the back, to make the 370Zki. The rest of the car is virtually unchanged, but if you think a rear-wheel drive car can’t handle well in the snow, Nissan says, "Are you guys silly? I’m still gonna send it."

Authored by
Devlin Riggs

Teslupdate & Germany's "Things You Just Do Not Do"

Teslupdate (again)

Good lord was there a lot of Tesla news in the last few weeks. Looking at my browser as I wrote this, there were no fewer than sixteen tabs open. And unless you were living in self-imposed media detox, which I would completely understand given the current political climate, you probably heard about the biggest story, which was SpaceX’s launch of the Falcon Heavy. But hold on, we have some ground to cover before then.

First up, a report from CNBC indicated that Tesla was having employees hand-assemble the battery packs to be used in the Model 3s while the machines that were meant to produce them were still being built. As part of this “production hell” that Elon Musk talked about, Tesla was apparently loaned “scores of employees” from Gigafactory partner Panasonic, who make the individual cells for each of the batteries. Concerns were raised that the hand assembly was pretty slapdash and the resulting products were incomplete or unsafe, which the company responded was an allegation that was “detached from reality.” 

Unfortunately for Tesla, it came back to bite the company later last week when Sandy Munro, the founder of Munro & Associates, a Detroit-based engineering firm specializing in reverse engineering products like cars and planes, compared the quality of a Model 3 he was tearing apart to a Kia in the 90s. Calling out panel gaps and fit and finish issues, as well as mechanical quirks, Munro says he hasn’t seen poor fitment tolerances on a car like the Model 3 since the 1970s. In one part of the car, he was able to fit a fingernail in between panel gaps, while on the other end of the same panel, his whole thumb nearly fit. Munro also pointed out how complex the cars were to get in and out of in case of an emergency, noting especially the fact that the rear passengers don’t have mechanical door handles, only electronic. This could be a serious problem if an accident ignites the batteries and cuts power. Of course it’s hypothetical, and these are some of the first models to come out, so hopefully the company is getting these issues all figured out, but not a great first impression to set. 

Video by Autoline.tv

So how did the company respond to Munro’s comments? Flamethrowers! That’s right, Elon Musk fired up the old hype machine on Instagram and announced the sale of 20,000 actual flamethrowers labeled with his Boring Company logo because I guess that was the brand flamethrowers make the most sense under. What they basically did here was take a nerf blaster, cut out the nerf darts and springs and paint it black and white, then insert a $50 Lincoln Electric Inferno propane torch kit, which you can buy at Home Depot, and call it a day. Oh, and they’re charging $500 for the privilege of owning it. Oh, and they’re already sold out, so Elon Musk just made $10 million in the span of a few hours. Oh, and god damn I wish I would’ve thought of this first because this is some Grade A genius shit. Seriously, it looks badass and sure, it’s a ripoff, sure it’s unnecessary, but it’s fun and I do admire a company that can have fun for the sake of it, even if the sake of it is also the sake of distracting you from all the other bad shit going on.

Speaking of bad shit, Elon, zeh Germanz are coming for you! (You may need one of those flamethrowers, so hang on to it.) Porsche announced this week that it's doubling its investment in electric vehicles to an amount nearing $7 billion, which is in addition to what they’ve already spent on their really sexy looking Mission E electric sedan. Some of that will go toward the hybridization and electrification of the Cayenne, Macan, Panamera and 911 and 718 Boxster/Cayman twins, but much will go to future vehicle programs, and they’ve promised that their cars will remain focused on fun. CEO Oliver Blume recently spoke at the 70th anniversary of Porsche sports cars, saying, “At Porsche, the driving experience will always be at the forefront, but in a traffic jam or when you park a car, the driver might want to hand over control of the vehicle.” Finally, someone gets me. Thank you, Oliver! In addition to the spending on vehicles, Porsche has committed almost a billion each will go to expanding their facilities and the development of a charging infrastructure.

But they’re not the only Germans on Elon’s tail. Volkswagen is busy trying to atone for its Dieselgate scandal, from which a big part of the settlement will go toward a massive charging infrastructure, the size of which will rival Tesla’s. Last February, Electrify America, the name of the initiative, announced a very adorable 500 charger network in the first phase. Well, after signing on infrastructure company Greenlots, they’ve gotten a bit more ambitious. Electrify America has announced their first phase will actually now be 4,800 chargers, beginning with 2,800 level 2 chargers in America’s 17 largest cities by 2019 and another 2,000 level 3 chargers throughout 39 states thereafter. Those level 3 chargers will restore 80 percent of a battery’s charge (depending on the battery, of course) in around 30 minutes. Tesla, meanwhile, hopes to have 5,300 chargers up by the end of this year, which is a respectable tally, but we know how Tesla is about keeping promises.

To that point, Elon Musk kept a promise this week when he sent his Tesla Roadster into space on the Falcon Heavy rocket launched by one of his other companies, SpaceX. The launch went off pretty well and successfully launched the car and its passenger, StarMan in his custom-designed spacesuit, on a trajectory toward Mars. In a truly un-Elon-like turn of events, SpaceX actually over-delivered on his promise because the Roadster is on course to overshoot Mars and end up somewhere in the asteroid belt. Whoops.

And speaking of whoops, yesterday Tesla’s quarterly earnings came out, showing the company lost $675.4 million in the three months ending in December. This is compared with losing just $121 million for the same period in 2016, which accentuates just how much the company is spending on the production of the Model 3. The production hell, however, only resulted in 2,425 Model 3s being shipped in the same quarter. It’s not abnormal for startups and tech companies to go for a while without posting a profit. Look at Twitter, they just scored their first ever quarterly profit in last part of last year. But Twitter’s product is entirely digital. To create and make real cars is a completely different undertaking than building a digital platform like PayPal or anything else Musk is familiar with. What’s critical not just for the company but for maintaining the confidence of investors is to show that Tesla isn’t making money right now, but has a roadmap to get there. If the constant production problems and quality issues continue, and if they can’t ramp up to the point where they’re meeting their 2,500 unit per week production target, Elon is going to need to sell a whole lot more flamethrowers.

Germany’s “Things You Just Do Not Do”

In one of the most bizarrely horrible stories to come out of the automotive world in recent memory, news broke this week that a research group operating at the Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute in Albuquerque, New Mexico, commissioned a test to prove that diesel fumes were not as dangerous as the World Health Organization indicated. The test itself involved locking ten monkeys in a sealed room and having them watch cartoons while the exhaust fumes from a Volkswagen Beetle were piped in. There are also rumours that there was a similar test conducted on humans, though it’s difficult to believe anyone would’ve signed up for that. It’s actually difficult to believe this whole thing was ever thought of as a valid option. The European Research Group on Environment and Health in the Transport Sector was funded by Volkswagen, BMW and Daimler, who hoped tests conducted would refute evidence that pointed to diesel engines’ potential for harm. Meanwhile VW and several other companies were installing clever software in their cars so the diesel engines could pollute more without being caught.

What really gets me about this is the stubbornness of the whole thing. We’ve known for a long time that diesel emissions aren’t safe and yet the Germans, who were so heavily invested in the development of diesel technology, simply couldn’t accept the fact that the rest of the world wanted a cleaner way to drive vehicles. The realization that diesels were bad could’ve been a turning point for Germany. They could have said, “You know what? You’re right. This is dangerous, and even though it’s more efficient, we need to find a better way to move forward.” They could’ve led the field in hybrid petrol powertrain development, or in electric vehicles or in hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. Instead, they found a way to make their diesels motors look cleaner while in fact being much dirtier. And they locked some poor monkeys in a room and probably gave them cancer trying to prove that the rest of the world’s scientific community was wrong.

So what happens now? Volkswagen has set up a lobbyist as a patsy who has accepted blame, despite the fact that internal emails leaked to the German paper BILD suggest that senior management was made aware of the details of the testing. What we get is another scandal for Volkswagen, and let’s not forget BMW and Daimler who helped fund the research, to sweep under the rug. 

Does someone have Elon Musk’s number? I think I know a few people who would like to borrow his hype machine.

Authored by
Devlin Riggs

Headlines & New Cars for the week of January 29th, 2018

PSA Moves into ATL

Peugeot Citroen Group or PSA, as you’ll recall, recently bought Opel and Vauxhall from General Motors and it’s looking like that’s not the only way the French are coming after America. That’s because this week PSA group announced that their new North American headquarters would be based in Atlanta. Mercedes-Benz and Porsche have also opened headquarters in the Atlanta area, so it’s starting to become something of an automotive hub outside Detroit. As an America, which I assume most of you are, you’ll probably know that Peugeots and Citroens aren’t sold in America and haven’t been for the better part of 30 years. Well, that’s about to change, as we’ve heard that all future PSA models will be designed to comply with American safety standards. According to CEO Carlos Tavares, they’ll start selling their cars here in 2026, which is exciting, because there are a lot of really neat French cars that could only make the roads around here look better. Whether or not they make enough compact crossovers to satisfy the American market is a different thing though. 

Volvo’s Very Green Factory

As we’ve covered before, all next generation Volvos will be hybrids or electrics of some sort, but they’re probably going to be using some sort of gasoline engines for some time more. But to demonstrate how deep their commitment is to environmental responsibility, Volvo’s factory in Skövde, Sweden, is now entirely carbon neutral. They accomplished this through biomass and waste incineration to produce heat for the factory, which, way up there near the arctic circle, they definitely need, and by sourcing all of their power from renewable sources. This is something they intend to reproduce across all their factories by 2025. BMW, in typical BMW fashion, wants to get to the same destination faster and is aiming for carbon neutral status at all factories by 2020. It’s nice to see both how manufacturers are embracing environmental friendliness and to see that BMW can turn literally anything into a race.

Tesla Bringing the Fire to the Firetrucks

Photo by Culver City Firefighters

Tesla was back in the news this week when a Model S operating in semi-autonomous mode smashed into the back of a parked firetruck on the 405 highway in Los Angeles. The firetruck was blocking traffic to help clean up a prior accident and luckily nobody was injured, but the images make it look like the Tesla was going pretty damn fast at the time of the collision. When reached for a comment, Tesla representatives pulled out their old standby that autopilot was only supposed to be used by a fully attentive driver, which everyone immediately knows is bullshit because why would you name it autopilot if it wasn’t meant to take over for the driver? Clearly the driver wasn’t paying attention because it’s generally pretty hard to miss firetrucks with their big red bodies and flashing blue and red lights, especially in sunny, clear LA. What this really underscores is not the carelessness of drivers trusting their cars too much, but rather how far we have to go before autonomous driving is ready for our roads. Tesla plays it fast and loose in this regard, saying that they’re the closest company to a level 5 autonomous vehicle, and Chevy unveiled its completely driverless Bolt last week, but a study by AAA this week revealed that 63% of drivers actively fear autonomous cars joining our roads. Granted, that’s down from 78% last year, and somehow 51% of people still want some autonomous features in their cars. But stories like this keep cropping up and that 63% may start to creep back up again. 

Lexus’ Loserface

Jeff Bracken, who is Vice President and General Manager of Lexus Group, sat down with CarBuzz this past week and spoke very candidly about the famous, or infamous, spindle grill that adorns all modern Lexuses. He said the grill was an attempt to revive the Lexus brand from its formerly boring identity after Lexus was outsold by Mercedes and BMW in 2011. Average buyer age was inching up past 60 and the company needed to attract younger buyers to stay relevant, so they shook things up and slapped on a face that looks like an angry insect mated with an alien that had its face stretched back by an industrial leaf blower. I won’t ever knock a company for trying to do something different because trying to appeal to everyone means you’re going to wind up with a bland product that lacks identity and appeal. Basically, a Subaru. Functionally good but completely uninteresting. But in doing so, you polarize your audience, and what Lexus has done is taken its brand from boring to ugly, and I don’t know about you, but I’d rather drive a boring looking IS-F with a 400 horsepower V8 that nobody expects because it’s a sleepy sedan, than a hideous looking ES350 that goes okay but looks like it burns when exposed to sunlight and will be waiting underneath your bed when you go to sleep at night.

This Week in Shade Throwing

While Lexus’ VP sort of took a dump on his own brand’s styling, other auto executives took this week to throw some shade on their competitors. Starting with Aston Martin CEO Andy Palmer, he spoke to Autocar on the difficulty of working with electric vehicle manufacturers and vendors and highlighted Dyson in particular, saying “I wish him the best of luck but on the numbers that have been reported, I know you won’t do it for that money, and you won’t do it in that timescale. At least, I know that I couldn’t.” Of course he’s not saying that Dyson can’t do it, and highlights the fact that he couldn’t, but still definitely implying that they don’t know what they’re into. He mentioned other EV tech companies, saying “We’ve had discussions with about 10 of them. Every single one has underestimated the difficulty of engineering a car to a budget and to an aggressive timescale. Some of them will get there, but always over budget and late.” 

Speaking of companies that sound an awful lot like Tesla, Bob Lutz, former GM executive, came out swinging this week, first bending over backwards to compliment the company on their incredible achievements in creating an attractive, fast electric car, but then he went off the rails a little bit. After suggesting that collectors should start snapping up Model Ss, he said “Twenty-five years from now, [the Model S] will be remembered as the first really good-looking, fast electric car. People will say "Too bad they went broke.’” Bob is not known for pulling punches, but he is known for reviving General Motors, so he absolutely knows the automotive industry, which should be fairly alarming for Elon Musk and Tesla. They, however, know how to run technology companies, and as the automotive market increasingly becomes the technology market, maybe they’ll figure it out or maybe Bob will be totally right.

Faraday Future Resembles the Presidency

In other electric vehicle startup news, Faraday Future lost their head of human resources this week, which wouldn’t have been much of a story if they hadn’t made it one. For one, the departing Crystal Peterson had been with the company for three years, which is ages in startup years, and her departure was greeted with an internal communication (which was, of course, leaked to the press) indicating a new no-tolerance policy for negativity or disloyalty. “We will not allow the organization to be submarined from within” said the memo. Oh, I think we’re well past, that, guys.

Be Nice to Robot Pizza Man

Last summer, I covered a story detailing the miserable lives led by some Ford engineers who had to babysit autonomous pizza delivery cars shipping out piping hot Domino’s to residents of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Well, occasional co-host and frequent contributor to the show Mike LaBozzetta shared with me a story that wrapped up some of their findings from the study, which did end up being pretty interesting, but still not something I’m sure was a good use of their master’s degrees. They learned that people were paranoid and didn’t want to enter the last four digits of their credit card to receive their pizza, but they were just fine entering their phone number. They learned that people were courteous and would thank the autonomous car for bringing them their pies. They learned that people were dumb and would come outside without shoes on and not want to step into the street where there may be broken glass. All of this evaluation of the user experience will help inform and refine future delivery processes for both Domino’s and Ford, which will make things easier for people as this sort of technology catches on. What I think we’ll start seeing is, rather than tailoring existing cars to fit the specific types of tasks an autonomous vehicle performs, I think we’ll probably see a tailoring of the vehicle design, where maybe there’s an animated figure that interacts with the user to both establish a personal connection and engender trust, so they can receive the credit card information and say “you’re welcome” when the vehicle gets thanked or “I’m sorry, you really should be wearing shoes” when the car runs over your bare feet. 

NYC to Try Charging for Congestion

Despite conjuring images of black lungs, congestion in cities is quite a different thing and is definitely a problem in many cities worldwide. While we have toll roads and bridges here in America, we haven’t really seen any congestion charges levied in any cities yet. But that could change soon in New York because a proposal from the governor’s panel recommends establishing a $11.52 charge for drivers accessing certain parts of the city. This is intended to discourage drivers going to areas to try to reduce congestion, thus the name. Scheduled to go into effect in 2020 if approved, the charges are projected to raise $810 million without factoring in fees for taxis or Uber or Lyft drivers, much of which would get reinvested into the city’s subway system, which is barely functioning. Of course, instead of driving, people will probably try to take the subway to get to the parts of the city now covered by the congestion charge, in which case they’ll be using the already-horrible system and not paying the fee to improve it. So New York definitely has it all figured out.

Once Again, LA’s in it for the Looks

Photo by Los Angeles Times

On the other coast, Los Angeles has been called out for its highly publicized purchase of all-electric BMW i3 patrol cars. A CBS investigation found that, after having the city spend more than $10 million on the cars, they mostly sit around unused in a parking garage. The whole report was pretty damning, finding the cars had very few miles and that the “administrative purposes” the cops were supposed to be using these for turned out to be manicures and not much else. They’re leasing the vehicles from BMW, getting a hundred of them every couple of years and BMW must be thrilled to be getting such low mileage cars back off lease to sell on to manicurists across the southland. Get your shit together, LA.

Bentley Takes on the Mountain

Speaking of doing things just for looks, Bentley has announced that they will be entering their new Bentayga SUV in the annual Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb this year. Now, I get on automakers’ cases for testing their cars on the Nurburgring because, come on, who really cares? Even most auto enthusiasts don’t get to drive on the Nurburgring. But taking a 5,340lb SUV on a grueling hill climb normally reserved for purpose-built race cars takes idiocy to an entirely new level. Maybe they just think they aren’t selling enough cars in Colorado, or maybe they thought Richard Hammond got some great press when he crashed his Rimac on a hill climb in Switzerland that they thought they could replicate it? Dunno. It’s dumb. 

Bullitt Bonus to Help Boys

After announcing the new Bullitt Mustang last week, Ford auctioned off the first to roll off the production line and it fetched $300,000 at the Barrett-Jackson auction. Unlike most auction sales, where buyers pay way over the value of a car to benefit nothing but their own ego, the money will actually go to Boys Republic, a school for troubled young men in California. A fun fact here is that Steve McQueen, famous actor and race driver, who drove a Mustang in the movie Bullitt for which the special model got its name, he actually attended Boys Republic when he was a kid. So kudos to Ford for doing something nice and making that neat connection there. I’m sure they’ll make up some of that money from suing John Cena for selling his GT.

Ford’s Self-Serving Study

But suing people and giving back to charity aren’t all Ford has been up to. This week they released the findings of a survey they conducted that found that, wouldn’t you just know it, driving a sports car makes ya feel good! Apparently the study focused on the vaguely-termed “Buzz moments” and what triggers them by testing people’s reactions to watching Game of Thrones, kissing their partner, dancing and driving a Focus RS. Unsurprisingly, they found that driving the Focus RS gave participants more buzz moments than all the other testing situations. Unfortunately, it could also give them carbon monoxide poisoning because Ford also announced a service advisory for more than 27,000 Focus RS models because of bad head gaskets, which has apparently been a known issue that is only now being confirmed. So if you’re driving a Focus RS and you’re feeling light-headed, you could be having one of those great buzz moments, or your brain could be starved for oxygen and you need to seek medical treatment.

Owl’s Involuntary Ride Ends Surprisingly Well

Photo by Petersburg Animal Care and Control

A couple of weeks ago, I covered a story about a bobcat getting stuck in a vehicle’s grill after being hit and being taken for a 50-mile ride. Well folks, it’s happened again, but this time to a great horned owl! After being hit by an SUV, the owl became lodged in the grill of the car for 160 miles before the drivers finally decided to stop and see what that thing was he hit a few states back. Fortunately, the poor owl will be okay apart from a few busted blood vessels in his eye and some tussled feathers, but people. Come on. If you hit something, (and you would feel it if you hit one of the largest owls in the world) pull over and check it out! 

Would you Trust 3D Printed Brakes? 

3D printing has come a long way in recent years, going from high-end manufacturing to consumer-friendly applications. Chances are you know someone who owns a 3D printer, but Bugatti is going a step beyond creating neat figurines, puzzles or wedding toppers. They’re working with a German company to develop 3D printed brake calipers - the things that squeeze the brake pads onto the brake rotors to actually cause your car to stop moving. Typically, brake calipers are cast aluminum or steel or iron because it’s reliable, sturdy and doesn’t flex, ensuring you get even braking which, as you can imagine, is fairly important. But cast metal is heavy and when you’re talking about super cars, every little gram of weight reduction helps improve performance. But the more weight you take out of brake calipers, the more likely they are to flex, which reduces braking performance. So by 3D printing these calipers, Bugatti is hoping to get the best of both worlds; light as a feather and stiff as a board. Kind of like that stupid game dumb kids play when they want to pretend their friends are dead.

Lotus Leader Leading Lovely Life

Photo by Warren Allott for the Telegraph

Jean-Marc Gales is the CEO of Lotus and someone I think would be really fun to grab a beer with. How can I tell? No, it’s not the french name, it’s the fact that he was pulled over for doing 102 miles per hour in a 70 mile per hour zone last year and tried to get out of the ticket by saying that it was important that he test the cars himself. Of course it didn’t work and he was fined £666 for his trouble and banned from driving for 30 days. In the worst case scenario, he could’ve been banned for six months, so he did get off light. And I know what some people will say “oh, he was driving dangerously.” Well there’s a difference between driving fast and driving dangerously, and you can hit those sorts of high speeds very quickly when nobody is around so it isn’t necessarily the case that he was endangering anyone. At the same time, dude, you’re a CEO of a major British car company. Your engineers take these cars to the countless tracks you have in England to test them. Just tag along sometime and test them there. It’ll be so much better and you won’t get banned! Still, Jean-Marc, you’re my kind of idiot. 

It’s the Dream of the (Honda) 90s in Forever 21

Like it or not, mom jeans are back in style and so is plaid flannel, holes in denim and a bunch of other dumb stuff we used to wear in the 90s. For me, this isn’t a real problem because my wardrobe never really evolved beyond that, but in case yours did and you’re aching to get back with that vintage vibe, and you also happen to be a huge fan of Honda Motorsports, well you should hit up Forever 21. The disposable clothing company announced this week that they are coming out with an outrageously extreme lineup of Honda-themed apparel that screams 90s and, as obnoxious as most trendy things are, I kind of love it? But at the same time I don’t. Because I would love it if it were one of those “look how crazy and silly this is, I’m going to wear it because I don’t care what people think and I think it’s radical,” but I fear it’s actually a “this is so extra because it looks like what my stepbrother used to wear when he would like come back from street racing with his friends. Oh my god, remember Bryan? I had such a huge crush on Bryan! Anyway, what’s Honda 500?”

High Times & Dank Withdrawals

If there is one business that has made a name for itself by catering to stoners and drunks, it’s Taco Bell. The home and indeed birthplace of "fourthmeal" knows its core customers, what they want and when they want it. The problem for their customers is, Taco Bell isn’t everywhere, which leads to problems like we saw this week in Spring Hill, Florida. There, a man desperately jonesing for a burrito tried to order one from a drive through lane at a Bank of America. Unfortunately for this gentleman, they were fresh out, so he passed out behind the wheel in his car, blocking a lane. After the manager tried pounding on the car to wake him up, he repeated his request and, when it couldn’t be satisfied, drove off in a huff. Fortunately he only made it as far as the parking lot, where he parked to pass out again. Cops determined he was high on Oxycodone and Xanax, which he was actually prescribed, and charged him with a DUI. So not only did the poor guy not get his burrito, he received prison con queso. Where queso is a hefty fine.

New Cars

LFP Hellion

Every once in a while, something good comes out of Ohio. My wife is one example, but it’s been more than 30 years, so they’re about due. In comes Lebanon Ford, a dealership in Ohio that just loves mustangs, but thinks that the measly 420 horsepower V8 is just pathetic. To resolve this perceived issue, they’re twin turbocharging the V8 and selling the revised model as the LFP Hellion. The crazy thing is, this thing starts at 600 to 700 horsepower at 7 PSI, but the turbos can be tuned to run at 30 PSI, meaning the car pumps out an incredible and entirely unusable 1,200 horsepower. And all of this starts at just $52,000. Of course, the current Mustang is one of the best looking in the company’s history, and now with Lebanon Ford’s help, they are also the most ridiculously powerful. In terms of bang for the buck, this has to be one of the best. Well done, Ohio. 

Casil Motors SP-110 Edonis Fenice

Even the relative car noobs will probably at least know of Bugatti from their outrageous Veyron (one of which I actually saw on the highway last weekend) and, more recently, the Chiron, but those are not the only two relatively modern super cars the company has made. The sort of analog black sheep of the Bugatti family is the EB110, which was last produced 26 years ago, but still looks incredible. Well a company that specializes in repairing those 110s apparently purchased a bunch of carbon fibre monocoque chassis for the 110 and are planning on making their own vehicle with ten of them. In place of the EB110’s surprisingly reasonable 550 horsepower quad-turbo 3.5 litre V-12, they’re porting it to 3.8 litres and twin turbocharging it to 720 horsepower, which will deliver 60 miles per hour in 3.4 seconds on your way to a claimed top speed of 220. The vehicle, which has a very sad look about it could be sad because of its name. It’s called the Casil Motors SP-110 Edonis Fenice, which sounds like a great name you give to a cat that’s an asshole so you can put him down in a way that he knows he’s being put down, but can’t do anything about. But for a car? That’s kind of a shame.