Headlines for the Week for June 18th, 2018

Flying Cars to Take Off in Ingolstadt

Long time listeners may remember a few months ago I mentioned Audi’s partnership with Airbus to start developing flying cars. As a refresher, these were very loosely termed cars. Basically it’s a three-part design, with a quadcopter, passenger pod and electric skateboard-like platform. The pod can be transported by either the quadcopter or wheeled platform, making it either flying or car, but not really “flying car.” I said at the time that the idea was pretty neat and more likely to succeed than any other system I’d seen and, sure enough, Audi has just received approval from the German government to start testing these in their headquarter city in Bavaria, Ingolstadt. Now, this is a long way from being like “oh my God, we are all going to be catching flying car taxis from the airports within five years,” but it’s a lot closer than I thought we’d see in my lifetime, so I’m hoping this actually goes somewhere. Onward and upward, Audi.

Volvo’s New US Plant feat. Dig @ Trump

In a time when automotive manufacturing jobs can be hard to come by in the US, who can we trust to bring back those jobs? Yep, the Chinese and Swedes! Volvo, which is owned by Chinese company Geely, formally opened their new factory in South Carolina, which will build the new S60 we’ll get to later. In addition to providing Volvo the chance to suck up to American buyers by focusing on the $1.1 billion investment in America and the 4,000 jobs the factory will host when construction is complete, the event gave Volvo execs the chance to cast some serious shade at Donald Trump and his supporters Nikki Haley and Governor Henry McMaster. Volvo CEO Hakan Samuelsson said “If you have trade barriers and restrictions, we cannot create as many jobs as we are planning to. We want to export and if suddenly China and Europe have very high barriers, it would be impossible. Then you have to build the cars there. And then all cars will be more expensive, you have to invest more tooling and have every model in every country. That’s against all the logic of modern economies that trade with each other.” It seems there’s a lot of commentary about our trade policy being against all logic, and yet here we are, threatening a 25% tariff on imported vehicles and auto parts. It’s almost like logic doesn’t factor into decisions at all, but what do I know, I’m only a master of business with a degree in political science who happens to like his cars cheap and fast.

Audi CEO Arrested, Thrown in Slammer

^Criminal

The fallout from the Dieselgate scandal continues still in Germany where this week Audi CEO Rupert Stadler was arrested based on concealment of evidence relating to the defeat devices on Volkswagen Auto Group vehicles. He’s actually remaining in custody because the prosecution thinks he’s a flight risk. Audi has had to scramble to name an interim CEO while their boss remains a jailbird, but this just continues to look bad. If the CEO of one of your major brands was aware of the effort to deceive authorities, former Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn is probably shaking in his boots because you can bet he knew about it too. It’s a serious problem when a culture of corruption comes straight from the top, and you would’ve thought Volkswagen had learned its very expensive lesson, but by keeping Stadler as Audi CEO this long after the scandal came to light, maybe they need a couple more billion dollar settlements before the root out all the corrupt jerks. I’ll take my settlement in the form of a V10 R8, thank you.

Teslupdate #1,000,000,000

This will again not be the week when we have no Tesla news, because there was some wild shit going on with Elon Musk’s company this week. First, the not-so-wild: tesla completed the setup of a third production line over the weekend...in their parking lot. Yes, the new line is underneath temporary tents outside because the space is needed that badly to ramp up production to meet goals. Back when the factory was a combined General Motors and Toyota venture, they managed to crank out 8,200 cars per week from the inside of the place, so if Tesla needs to move outdoors just to reach 5,000, I think you can imagine how much more complicated those production lines must be and how much more space they take up.

Amazing work by Tesla team. Built entire new general assembly line in 3 weeks w minimal resources. Love u guys so much! Pic of 1st Model 3 dual motor performance coming off the line … pic.twitter.com/Xr55P3fmGd

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 16, 2018

Next came some serious shade thrown from General Motors. Actress Mary McCormack who you may remember from some sort of television shows somewhere, tweeted out a video of her husband’s Tesla Model S, which apparently just started catching fire while he was driving it and burst into flames in the middle of Santa Monica Boulevard. Tesla has no idea what happened or why, but GM jumped at the opportunity, offering the actress a free Chevy Bolt as a more dependable loaner car. Nicely done, GM communications guy Ray Wert.

Okay now we get to the crazy shit - on Sunday, Elon Musk sent out an email accusing a former employee of sabotage and intellectual property theft, as well as leaking sensitive information to third parties and the press. He followed that email up with another about someone potentially trying to sabotage a production line by starting a fire. Then on Tuesday Tesla filed a lawsuit against a former employee for allegedly having stolen confidential information and making false claims to the media. Then on Thursday, someone claiming to be a friend of Martin Tripp, the guy Tesla sued, called the Gigafactory to warn that Tripp was coming in to shoot up the place, causing a minor panic and for beefed up security until the county sheriff found there was no credibility to the threat. Then AFTER THAT, Tripp posted to Twitter an email exchange that he had with Musk about the lawsuit wherein they both called each other horrible human beings and generally behaved like children.

We’re not yet sure if the Sunday email and Tuesday lawsuit are connected, but if not, that means there are several people trying their darndest to mess up Elon’s life. And jeez, people if you like constant dramabombs being dropped, no need to watch daytime television, just follow Elon Musk on Twitter. This is ridiculous.

J.D. Power Initial Quality Honors Hyundai

The annual list of J.D. Power rankings for initial quality were released this week and, if you’ve been listening to this show and looking at their recent cars, you won’t be surprised to learn that Genesis, Kia and Hyundai are the top three brands. All of them being owned by Hyundai. Even Porsche comes in at just fourth spot and Ford in a somewhat unbelievable fifth. The trick is, the initial power rankings count the number of problems experienced per hundred vehicles in the first 90 days of ownership. If things are going wrong within 90 days, that’s generally not a great sign for future reliability, but certainly not a sign that cars with good initial quality will last longer, as may be the case with Ford. They also don’t measure the severity of problems, so a busted transmission is effectively the same weight as a windshield wiper motor squeaking, which is pretty misleading. Furthermore, as I’ve discussed before, automakers pay JD Power for the right to use their awards in marketing materials, so these sort of non-firsthand user reviews should be taken with a grain of salt. Nevertheless, Hyundai definitely deserves a look as they do make some pretty nice cars. Just, as with everything else, QUESTION EVERYTHING.

RC-6 Corvette

While I’ve never driven one, It’s my understanding that Corvettes are very fun cars to drive. But in the Netherlands, where people decided they’d rather have land where the sea was so they built a complex series of windmills to drive the sea back into the ocean, one man has gone and made his Corvette a bit more complex as well. Specifically, he modified his C6 Corvette to be remote controlled. We’ve seen full-sized R/C cars before, but doing so to a Corvette is an entirely different scale; one that cost about $4,000. It’s honestly really impressive that someone could pull this off, but I still think I’d rather be behind the wheel of that V8 rather than just puttering it around a parking lot. But that’s the Dutch for you - defying convention, and the ocean.

Authored by
Devlin Riggs

Header image: When your GTI is the least athletic member of your automotive family tree.

Trade War Update

Donald Trump this week celebrated a small victory in a preamble battle to the Trade War he wants to start and insists will be easy to win. China announced that they will cut import tariffs for cars from 25% to just 15% starting on January 1. Car parts will be cut from 10% to 6%, which will help lower the cost to build new cars in the country as well. In exchange, the United States has lifted a ban on products from Chinese telecom company ZTE Corporation, which had apparently crippled the company. Set to benefit most from the relaxed tariffs are Volkswagen and luxury car makers like BMW and Mercedes-Benz, who don’t produce cars in China. Tesla also benefits, as do some premium Japanese brands, which will now be able to compete cost-wise on a more level playing field with vehicles produced in China.

This doesn’t particularly help Ford or GM, who have already established extensive production in China specifically to avoid high tariffs, and with the 15% tariff still in place, there isn’t much likelihood brands will magically decide to start producing cars in the States again and ship them over. There’s also some rich irony that the Germans seem to benefit most from the actions of the U.S. President.

Photo by Dilworth Police Department

And while China cuts their import tariffs, Trump heard only the phrase “import tariff” and decided “yeah, that’s a great idea, let’s look into that” and assigned the U.S. Secretary of Commerce some homework. Specifically, Trump wants him to initiate a Section 232 investigation into the import of automobiles, trucks and auto parts to determine their effects on America’s national security. And right now you’re thinking “oh, this is supremely stupid,” but remember, it has happened twice that Ford Fusions from a plant in Mexico were caught in the U.S. loaded down with a bunch of weed that some drug mules north of the border failed to offload, so it’s entirely possible that cars are the single greatest source of drug trafficking in the United States. Or maybe it could be that pot should be legalized and regulated and we wouldn’t have people smuggling it in and that two examples of some incompetent drug cartel don’t exactly signify a trend. In any case, the Commerce Secretary will decide.

But Trump’s call for the investigation itself has been met with widespread condemnation from, well, kind of everyone. It’s being regarded as a waste of time and resources that could end up not only harming our relationship with other countries, but harming American consumers through generating higher prices for goods, much like the tariffs on steel and aluminum have done. Moreover, most consider it a stretch to think that an import tariff has anything to do with national security, with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau going so far as to say it rests on “even flimsier logical grounds.” Automotive News has a great roundup of all the quotes lambasting the move but the best and most concise probably comes from John Bozzella, CEO of the Association of Global Automakers, who said “The U.S. auto industry is thriving and growing. To our knowledge, no one is asking for this protection. This path leads inevitably to fewer choices and higher prices for cars and trucks in America.” So who’s going to win this Trade War again?

Authored by
Devlin Riggs

Headlines for the Week of March 12th, 2018

How’s that Ramp Up Going, Elon?

If you’re hoping, as I do, that every time Elon Musk and Tesla revise their output schedules that this will surely be the time they get it figured out and it’ll be smooth sailing from here on out, you’re not going to enjoy this next story. Tesla had to completely shut down its Fremont, California manufacturing plant for a week last month to fix issues and bottlenecks related to the production of their Model 3 sedan. According to workers inside the factory, a staggering 40% of parts for vehicles were not suitable for use on cars, requiring extensive reworking or re-manufacturing, which are apparently different things. Reworking involves taking a new part and fixing it to be up to a certain standard, while re-manufacturing takes used parts and fixes them up to be new-looking again. Tesla insists they don’t put re-manufactured parts on cars, but if almost half of parts require reworking, and they’re still putting out cars with irregular panel gaps that command comparisons to 90's Kias, you can call it “re-wizarding,” but it’s still not a good thing.

Trump Strikes AGAIN

The President of the United States has a habit of weighing in on things in a…unique way, and last week, when discussing the Trans-Pacific Partnership and how horrible it is, cited a practice that is either so top secret that no auto industry professional in the world has ever heard of it, or is completely made up. Here are Trump’s exact comments: “It’s the bowling ball test. They take a bowling ball from 20 feet up in the air and drop it on the hood of the car. If the hood dents, the car doesn’t qualify. It’s horrible.” What!? What car could possibly pass this test!? After thoroughly baffling the automotive media for a while and offering no explanation for his comments, an astute reader of the Washington Post’s coverage of the story suggested in the comments that perhaps he was referring to a test where Japanese safety officials test pedestrian safety by shooting dummy heads at car hoods to determine how damaged a head might be if it made contact with a car. Perhaps someone explained this with a bowling ball analogy, which could account for some of the misunderstanding, but the part about a car failing if it dents is still completely out of left field. In any case, it’s a test Japan applies to all cars, not just imports to keep them out of the country, so to use it as a sort of argument against the Trans-Pacific Partnership was always a stretch but, when it comes to politics these days, sense and logic doesn’t really apply anymore anyway.

Green with Envy, Yellow with Value

When I chose the gorgeous Reflex Silver color for my GTI, resale value didn’t really factor into my decision; I just liked it more than all the other options available. But apparently people do choose white, silver and black because those sort of “neutral” colors are more universally liked and the theory goes makes your car more desirable secondhand. Well, turns out that’s bogus because a new study by used car search engine ISeeCars.com has revealed that the car color with the lowest depreciation rate was, in fact, yellow, depreciating an average of 27 percent in the first three years of ownership. Also above average were green and orange, going to show that safe colors really aren’t that safe. But that’s not to say all wild colors are helpful. Some of the worst performing colors were beige, gold and purple. The purple car that immediately jumps to mind is the Chrysler PT Cruiser, which immediately makes sense why it would be one of the worst cars for keeping its value.

Lamborghini Says, "Damn the Fuel Economy Standards!"

Speaking of yellow cars that don’t depreciate much, Lamborghini was in the news this week for comments made by the company’s chief technical officer, Maurizio Reggiani. He indicated that, while other companies like Ferrari are moving to a V-8 or V-6 turbo hybrid in their future cars, Lamborghini has no intention to stop making their V-10s like that which powers the Huracan today. I love this quote from him: “My question is, why do I need to do something different? If I trust in the naturally aspirated engine, why do I need to downgrade my power train to a V-8 or V-6? I am Lamborghini, I am the top of the pinnacle of the super sports car. I want to stay where I am.” You do you, Lamborghini, and we will love you always for it.

GM Wants to Rent Your Car

With the launch of its Maven service in several US Cities, General Motors joined the ranks of the ride-sharing businesses, but using new cars put into circulation by General Motors themselves. Starting this summer, GM will begin a pilot program, expanding vehicle availability to personal cars if owners are willing to put their vehicles up for rent. This equates to a sort of Air BnB on wheels, which actually already exists with services like Turo, which I did not previously know about. But this being a GM venture, it has some extra benefits, like Maven offering liability insurance for GM vehicle buyers who choose to take part in the plan. Given how people generally treat their rental cars, I can’t imagine there would be a whole lot of interest in pimping out your ride, but if you need some extra money, maybe it’ll catch on with the likes of people who see their cars as appliances.

Arlington 86s its Buses

In other ride sharing news, Arlington, Texas has done away with its public transportation, which apparently was lacking anyway. Instead of buses and routes, the city has launched Arlington Via, which features Mercedes-Benz Sprinter vans that can be hailed via an app or phone number and will come around and pick you up and take you to your destination. If this sounds a lot like Uber or Lyft, you’re totally right, except that it’s publicly subsidized, so trips are only $3 or you can buy a week pass for $10, which is crazy cheap! For about $40 a month, you can basically have your own driver that you occasionally have to share with other passengers. Mark my words, smart people will use and abuse the hell out of this system and it will be fantastic until the city realizes what a massive loss it is and discontinues it after its one year contract is up. I would absolutely be doing that if such a service were available here. It’s less than the monthly payment on any car! And you don’t have to drive in traffic!

Toyota Bolsters Avis’ Connected Fleet

Finally in rental car news, Toyota has signed a multi-year deal with Avis Budget Group that will supply 10,000 connected cars to Avis to “help streamline the customer rental experience.” It’ll basically help provide real-time location, odometer, fuel level and other information without the need for attendants to go check the cars manually, which would honestly be pretty handy if you’re running late for a flight and just needed your receipt so the accounting department doesn’t crucify you when you get back to work. It’s not very exciting and it seems like something that should’ve been accomplished years ago, but I guess we should just be happy with progress when we get it.

Buick’s Naming Crap Continues to Confound

Last you heard of Buick, they were prohibiting the use of the word wagon when mentioning their new Regal TourX, insisting it was a crossover. Well, starting next year, they will begin forcing drivers of all their new vehicles to insist that their car is indeed a Buick when asked by incredulous friends as happens all the time because their commercials are so reflective of real life. That’s because Buick is removing the “Buick” lettering from the back of its vehicles in the same way that BMW and Mercedes-Benz don’t actually say “BMW” and “Mercedes-Benz” on the back because people just know what the propeller circle and tri-star signify. Buick has the audacity to think that buyers most definitely know that the tri-shield badge means that a vehicle is the Buick. And while, sure, loyal listeners of my show may know that, I think it’s a bit presumptuous to suggest everyone does. But you know, good luck to Buick, who sold 4.5% fewer cars in America in 2017 than they did in 2016, which is also half the number of vehicles they sold in 2002. You’re probably doing just fine.

Elsa Lets the Boston Police Go

Video from Time

In South Boston this week, for the first time in, well, a week, the city got 16 inches of snow, which trapped a Boston Police van. Normally this type of story wouldn’t make the news, but the van was freed by none other than Elsa from Disney’s Frozen. A man dressed as the ice princess approached the beached van and asked the drivers if they wanted to build a snow ramp. She dutifully guided them as they rocked the van out of its spot and pushed until the vehicle was clear of the snow and then let it go. Turns out the cold never bothered her anyway. And that’s enough Frozen jokes.

New Cars

Baby Bronco and Mustang GT500

Ford made a big splash this week, announcing plans to refresh 75% of its lineup by 2020, which is good because, honestly, it needs the help. Where’s it making the biggest investment? Predictably, in vehicles that sell like hotcakes, namely SUVs, where the brand’s existing models are pretty long in the tooth. But we’re not just talking about the Escape, Edge and Explorer, all of which will get new versions, which include ST trim models that up the performance factor a bit. We already knew a new Bronco is coming and, although we haven’t seen it yet, Ford announced that they would have a smaller off-road-focused SUV that would be coming out to slot in below the revival of the bucking horse truck. We don’t really have any details on it, but the speculation is that it’ll give the Wrangler a run for its money in performance if maybe not in the customization sector. They also teased a photo of the new Shelby Mustang GT500, which can obviously only be a good thing. As we see automakers continue to churn out compact crossovers, it’s honestly great to see Ford say, “Yeah, but how about a Wrangler alternative and an even faster Mustang?” The market may not be demanding the most exciting vehicles, but at least automakers still have some people working there that want to inject the fun into cars to satisfy those of us in the so-called niche markets.

Audis for Everybody

If you like Audis, then screw the year of the truck, this is the year of the four rings for you. The company shared this week that they expect sales and deliveries of new cars to be pretty poor this year because they’re basically going to spend the entire next eight and a half months dropping new cars on us. They say there will be over 20 redesigned and new models launched this year, including the launch of several all electric models like the E-Tron crossover and E-Tron GT, a sedan. There will also be redesigned versions of most of the rest of Audi’s lineup, and the rate of unveiling means we’ll see a new car from them just about every three weeks, which is crazy ridiculous! But then again, when you think about Audi’s styling and realize they just stick an existing car in a copier and change the magnification level and hit “print,” maybe it’s not that outrageous to have so many cars coming out at once. Especially when Audi apparently achieved a billion Euro cost reduction last year by reducing research & development. Be prepared for a new generation of, “Oh, that’s a nice A-6. Er, A-4? Ach S-8!”

VW is S.O.L with New Names

Meanwhile at parent company Volkswagen, the Germans apparently had to come up with a new name for the electric vehicle brand they are preparing to launch in China with partner company JAC because they were not allowed to use the Chinese name for SEAT. Instead, they have chosen SOL, in all caps, which of course is Spanish for “sun,” conjuring images of a bright, shiny all electric future. Or, if you’re the type of person who uses acronyms, the capital letters S-O-L means “Shit Outta Luck,” which is just as well because the first car of the joint venture is a re-badged JAC vehicle that boosts just 114 horsepower and a top speed of 80 miles per hour. So, sorry, China, if you were hoping for a better electric vehicle to come from the partnership. I guess you’re, well, you know.

Lexus RC Black

It’s been at least a few weeks since our last black edition of any car, so we were about due for one. This time it’s Lexus, who is creating only 650 versions of their RC F Sport Black Line. The trick is, it’s not actually a trim available for the RC F. Just the RC 300 and 350. So not the V-8, just the V-6 and I-4 models, which, to me, causes it to lose a bit of the sinister element to it. What’s the Black Line version get you? More black. Just like in every black version of any car. Can this trend stop now?

Also from Lexus, they are launching the Sport Yacht concept, which is not a tongue-in-cheek concept car that plays on large sedans being referred to as land yachts. It is actually a yacht. It started as a fun concept from Toyota Marine Division, a 42-foot ship that features two Lexus 5-liter V-8 engines cranking out 885 horsepower and an almighty sound. The concept was never intended for production apparently, but after being handed the “Boat of the Year” award at the Japan International Boat Show, Toyota has had a sit down and think and decided that, yes, it would like to make more money from rich people and will actually build the boat and offer it for sale worldwide. Not just that, but they’re planning on a 65-foot version that can entertain up to 15 guests, because rich people love offering people a ride in their Lexus only to pull up in their Maserati and say, “Ha, silly, my Lexus is docked!”

Hyundai Kite Concept

Hyundai is also going nautical with their Kite concept, which debuted at the Geneva show two weeks ago but didn’t quite make it into my rap-up. It’s a sort of light weight dune buggy thing that was designed by 15 students as part of their Master in Transportation Design program at the Instituto Europeo di Design. The wild thing is, it can be transformed into a single seat jet ski, and who doesn’t want that! Granted, the utility of this thing is somewhat questionable. A dune buggy isn’t exactly practical for a daily commute and the number of times I have been flying over dunes only to arrive at a sudden ocean or lake and wished I could suddenly have a jet ski are relatively few. But you have to celebrate thinking outside the box, and this is most definitely that.

Honda Mean Mower Mk.2

Honda, it seems, is getting tired of being asked when they’re going to bring back the S2000 or some other affordable sports car now that their NSX has pushed decidedly upmarket. Instead of replying simply “never,” they’ve resorted to the tried and true internet tradition of trolling their fans. Instead of coming out with a fun sports car with 189 horsepower that will hit 134 miles per hour, Honda this week unveiled the Mean Mower Mk.2, a riding lawn mower with the engine from one of their 1,000 CC Fireblade motorbikes because why make a fun car when you can make a fun lawnmower instead? This isn’t the first time Honda has done this, having put a V-twin from a previous Fireblade into an older riding mower and achieving some impressive numbers. This second generation takes it up a notch, just as it takes up the trolling. Honda knows how to have fun. They’re just not going to go out of their way to help us have any. But hey, keep having your engineers work on pointless shit, Honda. And maybe give your designers the day off so we can have a Civic that doesn’t look like an origami spaceship.

Obituaries

Lincoln Continental

R.I.P

We heard some rumors last week that Ford is planning on canceling the Lincoln Continental after just one new generation of the car they allegedly spent $1 billion to resurrect, which seems like a ridiculous waste of money. That said, last year, they barely sold 12,000 examples, which pales in comparison to the 52,000 Mercedes-Benz E-classes or the nearly 41,000 BMW 5-Series cars of similar size and fanciness that were sold last year. When it debuted, the Continental was mocked for being a knock-off Bentley in its styling, but I guess not that many people are interested in driving Bentley knock-offs? This hasn’t been confirmed yet, but with sales that low and sales of sedans in general tanking like the Miami Marlins, it’s a safe bet that Ford might want to cut its losses. 

Authored by
Devlin Riggs

Headlines for the Week of February 26th, 2018

Time to Flee Chicago

An investigation from ProPublica and Mother Jones this week revealed that the city of Chicago has been bankrupting its citizens through aggressive efforts to collect on parking fines. And it’s not just a few isolated cases. They found around a more than 10,000 Chapter 13 bankruptcies that included debts to the city which were usually for unpaid tickets in amounts averaging $3,900. Tickets totaled about 7 % of the city’s total operating budget, around $264 million in 2016. Chicago loves to make parking difficult. For residential streets, they require you purchase a city sticker. Where you can find a parking spot, sometimes there will be neighborhood stickers too, further restricting spots. If you don’t have a city sticker, bam. $200 fine, and it’s not like they won’t give you a ticket because you have already received one. Unpaid tickets can result in garnishment of tax refunds, impounds, license suspensions and more. So while they can’t imprison you for debt, they basically make it impossible for you to travel, which makes it awfully hard to hold down a job to pay off fines.

There are many caveats to this, of course. You should obey the law and pay for parking and park legally, and in Chicago especially, having a car sucks because of the winter and it’s generally pretty easy to get around with the L and Metra, but they don’t go everywhere. So while it’s not impossible to avoid getting trapped in this cyclical debt loop with the city, it’s pretty hard to get out of once you’re in it. That’s where bankruptcy comes in, which is sometimes the only choice even when it wrecks your credit score. Chicago has been one of the only major metropolitan areas to lose population recently and one can’t help but wonder if it’s policies like this that place the city’s budget over the wellbeing of its people that is driving the exodus.

Geely Owner Buys into Daimler

This week Li Shufu, Chairman of Chinese automaker Geely, spent 7.3 billion Euro on Daimler stock, making him the largest single shareholder in the company who rejected advances from him previously. He now owns almost 10% of the company after initially asking for only five and has signaled his intention to stick with that amount for the time being, which sounds like a threat if he’s not taken seriously. China has been one of the strongest markets for German vehicles in the last decade and vehicles from Audi, BMW, Mercedes and others are frequently copied by Chinese manufacturers looking to cash in on their popular style. The Germans don’t need help selling their cars in China, and Daimler already has partnerships formed with BAIC Motor and BYD to develop electric vehicles under the Denza brand name, so it makes sense why Daimler wouldn’t want anything to do with Li or Geely. What it is Li is hoping to get from his hostile purchase of Daimler stock is still unclear, especially after it was reported that he had kicked the tires at Fiat Chrysler before going after Daimler stock. The companies are very, very different, so perhaps it’s just an effort to exert a greater control on overseas automotive players. Sort of the business equivalent of building sand islands in the South China Sea to claim more territory.

BMW to Build Mini-E in China

Speaking of China, they’re way out ahead of the rest of the world in terms of electric vehicle adoption and automakers the world over are seeing the advantage of working with Chinese companies who have developed expertise in this space. One such company is BMW, who has partnered with Chinese company Brilliance to produce the forthcoming electric Mini. Apparently this will be the first mini vehicle ever produced outside of England even though Mini has been owned, operated and designed by Germans since 2001. For some reason, some Mini electric vehicles will also be produced in England, but they will be different than the ones made in China. Given the strong history of both countries producing unreliable crap, this is sort of like a choose your own painful automotive adventure scenario. 

UPS Expands Electric Fleet

Meanwhile, UPS is keeping Brown close to town. Er, home. Hometown. They’re getting some electric vehicles from the U.S. Specifically from Workhorse, who we’ve mentioned a few times here for their electric pickup truck. Apparently they’ve been working with UPS for about four years on the development of a class 5 delivery truck, whatever class 5 means, but UPS want more of them and have placed an order for 50. They’ll use these vehicles as a technology testbed with the aim of purchasing more next year. Of course the range of these trucks won’t be as good as on their gas-powered counterparts, especially when hauling heavy loads, UPS said that, just like their skimpy shorts, they’re okay covering less ground than is appropriate.

Ferrari Keeps on Rolling (Back Odometers)

Some disturbing news for all of you looking at the used Ferrari market this week when it was revealed that Ferrari corporate openly allowed dealerships to manipulate odometer readings, rolling back mileage to zero to inflate the value of their vehicles for sale. It’s not clear if they could roll back mileage to an arbitrary number, since a car with 50,000 miles on it will show some signs of wear and the odometer reading zero miles would smell awfully fishy. There’s also a statement from Ferrari that this could only be conducted on cars with fewer than 311 miles or 500 kilometers, which seems like it was intended to be used to wipe off delivery miles so new cars could be handed over to customers with a big old goose egg on the dash. How many times they could be reset though, could be meaningful. And the fact that, in order to use the tool, dealerships were required to receive authorization from Ferrari HQ is most definitely meaningful because it means they’re at least complicit in violating US federal and state laws against odometer manipulation. Ultimately, I don’t think this is going to result in any substantial change in the used Ferrari market since its application was apparently so limited, but it’s just sketchy as hell that such a function existed anyway. It’s pretty strange to me that Ferrari makes cars where you can change the odometer willy-nilly, but you can’t even stop it catching fire because they used cheap glue. Italian priorities...

Metal Market Manipulation Means More Migraines

Back here at home, Donald Trump has announced that he will be applying a 25% tariff to foreign steel and a 10% tariff to aluminum, apparently to prop up U.S. metal manufacturers. This is, of course, shortsighted and idiotic because lots of things use metals as components including, importantly, motor vehicles. So by making parts more expensive to come into the country, that incentivizes companies to produce their cars elsewhere and then import them, costing the U.S. vehicle manufacturing jobs. It will also result in higher vehicle prices during a time when vehicle sales are down, costing dealerships salespeople jobs. It could also kick off a trade war with China, the world’s largest steel manufacturer, who could impose tariffs on American goods in response, costing jobs in other sectors like farming. While the tariffs haven’t been implemented yet, the announcement alone took the stock market down 500 points because real businesspeople have the common sense to understand how supply chains work and appreciate the consequences of such actions. Hopefully this is a warning sign enough to scare Trump away from actually implementing the tax.

Ford’s Dumb Advertising Record

Visitors to Madrid, Spain may have noticed the iconic España Building looking a little different due to a truly massive Ford advertisement recently. Showing off the new EcoSport compact crossover, it is actually the Guinness World Record holder for largest billboard. I know an audio medium is not an ideal venue to discuss the scale of a visual advertisement, but consider it’s the size of 20 tennis courts and you sort of have a mental picture of how huge and unnecessary it is. If you’re thinking it’s ironic that they’d use such a wasteful display to promote the EcoSport, Ford says that when the ad campaign is complete, it will be donated to the Apascovi Foundation employment center for people with disabilities, where the materials used in its construction will be repurposed somehow.

Toyota to Build Mini-Nurburgring

The Nurburgring in Germany is widely considered the best place to test the limits of a car thanks to its long and varied course. That’s why it’s so popular to try to set new records there - automakers think of it as a measure of a car’s ability to cope with the most demanding conditions a car can face while driving as fast as possible. But for Japanese companies, Germany is half a world away, so getting cars there for comprehensive testing can be a huge pain in the ass. So as Toyota got to work on a new research and development center back home in Japan, they have decided to dedicate two square miles to the creation of a mini-Nurburgring. It’s just 3.3 miles but will feature many of the most demanding turns and elements of the famous German track. Fortunately, since this will be owned by Toyota, I don’t think it’ll experience the same ridiculous lap time contests, saving journalists the world over from having to roll our eyes when some new company claims to be the fastest ever around it.

Uber Rider Blacks Out, Finds Himself Home (300 miles away)

Another week, another crazy Uber story, but fortunately this was in no way the company’s fault. A man visiting friends at West Virginia University got hammered and, like a responsible college kid, called himself an Uber to get back home. Problem is, he lives in New Jersey and the driver, a well-meaning chap with a ridiculously comfortable Toyota Sienna, obliged for the 300 mile journey across three states to return him home when he blacked out in the back seat. The cost of this monumental cock-up? $1,635 and one rich Uber driver’s whole night. Even worse, the guy accidentally ordered an Uber XL instead of just an X, so he paid $700 more than he even could have if his drunk ass had been able to press buttons right. At least he didn’t drive, but maybe there is such a thing as too drunk to Uber.

Stink Bugs Create Rotten Situation for Kiwis

New Zealand residents waiting for new cars from Japan have been forced to wait a bit longer due to a severe infestation of stink bugs on container ships from Japan. New Zealand has a fragile ecosystem to which stink bugs could potentially do severe damage, so three container ships hauling approximately 10,000 new and used vehicles from Japan have been made to sit off the coast of the country until they can be cleaned out. A further 8,000 are sitting at the dock in Japan waiting for transport. New processes will be put into place after this fiasco to ensure cars are cleaned prior to shipment, but there’s still no word on when those ships will be cleaned up and vehicles delivered. Suddenly my house’s infestation doesn’t seem so dire.

Clever Man Pays, Steals with Own Tools

Here in the Midwest, police across several states are looking for a man who has been stealing thousands of dollars from automated car washes in Ohio and Indiana. This guy rolls up to an automated wash, inserts a laminated $20 bill attached to some fishing wire, yanks out the bill and cancels the sale on the wash machine, which spits out money in the amount he paid. At one station in Indiana, he was able to complete the task 35 times, netting him $700 just at one location. He’s apparently done this several times at different locations in different states and has yet to be caught, despite his face being visible to cameras on the machines. And we’re not talking about some criminal hacker mastermind, we’re talking about a clever guy with a laminator and fishing line. I had no idea car washes were so easy to game or held $700 worth of cash in them at one time! Kudos to this guy, but also not because, you know, criminal.

Naked Man Plays, Drives by Own Rules

In Kansas City this week, drivers along the 435 freeway that loops the city were treated to quite the show. Specifically, on display was a nude male riding a stolen bright yellow ATV into oncoming traffic. He refused to stop police and kept going for a while, managing to be filmed by several drivers which, let me tell you, makes for one hell of an animated gif. Police were eventually able to apprehend him and noted that no “dangerous instruments” were found on him, which seems like an especially harsh commentary on his personal endowment. Apparently the owner of the ATV called the police to report it stolen, at which point the 911 dispatcher started laughing and said “we know where your ATV is.” The owner may want to go ahead and purchase a new seat though.

Authored by
Devlin Riggs