Cars Tips: October 2012

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

2014 Subaru Forester Officially Revealed, will Debut at the LA Auto Show, Offer 2.0L Turbo in America

Here comes the 2014 Subaru Forester, and this time, it's official as the Japanese carmaker released the first photos and details simultaneously in North America and its home market of Japan.

This is the fourth generation of the Forester since the model's debut in 1997 and as we've seen from previous pictures of the car, it doesn't stray too far away from the design of the current model. In fact, we wouldn't be surprised if an untrained eye had a hard time telling the two apart…

With all the chaos caused by Sandy, you would be forgiven to forget that it's Halloween today, a fest that under regular circumstances, is one of the most popular holidays in North America as well as other regions in the western world.

What Halloween means for most people, regardless of age and gender, is getting creative and having some fun by dressing up to either scare people or make them laugh their heads off.

In some ways, the same can be said for certain automobiles and the way that their respective owners have altered their appearance.

On Tuesday, we shared a scoop shot of a 2014 Mercedes-Benz E-Class sedan without a single trace of camouflage that was photographed while standing under a hotel entrance in the Spanish city of Madrid.

Because of the small size of the picture, we weren't absolutely sure about its authenticity at the time, but now that we have obtained the original, high-resolution version of the image, we can confirm that it is indeed the real deal.

We believe that we can deal with almost everything until nature decides to demonstrate that we are mostly helpless against its forces, no matter how technologically advanced our civilization is.

Hurricane Sandy that crashed onto the East Coast this week has sadly claimed many lives; and that pales in comparison to everything else.

Still, however harsh it may sound, life goes on and the survivors have to deal with the aftermath. Sandy being a hurricane and then a super storm has inflicted big damages. Besides homes, cars are probably the most expensive, as well as exposed, items that were flooded or broken by other means, such as falling trees.

We will let you in on a dirty "little" secret that may surprise a select few including the protagonist of this accident: Harley Davidson motorcycles aren't sports bikes and should never be treated as such on the road.

To give you an example, a telltale sign that you are definitely overdoing it and pushing your luck is the sound of stretched saddlebags scrapping the asphalt. If anything else, this should inform you that you are being too much of a "Low Rider" for your own safety.

Eight years in the market is a long time, even for a specialty brand such as Maserati and a car like its Quattroporte sports saloon, however gorgeous it may be.

This will soon change, though, as the Italians are in the final development stages of the next generation Quattroporte, which for the first time ever, has been spied without the clunky plastic moldings of previous prototypes.

On Tuesday, we ran a story based on a report by Bloomberg News that Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne has been talking to PSA Peugeot Citroen and Opel executives about the three carmakers merging into a single entity. Today, however, Marchionne refuted the report describing it to Automotive Europe as “bizarre”.

The Fiat-Chrysler CEO admitted that he had been talking with GM and PSA CEOs Dan Akerson and Philippe Varin, respectively, but he stressed that the discussions were misinterpreted by the report.

The circular design themes on the wrap are no doubt distracting, but make no mistake; this is a prototype of the production version of the next Lexus IS sedan, which we had previously seen only in test mule guise.

If you take a close look at the prototype's body, you will find many common styling cues with the Lexus LF-CC Concept displayed at the Paris Motor Show this past September, including the slanted "spindle" front grille that extends to the bottom of the bumper, the strong belt line, the creased side skirts and the design of the rear end.

This is no coincidence as the LF-CC was penned as a thinly disguised concept for an IS Coupe, which will join the range shortly after the sedan model pictured here, offering Lexus a product to compete against the BMW 3 / 4 Series and Audi A5 coupes.

New York City's Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) has its hands full after Hurricane and then super storm Sandy left absolute devastation in many parts of the Big Apple.

Over the past 24 hours, the state agency, which operates New York City's subway and buses, as well as commuter trains, bridges and tunnels, has released video footage of the damage caused to the public transportation system by the freak storm.

After recording a top speed of 216.133 mph (347.756 km/h) during the Land Speed World Finals for the Grand Touring Sports C (C/GT) class at the Bonneville Salt Flats this past August, ACAT Global's Ferrari 575 racer has now been parked at the company's SEMA Show booth at the Las Vegas Convention Center for all to see. Read more »

Fender Brings the Music to New VW Beetle Special Edition, Priced from $24,440*

Volkswagen has released U.S. pricing for its new 2013 Beetle Fender Edition that will arrive in dealerships across the country at the beginning of November with a choice of two engines.

The base model is equipped with VW's 170-horsepower 2.5-liter five-cylinder unit and is priced at $24,440 with the manual gearbox and $25,540 with the automatic, while those looking for more oomph can opt for the 200-horsepower 2.0-liter TSI Turbo model that starts at $28,130 for the manual version and $29,200 for the DSG-equipped model. All aforementioned MSRPs exclude a destination charge of $795.

Massachusetts-based kit car company Smyth Performance is pondering a new project for a pickup truck conversion of the fourth generation Volkswagen Jetta sedan.

The company's founder, Mark Smith, who also happens to be the co-founder of Factory Five Racing, said in a posting earlier this week that he is accepting "orders" from interested clients without a deposit, for one of the 50 kits he plans to manufacture for the Jetta pickup truck.

Every time the Volkswagen and Audi brands come out with a new model or even a limited edition, ABT Sportsline is sure to follow up with its own tuning take.

The facelifted Audi Q5 is no exception with the German tuning firm releasing a package for the compact crossover that increases output and gives its exterior a different look.

New videos shot during the cataclysmic Hurricane and then Post-Tropical Storm Sandy that unleashed it power on the Mid-Atlantic and New England Coasts this week are constantly popping up on the web.

In this clip filmed by a one "Gianni F", who along with his friend, was navigating through the flooded roads of Bayville, New York, captured several drivers including one in a Bentley Continental GTC Convertible and another in a BMW 5-Series sedan playing with their expensive wheel's fate and…insurance premiums.

The Cube was never the success Nissan had hoped for in overseas markets when it presented the third generation version , but the squared off sub-compact model with the asymmetric rear styling has its crowd in the automaker's home market of Japan, where it is now entering a new model year.

The revisions for the 2013 Cube are kept to a minimum and are highlighted by the improved 1.5-liter engine that now develops 110hp (111PS / 82kW) and which adopts a new start/stop system.

The battle for the 2012 U.S. elections has spilled over the automobile industry after Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney told an Ohio crowd last week that Jeep is planning to move all of its production to China, while also airing an ad that says Obama "sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China. Mitt Romney will fight for every American job."

The problem is that the Chrysler Group is not considering to relocate production from the U.S. to China, but instead is weighing its options to open new plants in China to meet increasing demand in the country.

With the new generation of the Viper, now marketed under the SRT brand, being just weeks if not days, away from launch, the Chrysler Group announced that it's Mopar division has already prepared a variety of upgrade parts for the two-seater sports car that will be available for order soon. Read more »

New Mazda MX-5 Super25 Concept Designed as an Endurance Racer

You can never have too much of a good thing, so while Mazda never proceeded with last year's supercharged MX-5 Super20, the concept lives on in a slightly different form as the MX-5 Super25 that made its debut at the 2012 SEMA Show this week.

The Japanese carmaker tells us that the new study was "crafted with endurance racing in mind".

As we have seen more times than we care to remember, slowing down at a zebra crossing is something not all Russian drivers are accustomed to, which leads to myriads of accidents like this one.

Only difference here is that after seemingly smashing into the car in front and on the side, the driver of the white Lada Samara quickly turns the hatchback around and heads towards the other lane abandoning the scene of the accident, almost causing another one in the process and leaving the other road users scratching their heads…

From day one, we all knew what was missing from the Honda CR-Z – feel free to say it out loud with us: Power, Power and Power. With the exception of some limited-run production models prepared by Honda's in-house tuner Mugen for Japan and Britain, the automaker has not addressed this problem.

At the 2012 SEMA Show in Las Vegas, Honda is displaying yet another concept model for a faster and more focused version of the CR-Z, which it describes as, "a further exploration of the performance potential of the CR-Z Sport Hybrid", but does not say if it has any plans for production.

Famed stand-up comedian and ventriloquist Jeff Dunham was summoned by the Chrysler Group to show his love about cars with a modern-day hot rod, dubbed Project UltraViolet, which was unveiled at this week's 2012 SEMA Show in Las Vegas.

Mopar and SRT collaborated with Dunham and his crew from Palmer’s Customs of Camarillo, California, to customize a 2012 Dodge Challenger SRT8.

With the 2012 Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) Show in full swing, Mazda lifted the wraps off three new concept versions of its CX-5 compact crossover to demonstrate the personalization choices owners have, and in one case, to highlight the diesel option that may soon be available in North America.

We will start with the latter that is named after actor and Mazda racecar driver Patrick Dempsey and which uses the Japanese brand's European-specification SKYACTIV-D 2.2-liter clean diesel engine to power the all-wheel-drive system through a six-speed manual gearbox.

Mega Storm Sandy Submerges 16 New Fisker Karma EVs, which Then Catch Fire at New Jersey Port

The bad news for Fisker continues. Among the many victims of Hurricane and then Tropical Storm Sandy are approximately 16 brand new Fisker Karma extended-range hybrids that were parked in Port Newark, New Jersey.

An eyewitness told Jalopnik (which like the rest of the Gawker websites, continues to be down after Sandy drowned its data center but is broadcasting temporarily from this site), that the Karma sedans “first submerged in a storm surge and then caught fire, exploded.”

Back in 2009, Lingenfelter Performance Engineering (LPE) become one of the many independent shops at the time to capitalize on the approaching death of the Pontiac brand by releasing a concept model inspired by the 1970s Pontiac Firebird Trans-Am and based on the then brand new Chevrolet Camaro.

Fast forward to today and the 2012 SEMA Show in Las Vegas, Lingenfelter unwrapped the production version of its T/A Concept that will be known from now own as the LTA.

All mainstream European carmakers are, to a higher or lower degree, facing problems due to the debt crisis that’s storming the continent.

Ford has started closing down plants, Opel and Peugeot are burning cash each day for the past eight months while they try to figure out how to work on their partnership and, as for Fiat… well, thank God that Chrysler is profitable.

The sole survivor in this mess seems to be the VW Group that’s still very profitable, much to the annoyance of its rivals and especially Marchionne who accused Wolfsburg of not playing by the book. However, even the mighty VW has been forced to trim its estimates, as the crisis begins to knock on Germany’s door.

Honda says it is "reaching out to the enthusiast community" with two new concepts of the 2013 Accord that were built by independent vehicle tuners and which are on display at this week's SEMA Show in Las Vegas.

The most impressive of the two models is the 2013 Accord Coupe "Grand Touring" developed by Bisimoto Engineering, which upgraded the stock car's 3.5-liter V6 with a supercharger system and a boatload of other goods to lift output to 401-horses.

The Specialty Equipment Market Association show, most commonly (and conveniently) known as SEMA, that’s taking place these days in Las Vegas is the perfect venue for manufacturers to showcase pumped-up versions of their normal production cars.

Some of them eventually enter production while others remain just something for the tuning scene crowd to salivate over. Hyundai’s Veloster RE:MIX belongs to the former category, as it is much more down-to-Earth compared to some of the other versions launched at the show.

If you happen to be in Russia, you may want to memorize the license plate of this small city car and keep a safe distance from it in the rare chance you cross roads with the woman behind the wheel (or so we are told that it's a lady by the person who uploaded the video), especially is she's trying to park.

To our surprise, even the pup featured in the clip senses that there is something fundamentally wrong with her parking skills and tries to warn the driver about her shortcomings by barking aloud.

A reader of Spanish auto website Autofacil claims to have nabbed the upcoming 2014 Mercedes-Benz E-Class sedan without a dollop of camouflage. The photographer, Víctor Gutiérrez Poza, told the site that he caught the car from his room in the hotel Chamartín in Madrid, Spain.

While one can never be sure, the image does look legit to us. Moreover, it wouldn't be a first for a yet-to-be revealed Mercedes-Benz model to be filmed unguarded and undisguised out in the open, with the most recent case coming to mind being the CLA compacts sports saloon.

About a month before the regular and hybrid variants of the new 2013 Avalon series arrive in dealerships across the States at the beginning of December, Toyota released detailed pricing info for the two models.

The new Avalon will begin at a lower price point than the car it replaces at $30,990 for the base gasoline model, rising to $41,400 for the hybrid variant in top-spec trim. Keep in mind that these prices do not include a delivery, processing and handling (DPH*) fee of $795.

There's a new racier pony car making its debut at Sin City's SEMA Show and it's called the Mustang Cobra Jet Concept.

It's a prototype version of Ford's factory-built turnkey drag racer that replaces the 2013 Mustang Cobra Jet's 5.0-liter V8 unit that's available with or without a supercharger with a new iteration of the V8 featuring a pair of turbochargers incorporating the brand's EcoBoost technologies.

We warned you that Kia was preparing a team of DC Comics superhero cars and here are the results of the Korean firm's efforts, inspired by the members of the Justice League, just before they set off for the SEMA aftermarket show.

The five DC Comic-themed tuned cars are: the Flash Forte Koup, Aquaman Rio 5-door, Cyborg Forte 5-door, Green Lantern Soul and the previously unveiled Batman Optima that was first shown in New York's Time Warner Center a couple of weeks ago.

The Blue Oval posted its third quarter results on Tuesday reporting a net income of $1.6 billion or 40 cents per share, which is about the same as the third quarter 2011. Ford has been recording a pre-tax profit for 13 consecutive quarters. Read more »

Unbelievable Raw Video Shows Cars Under Water in Manhattan

It would take someone with the imagination of fictional character Agent Fox Mulder to have predicted the catastrophe caused by the mega storm known as Sandy and which has not yet been unveiled in its entirety, that hit the east side of the United States on Monday.

Among the areas hit the most was Manhattan after a record 13-foot storm surge flooded the southern parts of the city.

A video shot by a one Sean Blackwell from the relative safety of a higher building shows how the raging water turned East 8th and Avenue C into a sea river engulfing cars and everything else in its way, just before the blackout took place.

Making their world premiere today at the 2012 SEMA Show are two new Acura ILX compact sedan builds, one for the street and the other for the racetrack, marking the return of the Japanese brand to the Las Vegas aftermarket show after a six-year hiatus.

The 2013 ILX "Street Build" project car was made to demonstrate the customization possibilities for enthusiasts.

Subaru is using this week's 2012 SEMA Show to reveal a pair of special edition WRX and WRX STI models with bespoke color themes inside and out, but nothing much else.

Both Special Edition WRX and WRX STI sedans are finished in an “Orange and Black” custom paint scheme, with a Tangerine Orange color for the body, jet-black custom wheels, black front fender badging and exterior mirrors, plus black exterior graphics.

If it is tuning extremes you want to see, there's no better place in the world to be than the annual SEMA Show in Las Vegas – period.

Over the next few days, we will bring you a taste of the heavily customized production and concept vehicles to grace the Las Vegas Convention Center's show floors and surrounding roads, the oddest, or if you prefer, the less mainstream of which, we will bundle under the "Oh, SEMA" tag line.

After the recent sighting of the revamped 2014 BMW 5-Series Touring, we knew that it was only a matter of time before our scoop photographers caught on to a prototype of the four-door sedan model.

Naturally, the subtle mid-life makeover will bring the same styling updates to both body-styles.

Even though these early prototypes may not be telling us the whole truth, we suspect that BMW designers will make some subtle styling revisions to the 5-Series' headlamps, the double kidney grille, the rear light clusters and the bumpers.

Despite our better judgment and unlike animals, people have the tendency to stay put when Mother Nature unleashes its destructive forces – well, that is, until something-something hits the fan...

Like this family filming the powerful gusts caused by this week's Superstorm Sandy from the supposed safety of their own homes.

The man holding the mobile camera describes the situation "The Apocalypse" and makes some funny remarks, but only until trees start snapping and crashing down on their own and their neighbors' cars as well as power lines, which eventually sparked a fire.

German tuning and styling house MR Car Design has announced the arrival of a new performance package for the European market Mazda3 MPS hatchback, which is known as the MazdaSpeed3 in North America. Read more »

Chevrolet's SEMA Show Trio of Classic and New Camaro Project Cars

In addition to the production 2013 Camaro Hot Wheels Edition that was unwrapped on Monday, Chevrolet will show six more Camaro models at the SEMA Show that opens today in Las Vegas, though, for the time being, we only get pictures of three of them.

First up is the 1967 Hot Wheels Camaro Concept that pays tribute to the original Hot Wheels “Custom Camaro” toy, while also premiering a brand-new crate powertrain that connects a 430-horsepower LS3 engine to a 4L65-E four-speed automatic transmission.

The devastating effects of Superstrom Sandy continue to create havoc on the eastern seaboard of the U.S. The storm, which has already claimed the lives of at least 16 people in the States and one in Canada, adding to an earlier toll of 67, has cut power to more than 7 million people and caused massive floods in many states.

In addition, Sandy brought down several popular websites in the New York area such as the entire Gawker family of blogs, which includes our friends over at Jalopnik, along with the The Huffington Post, Mediate and Buzzfeed.

The crew at Jalopnik, who are well in their health and are now posting through the blog's Facebook and Twitter accounts, and just moments ago, from live.Jalopnik.com as well, were still able to capture this shot of a Bentley Continental GTC Convertible, most likely in the streets or shall we say…river streams of New York City, in the early morning hours of Tuesday.

In most markets, the lifespan of a new model is about six to eight years - give or take, with a facelift scheduled somewhere in the middle. China, on the other hand, is not your usual car market; or at least it wasn’t for quite a long time.

That’s why the Volkswagen Santana, which was based on the second generation of the Passat, code-named B2, and was launched in the Chinese market in 1982, soldiered on for three decades!

During that period, it sold nearly four million units, which made it one of the most popular cars in the country.

On the occasion of the international driving debut of its brand new XF Sportbrake that took place only a few weeks before the car arrives in European showrooms, Jaguar unveiled a bespoke speedboat concept to showcase the brand's design DNA on a completely different product as well as to inspire buyers of the estate model.

"We recognise that both our existing and future customers enjoy diverse and active lifestyles," explained Jaguar Director of Design, Ian Callum. "With the launch of the new Jaguar XF Sportbrake, we had an opportunity to create a vision of how our design philosophy might be applied to an alternative product, in which speed and beauty are also priorities."

About a month after the SEMA Show that kicks off today, Europe will have its own aftermarket festival in the guise of the 45th annual Essen Motor Show, which takes place in Germany from December 1 to 9.

The BMW brand will be there with a host of production and racing models including its full M Performance range and Original BMW Accessories lineup.

New 2013 Nissan Altima V8 Supercar Unveiled in Melbourne

Nissan has whipped the covers off its brand-new contender for next year's Australian V8 Supercars Championship, the 2013 Altima Supercar V8 Supercar, during a special event on Tuesday morning in Melbourne.

The Nissan Altima will be the first new entry in the series that has been restricted to Ford Falcons and Holden Commodores for the past two decades.

The Japanese carmaker has partnered with Kelly Racing and will field four entries under the Nissan Motorsport banner for the 2013 championship.

For the time being, Alfa Romeo may be tangled in the ever-changing puzzle that is the Fiat-Chrysler group product plan, but there's certainly something about the brand that ignites automotive stylists’ inspiration.

With the Alfa Romeo Giulia 50GT Concept, Rome-based Italian designers Michele Di Mauro and Claudio Piccioli who run the GetShaped Studio have re-imagined the Giulia Sprint GT penned by Bertone.

Apart from bringing the classic Alfa coupe into the 21st century, the two designers wanted to celebrate the studio’s centenary as well as the model’s 50th anniversary (hence the “50” in the name).

The two studies, a GT-oriented and a sportier, more aggressive version (the red and the grey-colored examples respectively) remain faithful to the overall concept of the original Giulia, retaining its large circular headlamps and oversized Alfa “shield” at the front, as well as the hood air vent.

Even in the most horrible of circumstances, we humans can find some time to horse around, or so to speak, though in one occasion, that would probably be the perfect description...

So, after the horse-masked jogger in shorts and the numerous people dancing behind news crew reporting on Hurricane Sandy today (if you missed them, we've added the respective videos after the break), we now have footage of a power-happy driver getting his two seconds of fame when he passed by a live shot.

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

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