The Arquus Scarabée military vehicle concept was showcased to the public about a year ago, but the first clips of an early build in action started to surface online last month, and you can see why it’s named after an insect.
Read MoreMost people can only dream of owning their own battleship, but thanks to eBay (of course!) you can now be the proud owner of three battleships—and a light cruiser to boot. The catch: All four ships are underwater and technically shipwrecks. The ships are part of Germany’s World War I fleet, scuttled after the end of the war.
Read MoreA U.S. Air Force KC-46 Pegasus tanker made an unorthodox and—to the uninitiated, anyway—dangerous-looking landing. The brand new tanker, coming for a landing at Le Bourget Airport in Paris, looked more than a little out of control before pulling off a near-perfect touchdown.
Read MoreThe F-35’s myriad problems are really now just a running gag. But its latest ones are wild, ranging from buyers feeling that they’re being spied on through the jets to the potential for structural damage if flown fast at very high altitudes, which is something that fighter jets are known to do from time to time. Oh, and the possibility pilots could experience sudden, agonizing nose and ear pain.
Read MoreThe latest weapon in the great power competition shaping up between the West and China is, inevitably, the laser. Over the past year American and Australian military personnel have reported being the target of lasers coming from the direction of Chinese forces, in some cases resulting in eye injuries. The lasers are another form of deniable harassment conducted by Chinese military personnel and the so-called “maritime militia”: commercial sailors deputized by the Chinese navy.
Read MoreAs you likely know, it’s the 75th anniversary of D-Day, when 160,000 Allied troops invaded the beaches of Normandy, undertaking the largest from-the-sea invasion in the history of human warfare and marking the beginning of the end for the Axis. The actual business of getting over 100,000 soldiers and a metric crapton of vehicles and equipment from the ocean on to land is a decidedly non-trivial problem, one that the Allies solved with a brilliant but simple patented plywood boat: the Landing Cra
Read MoreOf all the stories of the D-Day invasion, the most heroic—and tragic—involve the waves of Allied soldiers who waded ashore to face the enemy on the beach. Thousands of American, British, and Canadian troops, many simple riflemen, were hurled against beach defenses occupying German troops had spent years perfecting. One of the unsung weapons that helped keep Allied casualties down were the “Funnies,” tanks modified to help sweep aside Axis defenses.
Read MoreAnybody who tries to claim BMW doesn’t position itself as a performance brand anymore doesn’t really know what they’re talking about. That’s never been more obvious to me than after I drove the new BMW 3 Series, BMW 8 Series and 2020 BMW Z4 back to back last month, but the star of the show was the Z4.
Read MoreThe latest high-performance car to come from BMW’s M division may be an ugly crossover coupe, but the 2020 BMW X4 M Competition also has over 500 horsepower from BMW’s most powerful inline-six ever, a rear-biased all-wheel drive setup, and 100 percent functional air vents. The X4 M is a real M car, and it’s actually pretty awesome.
Read MoreWhen it comes to picking between serious driving performance and ride comfort, it might be time to admit I have chosen my side and so has the 2019 BMW X5 4oi—a big, cushy cruiser that’s competent enough in regular driving, but really shines more in everything else it does.
Read MoreWell, I can go ahead and add “giant cruise ship hauling ass directly toward me while I gaze over the ocean from a dock” to the list of things I need to be unreasonably afraid of. And I’m sure everyone who was standing on this dock in Venice while 65,o00 ton cruise ship MSC Opera barreled toward them with no sign of slowing down now feel the same way.
Read MoreAs Jalopnik’s resident car buying expert and professional car shopper, I get emails. Lots of emails. I’ve decided to pick a few questions and try to help out. This week we are discussing avoiding the finance office, inspecting “certified” cars, and when ridesharing makes more sense than owning.
Read MoreOrder guides for the 2020 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 just dropped, so let’s you and I take a gander through what we can option with this 760-horsepower, supercharged monster. The first thing you need to know is that it starts at $70,300. Update: the full list with MSRP and options has been included.
Read MoreRobert has an Audi RS7 which is a very fast car but better suited as a daily driver, he wants a weekend toy and maybe some track days. It needs to be quicker than his current ride. He has a pretty healthy budget and a lot of options to consider, what car should he buy?
Read MoreDespite being in the age of internet car shopping, some dealers will still dig deep in the old bag of tricks to close a sale and prevent you from shopping elsewhere. One of the classic tricks is when they say “this deal is only good for today,” which is, of course, mostly nonsense.
Read MoreThe 2020 Mercedes-Benz GLS follows in the footsteps of its sister vehicle, the S Class, otherwise known as, at any given time, the best car in the world. It’s part of Mercedes’ family of SUVs, including the GLA (sister car of the A Class), GLC (C Class), and GLE (the naming convention should be obvious by now). But the GLS, now in its third-generation, wants to be the best SUV in the world.
Read MoreAs Jalopnik’s resident car buying expert and professional car shopper, I get emails. Lots of emails. I’ve decided to pick a few questions and try to help out. This week we are talking about getting deals on two cars, when the best time to sell privately, and minor accidents on certified cars.
Read MoreI don’t think we’re shocking anyone when we say that the Chevrolet Chevette was not really a great car. That’s not just because it was designed to be a cheap, everyperson’s car—there’s many of those I really admire—but the Chevette always seemed to be a bit of a half-assed effort.
Read MoreAmanda just got a job as a traveling nurse, so she is on the road a lot, but her old Honda Civic is too small to handle her gear and her pets. She is looking for something bigger but doesn’t want to sacrifice fuel economy or reliability. What car should she buy?
Read MoreThe Cadillac CT6 has officially been canceled, as we learned last year. Production ended at the beginning of this month, but there are still the 2020 model-year cars to roll out. And they look like they’ll be fairly good deals.
Read MoreI’m a professional car buyer who has helped hundreds of people find the right car and get a competitive deal, and along the way I’ve spoken with numerous young people entering the car buying market for the first time. I’ve also had way too many conversations with folks that make some wrong moves early on and put themselves in a tough spot. Here’s how to avoid that.
Read MoreAs Jalopnik’s resident car buying expert and professional car shopper, I get emails. Lots of emails. I’ve decided to pick a few questions and try to help out. This week we are discussing service issues on brand new cars, what to fix before you sell, and the risks of buying a car from a salvage auction.
Read MoreNew car sales are slowing down and due to the rising average cost of a brand new model, more buyers are pivoting to the preowned market. It’s no secret that letting someone else take the depreciation can result in a better value for your dollar, but a new study from iSeeCars examines which models can get you the most for your money.
Read MoreJohn has gotten tired of his 13-year-old Camry that treated him well, but it’s time for an upgrade. He is looking for something with a bit of excitement, that’s not going to cost a fortune to keep on the road. What car should he buy?
Read MoreThe original Mercedes CLA and GLA cars were not the most well received in their “regular” versions. While they were inexpensive for something with a Benz badge, you definitely noticed the cost on the inside. Of course, a healthy dose of horsepower from the AMG division fixed all that, and now the CLA/GLA 45 AMG cars can be found cheaper than you might expect.
Read MoreAs Jalopnik’s resident car buying expert and professional car shopper, I get emails. Lots of emails. I’ve decided to pick a few questions and try to help out. This week we are discussing bonkers online pricing errors, lease swapping, and buying a used diesel car.
Read MoreAlex got a new job that’s a big upgrade. But he has to make a good impression for the company’s clients, so he needs to upgrade his ride. He is looking for something that can seat four adults, is good for Minnesota winters, looks professional, but isn’t over the top. What car should he buy?
Read MoreThe 2019 Mercedes-Benz A-Class is a refreshing take at the luxury compact segment. It looks dashing—especially in CLA four-door coupe form—comes with fancy tech, drives well and it’s quite cheap too. But as a Canadian, I have to tell you, America, that you’re missing out on the best that is the Mercedes A-Class.
Read MoreSelling a car is a hard thing to do, unless that car is a piece of crap like my 1995 Honda Accord was. Especially if you’ve had some great memories with it, letting go can be tough. But sometimes you have no choice, and time, money, or just generally crappy circumstances force your hand. In that case, who is the ideal customer to sell to in order to minimize your agony? Do you care?
Read MoreAs if Porsche’s big-wing widebody GT3 RS needed anything else to make it stand out, this car has received a sharp set of bright green accents, and I’ll be damned if it doesn’t look mean. I don’t think this car really needed anything more to be worthy of your attention, but if you’re going to have an ostentatious car like this, why not go whole hog?
Read MorePretty much anywhere both cars and humans are present you’re bound to hear at least one of them talking about how amazing an aircooled 911 is to drive. If you’ve been a car enthusiast for more than a few minutes, you’ve likely heard more than you ever car to know about an aircooled 911. Whether you like old Porsches or not, you probably know that the steering is unparalleled, the sound of the flat six engine is evocative, and the driving experience is transcendental.
Read MoreEach and every one of us is entitled to an opinion on a given topic. Part of what makes us human is the ability to form subjective thoughts based on a lifetime of memories and influences. I can’t speak to the types of experiences that might have caused my colleague to type out an anti-rojo manifesto, but I no more want to diminish her opinion so much as I would be ecstatic to espouse my own. I. Love. Red. Tops.
Read MoreIt feels like the Indy 500 wasn’t all that long ago. Le Mans was two weeks ago. The Nurburgring 24 was just 7 days ago. Now it’s time for another event to equal those in historical significance, the 97th running of the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb. There is no team entered this year which can take on the overall record Volkswagen obliterated with its all-electric ID.R last year, but that doesn’t make the event any less exciting. There are tons of interesting and cool battles going on here
Read MoreFor 1990, General Motors introduced the world to the Isuzu-based Geo Storm. It was a deligtful economically minded lightweight sporty coupe, which was pretty well removed from anything else GM was doing in 1990. Of GM’s two youth-oriented sporty-ish wannabe Euro brands in the early 1990s, Geo was maybe sportier than Saturn. In 1991 Geo tossed a hatchback on the tail to give the rear seats more headroom and add some versatility to the storage area. It hits different.
Read MoreWe’re just a couple of weeks away from the reveal of the all-new mid-engine Chevrolet Corvette, but the outgoing C7 generation Corvette will seemingly forever be haunted by its legacy of never getting an official Nürburgring lap time. So what gives?
Read MoreAutocar caught up with Audi Sport boss Oliver Hoffmann at the 24 Hours of Nürburgring where he told the British car pub that his team’s trying to keep the V10 in the next R8, a hardcore “GT2” style R8 might be in the pipeline, and Lamborghini’s committed to staying away from turbochargers.
Read MorePublic transit is great for the deranged, attention-seeking communal city-living folks like me, but what about everybody else? It turns out you can get your very own bus for as little as $5,000 bucks with all of the pleasures of a city bus aesthetic without having to deal with any of the strangers.
Read MoreBentley, the maker of luxury cars and $252,000 books about itself encrusted in 100 carats of diamonds, now has a new set of writing utensils (that aren’t keyboards), all reasonably listed for around $600 to $700. Think, just think, about how many $252,000 books you can write for such a small investment price.
Read MoreAston Martin is bringing the DBX crossover, and soon Lagonda will also join the luxury crossover market. In a move that surprises no one, this means four-door Astons like the outgoing Rapide will likely cease to exist. But Aston is also being very careful about how its crossovers shape the brand.
Read MoreWe use words all the time—hell, I’m even using some right now, as I’m typing this! That’s why it’s sometimes alarming to realize that, hey, I don’t actually always know the full, literal meaning of every word I use, especially when it comes to proper names. For me, proper names are usually automaker names, so maybe it’s time we really look into what these names actually mean.
Read MoreJapanese car enthusiast and apparent technophile Stan LeJay has a Subaru GC8 with a few tuner mods, but the most interesting by far is his home-made infotainment system that cranks Initial D Eurobeat music when the throttle opens up. Hilarity ensues.
Read MoreIt’s time to look to the Japanese import world for our next head-to-head battle, yet another one steeped in the kind of rivalry only fun, affordable cars can create. Buckle up, Jalops. Today we’re looking at the legendary battle between the Acura Integra Type R and the Toyota Celica GT-S.
Read MoreOne of the great nameplates of the Second Minivan Wave (FWD, 1980s) was Voyager, which was used by both Plymouth and Chrysler back in the day, from 1988 to 2016. The evocative Voyager name has been dormant until today, when FCA announced that the name is coming back, as a way to rebrand and re-badge the lower trim levels of Chrysler’s minivan, the Pacifica.
Read MoreThe Supreme Court ruled on some important stuff today with significant implications for the fate of our country for decades to come. This ruling, though, may be the weirdest of the bunch:
Read MoreFender flares, when done correctly, are such a universally good car modification that they could probably make a beige Toyota Camry look good. (A few rally lights don’t hurt either.) But a wide-bodied Dodge Charger is finally here, and it sure was the perfect candidate for a little extra bulk.
Read MoreNew cars are overrated, as most of us who buy cars from questionable people and mutants online know. But the rest of America is catching up to that mindset—the “new cars are overrated” one, not the one about questionable people and mutants online—as the average age of vehicles on the road just keeps going up.
Read MoreIt’s a battle as old as time itself: who is the master of American muscle? Which is the fastest, baddest, sexiest machine? Is it the Ford Mustang? Or are you siding with the Chevy Camaro?
Read MoreArmored vehicles are, if I might say it, extremely my shit. They’re not extremely my shit in the sense that I think about and research them constantly, staying up to date with the latest armored-vehicle gossip and such, because I actually very rarely think about them and often forget they exist. But when I do remember, all I can think about is how extremely my shit they are.
Read MoreAs someone who has always owned old cars that were in something just shy of concours condition, I’m quite used to being stuck somewhere with a broken down car. That also means I’m very familiar with how people react to me and my broken-down cars. That’s also why my experience with my most recently acquired broken-down car, the Yugo, was so interesting. It revealed a lesson I very likely should have figured out intuitively: nobody has any sympathy for someone in a broken-down Yugo.
Read MoreDodge regularly gives its muscle cars both cosmetic and mechanical makeovers on top of their same, ancient roots, and we eat it up. We really do. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Thus, Dodge keeps pumping new ideas out, like a potential wide-body version of its 707-horsepower Charger SRT Hellcat.
Read MoreThis weekend during the Nurburgring 24, I was afforded some time to speak with the local German car company Hyundai and two of its executives, Albert Biermann, Head of R&D for Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis, and Thomas Schemera, Head of Global Product Strategy & Design for Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis. Both of these gentlemen are former BMW execs who made the transition to the Korean brands, and their influence has already been seen in many ways, including the addition of the Hyundai N performance car s
Read MoreBoris Johnson is a British former car writer turned Conservative politician, who is likely to be the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. When reporter Ross Kempsell simply asked him what he liked to do to relax, the answer was long, rambling, and also buses (???????????).
Read MoreYou can’t think of Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, without thinking of Matatus—colorful, privately-owned buses that about 70 percent of Nairobi citizens rely on to get around, as their speakers blast music so loud you can feel it in your stomach.
Read MoreThe Ford Puma, once part of that small, two-door car segment that was popular in decades past, is back, and it sure is big—bigger than it ever was, that is. Ford is reviving the old, driver-oriented nameplate as a new European crossover with exhilarating features like driver assistance, massaging seats and luggage space.
Read MoreThe Ferrari 250 GTO, which recently went for a record-breaking $48.4 million at RM Sotheby’s Monterey auction last August, is worth more than its own weight in gold. It’s one of the most iconic pieces of automotive collector culture and an Italian court has just officially recognized it as a work of art.
Read MoreIn the battle of 1980s 4x4 SUVs, there can be only one winner. And it’ll be up to you, Jalopnik, to decide. No pressure!
Read MoreRenowned automaker and less-renowned motorsport competitor McLaren, on Tuesday, teased an unexpected new iteration of the famous Spy Kids chronicles, in which the kid spies are now adult spies, building off of the thrilling narratives established by the original Spy Kids, The Island of Lost Dreams, Game Over and that one movie that came out way after the rest of the franchise in 2011.
Read MoreThe looks of a car model vary, sometimes slightly and sometimes significantly, between trims. A lot of that variance comes in terms of interior features, screens, and trims. But a major difference, in terms of the safety of the prospective car buyer and everyone else, is something most buyers wouldn’t notice at the dealership or in a daytime test drive: headlights.
Read MoreAn auto parts store spark plug locator kiosk has revealed that the new 2020 Ford Bronco will get Ford’s 2.3-liter turbocharged inline four-cylinder engine, the same engine found in the new Ford Ranger. That better not be the only option.
Read MoreGeneralizations about women in the car world aren’t limited to the back corners of Reddit or the comment threads, often absent of any actual female voices, about how women are “naturally inclined” not to like cars while men are the opposite, or the usual annoying stereotypes and gender-based assumptions about knowledge levels in “male” industries. The generalizations often stretch far past that, like a recent set from our friends at Aston Martin.
Read MoreNow that most of BMW’s M cars have enough power to neatly rip your face off, I suppose it’s also time for the automaker to consider how that power is made and put down. First, it gave the M5 all-wheel drive. Soon, there will be hybrid-powered M cars.
Read MoreSubaru’s lineup is one of the more focused among major automakers, and also among the most beloved, which is why it’s always been a little curious why its cars haven’t always been well-made.
Read MoreWhen Lotus first unveiled its plans for an all-new, all-electric hypercar back in April, code named Type 130, a good number of you balked at the name. Don’t expect that to stick around, though. The car will almost certainly bear a name-name, and it could very well be the Lotus Evija.
Read MoreWhat happens when you pair Williams Formula One team with British industrial equipment manufacturer JCB? You get one hell of a fast tractor that can absolutely destroy the previous British tractor speed record—and a soon-to-be released documentary about the whole process.
Read MoreBMW is having its own pseudo car-show this week in Munich called “NEXTGen,”and the first of the new vehicles to come out of it is a 600 horsepower hybrid sports car concept called the BMW Vision M NEXT. Here’s a look at every angle of this peculiar sports car, which the company’s chief technology officer seems pretty keen to put into production.
Read MoreShall I compare thee to a summer’s day, compact hatchbacks? You were the hottest thing around until everyone got extremely parched and sunburnt and decided they were done with this shit and couldn’t wait for fall. It’s time to revive the good souls of the AMC Gremlin and the Ford Pinto and let you all decide who shall reign supreme.
Read MoreIn general, the entire history of cars is much older than most people realize, partially because of Mercedes-Benz’ relentless misinformation campaign that they “invented” the car in 1886, and partially because most people just don’t really give a shit. But I do.
Read MoreTypically, if we’re talking about video games versus real life, you usually get a video game remake of something that happened for real or in a movie. Such as the Fast and the Furious drag scene or Gymkhana remakes, both on Grand Theft Auto 5. But some original bastard went ahead and did it backwards, turning real life into Need for Speed. It is utterly fantastic.
Read MoreIt is a rarified class of people who know what it’s like to roll up somewhere in a Porsche, but those very people, while fielding questions about how much their “Porsch” was, could also learn what it’s like for it to roll right on away—hence a new recall of nearly 100,000 cars.
Read MoreThe original 1997 Ford Puma was a fun, tiny, Europe-only two-door from a time when Ford Europe was obsessed with cat-like design cues. It even won Top Gear’s Car of the Year award. The new Puma will be a compact crossover, which will be like the original, only without any promise that it will be fun.
Read MoreIt is with great regret and sorrow that I bring you this particular bit of news on a Monday morning. Believe me, I wish it weren’t the case, but it is: The Citroën C4 Cactus is dead after this generation. Pardon me while I go and scream until my lungs give out.
Read MoreOne is a legend of rally racing, a fearsome and dominant machine piloted by some of the greatest drivers of its time, a car that would redefine the kind of performance we expect from a four-cylinder motor. The other is... well, pretty much the exact same, except with a boxer engine. They formed a rivalry that sadly no longer exists today, but its legend certainly does. In the war between the Subaru WRX/STI and the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, who ya got?
Read MoreEvery now and then, something really special emerges from the aether and goes up for auction, and I think this is one of those times. In August at Monterey, Mecum Auctions is going to be putting on the block a very rare (one of three) 1955 Porsche Tempo Mikafa Sport Camper. In case you, like 99.99 percent of the human population of Earth, are unfamiliar with this vehicle, imagine an embiggened Volkswagen Type 2 bus with Art Deco-like detailing and a Porsche 356 engine driving the, shockingly, fr
Read MoreNormally, when I come up with car names, my goal is to try and find the worst possible names, like the Mushler Groincat, but this time, for some inexplicable reason, I decided I want to really try. I’m tired of made up names that sound like sleep-aid medications or the interminable strings of alphanumeric names. I’m sure there’s still good, powerful, memorable, and evocative car names out there, so here’s my list, available to any carmaker with the wherewithal and howwithal to make these names h
Read MoreWhen a reader named Dan emailed me in February asking for help getting his late father’s prized small block Chevy-swapped Pontiac Fiero back up and running, I could tell the vehicle meant a lot to Dan. So gladly, I headed over to his house and got to wrenching. Now, a few months later, Dan gave me a ride in the beast, and holy crap is it quick.
Read MoreJosh Mazerolle’s truck is a 1977 Toyota Hilux (cool) with an LS V8 (whoa) twin-turbocharged (what?) to “about 1,000 wheel horsepower” (!) and the build process itself sounds just as improbable.
Read MoreJapanese auto safety supplier Takata admitted that certain airbag inflators that it supplied to General Motors for use in GMT900 trucks were defective. But GM continues to petition the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, saying that the trucks are actually safe and don’t need to be fixed. Unsurprisingly, some folks aren’t happy.
Read MoreIn The Morning Shift today, my brilliant coworker Aaron Gordon wrote about a report from the Department of Transportation stating that Americans drove 43 percent more miles in April of 2019 than they did during the same month 25 years prior. Even though vehicles are cleaner now, driving isn’t great from an environmental standpoint. But as one reader points out, sometimes it’s hard to avoid spinning up that odometer.
Read MoreWe’ve known there’s a new Land Rover Defender coming, though so far we’ve only seen heavily camouflaged prototypes running around. But it kind of looks like Lego has leaked it early. Or at least, it did its best.
Read MoreA Philadelphia oil refinery experienced a fire that caused at least three massive explosions in Southwest Philadelphia around 4 a.m. this morning, ABC 6 reports. Thankfully four employees only suffered minor injuries that were able to be treated on-site, and the blaze is still burning though firefighters reportedly now have it under control.
Read MoreOh, those poor souls who saw the rebirth of the old Fisker Karma and, entranced by its looks, bought a 2018 Karma Revero without doing a quick Google search—you know, to read a bit about it, maybe. It’s now on its second major U.S. safety recall in less than two months, this time for a side-impact protection issue.
Read More[Editor’s Note: It is with incredibly heavy hearts that we must convey the news that beloved former Jalopnik writer Davey G. Johnson’s body was recovered by Calaveras County authorities last night. Mike Spinelli was not only Davey’s editor here at Jalopnik, but a good friend.]
Read MoreOver four years since the Ford GT was first revealed, Ford is coming up with something new for it. The details are scarce, but you can see from the teaser photo above that it appears to have a giant, Le Mans-style rear wing, big enough to eat a turkey off of.
Read MoreMany modern performance cars come with some sort of fancy technical adjustable suspension setup. But not the Polestar 1. Its suspension is much more straightforward, which is surprising considering it weighs more than a literal Bentley.
Read MoreA YouTuber named Nick Shirrell decided to break out his vintage 1968 camera and record a modern track day, dubbing over some old-timey racing commentary. The resulting film makes it feel like modern race cars have somehow traveled back in time. It’s lovely.
Read MoreI was just down in Puebla, Mexico, visiting the Volkswagen factory there (I’ll explain that more soon), and while there I found some time to explore and be your eyes, ears, and, if no one is looking, tongue, to experience the cars on the streets of Puebla. Last time, I mostly focused on the many Vochos (Beetles), but this time I decided to branch out just a bit, and try to give you a bit more variety. Even I was a bit surprised. So come on! Join me on this magical voyage of discovery to the land
Read MoreI have checked our archives and was astounded to find this take by our very own Justin Westbrook that seemed to infer that the very idea of a Volkswagen T-Roc Cabriolet was ludicrous. It’s not very often that I disagree with my colleagues (OK, we disagree a lot), but this is one of those times where I must put my foot down. The Volkswagen T-Roc Cabriolet is good idea and seeing this test mule driving around brings me infinite amounts of joy.
Read MoreIt’s another year, which means it’s time for another round of J.D. Power awards. Up first is the Initial Quality Study, which reflects problems in the first 90 days of new-car ownership. Just like last year, the Korean automakers Genesis, Kia and Hyundai ranked the highest. And coming in dead last? Poor Jaguar.
Read MoreAmerican Honda Motor Co. turned 60 this year, and to celebrate, the company released a documentary that not only shows the captivating restoration of the very first Honda car brought to the U.S.,a 1967 N600, but it also describes Honda’s fascinating history in the daunting home of The Big Three.
Read MoreEverybody went crazy when Car And Driver put the new 2020 Toyota Supra on a dyno and found more power at the wheels than what was claimed by Toyota at the crank. Sadly, the Supra’s sister car, the 2020 BMW Z4, isn’t as surprising.
Read MoreAfter months of not knowing, the power figures for the 2020 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 are finally here. The supercharged V8 will put out 760 horsepower and 625 lb-ft of torque. Basically, it’s enough to drag down the moon.
Read MoreIf you want a nice and good and fine four-door BMW, you get a BMW 5 Series. If you want a nice and good and fine version of that four-door but want it with only two doors, you get a BMW 8 series. If you want a nice and good and fine four-door version of the two-door version of the BMW 5 Series, you get this, the 2020 BMW 8 Series Gran Coupe. And no, we don’t care how silly that is, because this really does look good.
Read MoreTo be a part of the automotive industry is to hear an endless stream of moaning and complaining, especially when it comes to Porsche’s cars. If Porsche deviates at all from something it used to do, you never hear the end of it, such as when the Boxster and Cayman traded out their flat-six engines in favor of turbocharged flat-fours. And now Porsche has given in.
Read MoreBMW doesn’t appear to want to even bother making a M version of the new front-wheel-drive/all-wheel-drive BMW 1 Series, as a new AutoExpress report claims.
Read MoreToday it’s not hard to think of Japanese auto companies being periodic specialists in high-revving, fun, little cars. But back in the ‘70s that was still something of a new concept. We went looking for a bit of that history in Williamsburg, and found a lot more, too.
Read MoreWe cannot thank you all enough for making the trek out to Red Hook in Brooklyn for our 2019 LeManstravaganza to watch race cars, eat food, drink booze and paint with us. It was such a kickass time!
Read MoreThe number of updates to the 2020 Lexus GX 460 can be counted on your fingers, but perhaps the most obvious one is the spindle grille. Or Predator-face, depending on your choice of science fiction. It’s less broken up by lines now, so it carries a similar effect to that of the Lexus minivan.
Read MoreFor the past two weeks, the close-knit community of automotive writers and aficionados of speed everywhere have been hoping for good news about Davey G. Johnson, the Car and Driver writer and Jalopnik alum who went missing on a motorcycle trip in California. Unfortunately, as of today, it seems that good news may not arrive.
Read MoreCertainly among the best driving experiences Porsche has ever built, the 981 Boxster Spyder remains an excellent road-going sports car, while the Cayman GT4 is a simply transcendent drive on a track or smooth canyon road. That’s great and all, but they’re old news. Porsche is back with a brand new bag, and the 718 Cayman GT4 and 718 Spyder are here for a second go-around with more power, and more grip.
Read MoreBob Lutz, a former top executive from all three of the major American automakers, occasional Corvette-powered Fisker investor, and casual skeptic of Tesla, recently came across a Tesla Model 3 and was surprised to be impressed by its build quality.
Read MoreHere I was, thumbing idly through the internet, when I hit upon an Autoblog interview with BMW CEO Markus Flasch that was published over the weekend. The interview touches upon BMW’s plans for hybrids, EVs, M-cars and then totally reminded me that BMW still actually makes a car with a V12! I had completely forgotten, instead believing BMW had ended the practice sometime during the Gulf War.
Read MoreIt’s Father’s Day, and it’s time to think about ultimate dad cars. You want something practical, but you want it to be fast and maybe a little bit flash. Maybe your own father had a really cool car that you’ll always associate with dad life, or maybe you’re a father yourself and you have a cool dad-mobile. Either way, we want to see it.
Read MoreWe’ve known the BMW 8 Series Gran Coupe has been coming for a few months now, as BMW has been playing the OEM teaser game. The car is built and exists, but hasn’t yet been shown in full. Late last week an image of the 8GC made its way onto the internet. Car and Driver confirmed with BMW that the image is real and beautiful. We’ll see more of the 8 series Gran Coupe when it is officially unveiled on Tuesday, June 18.
Read MoreAerodynamic science was still something of a black art in the mid 1960s, which is why it was still a major focus of a particular highly regarded trophy at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The Index of Efficiency was the second most important trophy at Le Mans, following the overall win, of course. And because it was so important, there were many teams who had no chance of winning that would go for the IoE victory.
Read MoreIt may not exactly be a surprise that the newest Audi R8 V10 Performance is the quickest of the bunch, but you may be taken aback by just how much progress has been made. Since the Audi R8 made its debut in 2006, it’s become a much more focused machine. It’s tossed aside the sedan-sourced V8 for a big V10, and ditched the shift-it-yourself gearbox for a flappy paddle fast shifter. Speed is its ultimate goal.
Read MoreFor the second time in five years, workers at Volkswagen’s Chattanooga, Tenn. plant rejected a bid to join the United Auto Workers, delivering yet another blow to the union’s efforts at organizing foreign car plants in America.
Read MoreBMW released the above image and three others as a way of teasing the buying public about a possible i8 replacement coming in the next couple of years. They’re calling the thing BMW Vision M NEXT as a performance foil to the BMW Vision iNEXT, and conscripted Adrian van Hooydonk to design it. He gave famed German sculptor and photographer Thomas Demand a sneak peek at the car, and he crafted a replica of the car in paper and cardboard, then took these photographs.
Read MoreVietnam is out to prove you can have communism and cars. There’s the very first Vietnam Grand Prix coming up next year, but first, the country is launching VinFast, its very own car brand with styling by Pininfarina.
Read MoreSomebody who gets paid a lot more than me decided it was a good idea to move the Jalopnik headquarters to the middle of Times Square in New York City, one of the busiest tourist destinations in the country. With this new opportunity landing in our laps, we took to the streets to find out just how much the people of America know about cars.
Read MoreI wasn’t previously familiar with the works of Master Milo, the Netherland’s premier organization for turning rusted-out shitboxes into genuinely bonkers vehicular wonders, but I’m glad I’m aware now. He (or the group? I’m not entirely clear if “Master Milo” refers to one person or an organization) has (or have?) just completed a project that seems like a deliriously bad idea: a car you drive from a hammock.
Read MoreFor American car enthusiasts, 25 years isn’t just the time frame for a quarter-life crisis, it’s the countdown until we can import the good foreign cars we never got the chance to buy here. And, as of now, we can go ahead and put the new Alpine A110S on the clock.
Read MoreThe U.S. is doubling down on its refusal to exempt Tesla’s and Uber’s request to dodge a 25 percent tariff on key parts for its electric cars and entire e-scooters because they are coming from China.
Read MoreAt Tuesday night’s annual shareholder meeting, Tesla CEO Elon Musk reassured everyone that there was no demand problem for the company’s cars, and that the Tesla Model 3 was actually the best-selling car, by revenue, against heavyweight competitors like the Toyota Camry, Honda Accord, and whatever the hell a “Honda Corolla” is. But what does that actually mean?
Read MoreIf I had to make a list of “worst vehicles to use to escape the police,” the Grumman LLV mail delivery truck would be somewhere just below tractor and forklift. And yet one Florida man apparently went for it anyway, and the results were 100 percent predictable.
Read MoreLamborghini, the fast-SUV manufacturer, hasn’t completely lost its way. No, Lamborghini still has some good ideas, like the off-road Huracan concept it debuted recently. And that particular idea might just make it to production.
Read MoreThe Chevy Cruze died last year, one of a slew of GM cars to be unceremoniously executed. The last Cruze came off the Lordstown GM plant’s production line in March. It has since changed hands no fewer than four times. Its newest owner is simply delighted to have it.
Read MoreWe’ve been given a glimpse of the future of the automobile, and it looks bleak my friends. With pretty much every manufacturer clamoring over themselves to abandon sedans for hatchbacks on stilts they call crossovers, there are a ton of them on the market. But according to an annual “Car Wars” study released today—extrapolating data on the future of new cars—by Bank of America Merrill Lynch, there is a huge wave of new crossovers heading to market in the next four years.
Read MoreBack in November of last year, a Georgia man drove to North Carolina to pick up a 1968 Ford Mustang fastback, but when he arrived, he found a surprise. In the passenger seat sat a mason jar filled with the ashes of the pony car’s former owner. The story, originally written last fall by MustangFanClub, is absurd.
Read MoreEarlier today, we told y’all about how two British companies are teaming up to reproduce a Mk II Ford Escort the way it should be—rally-ready and relatively affordable. And it got us thinking here at Jalopnik: which cars do you think most deserve a reproduction?
Read MoreI’ve always admired the Japanese car market’s unique ability to not take itself too seriously, and to be open to having actual, honest fun with their cars. One of the best ways to see how this manifests itself is in the thriving industry of aftermarket kits for Kei-class cars and vans to turn them into other, usually retro cars. They’re like costumes for cars, sort of, and I’ve written about them before. I just encountered a new (to me) company that does this, and I’m especially excited because
Read MoreA hydrogen refueling station in Sandvika, Norway exploded Monday, sending two people to the hospital with minor injuries, closing down two highways and causing both Toyota and Hyundai to halt sales of fuel cell vehicles in the country.
Read MoreI have never, ever looked at a Chevy Astro van and thought, “Someone should rally this.” But that’s what Team O’Neil Rally School is here for!
Read MoreAfter all the hype around the new 2020 Explorer during the New York Auto Show, Ford has some bad news. It’ll be recalling 1.2 million of its existing Explorers over some faulty suspension issues. Oh, and if you have an F-150 or a Canadian Taurus or Flex, you might have the same issue.
Read MoreBMW showed the new “G20" BMW 3 Series last October at the Paris Motor Show, and it looked fine as a sedan, but today the Munich-based automaker revealed the wagon version, and it looks more than just fine. It looks lovely. Just look at this beauty.
Read MoreThe 2020 Hyundai Palisade is the automaker’s largest son ever. It has three rows of seats and comes in either all-wheel drive or front-wheel drive. And now we also have word on pricing.
Read MoreWhether you own an electric vehicle or not, there’s still a good chance that you’ve heard countless diatribes about how much charging it sucks. Now, though, charging networks ChargePoint and Electrify America are partnering together, enabling members of one network to charge with another network, TechCrunch reports. EV drivers won’t have to mess around with any new memberships or fees. They’ll just have access to more charging networks.
Read MoreThere’s a new season of the technology-themed Twilight Zone-like Netflix show, Black Mirror, and the premiere episode, called Striking Vipers, has a passing cameo from a very interesting car that reveals where the episode was actually shot, despite attempts to obfuscate this fact. I’m not going to spoil the episode for you or anything; let’s just look at this car.
Read MoreFor reasons entirely beyond the scope of our own comprehension, we live in New York City, the town that truly despises the car. But in true Jalopnik tradition, we will rage against those forces that oppress us, and we’re going to throw a hell of a party while we do it. And since our 24 Hours of Le Mans party this weekend isn’t complete without some cars, here are some of the cars that will be joining us.
Read MoreMy mother, Jodi, has always been a good sport. She was a good sport when I, a teenager who really only liked NASCAR and had no desire to learn how to drive a manual, kept stalling her first-generation Mazda Miata in a parking lot. She was a good sport years later when I embarrassed her at the drag strip, and when we went off-roading together in triple-digit Texas heat.
Read MoreIn the UK, all cars manufactured since 2016 have been legally limited to 74 decibels, as Sky News reports. It’s also illegal to modify your exhausts in order to make them louder—but, as we all know, if someone is determined to drive a roaring dragon around, they’ll go right ahead and do it. And the UK’s Transport Secretary has had enough.
Read MoreThe 2020 Bentley Flying Spur took some notes from the Porsche Panamera it shares a platform with, finally getting rear-wheel steering, adding rear-wheel bias to its all-wheel drive system, and boosting its W12 engine to reach a top speed of 207 mph.
Read MoreThe Mercedes-Benz GLB, initially appearing as a concept before becoming very real, was unveiled tonight in Utah. It’s about the same size as the GLA and GLC, but can seat two more people than those cars in optional configurations. It’ll be made here and sold here, and my early guess is that many, many of these will be sold.
Read MoreDodge installs temporary yellow air dam shipping covers onto Challengers and Chargers to protect lower fascias from damage during delivery. Instead of removing these, some owners have been keeping the covers on for aesthetic purposes, and it’s driving some people so nuts that there’s now a Facebook group for folks who just need to vocalize their disdain for the splitter guards. It’s baffling.
Read MoreThe newest Cyberpunk 2077 game trailer dropped over the weekend, which featured John Wick himself and a promised launch date of April 16, 2020. It also gives us a glimpse of yet another car that could be available to us when the game finally comes out.
Read MoreBad news, Europe; you’re about to lose two examples of American V8 aggression as GM claims the new European Union emissions regulations are forcing it to stop selling its 6.2-liter V8 Chevy Corvette and Camaro.
Read MoreThe Audi E-Tron electric SUV is off to a great start with, wait, no, actually it is already getting a recall and it’s for potential battery fires. Nobody has been hurt with the roughly 540 cars sold in America thus far, and there have been no actual fires in the hands of customers, Audi says, but it’s not a good look.
Read MoreThe New York Fire Department responded to reports of a helicopter crashing into a high rise building in Midtown Manhattan Monday afternoon. The New York Times reports one person died in the crash.
Read MoreToyota is fully aware of how big of a deal the new Supra is, with fans have waited over two decades for the new A90. But the car is built in Austra and debuted in Geneva. So to celebrate the physical arrival of the new Supra in Japan, Toyota held a three-day long ‘festival’ at their Mega Web showroom in Tokyo Bay. The cars that showed up will surprise you.
Read MoreBig, lumbering, slow, and much taller than it is wide, the Mitsubishi Delica is the model for all vans to aspire toward. This particularly rad Delica has a huge and awesome roof rack and more forward facing auxiliary lights than your local Mexican restaurant has variations of tortilla with cheese, meat, and vegetables. With a proper two-tone paint job and a wheel/tire package that lends some serious off-road credibility, this Delica makes way more sense than some boring crossover!
Read MoreElectric conversion shops like EV West are the future of Southern California hot rodding. Just like racers in the 1950s used surplus wartime stuff and flathead V8s they had laying around to make their shitboxes go really fast, electric tuners are grabbing Tesla motors out of wrecked cars and stuffing them into lighter and more capable chassis to pump them up. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Read MoreJust like Pikachu evolving into a stronger and more focused Raichu, the Briggs Automotive Company has introduced the Thunder Stone to its single-seat Mono sports car, and it’s changing ostensibly for the better. It has been training for this moment since 2011, and the car is changing to keep up with the incredibly fast paced world of sporting motor cars. On July 4th, at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, the new Mono will make its public debut.
Read MoreOne of the advantages of having to fill in on a Saturday is that I feel like it’s okay to post things that may be, normally, even too niche or narrow or, let’s face it, idiotic, even for me. But it’s Saturday, so all bets are off! Which is why I’m going to ask you for your opinion on something I’d be stunned if anyone already has any opinions about: which taillight arrangement is better? Orange-red-clear, or red-orange-clear?
Read MoreThere’s no getting around it: the new BMW 3 Series is a big ol’ boy. Though BMW has touted it as a return to sporting form after the so-so F80 3 Series, it is larger and loses the manual gearbox. I don’t understand the disconnect there, but apparently the answer is the 2020 BMW M3, which has more power than ever but will reportedly offer a “Pure” model with a three-pedal option.
Read MoreIt was announced this week that Toyota and Subaru will work together on a new electric vehicle platform, one that will combine Subaru’s all-wheel drive expertise with Toyota’s electrification chops. Here’s a quick look at the new “e-TNGA” platform, which Toyota states will underpin future mid-size and large electric passenger vehicles and contribute to the company’s goal of selling 1 million battery-electric and fuel-cell cars by 2025.
Read MoreAre you familiar with the story of Bertha Benz? She’s amazing. She was the wife of Karl Benz, who built the car that would start Diamler-Benz, a car that was one of the earliest successful internal-combustion gasoline automobiles. The problem was that he couldn’t bring himself to really try it out or promote it. That’s where Bertha comes in, taking what had to be the first real internal combustion road trip ever. To commemorate this, Mercedes made this little film. I’m just not certain why they
Read MoreBMW guts or not, I was adamant that the 2020 Toyota Supra felt like it had more than the reported 335 horsepower and 365 lb-ft of torque. The car can seriously move, and when Car and Driver revealed a 3.8 second zero to 60 mph time we all started to wonder how much power it really put down. Now the latest dyno test reveals that, at least on the media tester cars we’ve seen so far, the advertised power figures are closer to what the car puts down at the wheels—not at the crank.
Read MoreA mere nine days ago, President Donald Trump was out there on The Twitter threatening tariffs on Mexican-made goods—including cars and trucks—that would be destabilizing to the auto industry, a new North American trade agreement and American consumers. Those tariffs, Trump said, would start at 5 percent and possibly rise to 25 percent by October unless undocumented migrants “stop” coming into the U.S. through Mexico.
Read MoreAuthorities are currently searching for automotive journalist Davey G. Johnson, a veteran of Car and Driver, Autoweek, Jalopnik and more, after he apparently went missing on a motorcycle ride somewhere along California State Route 49 earlier this week.
Read MoreThere was an article on USA Today, um, today that noted the declining market share and sales of minivans as SUV sales have climbed. The article suggested a declining birth rate as one reason, but the real main reason seems to be that people are choosing SUVs over minivans. This certainly seems to be the case, and points to one crucial fact that’s often overlooked in these sorts of articles: we’re a pack of fools.
Read MoreThe 26-episode anime series Wangan Midnight is ostensibly about Japanese street racers, wrenching, and a Datsun Z that may or may not be demonically possessed. It sounds wacky but somehow the show’s final message ends up feeling a lot more mature than what I’ve seen in any other show or movie about cars.
Read MoreAs I am sure you already know, hot-rodding isn’t exclusively for American cars. You can hot-rod just about anything you want. Even a Porsche 356. Especially a Porsche 356.
Read MoreNear as I can tell, the current year is 2019. The Lexus LFA was built in 2011 and 2012. So why, pray tell, is Lexus testing a weird widebody-looking LFA at the Nürburgring right now? I have theories.
Read MoreFiat Chrysler sure has a lot going on lately, between its on-again, off-again merger proposal with Renault to its Ram trucks hit hard with recalls. To add onto the pile, FCA is now recalling nearly 300,000 2019 Ram 1500s in the U.S. for the potential to disable their own airbags and seat-belt crash restraints.
Read MoreEarlier this week, a video of a Tesla Model 3 on Autopilot going down the highway at night with nobody in the driver’s seat went viral, which not only put the passengers in the Tesla and everyone in the cars around it in danger, but also now poses a much greater risk.
Read MoreA coalition of automakers composed of Ford, General Motors, BMW, Honda, Mazda, Nissan, Subaru, Toyota, Volkswagen and more delivered a letter to the White House on Thursday announcing that it did not approve of the far-reaching emissions and fuel economy rollbacks set in motion by the Trump administration, according to reporting by the New York Times. The letter stated that the collected automakers foresee the rollback of Obama-era regulations causing instability in the automotive market and cou
Read MoreFerrari never sold the exquisite 458 Italia you could shake hands with, and that’s an absolute travesty. The chassis and engine combination may be one of Ferrari’s best of all time, and while the paddle shift is quick and good, it can’t possibly hold a candle to the sensation that is three pedals and a gated shifter. The Texas company which built the manual-swapped 430 Scuderia is now popping row-your-own gearboxes in a limited series of 458s as well, which effing rules.
Read MoreThe Ford Fusion sedan, like all of Ford’s small cars aside from the rough, tough, still-selling Mustang, is fighting its inevitable death by inching along on a slow, indefinite conveyor belt that Ford will eventually decide to unplug. Slow and indefinite that planned death will be, too, as made evident by Ford itself.
Read MoreThe Kia Cadenza, a car I forgot was even sold in America, is getting a very heavy design overhaul for its mid-cycle refresh this year to keep its competitiveness with the likes of the Toyota Avalon and Buick LaCrosse piping hot. If you are surprised one of those cars also still exists and that they need “competition” at all, you are not alone.
Read MoreJaguar has a mad group of talented folks in its specialty vehicle operations department. They’re the ones responsible for the XE SV Project 8, a manic high-power muscle sedan that shares almost no components with the XE sedan it is ostensibly based upon. With huge flared arches, lots of carbon fibre, and a mega 592-horsepower engine under the bonnet, it’s a right proper super saloon. Now you can get one that doesn’t shout quite as loudly about what it is.
Read MoreIn the wake of a fraud investigation over Fiat Chrysler Automobiles screwing with sales figures, Automotive News reports that the company’s Head of U.S. Sales Reid Bigland has filed a lawsuit against FCA alleging that he was scapegoated and had his pay cut in retaliation for cooperating with the SEC.
Read MoreJust over one week ago, Fiat Chrysler executives laid out a formal offer to a “merger of equals” with French automaker Renault. Today, according to the Wall Street Journal, that offer has been abruptly rescinded after the second day of negotiations came to a close.
Read MoreI have a lot of respect for the sport of drag racing, partially because I believe there’s a lot more nuance and complexity to it than most people think, and also because I once almost crashed a dragster because I’m a moron. One thing I’ve never fully understood, though, is the name: why is called drag racing? You’re not dragging anything, at least ideally. So where’s the name come from?
Read MoreBack in the early 1990s, BMW was playing with the idea of a 550 horsepower version of its classic 8 Series sports car, infamously developing a prototype that never made it to production, and was only discussed in detail years after its development. Fast forward 30 years, and the 2020 BMW M8 is here for real, and it’s a 600 hp flagship capable of putting all that power down on just its rear wheels.
Read MoreGordon Murray, the designer of the iconic McLaren F1 that put the driver in the center and became the supercar of the 1990s (and every year after that), in the year 2019, has a new supercar in the works. That new central-seater supercar, according to his car company, is a whole lot like the McLaren F1.
Read MoreOne of the things that makes Dodge so wholesomely Dodge is that it regularly and eloquently debuts new editions of its rapidly aging muscle cars, keeping the masses happy and spending money in spite of the fact that their flashy new car and its flashy new style has sometimes decades-old roots.
Read MoreFirst responders airlifted an injured 74-year-old woman off Piestewa Peak near Phoenix, Arizona on Tuesday morning. She was reportedly recovering by the afternoon, but bad luck and a little wind made what was supposed to be a gentle lift look like Air Force pilot training in the most un-fun possible way.
Read MoreI’ve covered some of the history of driving and racing video games before, including finding the oddly Volkswagen-sourced origins of first-person driving video games, tracking the evolution of how video game cars looked, and, of course, showing you the worst driving video game of all. Today I want to give you a look at the first auto racing-based video game for a home console, way back in 1972, so you can shake your heads in confusion and pity at the sorry crap people had to put up with. I’m bei
Read MoreVolvo just announced that it will offer free roadside towing for all of its cars in the U.S. The service is called “Tow for Life,” and yes, it will cover rusted out shitboxes. But before you go surfing Craigslist for a Volvo beater, just know that this program is not even close to as good as it sounds.
Read MoreI have discovered my new heroes, and they are the Austin, Texas couple who converted their living room couch into a vehicle—and, yes, even drove it down the street.
Read MoreMost beneficiaries of the federal government’s electric vehicle tax credit would have bought an electric vehicle anyways even if they didn’t receive a subsidy, according to a new working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Read MoreLucifer, a wonderful show about a crime-solving devil who’s bored with Hell and living in Los Angeles instead, came back for a fourth season this year after Netflix swooped in and saved it from TV cancelation. As anything that includes the slight mention of a car, Lucifer has caused my colleague Kristen Lee and I to form some opinions.
Read MoreHere at the staff of Jalopnik, there’s nothing we love more than complaining about how hard it is to be a car enthusiast in New York City. Gridlock, parking costs, harsh winters, a near-constant temptation to dump your ride in the Gowanus Canal and tell your insurance company it was “stolen”... it’s not an easy life! But we are throwing our 24 Hours of Le Mans party here in New York, and we know some of you locals—or out-of-town visitors—are willing to make the same sacrifice we do. Tell us what
Read MoreEveryone, everyone, settle down! I need your attention! Over the course of a week I have somehow encountered two Dodge Omnis, each one representing an extreme of condition of Dodge Omnis still in active use.
Read MoreThe 1990s can be considered to be the start of the “modern” era of automotive design and technology: we get true aerodynamic-based design, extensive use of computers and electronics, and most of the features we take for granted today. The 1990s also saw the creation of what may be the most aggressively futuristic-looking car attempted in the 1990s, the Jensen One. They only made two, because that’s pretty much all anyone wanted.
Read MoreJust in case your near-500-horsepower BMW crossovers don’t drive the point home enough, BMW is now selling some appearance bits to make your X3 M and X4 M look even sportier. It’s all a bit much. But I know there are people out there who absolutely dig this stuff. The Venn diagram between them and Apple users is probably a circle.
Read MoreThere are a few perpetual, existential questions in this life, such as: “Where do we come from?” “What are we?” “Where are we going?” and “What the hell is Cadillac doing?” This time, though, that last one has reached a part of Cadillac that seemed safe from tampering—the high-performance V-Series models.
Read MoreSure, it’s not as fast as a 2019 911 GT2 RS, but I’ll be damned if the Carrera GT isn’t one of the best cars Porsche has ever built.
Read MoreHumanity is cruel and unusual in its treatment of the Ferrari P80/C. We have created it. Given it life. But to have created such a delightful thing and not seen fit to have given it a mate or a friend of its own kind, let alone an ultimate purpose, we have damned this poor creature to a life of loneliness and sadness. Come on Ferrari, have a heart. Build another one, or dozen, companions for the P80/C.
Read MoreLet me tell you what I’m happy to be done with: the rumors, concept cars, prototype drives, spy photos and wild theories about the 2020 Toyota Supra, all of which have been in ready supply since the joint venture with BMW was made known six or seven years ago. (That doesn’t even count all the crazy reports that came out between that, and when the MKIV Supra was killed off in the late 1990s.) Let tell you what I’m not here for: rumors, concept cars, prototype drives, spy photos and wild theories
Read MoreSure, it’s not as fast as the 2020 AMG One is supposed to be, but I’ll be damned if the SLR McLaren isn’t one of the most audacious cars Mercedes-Benz has ever built.
Read MoreChris Harris isn’t known for his car buying advice. He’s great at giving viewers a good show and describing what he’s doing. He’s a very compelling television show host. But what he doesn’t traditionally do is save wealthy people gobs of money on their track day car choices. But really, if you’re a rich guy looking for a track play thing, why would you buy a Senna over a proper GT3 racing car?
Read MoreThe 71-year-old British sports car maker has a new electric hypercar coming next month. We already know that it is called the Type 130, as it was made official at the Shanghai Auto Show a couple of months ago. When the new car is unveiled on July 16th, it will become the first new car Lotus has produced since the Evora was launched in 2008. Thus marks the rapid development that has been possible under Geely ownership and an influx of capital.
Read MorePorsche is known for taking risks to build exciting and compelling sports cars. Porsche offers a variety of flavors of mid and rear engine sports cars to fill a variety of niches. If you want a hardcore track monster with a roof, they’ve got you covered. The standard Boxster Spyder already has a tent-like roof that you have to get out of the car to erect or deconstruct, but it’s not as track focused as its stablemate Cayman GT4. That’s the idea behind the Boxster Bergspyder, a single seat, open-
Read MoreI think my most fervently-held political belief may be my fierce allegiance to the Antiboca movement, the grassroots organization of people very much against boring cars. That’s why I’m so baffled about my fascination with this car, the Daihatsu Applause. It’s a boring car. I can see that. And yet, somehow, it’s a boring car done right, and I have to respect that.
Read MoreI apologize if it seems like a bit of mixed-messaging, especially from virtually all of my dearly beloved co-workers here at Jalopnik who tell me I am so grievously wrong that it is causing physical pain to them, so let me set the record straight: Red cars are great, but red soft tops on convertibles are awful. Ban them. Ban them all.
Read MoreWhen you drive a historic, one-of-a-kind car out on public roads, you’re always taking a risk. Risk of a crash, risk of someone else hitting you. Risk of fire, even, which is what happened to Jim Glickenhaus’s Ferrari 512S Modulo concept recently.
Read MoreBright colors on cars are always a good thing, but occasionally you come across a particular shade that just stops you in your tracks. This morning, it’s the deep red on this Bentley Continental GT convertible Number 1 Edition. It’s a special edition paint on a special edition car and it is lovely.
Read MoreThe Nissan Murano Crosscabriolet was nothing if not uh, unique, and even though it only had a brief life in the early 2010s, its majesty and mysteries are immortal. Except for one, which has now been solved: What’s was the deal with that weird little secondary rear window?
Read MoreIf you’ve done something right, why change it up too much? That seems to be Audi’s approach to the 2020 Q7—the mild exterior changes give way to a hell of a lot of new interior technology that doesn’t mess with a good thing but makes the whole driving experience a hell of a lot better.
Read MoreThe new 992 Porsche 911 will get a series of Heritage Design Packages that pick and choose various style flourishes from 911s of time passed in a series of special editions. And because it wouldn’t be a real special edition without its own watch, the cars are getting matching timepieces, too.
Read MoreThe 2020 BMW 3 Series Touring wagon came out earlier this month and it looks Good, without a doubt. It also comes with a manual transmission, which is Great, and now you can slap a whole catalog’s worth of decorative M parts on it which I am 100 percent here for. I mean, not me personally. It does not sound like the car will be here for us, as in for sale in America, any time soon. But still.
Read MoreIf you were to approach a random stranger on the street, seize them by the shirt (or bib overalls, necktie, spaghetti straps, ascot, whatever) and demand they tell you what the first ever concept car was, chances are they’ll bark out “Y-Job! The 1938 Buick Y-Job!” before quickly attempting to lean in for a kiss. What you do then is your call, but I need to make one thing clear: that’s not exactly true. There was actually an earlier concept car, 43 years before the Y-Job. Sorta.
Read MoreSloths are perennial contenders for the title of Earth’s Cutest Creature, due partially to their inherent helplessness. They’re pretty much just sentient compost piles, and on the rare occasions that they have to traverse the ground, they’re in danger. So you know what they need? Sloth-sized cars.
Read MoreTurn your nose up at it all you want, but the 2019 Toyota Camry is solidly a good car. Especially when you order it with the 300-horsepower engine. It’s the king of the sedans for being reliable and spacious. I only have one complaint about it. And it’s petty as hell.
Read MoreA decision by the 9th Civil Division of the Landgericht Braunschweig (a German court) on June 19th has decreed that the daughter of Erwin Komenda, the designer of the original Volkswagen Beetle, is not entitled to any compensation from the alleged use of her father’s design in the 2012 (and up) version of the Volkswagen Beetle. The decision comes to a number of conclusions I find confusing at best, but, then again, I’m no lawyer, certainly not a German one.
Read MoreWe’ve reached the point of EV development where everyone can go ahead and get wild and start imagining literally all the potential uses for an eco-friendly vehicle (I’mma let you in on a little secret. Exactly like with a conventional car, EVs can do pretty much anything). And it’s not just because everyone loves whimsy and ice cream –ice cream trucks can actually be improved a lot.
Read MoreCar badges are kind of like name tags. They both declare the name of the car and you can buy them and stick them to your car, thus spreading falsehoods if you so choose. And that’s fine. But I find myself thinking about a different kind of badging that automakers seem to have largely forgotten these days. I’m talking about debossing and stamping.
Read MoreYou might recall that noted designer of the BMW Z8 and Aston Martin V8 Vantage, Henrik Fisker, is designing a new, all-electric SUV. So far, those of us in the turn-indicator appreciation and admiration communities haven’t had much to capture our attention. Until now.
Read MoreLife, for big companies, is really all about taking existing ideas and finding ways to profit off of them—whether that’s Instagram pummeling Snapchat with its own posting model, or an automaker bringing the typically post-factory idea of paint and wrap customization in house. If only the rest of us had it that easy.
Read MoreIf you’re reading this, chances are you already know why you love the Mk II Ford Escort—you know, the ultra-fun rally legend Mk II. Now, you might have a whole new reason to love it, because two UK firms are teaming up to build an all-new reproduction version that will likely cost you less than what you can find on Craigslist.
Read MoreJames May’s Honda Civic Type R car review parody on DriveTribe is, uh, kind of weird but it does address an important question: what’s the difference between a spoiler and a wing? May says it’s simple: if you can fit your head under it, you’re flying with a wing.
Read MoreThe lumpy Ferrari 612 Scaglietti never commanded much of my attention before—until a couple of Dutchmen recently turned one into a shooting brake. It’s the modern-day Ferrari Breadvan, and one that you can actually own. Now it has my attention.
Read MoreI thought we were done laughing about the breadth of the 2019 BMW X7’s nostrils, but then car writer Jason Cammisa went ahead and took the effort to physically face-swap BMW’s enormous SUV with the iconic E30 and frankly it’s hilarious.
Read MoreCroatian electric supercar company Rimac has been building its reputation as one of the leading expertises on electric hypercars (and their parts) since its inception in 2009. But if you’ve ever wanted to get a behind-the-scenes look at how the factory looks, you’re in luck—founder Mate Rimac is here to take you through it.
Read MoreLook at that stubby little guy there! It looks both cute and tough at the same time, like a pug that’s been taking secret Krav Maga classes when you thought he was sleeping. It doesn’t seem like Ford is planning on coming out with a special short-wheelbase F-150, though: what we seem to be looking at here is a test mule for the upcoming new Bronco.
Read MoreEver heard of FV Frangivento? If you haven’t, you’re not alone—the Italian automaker has only recently unveiled their outrageous 996 HP Asfane DieciDieci. But the company is already dreaming big.
Read MoreMercedes-AMG Tuesday showed off a long roof version of the CLA35 and I’m absolutely smitten. There’s more of everything to love; more swoopy bodywork, more glass-filled greenhouse, and more of that glorious bright yellow paint. It’s a turbocharged all-wheel drive wagon, and you can’t really ask for more than that out of a company, can you?
Read MoreAfter 20 years as the Director of Design at Jaguar—arguably one of the best carmakers to be Director of Design for—Ian Callum is finally stepping down to pursue his own projects. Callum has proved himself as one of the true greats of automotive design, leaving behind a legacy of really striking cars and managing to keep Jaguar design relevant and fresh while remaining true to their heritage. As an added bonus, he’s just pretty great guy.
Read MoreTire technology has advanced in leaps and bounds over my lifetime, and certainly over the last 15 years. Michelin have been trying to make Tweels a thing for as long as I can remember, and finally has GM on its side to develop a production-ready Tweel-based “Uptis” tire. Uptis gets its name as a shortening of “Unique Punctureproof Tire Sysem” but Tweel is a better name as it is a portmanteau of tire and wheel.
Read MoreAn armada of Ferraris has been cruising around the island of Capri for an exclusive event called the Cavalcade, which sounds awesome, and probably was, until a 488 Pista inexplicably stopped short and got plowed into by a skidding F50. Occupants appear to be OK but the vehicle looks tragic.
Read MoreThere’s all kinds of theories floating around now that reality, the place where you sleep and pee and buy lunch, may in fact be a simulation of some sort, run on some vast, unknowable computer. Even Elon Musk thinks we’re likely living in a simulation. I normally am pretty dismissive of this idea, at least until I saw this Facebook post about a teal Nissan Hardbody truck that hit a maroon Nissan Sentra that hit a teal Nissan Hardbody that hit a maroon Nissan Sentra. Uh, that does sound a lot lik
Read MoreThe gorgeous McLaren Speedtail that fascinated the staff of Jalopnik when it was first announced won’t be delivered until later next year—which means now’s the time to start honing in the tech to make sure it’s perfect. Ideally, that means... being a metaphorical, not a literal smoke show.
Read MoreMan, poor Tracy Morgan seems to have the worst luck with cars and driving, sometimes. It was about five years ago that a Walmart truck crashed into the bus he was in, severely injuring him. This accident, of course, is far less serious, but very news-friendly because it involves a Bugatti Veyron he only managed to drive a half mile away from the dealer before someone ran into him.
Read MoreEveryone is excited when the first pick up their new car, especially if their new car is a McLaren 600LT. Then they’re really excited. Possibly medically excited. It’s pretty certain that the 39-year-old Vancouver-area new McLaren owner was pretty excited about his new purchase, because within 10 minutes of picking the car up, he was pulled over for excessive speeding and had his brand new car impounded.
Read MoreNow, I know nothing here is close to the sorts of discrimination people suffer every day based on their race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, or whatever, but this is still absolutely maddening and completely inane. Here’s the deal: there’s a man with an orange 2007 Volkswagen GTI (a coveted factory Fahrenheit edition) , and he’s being harassed and had his car vandalized about parking on a street he has a permit for because his car is orange. That seems to be the sum total of the issue. Th
Read MoreA MKIII Volkswagen Jetta apparently wasn’t The Fast and The Furious Technical Director Craig Lieberman’s first choice for what would be known as Jesse’s car–it was originally going to be an E36 BMW M3. But the Jetta’s origin story and post-Hollywood life is also pretty interesting.
Read MoreI remember cringing in the movie theatre watching Suki’s pink Honda S2000 sail across the sky while she screamed “Yeah, smack that ass!” But after seeing some new-old behind the scenes 2Fast 2Furious footage, the stunt’s cool on a whole new level. Did you know that was a remote-controlled car on a real ramp?
Read MoreJames Bond will reportedly ride eternal, shiny and chrome into the gates of Valhalla in Bond 25 in the new Aston Martin AM-RB 003—which has been officially renamed the Aston Martin Valhalla after the Viking legend of a warrior’s paradise.
Read MoreIf you’re a racing fan in the United Kingdom you’ve probably figured this out already. But Ford V Ferrari, the upcoming new Matt Damon/Christian Bale film that recaps the time Ford whooped Ferrari’s ass at Le Mans FOR AMERICA, won’t have that title on your side of the pond.
Read MoreWe’ve seen the new hosts, sort of, we’ve mourned the loss of Matt LeBlanc and Rory Reid, we’ve seen the trailers, and you’ll finally be able to watch the new-new-thistimeactuallyNEW Top Gear setup when the season debuts on BBC America on July 14.
Read MoreThe narratives around John Z. DeLorean usually go one of two ways. He’s either remembered as an iconoclastic hero of American motoring, a David who fought one Goliath after another until he lost everything in an unfair and overzealous prosecution by the U.S. government, or scorned as a charlatan and a fraud who thought rules didn’t apply to him. But DeLorean’s life was too big to fit in just one box. And the new documentary film Framing John DeLorean is a chance to examine him from all sides.
Read MoreThe Ford Explorer emerged mewling and blinking sometime during the Cretaceous period. The year was 1990. Pterodactyls dominated the skies above great lumbering beasts, their huge wings blotting out the sun. And from its ancestral birthing ponds of the Louisville Assembly Plant the Explorer clung forth to the silted banks, crawling forward in low gear, dragging its heavy truck frame through the sand, its Eddie Bauer plumage resplendent in anticipation of mating rituals.
Read MoreThe seized supercar collection of our favorite son-of-an-African-dictator asshat car collector is back in the news once more. The cars are hitting the auction block in September, so you could get a shot at owning a piece of gross exploitation of a local populace all to yourself very soon.
Read MoreWhen the Honda Insight hybrid came out in 1999, its main focus was on delivering good fuel economy. The tires offered low rolling resistance, the bodywork minimized drag, and the gas-sipping engine made a paltry 67 horsepower. But this 2000 Insight for sale on eBay right now has a different mission than cranking up MPGs—namely, cranking the front tires into a plume of smoke.
Read MoreIt feels like there’s a sort of unspoken competition in the classic car auction world to see who can sell the strangest thing powered by a Porsche 356 engine. Sunday we saw the incredible Porsche 356-powered (well, originally) motorhome being offered up by Mecum Auctions, and now RM Sotheby’s has decided to meet the challenge with this astounding-looking 1953 Porsche 356 stretch limousine. It’s a wonderful time to be a very wealthy fetishist for Porsche 356-based freaks.
Read MoreThe GMC Sonoma is a small truck with about as much soul as a stick of margarine, so why someone would use its body to adorn a beefy Dodge Power Wagon frame is just beyond me. But this build is so random that I’ve decided that I like it.
Read MoreI once heard whisperings around the halls of Chrysler’s technical center that then-CEO Sergio Marchionne had shut down an early “DT” Ram design (that’s the current generation truck) because it was too “dainty.” I’m not sure how true this is, but it does lead me to the question: What’s wrong with dainty? Just look at this cute little Dodge A100 for sale on Craigslist—it’s pickup truck perfection.
Read MoreFor some reason, the world likes to give the Once Hot-Selling Chrysler PT Cruiser a lot of shit, but I for one am a fan of its daring, 1920s hot rod-ish design. So it should be no surprise that I’m borderline obsessed with this lifted one for sale right now on Facebook Marketplace. It is truly bonkers.
Read MoreGenerations of humans have grown up drooling over the iconic Aston Martin DB5 driven by James Bond in seven films—but most notably Goldfinger. Now, one example is going up for sale, and one human can be worthy (or, well, rich) enough to take home a piece of film history.
Read MoreSaab, as most of us know, is quite the busy zombie. It died, was retrieved from the great beyond by the confusingly named Chinese company National Electric Vehicle Sweden, and later formed loose ties to supercar maker Koenigsegg. Now, the last new Saab, which is technically five years old, is for sale.
Read MoreIf you’ve always wanted a Lamborghini, but your pocketbook is about as empty as a my oil-burning Willys CJ-2A’s crankcase after 100 miles, there’s great news. Available now on insurance auction site Copart is this incredible yellow 2006 Lamborghini—or, at least, that’s how the site has this sad looking Pontiac Fiero labeled.
Read MoreLet’s say you just finished canyon-carving in your Honda S2000. You enjoyed its lightweight chassis, 50-50 weight distribution and the sounds emitted from its naturally aspirated engine as that aggressive cam profile switched over, rushing to a 9,000 RPM redline. It felt good and entertaining with you deeply connected to the machine.
Read MoreHarley-Davidson is in trouble, and has been for some time. Young people in America don’t want the big, heavy motorcycles that are Harley’s main business, and President Trump’s trade war has been nigh disastrous. So it increasingly has turned to Asia. Pretty soon, the company hopes, selling bikes abroad will be its biggest market.
Read MoreThe Craigslist ad was for a mint-condition 1997 Honda ST1100, with an aftermarket seat, a tall windscreen, and new tires. I saw from the background in the photos that the bike was parked in front of a house just around the corner from me.
Read MoreSSC said Thursday that the Tuatara—its first new supercar since the second Bush administration and the company’s second car ever—would be delivered to its first customer sometime in the third quarter of this year. This comes after many, many stops and starts, and has, needless to say, been a longtime coming.
Read MoreYet another company partners with Google’s self-driving car division, AKA Alphabet’s self-driving car division, AKA Waymo; everyone seems to hate Trump’s new EPA rules; and supersonic jets. All that and more in the Morning Shift for June 20, 2019.
Read MoreThe first Rezvani Tank had 500 horsepower and was once driven by the worst person on Earth. The new one will double the horsepower, and the ridiculousness.
Read MoreHave you ever wanted to travel back to 1972? I can’t say as I have, but if it had to be 1972 or no time travel, I’d definitely volunteer for that trip. That’s a bit of what it’s like to drive an old hotted up Fiat Cinquecento on a sunny day through the countryside. Which countryside? It doesn’t really matter.
Read MoreWelcome to the Jalopnik Weekend Motorsports Roundup, where we let you know what’s going on in the world of racing, where you can see it, and where you can talk about it all in one convenient place. Where else would you want to spend your weekend?
Read MoreThe global community of automotive journalists isn’t particularly huge, so when something happens to one of our own, it gets our attention. When it happens to one as well-liked, respected, and well-known as Davey Johnson, it’s a big deal. The last anyone heard from Davey was last Wednesday, and there is currently a large search and rescue operation happening to try and find him.
Read MoreEvery so often we see jacked-up Lamborghinis, all ready for terrifying speeds and offroad adventure, and we mostly ignore them because they’re just renders. Ephemeral dreams that will evaporate as soon as we get too close, and then immediately disappear. But not this. This is a real car (though the photos may be digital renders). This is the Lamborghini Huracán Sterrato, and it the safari Lamborghini fantasy you’ve always wanted.
Read MoreMazda’s new Skyactiv-X engine—which promises better fuel mileage thanks to a new type of gasoline combustion—is finally almost here. Mazda confirmed power and fuel mileage numbers today and said that deliveries of new Mazda 3s with the 2.0 liter four-cylinder would start in the fall in Europe. Deliveries in the American market shouldn’t be far behind.
Read MoreThe Ford Fusion never really found footing in the American sedan market despite it’s Aston Martin influenced styling cues. While Ford did move a lot of units, the automaker didn’t make much money doing so and the Fusion along with other sedans and compacts will eventually be phased out of the US market. The first Fusion to get the ax is the Sport.
Read MoreThere was once a time where one could walk into a dealership and find another kind of car. A kind of car that is currently nonexistent. A car that we couldn’t help but sort of love, even if it was goofy and impractical. A kind of car that we should never forget—the sporty coupe.
Read MoreThe name of Kia’s new compact SUV—which will be unveiled in full later this month—is Seltos, named, according to Kia, after Celtos, son of Hercules. Celtos?
Read MoreLast fall, I was driving in upstate New York with my lady and I saw some smoke materialize from under the hood. There were no warning lights, but after I pulled over and lifted the hood more smoke appeared. I learned later that the air-conditioning unit on my 2008 Honda Fit Sport had toasted itself.
Read MoreToday’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe F430 has only 14,500 miles, but also already has required a new clutch. Could that make its five-figure price feel like it’s a five-finger discount?
Read MoreWhen considering things that have seemingly been around forever, your thoughts will likely turn to The Simpsons, your student loan debt, and the Mercedes G-Class. Today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe 300GD looks to be just such a survivor. Let’s see if its price can survive our scrutiny.
Read MoreToday’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Mazdaspeed Miata has a 178-horsepower turbo mill and a ridiculously low number of miles for that pumped up four to have traveled. Let’s see if its price is equally ridiculous.
Read MoreSummer will be here officially in just a few days, and what better way to celebrate its arrival than in a convertible like today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Celica? Let’s find out if its price is worth celebrating as well.
Read MoreToday’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe BMW 525tds presently lives in Vancouver BC, but accordingly to its ad it started life a Swiss Miss. It’s now old enough to come to the U.S., but at its price would be welcomed with open arms?
Read MoreThe seller of today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe RX-7 FD says it’s mostly stock. That is of course, if you discount the wheels, the exhaust, and while you’re at it, almost the entire body. That body is a rare RE-Amemiya re-skin and we’re about to take stock in what that might be worth.
Read MoreSaab’s long gone as a car company, but they left behind a ton of cool cars like today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe 9-3. That’s an XWD wagon with an engaging turbo four and a six-speed stick. Could all that kit get you to part with some of your cash caboodle?
Read MoreThe ad for today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe CTS-V claims you won’t find a more gently driven example anywhere. It also says the car’s dyno sheet is available for the asking. Let’s see if this hot Caddy’s price is as incongruous as its description.
Read MoreThere’s something intrinsically rewarding about having something few others can share. Today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe S3 is claimed to be one of only five in the entire U.S., which makes it as exclusive as can be. Does that fact mean it should be as pricy as it is?
Read MoreState lemon laws give buyers of seemingly un-repairable vehicles legal recourse to get out of them. Today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Viper is just such a lemon law car, but is it priced low enough to make lemonade?
Read MoreThe promised $35K Tesla Model 3 finally arrived a couple of months ago, but with a lot of compromises to meet that price. With a few miles under its belt, today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Model S comes in almost six grand cheaper than even that. Let’s see if that’s still compromising.
Read MoreThe Bronco is coming back, but it’s unlikely the new one will be as old school in concept as today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe ’96 is in reality. Could that comforting aesthetic be worth its old school asking?
Read MoreI saw today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe VW Quantum at the L.A. Radwood show, and I must say, I was duly impressed. It’s going to be up to you however, to determine if I was four-grand impressed.
Read MoreToday’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Ferrari offers drop dead good looks. It also offers a price that’s seemingly well below market for these cars. Could that mean it has an undisclosed flaw that would prove fatal at a higher price? Or, is it just the deal of the century?
Read MoreOne of the best ‘dad jokes’ is when someone asks you to call them a cab and you reply with “okay, you are a cab.” Today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe NV200 is already a cab, but could its price be calling you?
Read MoreThere was a golden age of imports and tuning in Southern California, and Riki Yoshida was lucky enough to have been there for it. Born in Japan, Yoshida and his family emigrated to the United States when he was three, settling down in Torrance, California. While attending university, he also started working with one of the most illustrious Japanese tuner shops of the day, Signal Auto.
Read MoreThis year’s Le Mans marked a Celica-filled win for Toyota overall. It was a historic back-to-back victory (one in which I lost $1 betting on Kobayashi to beat Alonso), but it was also one executed against no other factory-run race teams in the top prototype category. It was not always this way.
Read MoreToday I learned there is a whole genre of YouTube videos which are just cool car scenes from shows and films with techno/electro/synthwavey-sounding music laid over them. I am 100 percent here for it.
Read MoreWe may feel like we remember the past, but I think we only really to record highs, lows, and a few posed pictures in between. That’s why looking back on a long-forgotten moment of mundanity can be so fascinating. Or at least, that’s the best theory I could come up with as to why I was engrossed by this clip of some random dude’s uneventful commute in 1988.
Read MoreListen: this is very important. Do not drive a Honda Beat, ever, because it will ruin you for other cars and you will then have to buy one.
Read MoreIf you’ve ever decided that your best option for surviving a garbage day of air travel is just sleeping it out, you might want to revise your strategy a little. An Air Canada crew left a whole-ass passenger sleeping on the plane after everyone else had disembarked. They left her. Everyone got off, they stored the craft, and they left a passenger on the plane.
Read MoreYou may recall that, thanks to an issue with faulty sensors in the Boeing 737 Max flight control systems, those planes have been grounded after multiple crashes were found to be related to the issue. Grounded planes are, by definition, not in the air, and as such need to be stored, on the ground, somewhere. In the case of Boeing’s Renton Factory in Washington state, there’s so many grounded planes that some of that ground has to be taken from Boeing’s employee parking lots.
Read MoreThe disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 on March 8, 2014 remains an international mystery, and while we are not really any closer to finding out where the plane went down or how it vanished, a new story in The Atlantic gives us the fullest picture to date.
Read MoreAny airplane the President happens to be in, whether the President is doing wing-walking on an old Sopwith Camel or lounging drunk in the back of a Gulfstream jet, is known as Air Force One. But there’s really only one Air Force One known to most people, the specially modified Boeing 747 normally used to fly the President around. There’s a new one in development as we speak, and President Trump revealed what he wants the new livery to be during an ABC News interview released today.
Read MoreBack in March, Boeing 737 MAX aircraft were grounded after a tragic Ethiopian Airlines flight crashed, killing all 157 people on board. But, yes—there’s still a chance your flights are going to be delayed until early September if you’re flying American.
Read MoreThere is not really a single appealing thing about air travel, but going through security has to be right up there in the top three Shittiest Things about flying. Thankfully, London’s Heathrow Airport is actually being proactive about making that whole experience suck a hell of a lot less.
Read MoreIt doesn’t really feel like a race until some big ol’ jets cruise over the crowds in the traditional flyover. This year’s Indy 500 had one of the best post-national anthem flyovers I’ve ever seen—and now you can get an incredible view from the inside of the cockpit.
Read MoreEverything was smiles in the Ducati pit on Sunday morning. The newly unveiled Streetfighter V4 motorcycle was wheeled out of its pit stall and greeted to cheers as it lined up at the start line. Carlin Dunne had qualified the pre-production bike on pole, and being that the PPIHC motorcycle class runs from slowest to fastest, he would be the final motorcycle to start, just before the four-wheeled classes were scheduled to begin. He was the favorite to win the two-wheeled competition, and was look
Read MoreIn spite of the fact that Max Verstappen was finally able to break Mercedes’ stranglehold on the 2019 Formula One season victories and score the first race win for a Honda engine in over a decade, there is a larger story in the paddock today; F1 is quick to consider any form of contretemps penalty-worthy. With three of the last four races decided by penalty, or in this case lack thereof, the penalty process has become more important and more talked about than the drivers, the teams, or the cars.
Read MoreFor the third time this season we’ve born witness to Mazda Team Joest driver Oliver Jarvis absolutely smash expectations with an insanely fast lap in qualifying. After smashing the lap record outright at Daytona, and nabbing pole position at Mid-Ohio, Jarvis has officially run faster than the IMSA record at Watkins Glen International, by a lot of seconds.
Read MoreOne might imagine that the winningest driver in Le Mans history, the unique Tom Kristensen, would be bored by many automotive experiences. After having taken nine class wins at the French 24 hour classic, including an overall win in 2003 with Bentley, however, he still cracks a huge smile behind the wheel of a ninety year old Blower Bentley. It’s a little reassuring that even driving crazy four-wheeled space ships doesn’t inoculate Mister Le Mans to the Bentley’s awesomeness.
Read MoreRich Energy, the enigmatic sponsor of the Haas Formula One team, got taken to court over its logo recently and lost. The energy-drink maker said afterward that it was looking forward to returning to court so the “truth” could “emerge,” but Rich Energy was just denied its request for an appeal.
Read MoreThere is little in racing more incongruous than putting an entire swarm of relatively low-power Battery Tender Global MX-5 Cup cars out on the long-straights of Wisconsin’s famed race course. This just shouldn’t work, the track is usually seen as one that rewards big power and even bigger cubic inches. The long start/finish straight is uphill for the sake of Pete. Can these little roadsters possibly put on a good show here? Hell yeah!
Read MoreSebastian Vettel crossed the line first but finished second in the Formula One Canadian Grand Prix earlier this month thanks to a controversial penalty, and, in an act of historic but relatable pettiness, swapped the finishing-order signs to convey that he’d won. Now, there’s a commemorative diecast for it.
Read MoreYoichi Imamura may be a familiar name to you. He was a champion in the early days of D1GP in Japan, and it was he who ran the Lexus LFA with a NASCAR V8. Now he’s running an even more sacrilegious exotic in the same series. This is a Ferrari 550 Maranello with a V6 out of a Nissan GT-R bursting out of the hood.
Read MoreRacing is sort of like an evolutionary crucible for cars. The specific challenges and criteria of a given type of racing will invariably breed cars uniquely adapted to those particular circumstances. When racing officials and overseeing bodies impose rules and restrictions, it’s fascinating to see how the cars evolve to incorporate, or maybe more likely, overcome those restrictions. Sometimes the results are beautiful machines, bred for one specific purpose, and sometimes the results are absolut
Read MoreIf you’re like most people, you wake up most mornings and immediately check your Telex machine to see if there’s been any announcements that someone has finally built an open-wheeled formula race car that is powered by the motor from a washing machine. Most mornings end in bitter disappointment, with no washer-powered racer news and just raw, uncut rage to fill the hole. Until now. Yes, your long nightmare is over, thanks to the team of Craft-Bamboo Racing and Haier Washing Machine, who have joi
Read MoreWhen a race car catches on fire, most people stop, hop out, and hope the fire truck can get there fast enough to prevent totaling the car. But not Calum Lockie. Lockie passes the pace car, with a literal fire under his ass, and takes the car to the fire truck.
Read MoreIf you made some relatively poor decisions this weekend, at least be thankful that they (probably) haven’t impacted your career. The same can’t be said for Mahaveer Raghunathan, a Formula Two driver who screwed up so bad at the feature race ahead of the French Grand Prix that he racked up enough penalty points to be suspended for the next round in Austria. It takes a hell of a lot of effort to get enough penalty points in F2 to get suspended—it takes even more to do it in the span of a single ra
Read MoreThe carousel turn at Sonoma Raceway is, like a carousel at the carnival, a nice feature that makes everyone smile. Also like the kind at a carnival, the carousel is highly trafficked—by racing series, track-day schools and more. But NASCAR stopped using it in 1998, and took more than 20 years to bring it back.
Read MoreI’m just coming down from the high that was my weekend at the Nurburgring 24 hour race, and the one thing that I can’t get over is the quantity and quality of livery that turned out for racing. With vintage races and WTCR supporting the N24 itself, there were hundreds of cars to look at, but some screamed “look at me” just a little bit louder.
Read MoreWatkins Glen International is one of the most storied race tracks in the United States—but if you’re just heading to upstate New York to watch a race and that’s it, you’re doing it wrong! The Glen is loaded with so much cool stuff that it is absolutely criminal to not take advantage of the fact that you’re sitting in the midst of a huge amount of race car history.
Read MoreFor years I’ve had a theory that the best bet in an endurance race over 12 hours is a nondescript white-liveried Porsche GT3. With anecdotal evidence continually proving my theory, I’ve seen any number of times that the race commentators continually gloss over said car, then in the final few hours it steadily moves up the order as leaders conk. The Phoenix Racing Audi team laughed in the face of my theory by doing it in a nondescript white/blue/green/red V10 Audi rather than a Porsche.
Read MoreWatch this Porsche 911 pass a Mercedes AMG GT flat out, with two wheels fully off-road, and listen to the 24 Hours of Nürburgring announcer appropriately freak the hell out. Seriously, it’s nothing short of spectacular.
Read MoreMost race pit stops involve mobs of people with very specific jobs. Not Super Formula. Well, the jobs are specific, but the staff is leaner. So some folks have to work harder.
Read MoreThe 47th edition of the 24 hours of Nürburgring is going to be on, well, all day (obviously) and warm-ups have been rolling for awhile. But official racing kicks off at 6:30 a.m. pst in the U.S.A. (right now!) and there’s a livestream feed for you right here.
Read MoreWelcome to the Jalopnik Weekend Motorsports Roundup, where we let you know what’s going on in the world of racing, where you can see it, and where you can talk about it all in one convenient place. Where else would you want to spend your weekend?
Read MoreIf you, like me, are not quite ready to relinquish the hold of the most arduous race in the world, then I have good news: we’ve got a kick-ass gallery from Jay Liu of the 24 Hours of Le Mans for you to indulge in. Sit back and relax—let’s enjoy our Friday.
Read MoreThe Ferrari Formula One team, evidently still not over the controversial penalty that cost Sebastian Vettel the victory at the Canadian Grand Prix two weeks ago, had a hearing in France on Friday to try to win its win back. It didn’t work.
Read MoreIn the town of Brandon, South Dakota, there’s a race track with a recent history that’s about as incoherent as whatever you just read on Facebook. It was bought a few years ago, remodeled, listed for sale, given an expiration date to be torn down on, and, now, its owner is hosting a race with the track itself as the prize.
Read MoreToyota has a knack for heartbreak in the final moments of Le Mans, and even though the team won overall this year with its No. 8 car, the No. 7 car that had been in the lead found a way to have a disaster. Multiple tire changes as the result of a supposedly faulty tire sensor saw that leading car take a sorrowful second. Now, Toyota is letting us know exactly what went wrong.
Read MoreThe rain-delayed NASCAR Truck Series race at Iowa Speedway on Sunday was kind of a mess, in that the driver who crossed the finish line first didn’t win and that one driver in the field, Johnny Sauter, got so mad at another that he wrecked him under caution. That’s a big no-no in NASCAR, and the sanctioning body is penalizing him accordingly by making him take a little vacation.
Read MoreMercedes, the team that can do no wrong and still succeed even if it doesn’t command a race, has a way of doing that with its front-end setup, as explained in a recent video by former Williams team manager and longtime F1 journalist Peter Windsor: Thanks to some extremely trick engineering and manufacturing, these cars coordinate steering inputs to lower the front of the car itself.
Read MoreToyota won at Le Mans this year, and thankfully, nobody went airborne. But that hasn’t always been the case at Le Mans, especially in the late 1990s. Especially if you’re in a Mercedes CLR. But exactly how that sort of thing happens can be befuddling. After all, don’t race cars look like that precisely so they stay on the ground?
Read MoreAfter running an impeccable Le Mans 24 hour race, the gorgeous throwback Wynn’s liveried customer-entered Ford GT of Keating Motorsports won the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Then, on Monday, the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile struck the car from the race altogether for breaking two different fuel refilling regulations. The first, filling the tank too quickly, and the second, carrying too much fuel for what the car was allocated.
Read MoreIn NASCAR, teams know they have to cheat to win, and do. But NASCAR decided to reel in its “culture” of cheating this year by throwing out a long-established mindset of not revoking wins from cheating race cars, and for the first time in decades, it happened. NASCAR overturned a victory after the race.
Read MoreIt feels like just last week that we were talking about how Toyota announced it was going to be taking part in FIA WEC’s new Hypercar regulations in 2020-21. As it turns out, the prototype was already kicking around on the track.
Read MoreFrom the outset of the world’s most important endurance race a day ago, it was pretty much a foregone conclusion that Toyota would take the win again. As the lone manufacturer-entered Hybrid-powered prototype in the field, Toyota has significantly more power to play with than any other car. The only question that remained pertained to which Toyota prototype would take that win.
Read MoreThe 24 Hours of Le Mans is well underway, and pro photographer Jay Liu is there to capture all of the action. Jay has given us access to his full portfolio of images throughout the Le Mans weekend, freezing everything from the big speed of the hybrid Toyotas to the incredible liveries of the GTE Am class into larger than life images. I picked out a few of my favorites from the pre-race and from the first few hours of the race for you to enjoy, but you can see the rest of his work from the race r
Read MoreEvery year the prior-year’s winning team brings a convertible to Le Mans to haul the big trophy around the track. Toyota, having won last June, has kept the trophy in good condition during their tenure as guardian, and brought a totally rad car to France to serve as the trophy’s truck. It’s a gorgeous 1987 Celica, it’s my new best friend, and I love it.
Read MoreThe World Rally Championship’s highest class will move to incorporate hybrid electric drive in two seasons time. The rule change will initially feature what the rulemakers are calling a “supplementary hybrid system” with spec components and software as a transitional stage from 2022 to 2025. Following that, regulations will open up for more electric power assist options.
Read MoreIt is not usually a good idea to attempt a pass on traffic in the middle of the Porsche Curves at Le Mans. And one would imagine that Corvette factory ace Marcel Fassler, marking his 14th race at Le Mans (where he has won overall thrice with Audi), would know better. In any case, whether as a result of brain fade or simple bad luck, Fassler pushed down the inside of the GTE Am pole-sitting Porsche #88 at an inopportune time, and ended his race.
Read MoreNext season is something of an interim year for the FIA WEC. The new 2020-2021 season regulations have been announced, and there have been a couple of takers thus far, but that’s not for another year. Toyota, in the 2019-2020 season, will again be the only factory supported LMP1 Hybrid. Some manufacturers have decided to leave GTE Pro, but the LMP2 grid is still strong, and the GTE Am class is bigger than ever. The season kicks off with the 4 hours of Silverstone in September, so who is going to
Read MoreBeing that Toyota is the first Japanese manufacturer to secure an overall Le Mans 24 victory since Mazda’s famed 787B win in 1991, I had high hopes that the company would stick around to fight into the next generation of regulations. While Porsche and Audi left Toyota to run around at the front with no real competition, it has been running a pair of TS050 LMP1 prototypes as fast as they’ll go. And today the company announced it would be sticking around the FIA WEC through the new Hypercar regula
Read MoreThe top class of the World Endurance Championship, which has gotten rather lonely and sad over the years, will be a little less bleak for the 2020/2021 season. That’s because it’ll include a hardcore race version of the Aston Martin Valkyrie, also known as that supercar you don’t even dream of affording because it will never happen.
Read MoreHere’s the deal. You like NASCAR, but you’re not the type to unbutton (unhook? untie? you don’t know, that’s not your thing) your overalls to show a big “3” for Dale shaved into your chest hair or sunburned onto your skin. You don’t relax in an old, stained recliner with yellowing socks on to watch cars do circles. You’re fancier than that, and we understand. You can’t stop reassuring us of it.
Read MoreRich Energy, Haas F1's mysteriously elusive energy drink sponsor, has been in the headlines for plenty of scandals lately. But the main mystique is that it’s been all-but impossible for us American race fans to get our hands on the stuff. But now, blessedly, you can finally acquire this “premium” libation at America’s favorite retailer: Walmart.
Read MoreThe 24 Hours of Le Mans is one of the most challenging races in the world—but every now and then we get a reminder that drivers are fallible people, too. And we sure as hell got that last night during the first qualifying session.
Read MoreWhen someone tells you their racing series is inspired by Formula One, you’re probably thinking it involves some high-performance cars that race at prestigious international tracks. But this is office chair racing, and it’s the greatest sport in the world.
Read MoreDriving flat-out up Pikes Peak is already incredibly challenging. It’s over 12 miles of uphill driving with 156 turns, many of which are bounded by sheer rock and vast areas of nothing into which you could plummet. It’s hard. That’s why doing it without the benefit of a handy little sense called “vision” is so amazing, but that’s pretty much what pal-of-Jalopnik Robb Holland did in this fog-saturated test run up the hill.
Read MoreMonday saw Simon Pagenaud become the first Indy 500 winner to visit the White House since 2006, which, hm. Pagenaud did his assigned job of standing there and being relatively boring, but the real weirdness began when President Trump decided to just start riffing on NASCAR instead.
Read MoreMuch like every other facet of the company, mystery Haas Formula One energy-drink sponsor Rich Energy’s official Twitter account has a lot going on—most of it resulting in more wide-eyed head tilts than anything else. It can be a real trip.
Read MoreYou don’t see the enormous wings of a high-dollar hillclimb car anywhere outside of, well, a hill climb, too often. But this Audi Quattro S1 E2 built for Pikes Peak would look glorious on any track.
Read MoreHonda, as you might remember, spent an unspecified amount of time building and perfecting a super lawn mower that it believes could cut grass at 50 mph, probably for no reason other than giggles and a little press. That lawn mower, as it turns out, can reach 100 mph faster than the famed McLaren F1.
Read MoreThe Canadian Grand Prix on Sunday began as a welcome break from the norm in Formula One, with a car finally giving Mercedes, which has won every race this year, a real challenge—a beatdown, even. But the race ended with Mercedes on top yet again, by virtue of a penalty dealt to the team that actually finished first.
Read MoreHad Norman Dewis not lost his father when he was 14, the world of cars may well have been a very different place. Disc brake development for road cars wouldn’t have gone the way it did, Jaguar’s C- and D-Type racers wouldn’t have established that marque’s legend, and some royal advisors may not have had a headache in 1957. Norman Dewis, the legendary Jaguar test driver who died Saturday at the age of 98, was one in a million.
Read MoreLewis Hamilton equaled Michael Schumacher’s famed 7 victories at the Canadian Grand Prix Sunday after FIA stewards awarded Sebastian Vettel a 5-second penalty for an unsafe return to the track after a mistake put him four wheels off. Vettel, who qualified on pole, was leading at the time of the incident with a closing Hamilton pushing him to run flat out. When the penalty came, the wind was out of everyone’s sails and the remainder of the race was a boring slog of a procession.
Read MoreIt would take a miracle for the Rebellion Racing team cars to win the LMP1 class at Le Mans next weekend. The cars are incredibly fast, and the drivers really know what they are doing, but the regulations prevent this privateer team from competing directly with the Toyota TS050. But at least their cars look freakin’ awesome.
Read MoreWelcome to the Jalopnik Weekend Motorsports Roundup, where we let you know what’s going on in the world of racing, where you can see it, and where you can talk about it all in one convenient place. Where else would you want to spend your weekend?
Read MoreRich Energy, the mysterious energy-drink sponsor of the Haas Formula One Team that seems to perpetually create more questions than answers for onlookers, has, after being taken to court on copyright allegations and losing, pulled its now-infamous stag logo from the team’s cars for this weekend’s Canadian Grand Prix.
Read MoreMotorsport isn’t known for being the most diverse and inclusive thing in the world, and visibility for minorities has always needed more work. Racing Pride, an organization dedicated to promote LGBTQ+ visibility, is determined to change that.
Read MoreOne of the best things about Fernando Alonso’s retirement from Formula One stardom isn’t that he’s free from McLaren-related woes, mainly because he’s not, or that he’s now taking up and Instagramming his long-neglected pastime of knitting little berets for kittens—again, because he’s not (that we know of). It’s been watching him race every kind of car he can get himself a seat in.
Read MoreAre you really a Formula One fan if you haven’t cursed a Tilkedrome at least once in your life? It’s pretty commonplace to lambast the series for the hellishly boring, cookie-cutter approach to track construction since Hermann Tilke joined the racing scene with a vision of how to bring F1 into the 21st century. But Tilke’s fall from grace is a pretty damn interesting one.
Read MoreOn the cusp of IndyCar’s second oval race of the season at Texas Motor Speedway, Carlin driver Max Chilton has stepped down. He’s not retiring, not yet—but he’s just not comfortable competing in the last four oval races of the 2019 season.
Read MoreThere was a time when Santino Ferrucci was “America’s next Formula One star.” But racing’s new star-spangled golden boy fell from grace in a single weekend: after intentionally crashing into his own teammate, allegedly making racial slurs and then being caught texting in the cockpit at the same time people found out he applied to run a “Make America Great Again” decal on his race car, Ferrucci was cut by his team and fined $575,000 in damages. You’d have been forgiven for thinking that Ferrucci’
Read MoreRemember that 2000 hp runaway diesel truck we wrote about a few weeks ago? The one that exploded into a giant, angry fireball on the dyno during the middle of a race weekend? Here’s how the team busted their collective ass to make sure their truck would be good to go for the next day’s competition.
Read MoreLate afternoon sun melts through the wall-sized windows of the Manhattan Car Club, a members-only establishment that gives you access to any beautiful classic and exotic cars—for a fee of $180 a month. Dale Earnhardt Jr. is here in New York City promoting his new partnership with Nicorette, sharing his own story of being a former smoker and using his experience to encourage others to put down their cigarettes. But although I have questions about his health, I’m more focused on one of the bigge
Read MoreAfter months of hype, the Volkswagen ID. R—the automaker’s ultra-fast EV purpose-built for crushing every record known to man—has done it. It has conquered the Nürburgring. And when I say “conquered,” I mean friggin’ conquered.
Read MoreIf 21st century technology has given us anything, it’s the ability to recreate awesome historical race car battles with obscenely great cinematography, and badass on-track battles. The new Ford v. Ferrari trailer, the movie about Ford’s battle to conquer the dominant Ferrari at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, is promising all that and more.
Read MoreThe Project 1 Racing Porsche with drivers Egidio Perfetti, Patrick Lindsey and Jörg Bergmeister is the current GTE AM class points leader going into the final race of the FIA WEC 2018/2019 superseason. To celebrate the potential championship, the team contracted American artist Richard Phillips to design an art car livery for the #56 car to race at Le Mans, with assistance from renowned livery design master Andy Blackmore.
Read MoreThis year marks the inaugural running of the Sonoma Speed Festival. While it is a brand new event, I am stunned at both the level of preparation of the event, and the high quality of racing cars that have been hauled to wine country for a good bit of vintage motorsport. And the best part is, you can watch it all live all day Saturday and Sunday on YouTube.
Read MoreWelcome to the Jalopnik Weekend Motorsports Roundup, where we let you know what’s going on in the world of racing, where you can see it, and where you can talk about it all in one convenient place. Where else would you want to spend your weekend?
Read MoreThe redesigned 2019 Ram 1500 is big, capable and nice to look at. On paper, it seems like an adept family car considering how many toys, consumables (diapers) and other assorted baby-related flotsam most parents find themselves traveling with. But the Ram is also utilitarian by nature, and did I mention big?
Read MoreIt’s always a good idea to do a real dry run before doing something big. Like, you’re not going to try and bust out your full interpretive-dance karaoke of Radar Love without trying it out in front of the mirror first, right? Of course not. The same was true for NASA and the Apollo moon landings. The Apollo 10 mission did almost everything the actual Apollo 11 lunar landing did—except land on the moon. The lunar lander, named Snoopy after the noted cartoon beagle, was jettisoned into space after
Read MoreThere is an over-reliance on technology, especially when it comes to navigating. I’m just as guilty as most of you when it comes to simply plugging my destination into my phone and blindly following the directions. Most of the time, it’s fine. Until it isn’t, and your navigation system directs you and almost 100 other strangers onto a muddy road where you can get stuck.
Read MoreI’m not sure if you realize this, but spark plugs are older than the American Civil War. Jean Joseph Étienne Lenoir first used electric spark plugs on his 1860 gas engine, and in the intervening 159 years since then, they really haven’t changed all that much, fundamentally. They’re one of the few parts that could be swapped, with some success, between a vintage car and a modern car. Now a company has an all-new high-tech replacement for spark plugs that they claim will make engines significantly
Read MoreBMW calls it “Lucy.” It’s 710 horsepower, 848 lb-ft, triple-electric-motor, one-off sedan that the automaker says can do 0-62 mph in 2.8 seconds. Lucy’s being used to develop future electric vehicles, and after getting a ride in this modified 5 Series, I can tell you that the thing is an absolute monster.
Read MoreThe tagline of Lightyear One’s website reads “Lightyear One | The electric car that charges itself with sunlight,” and while, yes, this is technically true, in practice it’s really sort of bullshit. Yes, the car does have about 15 square feet of fairly efficient solar panels, but calling it a “solar” car like many outlets are doing, is very misleading.
Read MoreOn June 13, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law new legislation that opens the door to fully autonomous vehicles in a way no other state has. “A fully autonomous vehicle may operate in this state regardless of whether a human operator is physically present in the vehicle,” the law reads in no uncertain terms.
Read MoreAs shared e-scooters have proliferated around the world, resulting in frequent hand-wringing and disproportionate media attention relative to the damage and inconvenience they cause, a handful of cities have remained outside the e-scooter bubble due to local laws prohibiting the little rascals (no, not those rascals).
Read MoreThe modern car market is in a period of transition as semi-autonomous features migrate onto it, and not in the joyous, life-is-about-to-change-forever kind of way. It’s more like it just hit middle school, and a bunch of terrible, miserable things no one understands are happening to it.
Read MoreAnthony Levandowski, the guy you may recall from the center of the Waymo and Uber lawsuit over autonomous vehicle I.P., the radical who started a church worshipping an A.I. god, the person who allegedly intentionally modified Google’s driverless car fleet to take them where they weren’t permitted only to get into a crash, injure a co-worker, and allegedly covered it up, that freaking guy, is now taking a cautious approach to autonomous vehicles.
Read MoreWe live, my friends, in a world of anarchy. Chaos reigns over our streets. We live in a society that tolerates half-demented, half-driving barely-robot cars. Teslas that can be fooled with an orange. Cadillacs that stare at you with the eye of Sauron. Volvos and Kias that require you to hold your car’s hand all the god damn time. It’s absurd. It’s inane. It’s time for someone to step in and whip the entire automotive industry into shape. The semi-autonomous revolution desperately needs a govern
Read MoreWe’ve seen this before, and you better believe we’re going to see a hell of a lot more of it. According to video obtained by NBC Los Angeles and an interview with the person who shot the footage, a Tesla driver fell asleep at the wheel of the car while it was moving on a federal interstate for at least half an hour.
Read MoreI know there’s sort of a stereotype about a certain sort of painfully obsessed Tesla fan/Elon Musk worshipper that is, likely, an unfair categorization of most Tesla fans. But then you see something like this recent discussion on Reddit’s r/TeslaMotors forum, and you remember that, oh yeah, sometimes stereotypes do come from somewhere.
Read MoreLast time we checked in on General Motors’ Cruise autonomous-vehicle arm, it was worth a surprising $19 billion, because the dream of a self-driving world is one people are willing to dump loads of cash into, growing skepticism or not. That $19 billion, though, has apparently gotten Cruise a whole lot of on-road glitches and safety concerns so far.
Read MoreOne weekend morning toward the end of 2017, I woke up at home in Venice, CA and took a walk, only to see something entirely new: people on electric scooters. And I mean lots of people on electric scooters. Literally overnight, a new company called Bird, founded just two miles away in Santa Monica, had launched an app and dumped thousands of dockless scooters all over the place. A few things happened very quickly after that:
Read MoreEarlier this year, Aurora Innovation, a self-driving startup, raised over half a billion dollars from investors. It looks like the company is still doing okay, as Aurora announced yesterday that they’ll be partnering with Fiat Chrysler to start developing autonomous platforms for their commercial vehicles.
Read MoreIn every way I’ve seen so far, Mercedes-Benz has really stepped it up with the new A-Class and its coupe-ier sibling the CLA. What was once a penalty box designed solely to get millennials into dealerships and then trap them into leasing a more expensive SUV is now far nicer inside, packs much better tech and should put down serious power in AMG form. And in the new top-trim Mercedes-AMG A45 S, you will get some crazy numbers from just a 2.0-liter four.
Read MoreGM is stepping up the bullish rhetoric on electric cars. During a conference presentation on Sunday, the company’s president, Mark Reuss, said electric cars will soon cost the same as gas cars and “reach parity a lot sooner than people think,” as reported by Bloomberg.
Read MoreRed lights? I even don’t bother slowing down anymore, friends. Ever since I fitted ZF’s concept pre-crash external side airbags, I can pretty much just let traffic ping-pong off my car’s pillowed body.
Read MoreFull disclosure: I think all Level 2 semi-autonomy systems—that is, every sort of partial self-driving system you can get in a car today—are stupid. Not because the technology is necessarily bad, but that these systems, like Tesla’s Autopilot, are just not compatible with how human brains work. If you don’t believe me, please stare gape-mouthed at this video of a noted internet idiot’s new Tesla Model 3 driving itself on Autopilot with no one in the driver’s seat.
Read MoreBird, the mobility company known for its shared electric scooters, announced it will roll out a new “seated electric vehicle” this summer. The thing’s a little hard to categorize, but it’s somewhere along the e-bike/seated scooter spectrum. The Verge reports it will have a maximum range of about 50 miles, which is roughly in line with the top-line e-bikes currently on the market. Bird didn’t announce any details on maximum speed, but The Verge also reports Bird will comply with local regulations
Read MoreIf you needed any further proof that we live in hell and everything is meaningless, there is a new tech-less pogo-stick-sharing micro mobility startup from Sweden called Cangoroo that people are apparently taking seriously. Allegedly intended to compete with soul-crushingly popular danger sticks known as dockless e-scooters, this pogo nonsense is eventually coming to American shores.
Read MoreTesla makes some revisions after its viral car fire in Shanghai, Carlos Ghosn backs out of a last-minute press conference, Ford gets its data exposed, more automakers team up on self-driving cars, and Geely’s interest in Volvo trucks. All of this and more in The Morning Shift for Friday, June 28, 2019.
Read MoreFord’s plans to cut a bunch of jobs in Europe, upcoming strict emissions regulations in Europe spell trouble for automakers, a new legislative bill designed to help consumers and more await you in The Morning Shift for Thursday, June 27, 2019.
Read MoreMost of the American-made cars sold in the U.S. are Japanese, Tesla is doing great why do you ask, that massive Philly refinery that went supernova may shut down, and much more in The Morning Shift for Wednesday, June 26, 2019.
Read MoreWar has begun, and it’s against “completely over-engined tank models,” as members of the German government put it. There’s war on the horizon, and it’s against SUVs. All that and more in The Morning Shift for Tuesday, June 25, 2019.
Read MoreThe Chevy Silverado hopes for a boost in sales by stealing the fuel economy crown from the Ford F-150, Renault-Nissan and the FCA just might still partner up, and Daimler is back at it again with the emissions problems. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Monday, June 24, 2019.
Read MoreI’m not going to lie to you, it’s a bit of a slow summer Friday out there, news-wise. Hopefully that’s a leading indicator that it will be a slow summer Friday for you, work-wise. Anyway, onto The Morning Shift for Friday, June 21, 2019.
Read MoreMore Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance drama, General Motors’ fight with the United Automobile Workers union, Walmart’s plan to go driverless and profit, Geely’s new autonomous-software partner, and how London will handle that little “pollution” problem it has. All of this and more in The Morning Shift for Wednesday, June 19, 2019.
Read MoreFires have China cracking down on EVs, Ford is in the middle of an important connected-car discussion with the government, Volvo and NVIDIA are working on self driving trucks, FCA apparently can’t keep its suppliers happy, and more in The Morning Shift for Tuesday, June 18, 2019.
Read MoreThe Renault-Fiat Chrysler merger could still be in the works, the Chevy Silverado is on struggle street, Carlos Ghosn, and more in The Morning Shift for Monday, June 17, 2019.
Read MoreVolkswagen workers are possibly unionizing, back seat seatbelt chatter and a death wobble class-action lawsuit. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Friday, June 14, 2019.
Read MoreCar sales seem to be hitting recession levels of decline, China is eyeballing hydrogen fuel-cell tech, oil tanker attacks boost oil prices, and Infiniti seems to be getting some much needed help. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Thursday, June 13, 2019.
Read MoreFord and Volkswagen are ready to become partners in autonomy, GM is funneling more money into trucks, and, yes, there’s a hell of a lot more Renault-Nissan drama to catch up on. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Wednesday, June 12, 2019.
Read MoreI would say that today is Tuesday, June 11, 2019, but it appears that if you’re a major automaker or automotive researcher, apparently it’s the mid 2000s. I guess everyone woke up this morning and realized that electric cars are a thing. Maybe they’d been napping! I don’t know. Let’s get into that and more in The Morning Shift.
Read MoreEverything is falling apart for Renault-Nissan, more tariff threats, more Brexit fallout, more alleged corruption in the Trump administration, and bad reviews for Elon Musk as a boss. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Friday, June 10, 2019.
Read MoreToyota wants to get you into an electric vehicle faster, GM may be putting controls in their autonomous vehicles after all, the Tesla stock roller coaster rides on, and more in The Morning Shift for Friday, June 7, 2019.
Read MoreFiat Chrysler’s latest best hope just collapsed, Ford shuts down a plant, and GM defends shutting down a plant. All that and more in the Morning Shift for Thursday, June 6, 2019.
Read MoreHow gas-powered car purchases help keep Tesla going, Toyota’s warnings about the Trump administration’s proposed Mexican tariffs, more tariff news, the latest on the Fiat Chrysler-Renault relationship, and new electric-vehicle partnerships. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Wednesday, June 5, 2019.
Read MoreVolkswagen seems to want to give America the small and cheap truck it deserves, China’s trying to avoid an EV market crash, and tensions between Nissan and Renault continue. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Tuesday, June 4, 2019.
Read MoreToyota isn’t ready to call it quits on the Prius, Nissan is getting possessive about its technology and Mitsubishi’s woes about a potential merger. All this and more in The Morning Shift for Monday, June 3, 2019.
Read MoreI think we can all agree that riding the train is objectively bad. But, when you’re riding the world’s only 100% solar-powered train that hasn’t missed a scheduled service in over a year, that’s maybe a pretty awesome experience. The Byron Bay Railroad Company operates a 100-seat vintage train on a short 6-kilometer route that basically goes from a town and down to a resort and beach, and then back. A couple of years ago the town decided to invest in converting the train to pure EV, powered by t
Read MoreOne of the earliest pieces of advice I ever got from my mother is to never share hats with someone. My coworker Erica Lourd received similar motherly advice, forbidden from using a friend’s hairbrush. Why? Because this is how things like lice and bedbugs can spread. And now with startup Revel’s common-use electric mopeds (and common-use helmets) deployed across Brooklyn and Queens, there are some hygiene concerns.
Read MoreEurope is currently bracing for a scorching heat wave that’s started this week. Temperatures are expected to hit 109 degrees Fahrenheit and government officials are taking extra safety precautions. Germany, in particular, has imposed temporary speed limits on the Autobahn and other roads.
Read MoreOn Tuesday morning, the New York City Department of Transportation suddenly changed the direction of traffic on 11th Avenue for an eight-block stretch, removing all northbound lanes. The trouble is the DOT didn’t warn anyone about the changes, and the NYPD started writing tickets almost immediately.
Read MoreUber is a modest company with modest goals. It simply wants to change how people get around and also get New Yorkers from Manhattan to John F. Kennedy Airport in less than half an hour. I’m still not entirely sure how it plans to accomplish the former, but Uber’s plan for the latter is pretty straightforward. Choppers.
Read MoreBill de Blasio is the Mayor of New York, or so we are told. He rarely shows up to work and often appears disconnected and bored from the day-to-day duties of running America’s largest city. He is so disinterested in the city, in fact, that he has decided to run for president even though nobody else wants him to, including his own donors.
Read MoreIn a now-deleted post from an unknown, private Instagram account, there it was: almost assuredly the front quarter of a mostly-built next-generation Land Rover Defender. Or, at least, a show car that’s probably close to the real deal. Since the internet is forever, you can take a look at a screenshot here.
Read MoreFor anybody concerned that the Ford F-150 Raptor isn’t capable enough off-road, the new 2020 Ford Super Duty Tremor with off-road upgrades paired with the new 7.3-liter V8 engine will gladly take your money.
Read MoreThe 2019 Ford Ranger is alright looking, and its not-for-American-consumption sister the Everest SUV is pretty cool. But they both look like absolute monsters when they’re kitted out for an actual theatre of war. Go figure.
Read MoreThere are still cowboys driving livestock across America in 2019. While most of us are snoozing, they’re rolling up to dark fields with trucks full of creatures that are critical to our nation’s agriculture: thousands and thousands of bees.
Read MoreLast week, Lego did us all the favor of leaking what is most likely a brick-built impression of the 2020 Land Rover Defender, which lined up with spy photos we’ve already seen. Now it appears the new Defender has leaked a image of itself, with a dashboard display showing off a clear image of the upcoming SUV.
Read MoreAfter selling my 1995 and 1996 Jeep Cherokee Sports, I wondered to myself why I never found them as handsome as my 1991 or 1992 models. and while part of it had to do with the interior and grille, a big factor was the windows. And after thinking about it, I’ve decided that pretty much all boxy SUVs look better with clear, untinted glass.
Read MoreWhen Jeep first showed the 2020 Jeep Gladiator to the public at the 2018 LA Auto Show, it proudly displayed a photo of the new mid-size truck yanking a pristine, classic Jeep Grand Wagoneer down a highway. That picture came to mind as I found myself inadvertently recreating it in some slightly more real-world conditions, with a rented U-Haul trailer hauling a somewhat less-pristine, free Jeep Grand Wagoneer 250 miles from Dayton, Ohio to Detroit, Michigan.
Read MoreAmerican Honda celebrated its 60th anniversary by restoring a vehicle built by a brand that is now considered a competitor. That vehicle a 1961 Chevrolet Apache 10, and here’s why Honda decided to fix it up.
Read MoreIf you want an electric pickup truck, you sort of don’t have any options right now because none currently exist for the public to buy, at least here in the U.S. There’s the Rivian R1T, of course, but it isn’t available yet. And there’s the Tesla pickup truck which we’re told might happen this summer. So, if you want one now, you kind of have to build it yourself.
Read MoreWhile the current Toyota Land Cruiser has become something of an expensive status symbol like many big off-roaders before it, it’s still one of the best in its class, even if this generation’s been around since 2007. It also has something the next generation might not: A V8 engine.
Read MoreGeneral Motors has big plans for electrification, already promising 20 new electrified models in the next few years. But it’s also working on an EV truck platform, which reportedly is being considered for an electric revival of ostentatious off-road brand Hummer, of all things.
Read MoreThe 2019 Ford Ranger may technically be new, but it’s actually based on a platform that’s been around since 2011. Yet it’s still a rock-solid offering that makes up for its lack of soul with sheer competence in every area that matters to mid-size truck buyers.
Read MoreRemember the truck platooning? It was supposed to be the Next Big Thing in trucking—basically, one lead truck could control a string of trucks behind it, which could form a sort of electronically-connected road train—but now it seems that the real-world benefits aren’t materializing, and many of the big players are rapidly losing interest.
Read MoreWhat appears to be the last remaining 2018 Ram 3500 Laramie that you can buy brand new with a manual transmission has apparently been languishing on a dealer’s lot in Pennsylvania for more than six months. Folks, I am crestfallen.
Read MoreThe Willys M38A1s that powered U.S. troops through Korea and Vietnam came from the factory with torquey “Hurricane” 134 cubic-inch four-cylinder engines. But one owner in Pennsylvania swapped his military Jeeps’ original engines out for off-the-shelf units meant for mowers and pressure washers, with one vehicle driven by two such engines and the other getting a turbocharger. Check out these amazing contraptions.
Read MoreRam has been going through some regulatory issues with its 3.0-liter EcoDiesel engine, so it wasn’t surprising that the all-new 2019 “DT” generation launched with only gas motors. For 2020, though, the EcoDiesel is back, but it’s been updated to make more power and torque than ever.
Read MoreThe Mitsubishi Montero suffers from also-ran syndrome in the United States; it doesn’t enjoy the level of nostalgic love people have for the Ford Bronco or Toyota Land Cruiser. But Mitsubishi’s SUV basically dominated the Dakar Rally, arguably the toughest event in off-road racing, longer than anyone. Mitsubishi apparently still has some of its early champ trucks lying around, and got some drivers together for a little reflection.
Read MoreEvery year, I take a trip to the rock crawling heaven that is Moab, Utah, and while that might make you think that rocks are my favorite off-road surface, it’s actually mud that has my heart. It’s a type of terrain that lots of off-road enthusiasts absolutely detest, but here’s why I can’t get enough of it.
Read MoreElon Musk recently sat down for the Ride the Lightning: Unofficial Tesla Podcast and touched on details for the upcoming Tesla Model Y, Tesla Roadster, and the Tesla Pickup, surprisingly revealing the truck will have to start at less than $50,000.
Read MoreSummer is here and all excuses you have for not washing your car (and really, are there even any legitimate ones?) have gone out the window. The sun is out, the weather is nice and everyone is generally in a better mood. Get your car to the car wash!
Read MoreIn 2015, Gabe Emerson called up the Minnesota Zoo and asked to buy their monorail. It had been decommissioned two years prior and the zoo, apparently, didn’t know what to do with it. They had listed it for auction on what Emerson describes as “some obscure state surplus auction website” and were out of ideas. “They apparently,” Emerson quipped over email, “hadn’t heard of Craigslist.”
Read MoreLast weekend, I used a 2020 Jeep Gladiator to bring home a free 1987 Jeep Grand Wagoneer, and while, from a distance, the SJ Jeep is a beautiful wood vinyl-covered classic, a closer look reveals that it is deeply flawed.
Read MoreIt’s always neat and interesting to see how people in other countries conduct their day-to-day business. A glimpse into a Japanese car repair shop reveals one that is cleaner than nearly any other office (let alone shop) I’ve ever seen.
Read MoreNot everybody understands the desire to modify a car; to make it faster or tougher or just turn a piece of transportation into a work of art. It’s an intimidating hobby that seems to demand serious money and mechanical talent. But those are not fixed prerequisites. The only thing you need to really need to survive having a project car is patience.
Read MoreOne of the things my Pao has needed from the day I got it was a new set of front shocks. The ones on the car were totally shot, making all kinds of scary clunking noises and ending every speed bump with a jarring BANG that made me wet my pants, just a little squirt, every time. So, I finally did something about it, and with the help of a friend with a garage and lift and air tools, I’m now ruined for doing car repairs the miserable way I’ve always done them.
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