C’etait un Rendezvous is a legendary film with a very simple premise – a man drives very quickly to be with the woman he loves, careening through the streets of Paris with a blatant disregard for things like road signs, speed limits and pigeons. This film, from South African director Seagram Pearce, has a similar but much more law-abiding plot.
An unnamed racer arrives a track, gets his safety gear on, and zips around at the wheel of a KTM X-Bow. All the while, a beautiful woman watches on, with the driver finishing the film alongside his leading lady.
Take a look below for the stylized, beautifully filmed piece.
I think that the new BMW 4 Series is an attractive coupe. The design is a little bit on the wrong side of “fussy” I’ll grant you, and I don’t particularly care for the look of the scalloped, black-bordered vents on the fender sides – functional though they may be. But for the most part, I find the coupe to be pretty pleasing to look at.
You all, by and large, do not care for the 4 Series. (For the sake of constructing my intellectual argument, I’m going to make the ridiculous statistical assumption that the 140 or so comments on our 4 Series First Drive provide a representative opinion of our readership as a whole.) In the first 24 hours after we published our review of the car, you felt moved to comment that it was “ugly,” “REALLY ugly” and “a disappointment” among other, less reprintable statements of ardor.
So clearly we see things a little differently in terms of styling, but what does any of this have to do with the 2014 Hyundai Equus?
There’s been a lot of news regarding future Lexus products recently, including spy shots of new RC coupe and NX compact crossover, and reports that a 2+2 coupe based on the LF-LC concept is heading for production. Now, Automotive News says that Japan’s #1 luxury automaker is planning to replace the fullsize, body-on-frame Lexus GX SUV with a three-row crossover called the TX.
The article says that the GX, which is based on the foreign-market Toyota Land Cruiser Prado, will get a styling update for 2014 before being phased out in 2016. In a similar move as Infiniti made with its new three-row JX/QX60, the new TX will be car-based, but details are still unknown as to whether it will be front-wheel-drive riding on the Toyota Avalon platform or rear-wheel-drive using the Lexus GS platform. Either way, this new luxury crossover could join the Lexus lineup as soon as late 2016.
Applications for U.S. home mortgages decreased last week with potential buyers shying away from the market as rates held steady just below their two-year highs.
The Mortgage Bankers Association said its seasonally adjusted index of mortgage application activity, which includes both refinancing and home purchase demand, declined 3.7 percent in the week ended July 26. It was the seventh week in a row the index has been lower.
The MBA’s seasonally adjusted index of loan requests for home purchases, a leading indicator of home sales, fell 3.4 percent.
Fixed 30-year mortgage rates averaged 4.58 percent, unchanged from the week before and only 10 basis points below a two-year high hit earlier in July.
Rates have risen sharply since early May, pushed higher by the Federal Reserve’s plan to start slowing its economic stimulus later this year if the economy progresses as expected.
The Fed is currently buying $85 billion in bonds a month to keep borrowing costs low. The cheap mortgage rates have helped lure homebuyers and worries have emerged that higher costs could take some of the strength out of the housing market’s recovery.
Still, most economists don’t expect it to derail housing’s growth altogether. Rates have risen about 1 percentage point since early May, but still remain low by historical standards.
Refinancing activity has been hit harder than purchases by the rise in rates, which makes refinancing less lucrative. The gauge of refinancing applications fell 3.8 percent.
The refinance share of total mortgage activity was unchanged at 63 percent of applications.
The survey covers over 75 percent of U.S. retail residential mortgage applications, according to MBA.
Luca Cordero di Montezemolo does not strike us as the kind of person we’d want to cross. We imagine the Chairman of Ferrari as sort of like an automotive Don Corleone, a thought that is further confirmed when we hear about the aftermath of last weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix.
Fernando Alonso and his eyebrows made some unsubstantiated remarks that have angered his team, withThe Daily Mail reporting that when asked after the race what he wanted for his birthday, the Spaniard responded “Someone else’s car.” And while no one seems to know exactly what was said, it was enough to prompt a personal phone call from the boss of Ferrari on Alonso’s birthday for a dressing down.
Montezemolo reminded Alonso that, “All the great champions who have driven for Ferrari have always been asked to put the interests of the team above their own. This is the moment to stay calm, avoid polemics and show humility and determination in making one’s own contribution, standing alongside the team and its people both at the track and outside it.”
The Italian wasn’t done, though, presenting each of the team’s engineers with a symbolic gift – a knife to put between their teeth. We think there’s a pirate reference here, but aren’t certain. According to Sky Sports, he opened the post-race meeting by informing team principal Stefano Domenicalli that, “The Ferrari I saw in yesterday’s race doesn’t sit well with me.” We aren’t the only ones imaging the threatening undertones here, right?
Formula One is entering its summer break, meaning that each team has four weeks to get itself sorted out before the end-of-season grind kicks in. There’s no doubt that after this very public display from Montezemolo, that Ferrari will have its nose to the grindstone.
Engadget is reporting that Mercedes-Benz might be tinkering with Google Glass for its future navigation systems. The first, big-name wearable tech item of the 21st century, Google Glass has a huge degree of potential in a number of fields, not the least of which is the auto industry.
Citing the Silicon Valley Business Journal, Engadget mentions that Mercedes is focusing on producing genuine, door-to-door directions that combine the pedestrian and automotive applications that Google Maps has become known for. President and CEO of Mercedes-Benz Research and Development North America, Johann Jungwirth, mentioned this seamless integration of directions is the division’s ultimate goal.
The idea is intriguing, but we’re probably going to be waiting on it for some time. Google Glass is still quite expensive and is far from being available at the local Best Buy. Until that day comes, it looks like we’ll just have to make do with going from our car’s navigation to a smartphone.
PSA Peugeot–Citroën has been struggling to offer low finance rates to customers since its banking arm, Banque PSA Finance, had its credit score downgraded, which in turn has made it hard for the French carmaker to compete with brands that offer lower finance rates, such as Volkswagen. The French government recognized the catch-22 and, after negotiations with PSA and European Union approval, has guaranteed the banking arm seven billion euro in bonds to secure its debt and lower borrowing costs, Automotive News reports. The infusion of bonds will be spread from January 1, 2013 through December 31, 2016.
As part of the requirements for EU approval, PSA agreed to refrain from acquisitions in excess of 100 million euro per year and curb its debt levels, Automotive News reports. The EU Comission was required to approve the bond infusion before it could take place in an effort to reduce to a minimum “the damaging effects for competitors who have not received support from public funding,” said Joaquin Almunia, EU Competition Commissioner.
In addition to the bonds for Banque PSA, a diesel-hybrid program will also receive 86 million euro from the French government, which was also approved by the EU Commission.
PSA was hit hard by the European auto-market recession and posted a loss of five billion euro last year, and it still has an appetite of 100 million euro per month. We hope this is the start of a turnaround for the struggling automaker.
Even though American Suzuki Motor Corporation filed for bankruptcy last year and stopped selling cars in the US and Canada as part of its reorganization, there are still plenty of countries around the world where Suzuki continues to sell autos. For those markets, the automaker is working on a compact sport-utility vehicle, called the iV-4, which will be unveiled at the Frankfurt Motor Show in September.
Suzuki says the iV-4 “embodies the basic ruggedness of an SUV,” and that its styling is modern and innovative. We’ll have to take Suzuki’s word on that one, though the teaser above certainly looks the part, with the grille reminding us of the one found on the Jeep Grand Cherokee (minus a few slats, of course).
Scroll down for the short-and-sweet press release, and expect the full brace of information to be revealed in September.
It’s easy to refer to the recession in 2008 as the point at which Americans started driving less, but a growing number of studies are showing that American driving peaked in 2004, The New York Times reports, and it’s hard to quantify why.
A study recently published by the University of Michigan shows that miles driven in light-duty vehicles peaked in 2004 and fell five to nine percent through 2011. Several measures were used in the study, including distances driven per person, per registered vehicle, per licensed driver and per household, according to the Times, and all of the measures have decreased since 2004. Interestingly, light-duty fleet vehicle driving peaked in 2006, and decreased from 2.8 trillion miles driven per year to 2.6 trillion miles in 2011.
“I’m reasonably confident that 2006 was a temporary peak in driving,” says Michael Sivak, a research professor at the school’s Transportation Research Institute. “I’m less confident that the peaks in the rates reached in 2004 are temporary.” Lifestyle changes, such as relocation to cities and increased telecommuting and public transit, are driving factors in Americans driving less miles, as is the aging of the driving population, Sivak says.
Micheline Maynard, former Detroit bureau chief for the New York Times, adds that young people tend “to be more infatuated with social media than with cars and driving,” and the number of teenagers earning drivers licenses has reached “recent lows.” And with gas prices high and money tight, people tend to cut cars from their lives first, says Maynard, adding that the Obama administration has improved public transit systems through aggressive financing of projects.
All of this has led to fewer vehicles on the road. Sivak found in a previous report that the number of registered light-duty vehicles peaked at 236 million in 2008 and has fallen since then to 234 million in 2011.
Mercedes-Benz makes some fine automobiles. The Silver Arrow’d cars are so good, apparently, that thieves can’t help but try to steal them. The German brand is at the top of the charts for luxury car thefts in the US, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, with New York City leading the way. (And those New Yorkers complain about Detroit being bad!)
The C-Class was the most stolen model, with 485 ganked between 2009 and 2012 in NYC alone, while the E-Class and S-Class (which also boasted the worst recovery rate, at 59 percent) both finished in the top ten. Following the C-Class was the BMW 3 Series and Infiniti G. Not surprisingly, each of these were the most common models in their respective lineups. Los Angeles and Miami are also prime hotspots for luxury car thefts, according to the Detroit News report.
While getting your car stolen is pretty awful, there was one inspiring statistic compiled by the NICB – the average recovery rate across the board was 84 percent, with the Cadillac CTS getting recovered 91 percent of the time.
NEW YORK — U.S. private employers added 200,000 jobs in July, topping economist expectations in an encouraging sign for the labor market recovery, a report by a payrolls processor showed on Wednesday.
Economists surveyed by Reuters had forecast the ADP National Employment Report would show a gain of 180,000 jobs. June’s private payrolls were revised up to an increase of 198,000 from the previously reported 188,000.
The report is jointly developed with Moody’s Analytics.
Chrysler Group, pumped up by the strong demand for its Jeep vehicles and Ram pickup truck, reported healthy second quarter earnings. Its CEO said the solid performance had the company poised for an initial public offering by the end of this year.
Chrysler reported net income of $507 million for the second quarter, up 16 percent from the same period a year earlier. The company said modifications it needs to make to the Jeep Cherokee and Liberty models to prevent fires will take a bite out of earnings for 2013.
CEO Sergio Marchionne, who also serves as CEO of Italian automaker Fiat, which has a controlling stake in Chrysler, said the company is preparing paperwork for its long-awaited IPO. “November or December would be the ideal time” for the Chrysler listing, said Marchionne.
Will there be demand for Chrysler stock? Auto stocks have underperformed the market the last two years except for Tesla Motors. And General Motors, which along with Chrysler was the beneficiary of taxpayer-assisted bankruptcy in 2009, has not enjoyed great demand for its shares until recently.
For more on Chrysler’s fortunes, get the rest of the story at AOL Autos.
Ford is toiling away, installing heavy-duty engine components into select 3.7-liter V6s to allow them to run on compressed natural gas (CNG) and liquid petroleum gas (LPG) in addition to gasoline. That’s nothing new, but now, Ford has announced that it will offer the 2014 F-150 with this engine configuration, bringing the Blue Oval’s total number of CNG/LPG-friendly vehicles up to eight. The F-150 will be the only half-ton pickup on the market that can run on these gases.
Ford will charge $315 per vehicle to equip the optional engine, but the trucks won’t be ready to run on the alternative fuels straight from the factory and must be upfitted with additional equipment. A Ford Qualified Vehicle Modifier will install a separate fuel system for the compressed gases at a cost of $7,500 to $9,500, depending on fuel tank size. With the right-size tank, the F-150 equipped with the CNG/LPG-prepped engine can go 750 miles on one tank of gas, according to Ford, averaging 23 miles per gallon.
The practice of offering flex-fuel vehicles is gaining momentum as businesses take advantage of cheap gas. CNG can be bought for $2.11/gallon on average (per gasoline equivalent), and sometimes for as little as $1.00 in some parts of the US, Ford states. “With the money saved using CNG, customers could start to see payback on their investment in as little as 24 to 36 months,” says Jon Coleman, Ford’s fleet sustainability and technology manager. The automaker expects to sell a total of 15,000 CNG/LPG-prepped vehicles in the 2014 model year.
Check out the press release below to read the details, and to see what other vehicles Ford offers with the CNG/LPG package.
There’s a classic The Far Side comic where two aliens, cleverly disguised as traffic lights, discuss eliminating the Earth’s population slowly, one at a time. The joke, of course, is that things aren’t always what they seem.
Apparently, filmmakers Les Drew and Kaj Pindal had a similar idea back in 1966, when they made the animated short called What on Earth! The nine-minute movie is a satirical look at Earth from outer space. Specifically, when Martians arrive on our blue rock, they assume, based on the observable conditions, the automobile is the dominant species. It’s a warm and funny little video, especially the part about how getting crushed and heading to the junk yard is an individual’s final contribution to society. The Film Board says, “This animated short proposes what many earthlings have long feared – that the automobile has inherited the planet. When life on Earth is portrayed as one long, unending conga-line of cars, a crew of extra-terrestrial visitors understandably assume they are the dominant race. While humans, on the other hand, are merely parasites.”
What On Earth! was nominated for an Oscar for Best Animated Short in 1967, but lost to something called The Box. Produced by the National Film Board of Canada, the movie was shown in theaters and on ABC television in the US in the 1960s. Now, it is available for your viewing pleasure simply by clicking below.
The Pontiac Aztek will always have a place in automotive history – right in between the Edsel and the 2014 Jeep Cherokee – but if you happen to be a fan of this unconventional-looking crossover, then here’s your chance to own a rare find. The 2001 Aztek you see here has the distinction of being the very first Aztek ever sold with VIN 001, and it’s currently up for auction on eBay.
This isn’t the first time this particular Aztek has seen an auction block, though. It was one of many GM-owned vehicles at the 2009 Barrett-Jackson auction in Scottsdale, Arizona, and it ended up selling for $15,950. Now the Aztek is owned by a car dealership in Texas that has it listed locally on its website for $16,999 – compare that to the $21,445 base price of a brand-new Aztek in 2001.
As of this writing, the eBay auction for Aztek No. 001 has not met the reserve, with six days left and 15 bids, the highest of which is $3,222 (slightly higher than the $2,848 Blue Book value). With just 8,000 miles on the odometer, this well-maintained Aztek isn’t your typical used car, and you can check it out in all of its plastic-cladded glory in the gallery (of not-so-great images) above.
Although we’re still not entirely sure what Mercedes is planning to call its new sub-SLS coupe, more potential information about the car is starting to come to light. After Mercedes released official “spy shots” (shown above) back in June, Auto Express is saying that we might have to wait until 2015 to see this production version on the road.
Potential names for the car include SLC and the return of the SLR name, but regardless of what it will be called, this car is aimed squarely at the Porsche 911. Previously, we heard the new Mercedes could start under $100,000, but this report says that the new coupe will carry a base price of around $122,000, while a Black Series model could go for around $180,000 (both prices converted from British pounds). In any case, seems it’ll be a few more years before we actually know for sure.
Inserting an LTE-enabled SIM card into the Audi’s MMI navigation will make the S3 a WLAN hotspot that can quickly shuffle high-definition content from the cloud to the cockpit. It will also bolster Audi Connect services like Google Earth, Facebook and Twitter, e-mail, and streaming internet radio.
We’ve been told that we’ll be offered the LTE option when the 2015 A3 sedan gets here in the spring of 2014. Since the service requires you to provide a SIM card, we expect that costs and data caps will be a matter between you and the service provider; speaking of which, Audi hasn’t announced yet who that provider will be on this side of the Atlantic. The press release below has more details.
Henry Ford, founder of Ford Motor Company and the man that is widely considered to have put America on wheels, would have been 150 years young today. Naturally, there are celebrations at Ford’s Dearborn headquarters, and the state of Michigan has declared today, July 30, 2013, Henry Ford Day.
While Ford’s flaws are well documented, his institution of the moving assembly line and $5 work day were largely responsible for the middle class explosion in Detroit during the 1910s and 1920s, while vertical integration in his production contributed even further to the affordability of Ford’s products. Ford’s company was also a key component of the Arsenal of Democracy, with the company’s Willow Run Assembly Plant one of the crown jewels of war-time production.
Besides celebrations in Michigan, Ford facilities around the globe are celebrating the 150th anniversary of its founder’s birth. Ford’s German outlet is holding five road rallies over the course of 2013, while 21 markets in the Asia Pacific region have converted showrooms into displays celebrating Ford’s history, as part of Ford Heritage month. There will be more celebrations in the coming months, as well.
Have a look through the gallery above for lots of historical photos of Henry Ford, as well as celebrations taking place in other parts of the world.
The current Subaru Legacy is only three years old, but compared to rival midsize sedans like the Mazda6 and Ford Fusion, which have recently received thorough redesigns, it might as well be a million. In other words, a reworking is in order. Caught in these spy shots, the 2015 Subaru Legacy appears to be about the same size as the current model, but it appears that Subaru is looking to push the sedan a little more upmarket in terms of styling and luxury.
Despite the heavy camouflage, some elements of the new Legacy’s design are still visible. The new headlights still have a scalloped shape but are much narrower, and we can also see the deep body creases that run the full length of the sedan. At the rear of the new Legacy, the taillights should get some added depth with a C-shaped brake light design similar to what we saw on the WRX Concept earlier in the year.
Showing that Subaru is aiming a little bit higher for this Legacy, this car is being benchmarked against all-wheel-drive luxury vehicles like the current Infiniti G37 and the Audi Allroad – the latter is likely for comparison with the Legacy’s wagon version, the Outback. Following the XV Crosstrek Hybrid, we expect the 2015 Legacy to be the next Subaru product to get a gasoline-electric hybrid powertrain, which we hear will be paired with a turbocharged four-cylinder engine, a CVT and, of course, all-wheel drive.
No word as to when the 2015 Legacy will debut, but the New York Auto Show is as good a guess as any.
Dash cam videos out of Russia and Eastern Europe always manage to crank the pucker factor up to surprising levels, but this might be one of the closest calls we’ve seen yet. As a man was casually crossing the street with a pair of tires in hand, a Lada Niva driver hit the brakes a little too late and a little too hard causing this spectacular incident.
Lots of luck was involved here, and it is impressive how calm the pedestrian remained during and after the incident (he might even be luckier than this pedestrian who narrowly avoided being hit by a car carrier earlier in the year). The whole ordeal seemed to be over just as fast as it happened, and you can check it out in the grainy video posted below.
