GEE, WHO COULDA PREDICTED IT? Sales of Electric Vehicles Collapse in January

Never mind that the United States sits on hundreds or thousands of years of fossil fuel supplies. Never mind that. The federal government wants you to drive electric cars. The problem is, you ain't buyin' em.

EV sales had shown minor signs of life in the last quarter of 2012, only to collapse sharply in January. “Sales of the Chevrolet Volt, the Toyota Prius Plug-In and Nissan Leaf each had deep dropoffs in January from December,” Reuters says.

“Even after accounting for the fact that January is one of the slowest months of the year for auto sales, the dropoff for plug-in electric cars was considerable,” Michelle Krebs of Edmunds told the wire. According to Krebs, consumers are opting instead for less-expensive standard hybrids, rather than plug-in electric cars. OEMS blame other factors, such as limited supply, model year changeovers, or changeovers from Japanese to U.S. production, as it is the case for the Nissan LEAF. GM says January sales were down for the Volt because people bought before the end of the year to gain the 2012 tax credit. Which may have been the power behind the last quarter rise of the still tiny segment...

Ain't central planning grand?

I mean, how many billions of dollars did this administration waste on electric cars and batteries when the technology just isn't ready? When the full history of the Obama green energy program is written (starting with Solyndra, Fisker, A123 Systems, Tesla, etc.), it will make the Teapot Dome Scandal look like a shoplifting incident.

Thanks to Chief Justice John Roberts' outrageous Obamacare decision, though, it would seem the federal government has the legal right to command you to buy electric vehicles. So we got that goin' for us.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

Dude, we can't quite decide whether the grille should be placed high or low... but don't worry, we'll just do both!

That was my initial reaction to the AutoWeek cover shot of the 2013 Toyota Avalon

Is it just me, or does it look like the design committee couldn't agree where to put the grille, so they threw in two?

Experience the radically new, radically disturbing Avalon!


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

Look, Ma, No Wheels!

Photographer Renaud Marion imagines a world in which cars require no direct contact with the ground.

The shots depict cars throughout many eras of motoring that look normal except for one thing: they have no wheels. The models used include a Jaguar XK120, Cadillac DeVille (shown above), Chevrolet El Camino and Camaro, and Mercedes-Benz SL and 300 roadsters.

Perhaps one day when our future becomes our past, you'll be able to walk the street and see with your own eyes the rust and patina of age on our nation's fleet of floating cars. Until then, Monsieur Marion's photographs will have to do.

Given the rate of technological change -- especially nano-tech and applied quantum physics -- this kind of innovation doesn't seem all that far-fetched, does it?


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

SCHWING: Audi R8 Spyder

Maybe the president could redistribute an Audi R8 Spyder to some deserving young blogger.

...the V8 I drove is still the 424bhp 4.2-litre V8 - and that certainly didn't need to change. Personally I've always preferred it to the mellifluous 518bhp V10, which although more powerful, doesn't quite have the raw, raucous engine note and savage response of the V8. Audi claims a 0-62mph time of 4.5secs for the S Tronic V8, against 3.6secs for the V10, but I always thought Audi cheekily skewed those figures to make the V10 look good...

...No changes have been made to the all aluminium double wishbone suspension, the heavily rear biased 4wd system, nor the 43:57 weight distribution. The R8 is an effortlessly rewarding car to drive. It pootles about majestically, suspension so supple and accommodating, but has the ability to raise its hackles and change its personality in a split second. I'm still not sure that even a 911 does this better. What you discover on a good road is a car that's pin-point accurate, with lovely feelsome steering and body control that's rock solid, yet utterly placid. Accusations of blandness are ludicrous, they only come because of the ease with which the R8 goes about its business...

Daddy like.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

WHAT EVERY AMERICAN NEEDS: A DeLorean Hovercraft

"Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads..."

Great Scott! It's only a blimmin' DeLorean Hovercraft! Is this Dr. Emmett Brown's latest invention? A symbiotic hybrid of two of Back To The Future's greatest props: the Hoverboard and The DeLorean DMC-12? We're not sure, and don't really care. We're just glad it exists...

...Check the vid... to see a DMC-12 waft along San Fransico Bay on a cushion of air (potentially at 88mph), do a beach landing, followed by a pirouette, and then continue on its way like nothing happened.

We don't know who's driving (maybe the Libyans?), but we're just glad that someone had their camera phone unholstered and got this on digital tape. Meanwhile, we're also trying to get confirmation it runs on a hybrid nuclear / petrol motor requiring 1.21 jigawatts to charge...

No word on a "Mr. Fusion" power-plant option.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

HOLY HEART ATTACK, BATMAN: Detroit Auto Show Reveals Acura NSX Getting Closer to Reality

Look up carlust in the dictionary and you may see this tight little number:

You could imagine it going on sale looking just like this, when it reaches showrooms in about two years from now. Honda’s people weren’t giving much else away, but we’ll eat our origami swans if it doesn’t have the petrol-electric powertrain and 4WD we speculated on last year. The petrol engine, mostly likely a 3.5-litre V6 with 400bhp, will be correctly placed in the middle of the car and power the rear wheels. Then there are two electric motors up front: one for each wheel, operating independently to sniff out grip and see-off understeer, plus another one in the transmission at the rear to boost engine power when asked. Together, the electric motors will most probably add about 100bhp to the powertrain, bringing the new NSX to 500bhp overall.

This version – probably one or two steps away from the final production model – is also slightly smaller than before, but we’re talking about a few millimeters trimmed here and there. Overall, the proportions are as low and taut as an Audi R8. In fact, standing beside it, with the roofline just above your waist, it’s hard to fathom how they’ve crammed all those motors inside. If it stays like this, you could be looking at one of the most exciting cars we’ll drive this decade.

Excuse me for a second. I think I may have soiled myself.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

ONE OF THE ADVANTAGES OF OWNING A SUPERCAR: Spit Flames Out of Your Exhaust on Demand

Dude.

Better take some TUMS.

There are many benefits to owning a super car: breakneck acceleration, eye-catching design, unreal handling, superb braking, the list goes on and on. Some super car owners, like those that own the Lamborghini Aventador LP700-4, can add “shooting flames out of the exhaust” to that list.

Imagine just sitting in your driveway with your Aventador running, a camera behind you recording the rear of the car, and just stepping on the throttle to hear that special “pop”, knowing that the fires of 690 horses is erupting out of your exhaust in a brilliant display of power, consuming anything dares to get in its path of rage.

Yet another reason not to drive an electric car.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

NECK BRACE REQUIRED: The Fastest Ferrari Ever

Top Gear got a hold of the F12 Berlinetta and lists a few of the stunning metrics...

Let’s not get carried away, because we need to put this car into context first. And the best way to do that is to put some facts at your fingertips. So, open brain and absorb the following: it has 730bhp and 509lb ft of torque, stats which give it a 211mph maximum and a 0-62mph of 3.1secs. 0-124mph is dealt with in 8.5secs, so 0-100mph must be around the 6.5 second mark. That makes this an astonishingly fast car – Ferrari’s fastest ever road car, in fact. Quicker than the Enzo, quicker than the 599 GTO. And not just in a straight line. It gets round Ferrari’s own Fiorano track faster than both of them, too.

...It has the sharpest steering rack of any Ferrari, carbon ceramic brakes that now have more top end bite, and bodyroll has been reduced by 30 per cent from the 599. Turn in is 20 per cent faster, and you’ll use 15 per cent less steering angle, the engineers claim.

But it’s been so well honed. The brakes, steering, throttle, gearbox, all do exactly what you expect. There’s no slack or slop at all, so you always know where you are with it. It sounds ridiculous to say that a car with 730bhp (the same as a Pagani Huayra, let’s not forget) is a doddle to drive, but this one really is. It drives cleanly and precisely...

And speaking of the Pagani Huayra...


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

WHATEVER YOU DO, DO NOT TELL THOMAS FRIEDMAN: "Air Pollution From Cars Is Killing Everyone In Beijing"

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman has, on numerous occasions, praised the governmental structure and leadership of the People's Republic of China. To do so, he studiously must ignore Red China's "re-education" camps, its slave laborers, its systematic persecution of religious practitioners, and its controlled economy. The latter requires government approval and intervention for virtually every business in the country and has spurred the growth of a corrupt and dangerous form of crony capitalism.

And then there's the PRC's destruction of the environment:

No one would ever go to Beijing for its crisp air and clear skies, but smog problem in China's capital has, evidently, gotten way out of control.

NPR reported Saturday that the smog in the second-most populous Chinese city was thick and causing people's eyes to burn, with residents being urged to stay indoors...

...It's so severe that the level of pollution was, according to NPR, "literally off the charts," because the U.S. Embassy's smog index stops at 500 and the projected index in Beijing was closer to 800. Things in the 300 or higher range are usually pretty bad to begin with.

The contributing factors to heavy smog? Cars, of course, which have exploded in popularity in the last decade in China, and in Beijing in particular. There have been measures to slow the car congestion, but things like limiting the amount of new vehicle registrations have just made people stand in long lines. And talk offering rebates on electric vehicles sounds like a great idea, until you remember that it's coal producing most of the city's electricity.

Perhaps we should require Thomas Friedman to run the Beijing Marathon before publishing future advertisements for Communism.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

FRIGHTENINGLY UP-TO-DATE NEWS: For Regular Americans Only

Washington, DC - Citing a growing need for accurate news sources, spokesman Biff Spackle announced the addition of several channels to the BadBlue family of news sites.

"Regular Americans deserve better sources for timely and accurate news," Spackle said in a prepared statement, "And BadBlue's unique technology monitors social networks 24 hours a day, every day, to find out what's really happening, without the spin and bias that the alphabet channels promote."

In that vein, Spackle and a scantily clad spokes-model unveiled a new automotive channel (BadBlue.com/cars) as well as an entertainment channel (BadBlue.com/cars). The complete BadBlue lineup includes:

BadBlue.com

BadBlue.com/cars

BadBlue.com/fame

BadBlue.com/money

BadBlue.com/tech

Check 'em out. If you have any complaints, feel free to call Spackle on his direct line: 1-800-555-1212.

DUDE.

I wonder what the EPA thinks of these particular vehicles?

Yes, they're fitted with Mercedes' now well-proven 5.5-litre twin-turbo V8 sending power to the rear wheels - we won't get the four-wheel-drive versions in the UK - producing 557bhp in the ‘standard' E63 AMG (interestingly, 5bhp more than an M5).

But in the E63 AMG ‘S' version, that power rises to a whopping 585bhp - that's 28bhp more than the standard car and also 28bhp more than the old ‘Performance pack' previously optionable. Not only that, the ‘S' gets a differential lock on the rear axle that Mercedes claims helps increase traction, "especially on the race track". There's a gauntlet if Top Gear ever heard one...

The difference it makes is actually quite astonishing. 0-62mph in the standard E63 takes 4.2s (0.1s quicker than before). In the E63 AMG ‘S', 0-62mph takes 3.6s, which is 0.1s faster than a Ferrari FF. Faster than a four-wheel-drive Ferrari!

You'll find the AMG seven speed ‘Speedshift' sports auto ‘box as standard, complete with four modes (manual, sport, sport + and controlled efficiency). Both E63 versions get steel springs up front, and three-way adjustable air suspension at the back, with components built from aluminium. As expected, cycle through the ‘Comfort', ‘Sport', and ‘Sport+' modes, and you increase the likelihood of spontaneously combusting your passenger's mid-afternoon snack.

Merc has fitted ventilated and perforated 360mm discs all round (six pistons up front, four pistons on the rear) for the standard E63 AMG, finished in silver with white AMG lettering. The ‘S' gets the same, only with red calipers.

But, if you buy the E63 AMG ‘S', you can option ceramic high-performance composite brakes. They're 402mm in diameter, 40 per cent lighter than the standard ones and get a special paint finish. Press down too hard on these and you'll create a black hole in the Milky Way. 402mm. Sheesh.

Three letters: A. M. G.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

GEE, YOU MEAN IT DOESN'T MAKE ANY FINANCIAL SENSE? GE Abandons Plans to Buy 25,000 Electric and Hybrid Vehicles

Forrest Gump could have predicted this frickin' mess.

While General Electric has a vested interest in see electric and plug-in hybrid cars storm the car market, GE has apparently had a change of heart. The electronics and aviation giant announced that it was no longer seeking to replace much of its fleet with 25,000 hybrid and electric vehicles. Instead, GE will pursue other alt-fuel options, including CNG and propane.

That isn’t to say GE is completely abandoning its plans to buy electrified vehicles; just a few months ago GE announced that it would be buying 2,000 Ford C-Max Energi plug-in hybrids to bolster its fleet. Add to that the thousands of Chevy Volts GE has already purchased, and it is fair to say that GE put its money where its mouth is.

Unfortunately, as GE soon found out, hybrids and electric vehicles don’t make financial sense for every job or situation. With many GE employees logging an average of 100 miles or more a day, the hybrids face diminishing returns when it comes to fuel savings, and a Chevy Volt is a poor replacement for a work truck or van.

Electric and hybrid vehicles don't make any financial sense? I'll alert the media.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

Nah, no one would ever fall for the old "invisible driver drives through the drive-thru" gag!

Now this is good:

Hat tip: Ame.

JUST PERFECT: New "Eco-friendly" AC Coolant Said to Catch Fire, Poison Humans, Melt Windshields

Chalk this up as yet another epic failure by the ecotards (which is the term they prefer, I hear).

The case of Dupont and Honeywell's refrigerant R-1234yf is doing the exact opposite of keeping things cool. The two chemical companies have spent years and hundreds of millions of dollars developing R-1234yf to replace R-134a, the new refrigerant shown to be 99.7-percent kinder to the environment than the one it is meant to succeed... [After testing, the EU declared] that new and significantly revised cars from 2013 onward needed to use R-1234yf, and mandated that every car as of 2017 must use it.

Enter Daimler AG. The automaker created a head-on collision test with a B-Class at their Sindelfingen test track that would lead to the pressurized refrigerant being sprayed on the engine. The result in 20 out of 20 test[s] was that the refrigerant burst into flames as soon as it hit the hot engine... Another unexpected result of the R-1234yf test was the release of hydrogen flouride, a chemical far more deadly to humans than hydrogen cyanide, emitted in such amounts that it that turned the windshield white as it began to eat into the glass.

Said a Daimler engineer in a Reuters piece, "It was scarcely believable. The most complicated lab tests conducted using the most sensitive measuring instruments around found nothing and all we do is drive a car around a couple of times, open a tiny hole in the refrigerant line and the next thing you know the car is on fire." So Daimler said it wouldn't use the refrigerant, and it recalled the cars it had already shipped with R-1234yf.

...At least two other German and Austrian testing agencies have cautioned against the new chemical, a German firefighters organization has lobbied to have it banned while a rival German firefighters organization has cleared it for use, some German authorities are asking that automakers be given more time by the EU to conduct more tests, and it's reported that 13 carmakers have begun their own testing based on Daimler's initial findings.

A report in Bloomberg says that Volkswagen has joined Daimler in refusing to use R-1234yf in its cars. There aren't any 2013 VW models that fall under the EU mandate for use this year, so the fact that VW is speaking up means it wishes to lodge a vocal protest. Other automakers are still committed to the new chemical; Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet and GMC are still switching over in 2013, and Toyota in the EU has gone on record saying it hasn't found any safety issue with R-1234yf. The EU says it will enforce its decree [and] a Honeywell manager say[s], "The key element for the EU government is forcing the implementation of their rule."

Ain't central planning grand?

Hopefully this "green initiative" doesn't cost as many lives as the eco-Statists' last big propaganda campaign.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

VIDEO: Watch the world's oldest dashcam footage, circa 1926

Absolutely amazing:

The archives of the Fire Department of New York has released footage of a borough department responding to a fire in 1926. In the first of two silent videos, the camera is mounted on the car transporting Fire Chief John Kenlon from the Brooklyn Fire Department to a storage warehouse fire on East 123rd Street. Kenlon's name comes up frequently in the rise of the FDNY during the early part of the 20th century. The date of the video is given as April 24, 1926, and it was not only a remarkably snowy spring day, it could be the first dashcam video ever.

...The low-res screencap above shows the hood of Kenlon's vehicle, with a clanging bell at the front, driving on the sidewalk among pedestrians to get to the fire. As you'll see in the videos below, the situation on the actual roads was just as chaotic as the driving. So is the footage playback itself, which repeats and plays upside down and backwards at times, but we think is worth every second.

The video is arguably more exciting than the iconic chase scene from Bullit. And suitable justification for some bare minimum of traffic laws.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

PAGANI HUAYRA: Daddy Like

If you're into cars and don't visit BadBlue.com/Cars every 12 minutes, you're missing out on stories like TopGear's Hypercar of the Year:

The Hypercar of the Year is not going to revolutionise personal transport, reinvent motorsport or solve the looming energy crisis. Far from it, in fact. Unlikely to squeeze very much to the gallon, it will be made in tiny numbers and, at around £800,000 – more than three times the price of a Lamborghini Aventador – it will be bought by just a very few, very rich characters who will enjoy the exquisite qualities of a machine so unlikely ever to be a real, material presence in most of our lives that it may as well be a unicorn. And there it is: the Pagani Huayra, perhaps unicorn is the best way to think of it.

Even the ignition key is tasty.

Oh, and then there's the front view.

Holy shnikeys: are you checking out the turn-controlled flaps on the hood?


Hat tip: BadBlue.com/Cars.

WE NEED MORE ROLL-FREE ZONES: GM Recalls More than 69,000 SUVs and Trucks Because They May Roll Away

A brake is a terrible thing to waste

General Motors... says more than 69,000 full-size pickup trucks and SUVs distributed globally may be affected by a problem that could cause them to roll away after being parked.

According to safety regulators, certain 2013 model Cadillac, Chevrolet and GMC vehicles including the Escalade, Sierra and Silverado, may have been built with a cracked park lock cable or a malformed steering column lock actuator gear in the lock module assembly.

In this case, said vehicles may shift from Park with the ignition key removed or in the OFF position, as well as without the application of the brake pedal while the key is off... "Either of these scenarios may cause the vehicle to roll away after the driver has exited the vehicle, resulting in a possible vehicle crash and/or injury," GM said in a filing with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

In related good news, the U.S. taxpayer will get hosed for about $20 billion when it sells its GM stock, even though GM has reported roughly $16 billion in profits since President Obama "saved" the company -- using our money.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

COOLEST. TAXI. EVER.

Granted, it's a promotional stunt, but still...

For an advertisement by New York-based fashion brand Nooka, designer Mike Lubrano imagined converting a DeLorean into an iconic New York City yellow taxi cab. He says that the automobiles have ‘come to symbolize the future’ and communicate the brand’s ‘futuristic philosophy.’

Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever.

I still wanna ride in it.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

CLIMBING MOUNT AWESOME: Plotting Super-Car Performance Through the Years

I've always wondered about this, going so far as to revisit what top automotive performers looked like in 1988. But Car and Driver has put together the ultimate set of comparison charts:

As far as we’re concerned, the Mercedes-Benz 300SL was the first supercar. Why the 300SL? Funny doors, of course—plus a tricky mix of brawn and performance with intangibles such as outlandishness and rarity. It was a wobbly road from that 220-hp, 138-mph gullwing coupe to today’s aluminum-and-carbon-fiber wedges, but we’ve mapped the progression of the defining exotic-car stats here with data from our test archives.

Shhh. No one show this chart to the kooks at the EPA: their heads might explode, and I don't want to be responsible for the resulting clean-up.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.

STUNNING: Ohio State Researchers Discover Crippling Flaw in Batteries Powering Chevy Volts, Other EVs

Well, slap me on the butt and call me Nancy.

[Researchers at] Ohio State University [raised] new questions about the functional lifetime of a typical lithium-ion battery as used in a hybrid or battery electric vehicle.

A couple of Buckeye engineers found that, over time, a battery's lithium accumulates on the sheet of copper that serves as a "current collector" that transfers energy. With lithium ions traveling between the anode and cathode, lithium was previously thought to collect only on the anode's surface as the battery ages.

The issue of battery life and energy retention has been a major one as automakers offering electric-drive vehicles need to assure potential buyers that the newfangled car's battery life will equal or exceed the timeframe of typical vehicle ownership. General Motors gives an eight-year, 100,000-mile warranty on the batteries in the Chevrolet Volt extended-range plug-in (longer in California), while Nissan has said the battery pack for the all-electric Leaf will have 80 percent capacity after five years and 70 percent after a decade. Nonetheless, Nissan has been getting flak from a group of Leaf owners in Arizona who said their cars' battery capacity was shrinking more quickly than advertised. Perhaps OSU's research will help future electric vehicles avoid similar complaints...

Brainstorm! If you bundled campaign contributions for President Obama and would like to start a "green energy" company, I've got just the thing. Name your company something cool ("Lightbringer" comes to mind) and claim you're going to solve this very problem. The Department of Energy, I'm guessing, would be champing at the bit to send you $100 million or so of the taxpayers' loot.


Hat tip: BadBlue Car News.