Motor News

Hyundai has shown off the first images of the 2024 Kona, with the second-generation subcompact crossover bringing a fresh, angular design. The Kona will yet again offer electric and gas powertrains, with a hybrid powertrain potentially coming to the United States for the first time.The 2024 Kona also grows, adding 5.9 inches of length, with 2.4 extra inches in the wheelbase.The subcompact Kona crossover has been a hit for Hyundai, consistently coming in among the Korean automaker’s top five bestsellers since it was launched for 2018. Now Hyundai has revealed the first photos of the second-generation Kona, showing off a sharp, futuristic design that will continue to house a diverse array of powertrains. The 2024 Kona will be offered with varying degrees of electrification, with an all-electric model, a hybrid, and internal combustion engines including a sportier N Line variant. Unusually, Hyundai says the new Kona was developed as an EV first and then adapted to fit the other powertrains. The Kona has also grown, now measuring 171.5 inches long, 5.9 inches longer than the previous electric Kona. The crossover is also nearly an inch wider and has a 2.4 inch longer wheelbase than before. The pointy front end features a thin LED light bar stretching the width of the car, with the main headlights once again housed within a black plastic piece that stretches around the bumper to encapsulate the front wheels. On the electric model, the light bar gains a pixelated appearance to tie it in with Hyundai’s Ioniq EVs, and the electric Kona also has body-color wheel arches. A closely cropped image of the rear shows a similar design theme to the front end, with a narrow light bar atop larger taillights units incorporated into the wheel arches. The 2024 Kona’s expressive bodywork echoes the Tucson with heavily creased diagonal character lines on the side. The different variants get distinct faces, with the EV receiving a pixelated design in the front bumper and the standard gas and hybrid versions wearing a faux skid plate and chunky chrome details. The N Line sees a black grille linking the headlights, as well as a blacked-out roof and a rear spoiler. The 19-inch wheels also vary in design depending on the powertrain.More Hyundai EVsThe interior is completely reimagined, with an airy feel and two 12.3-inch screens combining to make up the digital gauge cluster and infotainment system. The gear selector has moved from the center console to a stalk behind the steering wheel, freeing up more storage space in the center console. Hyundai didn’t reveal any powertrain specifics, and it’s unclear if the hybrid will be sold stateside, since the first-generation Kona did not offer the hybrid model in the United States. Hyundai says more information on the 2024 Kona will arrive next year, and we expect to see range and power increases for the electric version. This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. More

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has opened an investigation into 242 Chevy Bolt–based robotaxis operated by the General Motors subsidiary Cruise in San Francisco.The investigation follows three crashes where the Cruise vehicles braked abruptly as a car approached quickly behind, causing the approaching vehicle to rear-end the Cruise cars.Cruise said it will fully cooperate with NHTSA. The company is looking to expand operations in 2023 as it readies its podlike Origin autonomous vehicle.Cruise, the autonomous-driving subsidiary of General Motors, has been testing its robotaxi service in San Francisco since summer 2021. That entity is now under investigation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The safety organization is looking into a series of crashes in which Cruise’s Chevy Bolt–based prototypes were rear-ended after the electric cars performed a heavy braking maneuver. NHTSA says it has received three reports of the Cruise vehicles “initiating a hard braking maneuver in response to another road user that was quickly approaching from the rear.” Each time, the result was the car behind hitting the rear of the Cruise vehicles. Two injuries were reported in the three collisions. The upcoming Cruise Origin.CruiseThe organization says that the Cruise vehicles “may engage in inappropriately hard braking or become immobilized,” leading the modified Bolt EVs to become “unexpected roadway obstacles.” NHTSA will now begin an evaluation of 242 Cruise vehicles, investigating the logic used by the cars’ computer systems when they performed the hard braking action. Depending on the results, this could lead to a recall of the autonomous vehicles.Stranded RidersNHTSA also says it has reports of Cruise vehicles “becoming immobilized,” which “may strand vehicle passengers in unsafe locations.” This is not the first time Cruise has faced scrutiny—a crash in June that left two people injured prompted a recall of 80 vehicles to update the self-driving software.More Futuristic Pod VehiclesCruise responded by pointing out that, after “nearly 700,000 fully autonomous miles in an extremely complex urban environment,” there have been “zero life-threatening injuries or fatalities” but said it will “fully cooperate with NHTSA or any regulator,” as reported by Reuters. The company also noted that the police did not issue tickets to any of its vehicles in the three crashes. Despite the investigation, Cruise is charging ahead with its ambitious goals, planning to expand into new markets and introduce thousands of autonomous vehicles in 2023. The company announced last Thursday that it had received the first of two permits needed from California that will allow it to charge riders for trips across all of San Francisco in its self-driving cars. The company also petitioned NHTSA in February 2022 for permission to use autonomous vehicles that do not have steering wheels, mirrors, or other physical controls as it develops the pod-like Origin first revealed in 2020. This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. More

Today you can listen to whatever you want on Apple Music or Spotify, but back in the 1960s, your Christmas music was on the radio or on vinyl.It seems unlikely today, but Goodyear and Firestone sold holiday music alongside tires during holiday seasons of the 1960s and early 1970s.As an Ohio-based LP-to-MP3 conversion company is still doing a booming business with these classic discs, although the era of getting them at tire stores is long gone.From Spotify playlists to radio stations starting holiday tunes on Black Friday, it’s nearly impossible to avoid the sounds of the Christmas spirit. But back in the 1960s, if you wanted a compilation of holiday tunes, chances are you picked it up at the same place you’d get a new set of whitewalls. From 1961 to the mid-’70s, well before Mariah Carey’s monopoly on the holiday spirit, tire manufacturers such as Goodyear and Firestone offered Christmas records in their stores for about $1 (the equivalent of approximately $9.40 today).Stanley Arnold was the man responsible for the unlikely, yet successful, pairing of rubber and Rudolph. Arnold worked at an advertising agency before striking out on his own and convincing executives at Goodyear to lure customers into its stores with something that today anybody with a smartphone can access: a who’s who of classic Christmas covers. Arnold’s idea helped Goodyear sell more than 15 million records—not to mention millions in tire and accessory sales—over 17 years. The albums even remain popular today. “They are still our bestsellers, particularly the Goodyear and Firestone albums,” said David Feinauer, co-owner of Christmas LPs to CD, a Cincinnati, Ohio, company that converts vinyl into downloadable MP3s and CDs. “For Goodyear, the 1965 and ’66 [albums] are the two most popular; the Firestones have a more even demand.”A Lucky StrikeBut how did Arnold associate Christmas music with tire companies? The idea, as he wrote his 1968 book Tale of the Blue Horse and Other Million Dollar Adventures, started after a meeting at Lucky Strike’s headquarters in Durham, North Carolina. Arnold and others were invited to pitch ideas that would help boost cigarette sales. “All the way back to the office I kept humming the tune of the Lucky Strike television commercial that had been played at the meeting,” Arnold wrote. “I decided that music would reverse the sales decline of Lucky Strike.” Arnold’s idea was to offer a collection of music, pulled from Columbia Records, to those who mailed in $1 and proof of purchase of Lucky Strikes. It wasn’t long until sales climbed. The plan proved successful, and Arnold set out to repeat it with another billion-dollar industry: tires.A Goodyear for Christmas MusicWith the runup to Christmas being a big season for tire sales, Arnold bet that music could draw people into Goodyear’s then 60,000 retail outlets. Arnold pitched the idea that buyers would be interested in a Christmas music album.One of the ways he made it easy for a tire company to agree to sell records was by proving it wouldn’t cost them anything. Arnold worked with Columbia Records, which agreed to put together a collection of its best recording artists, which it would offer to Goodyear as an exclusive for only $1 per record. As long as Goodyear sold the records for the same amount, the tire company wouldn’t pay a penny for the albums. Even if no one bought a tire, chances were that these companies wouldn’t lose money from this scheme. For the inaugural Great Songs of Christmas, Arnold amassed a collection of timeless songs that included the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing “Silent Night” and the Leonard Bernstein–led New York Philharmonic’s version of “Unto Us a Child Is Born,” as well as classics such as “The First Noel,” “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” and “Deck the Halls.” Despite Arnold’s suggestion to order 3 million copies, Goodyear countered with 90,000 records. Arnold worked to get the order up to 900,000. Christmas by the Fire(stone)It was around this time Arnold heard that Firestone was working with RCA Records on a Christmas album. Of the conspicuous timing, Arnold wrote: “These coincidences are common in the world of ideas, but the deciding factors are the relative quality of the ideas and the determination with which management supports them.”By December 1, 1961, after only a few weeks of sales, Goodyear stopped promoting the Christmas album—the tire giant had sold every record it ordered. When Goodyear’s second Christmas album came out in 1962, it sold every one of the 1.5 million copies it ordered. This trend continued, too. By the time Goodyear’s sixth Christmas album came out, the tire company had upped its order count to 4 million records. Once again, they sold out. Eventually, distribution for the Goodyear Christmas compilations switched from Columbia Records to RCA Records. As a result, a different set of artists appeared on these albums, including Julie Andrews and Ella Fitzgerald. Firestone, meanwhile, released a total of seven Christmas records starting in 1962 and ending in the 1970s. Whereas Goodyear’s records often featured images of the artists, Firestone’s featured a bow. Feinauer categorized the Goodyear albums as having more of a pop twist with songs such as “Jingle Bells.” The Firestone collections, meanwhile, skewed a bit more traditional, as shown by the records’ more modest branding. By the mid-’60s, the trend of tire companies selling Christmas music was firmly established, with other tire manufacturers, including BFGoodrich, joining in. Other stores, such as JCPenney and Sears, soon offered Christmas records of their own. With this increased competition, sales of such albums from tire companies began to wane. Before long, the era of tire manufacturers selling Christmas records came to a close. This content is imported from OpenWeb. 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There are 1.9 million vehicles on the road today with incorrect numbers on their odometers, according to Carfax. That is up 7 percent from a year ago.While California has the most of these kinds of vehicles on the road today, the rate of increase was especially high in Texas, Florida, and Arizona.Digital odometers can make it easier to falsify a dashboard reading but also harder to get away with it if someone takes the time to investigate.Used-car prices continue to decline in the U.S., but that doesn’t mean everything on the secondhand market is running perfectly. One unfortunate, old-fashioned trend that’s making a bit of a comeback is odometer fraud. The digital age has, in some instances, made it easier than ever to roll back time.Almost 2 million vehicles on the road today have an odometer number that’s been reduced in some way, according to a new report from Carfax. The 1.9 million incorrect readings represent a 7 percent increase from last year, Carfax said. As the largest car market in the U.S., it’s not a surprise that California has the most affected vehicles—more than 437,000, Carfax said—but that number is only 2 percent higher than last year. There were three states in the top 10 with the most affected cars that saw double-digit growth in odometer fraud in the past 12 months: Texas (up 15 percent), Florida and Arizona (both up 12 percent). These rollbacks can have a real impact, causing buyers to lose an average of $4000 in value with their purchase, not counting any unexpected maintenance costs, Carfax said.Trouble in the Car MarketThe National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has been tracking odometer fraud for decades. In 2002, it said there were around 450,000 cases of odometer fraud reported each year and that these misreported numbers ended up costing used-car buyers over a billion dollars a year. NHTSA said there is about a 3.5 percent chance that a car will have its odometer messed with in the first 11 years of its life. As we wrote in 2018, the digitization of vehicle odometers introduces a host of other factors to an odometer rollback, as so many other parts of the car use that number. This, plus increased data capture by auto repair shops and other sources, mean that even if the odometer is messed with, there are now more ways to confirm any changes. In 2021, NHTSA changed its rules for required ongoing odometer reporting so that any vehicle built in or after the 2011 model year now needs to be tracked for 20 years instead of just 10, as it was before. NHTSA said it made this change because the average age of the car on the road was increasing, and a change in the rules was required “to address an increase in odometer fraud involving older vehicles.”How to Protect YourselfIf you are looking to purchase an older vehicle with a mechanical odometer, there are some key things to look out for, NHTSA said. Ask for the title to see what the officially reported odometer reading is, and make sure that that detail is not difficult to read. If the car includes maintenance records, especially oil changes, they can be a good start to estimating accurate mileage. For relatively new vehicles (with under 20,000 miles), the tires should be original. NHTSA also recommends getting a vehicle history report, which Carfax (unsurprisingly) offers as an organization interested in selling information about used cars to buyers. The group’s Odometer Fraud Check compares your Vehicle Information Number (VIN) to information in state DMV databases of vehicles that have been reported as having their odometers falsely changed.This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. More

After increasing pricing for the Ford F-150 Lightning in August and again in October, Ford has raised the bar for entry yet again, this time to $58,514.The price increases struck the more budget-oriented Pro and XLT trim levels, with the more expensive Lariat and Platinum trims being spared the increase. Destination charges were raised by $100 across the board.Ford issued a statement to Car and Driver saying customers waiting for delivery on current orders are not affected by the increase. The adjusted prices began with the new retail order bank on December 15 and will go into effect for the Q2 commercial order bank when that opens.Looking back now, the original 2022 F-150 Lightning was a bargain at the starting price of $41,669. When it reopened order banks for its electrified pickup, Ford quietly increased the price of the 2023 model for the third time since August, raising the base price to $58,514. The new price reflects an inflation of nearly $5000 since only the last round of adjustments, and it pushes the needle further out of reach for customers in search of a base electric truck. Unlike the price increases from August and October, which raised the price on each trim level, this most recent hike only seriously affects the cheaper trim levels. Apart from a $100 increase in destination charges (which happened across the board), the top two trim levels are unaffected by the recent changes. Earlier Price IncreasesC/D’s preferred model, the XLT, now starts at $66,014 when equipped with the standard range battery, while the XLT Extended Range moves up to $82,869. The more expensive Lariat and Platinum trims only move up with the $100 destination charge increase, to $76,369, and $97,819 respectively. FordAccording to a statement from a Ford representative to Car and Driver, the price increase is a standard business practice due to rising material costs, market factors, and ongoing supply-chain constraints. The updated pricing went into effect December 15, when order banks reopened for retail customers. Commercial pricing will increase when the Q2 order banks next open. Customers who ordered in a previous order bank and are still awaiting delivery will be unaffected by this increase. This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. More

German tuner Mansory has whipped up another bizarre automotive creation, this time modifying a Bentley Continental GTC with an outlandish two-tone paint job.The black-and-yellow paint isn’t symmetrical, with the yellow taking over more of the exterior bodywork before spreading to the quilted leather cabin.The engine has been tuned to extract 740 horsepower and 752 pound-feet of torque.With its daring two-tone paint job, this one-off concoction from German tuner Mansory, called the Vitesse, looks like it should be the official car of Pittsburgh’s pro sports teams. The unique style, which nearly divides the Bentley Continental GTC donor car in half but sees the yellow paint take up slightly more real estate, is a first for Mansory. The color scheme makes the one-of-a-kind Bentley look like a rolling mascot for the Pittsburgh Penguins, Pirates, or Steelers. MansoryStatement-Making Style and PowerWhile the 2010 Wiz Khalifa banger “Black and Yellow” is a certified classic, we’re not sure the color scheme works quite as well on the Vitesse, but the Continental GT convertible’s motor should still produce a sonorous noise. Mansory doesn’t specify whether it uses the twin-turbo V-8 or the twin-turbo W-12, but the hexagonal exhaust tips match the look seen by Mansory’s previous 12-cylinder Continental monstrosities. MansoryEither way, the engine has been fiddled with by Mansory, now producing a whopping 740 horsepower and 752 pound-feet of torque. This is a substantial increase over any factory Continental, even blowing the 650-hp Speed model out of the water. The Vitesse sprints to 62 mph in a claimed 3.3 seconds, a slight improvement over the 3.6-second 60-mph sprint that Bentley quotes for the GTC Speed. Meanwhile, Mansory’s 206-mph top-speed claim is actually 2 mph down on what Bentley estimates for the standard car.More Wild Mansory CreationsWild Outside and Wild InsideDetails are otherwise sparse, but the main draw of the Vitesse is the wild color combo. Along with the exterior bodywork, the interior has received the same polarizing asymmetric treatment, with the left-side seats upholstered in yellow leather and the right colored in black. The quilted leather extends to nearly every surface inside the car, including the dashboard, the floor mats, and the transmission tunnel. A plaque on the center console declares the Vitesse’s unique nature. There’s currently no word on how much it’ll cost, but we’re sure Mansory will be able to find a buyer who has more money than taste to add the Vitesse to their collection.This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.This content is imported from poll. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. More

Having made a name for itself building beautifully imagined Broncos, Florida-based Velocity Restorations is moving into the pickup truck business.Like the company’s Broncos, this 1970 F-250 is powered by a Ford Performance Coyote V-8, matched with a four-speed automatic transmission.The top-of-the-line Heritage package is no farm truck, fitted out with a full leather interior and high-end stereo.In Miami, nobody raises an eyebrow at a Lamborghini. You might as well be driving a Golf for all the attention a Huracán will get you, and unless you’re one of the lucky few to have nailed down a preorder for Lamborghini’s safari-inspired Sterrato, you’re going to spend a lot more time worrying about scraping the nose than enjoying that V-10 screaming to redline. Besides, for the same money you could have a truck.That’s a capital-T Truck, specifically a 1970 F-250 hand-built from the ground up to provide the kind of experience you don’t get from a factory. The Velocity Restorations F-250 is eye-wateringly expensive—$285,000 to start, $325,000 for this blue-and-white commission-built Heritage package—but it’s a no-detail-spared masterpiece.We drove a 1969 Ford Bronco reworked by Velocity Restorations back in 2019, and came away both bewildered and beguiled. The Bronco was the easily coolest thing on the streets of Florida, but also seemed like a “more money than brains” option. We desperately wanted one anyway.More RestomodsThe company’s take on the F-250 is possibly even cooler. Any child who ever picked up a Tonka truck can’t help but be charmed by the stance of this pickup’s chunky 33-inch Toyo off-road tires and exposed suspension and axles. Trucks were simpler in 1970, less about the ornamentation than the purpose. Velocity’s trick here is taking that early simplicity and adorning it with flawless two-tone paint and billet accessories—subtle details you don’t notice at first.The powertrain, on the other hand, is not so subtle. Building on the lessons learned in crafting its Broncos and Harvesters, Velocity here pairs a Ford Performance crate Coyote 5.0L V8 with a stout 4R70 four-speed automatic transmission. Brakes are Baer discs at all four corners, the underpinning chassis is from the well-respected Roadstershop in Illinois, and the F-250 now rides on custom-valved Fox dampers. Velocity’s in-house custom exhaust and Dana axles complete the package. This blue-and-white two-tone model is a built to order special called “High Roller.” It marks the start of a new line for Velocity, which will start taking orders in 2023. Turnaround time is estimated to be 14 weeks, but it should be noted that wait times for the company’s Broncos stretched out to over a year. The order books for this thing will likely fill up fast. There’s also a plan to release a similar build based on the classic F-100 series pickup next year, though no concrete details are yet available.Throw in a full leather interior, air conditioning (not an available luxury for a Kansas corn farmer in 1970, totally necessary for a Miami beach cruiser), and a powerful Morel sound system to belt out your latest hit, “Only my dog’s been true to me.” You can keep your high-strung Italian exotica. Everybody loves a pickup truck, and Velocity Restorations is currently taking orders for one of the best.This content is imported from OpenWeb. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. More

The ARX-05 competed in the 2022 IMSA championship, powered by a 600-hp twin-turbo V-6 mounted to a carbon-fiber monocoque and sending the power exclusively to the rear wheels. Finding a recent race winner up for sale so soon after its competitive career has ended is a rare occurrence, especially since the car is offered directly by Honda Performance Development.The ARX-05 is up for sale on Bring a Trailer, with the online auction ending on December 23.The 2023 IMSA SportsCar Championship will kick off an exciting new chapter in American endurance racing. A new set of rules for the top class, now called GTP, has brought increased interest from major manufacturers, with Cadillac, Porsche, Acura, and BMW all set to compete in iconic events including the 24 Hours of Daytona. Only a few dozen of the world’s top drivers will have the chance to pilot one of the new GTP race cars, but now there is the opportunity to get the next best thing: a 2022 Acura ARX-05. This prototype ran in the predecessor to the GTP class, called DPi, and is now up for auction on Bring a Trailer, which—like Car and Driver—is part of Hearst Autos.Bring a TrailerThe Acura ARX-05 DPi was introduced for the 2018 season and is based around an Oreca 07 LMP2-class carbon-fiber monocoque. Power comes courtesy of a twin-turbocharged 3.5-liter V-6 that is based on the J35 production-car engine, variations of which appear in vehicles including the Acura MDX and the Honda Odyssey. Unlike those family haulers, however, the ARX-05’s V-6 churns out 600 horsepower at 6500 rpm and sends that shove to the rear wheels through an Xtrac six-speed sequential transaxle. Bring a TrailerBring a TrailerThe black 18-inch Rotiform forged aluminum wheels, shod in Michelin Pilot Sport P2L tires, are mounted onto an unequal-length control arm pushrod suspension. Brembo six-piston calipers combine with carbon brake rotors haul the ARX-05 down from a top speed of around 200 mph. The car also has a built-in air-jack system for rapid pitstops. Open the butterfly doors and you’ll find a stripped-out, focused cockpit with an abundance of buttons, a yoke-style steering wheel, a fire suppression system, and a six-point harness. Meet the 2023 GTP Race CarsThis particular ARX-05, chassis number seven, was built by Wayne Taylor Racing in December 2021 and competed in the 2022 season, securing pole positions at Daytona, Laguna Seca, and Road America and notching victories at Laguna Seca, Mid-Ohio, Watkins Glen, and Road America. Filipe Albuquerque and Ricky Taylor, who have each won the 24 Hours of Daytona twice, were the car’s full-time drivers, while Indy 500 winner Alex Rossi, three-time Le Mans winner Brendon Hartley, and former F1 driver Will Stevens also spent time behind the wheel. The car still wears the blue, black, and silver #10 Konica Minolta livery. It’s being offered for sale by Honda Performance Development, which works closely with privateer teams such as Wayne Taylor Racing to run top-class endurance racers. While old race cars occasionally come up for auction, it’s unusual to see one available for sale so soon after its final race, and even rarer to find one that collected so many trophies. This unique piece of history would make for a head-turning track day. With a week remaining until the auction ends on December 23, bidding is currently at $320,000.This content is imported from OpenWeb. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. More