Paintless Dent Removal Illinois

As a tribute to the wit and wisdom of David E., we’ve selected a number of his best columns and stories. It’s a brief look back at his life in his own words.

David E.’s seminal BMW 2002 review brought the brand to the attention of American enthusiasts. His Driver’s Seat columns reflect his love of good cars and lasting friendships, with topics including his emotional connection to the Chrysler Town & Country, a cross-country trip in a Chevrolet Camaro Z-28, a meeting with President Carter’s secretary of transportation, the racing accident that shaped his career in journalism, and the passing of his own father. And the 1980 Enthusiast’s Diary from our 25th anniversary issue provides a snapshot of his life in 1955, the year of the magazine’s founding.

Keep Reading: David E. Davis, Jr., A Retrospective

At the Geneva auto show earlier this month, Kia introduced the 2012 Rio hatchback—a fancily re-skinned version of the same old Rio the company has been selling for several years. Today, the company announced that it will debut the sedan version of the restyled subcompact at the New York auto show in April, where Americans will also get their first glimpse of the five-door.

You can read our full rundown of the 2012 Rio here, but in truth there’s not much to say. The Rio hatch uses the same underpinnings as the last-gen car, and we expect the same to be true for the sedan. The best we can hope is that Kia updates the Rio’s present powertrain, a 110-hp engine that’s paired with either a five-speed manual gearbox or a four-cog auto.

The current Rio is inoffensive, but with every other automaker pouring money into developing and delivering refined, fun, high-content subcompacts to the American market, Kia’s move of dressing up the same ol’ car isn’t going to cut it. There’s a reason the Soul outsells its aquatically-named sibling four to one.

Meet the Mi-ray hybrid concept, a comely wasp of a roadster/speedster concept that debuted today at the Seoul auto show. Why Seoul? It’s Chevy’s newest market; you may recall that the bowtie recently replaced the domestic Daewoo nameplate in Korea. (You also may not remember this event, which we completely understand.)

The car’s name means “future” in Korean, and its powertrain fits that bill (more on that in a minute), but GM says the Mi-ray pays tribute to the past 100 years of Chevrolet design, and specifically the 1962 Corvair Super Spyder and 1963 Corvair Monza SS concepts. We confess to not seeing much more than the slimmest of ties to the older show cars, but all three are speedsters, so there’s that. Inspiration also came from jets, so apparently there were a few Saab brochures still kicking around the design studio.

1963 Chevrolet Corvair Monza SS Concept

The Mi-ray’s chunky front end combines an aggressive splitter, a bulging take on the Chevy grille, and Opel Ampera–esque slits that we imagine feed air to the front brakes. The rear fascia is blunt and pretty boring, but there is still plenty of visual interest back there, with fairings that flow back from the cockpit, the panels that rise from the rear haunches like insect wings, and a snazzy light-up Chevy emblem. The body is constructed from carbon-fiber, including the scissor doors, which take slices out of the wraparound windscreen when raised. The wheels—20s up front, 21s at the rear—are made from carbon-fiber and aluminum, and yet more carbon was used to construct the passenger cell. Like every recent concept, cameras function as side mirrors, although these perform a new trick by retracting into the side glass.

Like, Mercury or Molten?

1962 Chevrolet Corvair Super Spyder Concept

Inside, both seats are mounted to an aluminum rail that is then fixed to the passenger cell, and a Mercedes-Benz-style air scarf warms cold necks. The press release says that the cabin “contains a mélange of brushed aluminum, natural leather, white fabric, and liquid metal surfaces, for an overall effect of sculptural velocity”, to which we say, “okay,” “cool,” “won’t that get dirty?,” “seriously, don’t touch that,” and “we like turtles.” The instrument cluster is displayed via rear projection, just like your neighbor’s state-of-the-art TV twenty years ago, and is divided into three sections: vehicle performance info sits front and center, powertrain info is to the left, and navigation and mileage sit to the right. A forward-facing camera allows real-time video to be integrated with GPS information.

Now, about that powertrain. The Mi-ray can be front- or rear-wheel-drive at the driver’s discretion, thanks to its front-mounted electric motors and mid-mounted turbocharged four-cylinder. Output for the 1.5-liter gas engine is undisclosed, but the electric motors are each good for 15 kW (20 hp) and are fed by a 1.6-kWh li-ion battery pack the lives beneath the driver. Recharging is accomplished through regenerative braking or a port (with charge-level display) accessed via a sliding panel on one side of the car; a similar panel hides the fuel filler on the opposite side of the car. The transmission is a dual-clutch unit. Fuel economy is claimed to be around 60 mpg.

The Mi-ray has dimensions pretty similar to those of the late Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky roadsters—and the Sky was in fact sold in Korea as the Daewoo G2X—but don’t expect GM to start dishing up speedsters to the paying public any time soon. (And yes, between the title of this post and today’s report on the Kia Naimo concept, we’re trying to get hellaciously catchy songs stuck in your head. Did it work?)

Illustration by Andrei Avarvarii

Piscine, unpronounceable, ungodly powerful and now topless? Given the number of Zonda variants Pagani cranked out over the car’s decade-plus lifespan, it should come as no surprise that Horacio’s army is ready to milk the new 690-hp Huayra for all it’s worth. And merely a month after the car’s Geneva debut, the company’s confirmed it will build a topless version of its latest doubloon-raider. Pagani hasn’t given an official name for the droptop version yet, but if it follows the pattern of the Zonda, “Huayra Roadster” seems like a likely moniker for the beast. And because you can’t wait, we’ve commissioned a rendering of what the new Pagani might look like.

Each week, our German correspondent slices and dices the latest rumblings, news, and quick-hit driving impressions from the other side of the pond. His byline may say Jens Meiners, but we simply call him . . . the Continental.

Remember the Shuanghuan CEO? (That’s the Chinese automaker’s SUV, not its head executive.) One of the most talked-about vehicles at the 2007 Frankfurt auto show, the old-fashioned off-roader combined styling elements of the Toyota Land Cruiser Prado with a rear end that looked suspiciously like that of a first-generation BMW X5. BMW went ballistic and took the importer to a Munich court, which eventually ordered the cars to be destroyed. BMW sued for damages to an extent that forced China Automobile Deutschland, which also imported other cars from China, out of business.

The amusing CEO, more of a robust workhorse than an upscale SUV, certainly is less of a copy of the old X5 than the Brilliance A3—of which official pictures have now surfaced on the web—is a carbon copy of the spanking-new BMW X1. Brilliance, deliciously, is BMW’s cooperation partner in China, where the 3- and 5-series models are built in a jointly operated plant in Shenyang. When I visited the plant a few years ago, the paint shop was shared by BMW and Brilliance vehicles. Perhaps that’s why the brown paint of the Brilliance A3 looks so genuinely BMW. Let’s see whether the vehicle actually turns up in Shanghai. Brilliance would be wise to modify the styling to resemble a Toyota model’s instead, as the Japanese generally don’t make such a fuss about this kind of “competition.”

Speaking of BMW’s business partners, almost exactly one year ago BMW marketing chief Ian Robertson and Connersville, Indiana–based startup Carbon Motors announced a contract to deliver 240,000 diesel engines and transmissions for the tough-looking cop car that was supposed to be launched in 2012. Meanwhile, Carbon Motors is still waiting for the $310 million loan it requested from the Department of Energy. At present, only one demo car exists, and the company submits that it will take 36 months from closing the DOE loan to actually commercializing the car. But will the money materialize? There is not exactly a pressing need, as cops can choose now between a number of new and highly capable vehicles, including the Dodge Charger, the Taurus-based Ford Police Interceptor, and the Chevrolet Caprice. This is BMW’s terse comment: “We have a contract to deliver diesel engines and expect the contract to be fulfilled by both sides.”

Even though we own cars, aren’t we all victims as well? That’s what the World Health Organization says. The Geneva-based juggernaut (which runs through a staggering $2 billion every year) is lecturing us that “traffic noise alone is harming the health of almost every third person in the WHO European Region. One in five Europeans is regularly exposed to sound levels at night that could significantly damage health.” Traffic noise is responsible for 50,000 heart attacks and “one million years of sickness,” the study claims. Without traffic, certainly everyone’s quality of life would vastly improve.

Here’s another one you’ll like: Aonghus McNabola, lecturer at Trinity College in Dublin, has discovered that rear spoilers of modern cars pose a danger to the health of pedestrians and cyclists by guiding exhaust fumes (which aren’t exactly what they used to be) right toward their heads. Eco-minded busybodies are already weighing in, claiming that spoilers have no real use and should therefore be designed to facilitate the air flow requested by non-motorists.

Autobahn Tested: Mitsubishi ASX

The Mitsubishi ASX, as the Outlander Sport is called in Europe, isn’t much of a driver’s car with the gasoline engine, but I was pleasantly surprised by the front-wheel drive, manual-transmission, turbo-diesel version that I piloted for two weeks. The 1.8-liter oil-burner produces just 148 hp, but an impressive 221 lb-ft of torque. The throttle is so aggressive that the ASX jumps forward at every green light, and then it actually keeps going strongly well into triple-digit speeds. Does it want to be an Evo?

Perhaps in a straight line. The limits of the chassis are not sky-high during cornering, but you get good-natured behavior as you push it. The ASX also is sufficiently comfortable for long trips. The amber lighting of the panoramic roof, of course, is amusing rather than tasteful. Think 1970s music hall and load your MP3 player accordingly.

Gott im Himmel! Rennsport und Familiewagen! Our spies have snapped what appears to be Audi’s new RS4 Avant undergoing testing at a local track in Germany’s Eifel Mountains colloquially known as “The Green Hell.” (Perhaps you’ve heard it called the “Nürburgring.”) The tells that this is an überwagen? RS5 wheels, more-muscular fenders and an angrier front fascia with higher-volume under-bumper air intakes.

What’s not clear is whether this is the final shape of the car or whether it’s merely a mule disguising something a little more radical or refined. Also still open for debate is will power the production version of this car. It’s likely that the glorious V-8 from the RS5 will reside under the hood, but it’s possible Audi will go with a forced-induction V-6 instead. Either way, expect at least 450 horsepower, the price of entry to keep pace with Mercedes-Benz’s C63 AMG and BMW’s M3.

The RS4’s production history’s been checkered at best, first appearing with a twin-turbo V-6 and in Avant-only form, and just in select markets (read: not in the US). After taking a half-decade hiatus, it returned—packing a high-winding 4.2-liter V-8—in a full range of A4 bodystyles between ‘06 and ‘08, with the sedan and cabrio eventually crossing the Atlantic. While we’ll likely see a saloon version of the new RS4 over here, we’d advise you not to hold your breath for the Avant—we were craving it as much as anyone, as our speculative rendering from last year illustrates. Audi, you basically invented the modern hot wagon segment with the RS2—is it really okay to just let Cadillac’s CTS-V wagon stand unchecked in America?

Jaguar’s cars may not sit at the top of their segments’ sales charts, but each of the company’s three current offerings—the XJ, XF, and XK—really hit the sweet spot. The cars all share forward-looking styling, interiors finer than a Milan luxury hotel’s, athletic handling, and powerful engines. For 2012, Jaguar will try to improve on the near-perfection of the XF sedan and XK coupe, and the face-lifted cars will be revealed at the New York auto show this April.

The changes will definitely include a cosmetic freshening for both cars, just to keep the styling fresh. (Brace yourselves; we may be in store for more LED lighting.) The real question is whether Jaguar will make any changes under the cars’ hoods. The 5.0-liter V-8 makes 375 hp in its base guise—nothing at all to complain about—and would likely remain unchanged. But higher up the line, it takes on a supercharger to produce 480 hp in the XF, and offers 510 hp in the XFR and XKR. The recently unveiled XKR-S makes 550 hp, so we’d be thrilled to see this powertrain come to the XFR.

At the other end of the lineup, Europeans will receive a new 2.2-liter four-cylinder diesel in the XF. It should be good for 187 hp and 332 lb-ft. Frugal? Sure. But while this engine is an absolute necessity for Jaguar to sell cars on the continent, it’s definitely not coming to the States. With the 375-hp XF ringing up cheaper than much of its six-cylinder competition, we’ve got no complaints.

Unfortunately, we doubt that the XF’s freshening will include the one thing that could rescue the car’s sales: all-wheel drive. The Jag is the only car in its class to be rear-wheel-drive only, and considering that the company’s strongest market is the snowy Northeast, the lack of all-wheel drive is a dealbreaker. But engineering such stuff is expensive, and Jaguar/Land Rover no longer have Ford’s pockets from which to borrow.

We’ll bring you coverage of the face-lifted XK and XF from the show floor in New York.

Click to enlarge

On Monday we presented this week’s shifter and asked you to identify the make and model of the vehicle from whence it came. Many of you were misled by the unique dual-stick transmission into thinking this week’s shifter was from a four-wheel-drive vehicle. In fact, the second stick to the left of the shifter operates not a four-wheel-drive system, but one half of the Mitsubishi Tredia’s “4+4” dual-range gearbox. A few of you were close with guesses of Dodge Colt and Plymouth Champ, but the first commenter to correctly identify it as a Mitsubishi Tredia was Frans T, who will receive a Save the Manuals pin and sticker as a reward.

The Tredia pictured here is from our March 1983 issue. The unique 4+4 transmission featured “power” and “economy” settings by combining an individually shiftable four-speed manual transmission and a final-drive-altering two-speed gearbox. Whether thought of as an eight-speed or as a four-speed with overdrive for each gear, or anything in between, the 4+4 ensured that drivers of the $9500 sedan were never lacking in gear choices.

General Motors has filed an application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to trademark the term “Intellilink.” In the application, GM describes Intellilink as an “electronic interface module sold as an integral part of a motor land vehicle for wired and wireless interface of handheld electronic devices.”

This sounds an awful lot like the Chevrolet MyLink system. Headed for the Equinox and Volt this fall, Chevrolet MyLink will allow drivers to run specialized apps on their smartphones—from Pandora to Stitcher to, well, that’s it for now—and control them through the in-dash infotainment system in the car.

So what’s the difference between Intellilink and Chevrolet MyLink? Based on the very superficial descriptions in GM’s previous trademark applications, practically nothing. The trademark application for Chevrolet MyLink, filed last year, describes that system as “electronic interface modules sold as an integral part of a motor land vehicle for wired and wireless interface of handheld electronic devices.” The same can be said for the descriptions of Buick MyLink and GMC MyLink in those systems’ trademark filings. Figure on the difference between “module” in reference to Intellilink and “modules” for the MyLink setups simply coming down to a typo or discretion.

This leads us to think that GM might be rebranding all of the MyLink systems as Intellilink, thereby avoiding confusion with MyFordTouch, or that Intellilink will serve as some kind of expansion of the MyLink brand. With the company showing that it’s willing to unveil new tech anywhere—GM just made an announcement about OnStar at the SXSW concert series/bacchanalia in Texas—an announcement could come anytime, in any place (or not at all).

Porsche applies the go-fast formula to its top-spec sedan.

It was inevitable—and reported by us just yesterday—that Porsche would further extend its Panamera range. Just a couple of years after the launch of the Panamera Turbo, Porsche is adding a Turbo S to the lineup by squeezing another 50 hp out of its awesome 4.8-liter, twin-turbo V-8. This model is not exactly a surprise: The Panamera’s V-8 engines are shared with the Cayenne, and the last-generation Cayenne was already offered with a 550-hp variation. (Here’s a wild prediction: Porsche will add a new Cayenne Turbo S soon.)

Keep Reading: 2012 Porsche Panamera Turbo S – Auto Shows