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Study: Automotive Debt Is Out of Control, You’re Being Swindled

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Consumer Reports just released the findings of a year-long study looking into the latest trends in automotive loans and car payments. The resulting information highlights just how explosive the debt growth has been over the last 10 years and the arbitrary way in which borrowers are now being treated.

Long story short, we’re all being swindled.

With vehicle prices ballooning and the associated loans becoming longer than ever, dealers and lenders seem to be operating whatever way yields the steepest profit margins with only a modicum of consideration being given to the established frameworks designed to act as a guard rail. This has led to U.S. citizens carrying around a record $1.37 trillion in automotive load debt and customers with good credit being treated no different than those that fall into the subprime category. Sadly, the issue appears only appears to be worsening as new economic perils are only making things more expensive. Meanwhile, data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York is projecting national auto debt to swell to $1.42 trillion by year’s end. 

For the sake of comparison, Americans were only on the hook for $710 billion going into 2011. But the amount of debt being hauled behind us is only part of the story. Consumer Reports has used the study to assert that vehicles are eating up an increasingly large share of household incomes, citing nearly 858,000 loans from 17 major auto lenders.

From CR:

Today, Americans with new-car loans make an average monthly payment approaching $600 — up roughly 25 percent from a decade ago.

Most borrowers pay their loan with no problem. But in recent years, tens of thousands of consumers have found themselves in financial sinkholes after receiving high-interest, longer-term auto loans that, like the Maryland resident, put them at serious risk of default, CR’s investigation found.

This is happening as total auto loan debt held by Americans has increased dramatically over the past 10 years, surpassing $1.4 trillion — more than the gross domestic product of Australia. Because of recently skyrocketing prices for new and used cars, that debt is likely to grow even more.

“You’re not helping somebody to get a car if the odds are they’re going to lose it,” says Kathleen Engel, research professor at Suffolk University Law School in Boston who studies subprime financial products and is also the vice chair of CR’s board of directors. “That’s not getting somebody a car. That’s taking their money.”

Worse yet is that it’s not unheard of to see APRs surpassing 25 percent and lenders don’t seem to care who the customer is. While credit scores were invented back in the 1950s, under the auspices of delivering a standardized and impartial way of determining the creditworthiness of individual customers, the FICO score system used today didn’t appear until 1989. But it’s often been accused of allowing lenders to enact predatory stipulations on loans going to those with less-than-desirable numbers, particularly as the system has seen broader use.

Credit scores no longer apply exclusively to mortgage applications and loans. They’re now being included as part of some rental agreements and even job applications. It’s gotten to the point where we’ve begun to see pushback, often with claims that scoring doesn’t accurately represent debt risk and functionally serves to keep certain individuals from achieving upward mobility. While we’re not going to be diving into that, CR has asserted that the arbitrary nature of credit scoring has become a serious issue.

The outlet suggested that dealers and lenders are setting interest rates based upon something other than the standard loan underwriting practices. Instead, they’re conducting business in whatever manner “they think they can get away with” because many borrowers have no idea that they can (and should) negotiate terms or pit lenders/dealers against each other in hopes of getting a better bargain. Some of this is down to the legal and regulatory disparities between states. Though the outcome is the issue of focus because it’s in danger of permanently upending the economy when a meaningful percentage of the population can no longer afford to drive:

For one thing, it makes it harder to build the savings needed to purchase a car outright, says Pamela Foohey, a professor at the Cardozo School of Law in New York City who has published several studies on auto lending. Longer-term car loans — the average is now about six years — compound the problem, she says, trapping people in debt to fund a necessity like transportation.

“The trap for consumers, of course, is a boon to lenders,” Foohey says.

Falling behind on car payments can lead to repossession, triggering a cascade of other problems.

Lana Ash of Oklahoma and Dennis Lamar of Connecticut both had their vehicles repossessed last year in the middle of the pandemic, after getting stuck with high-APR car loans that proved to be more expensive than they could afford. Without a car, Lamar had to bum rides to doctors’ appointments. Ash had to take out another loan to fix a busted transmission on an old car.

“To this day, I still get emotional and upset about it,” Ash says.

Many Americans have faced similar outcomes. By spring 2021, an estimated 1 in 12 people with a car loan or lease, or almost 8 million Americans, were more than 90 days late on their car payments, according to a CR analysis of data from the Federal Reserve Banks of New York and Philadelphia.

The resulting scenario has left us with a non-comparative automotive market where big businesses and banks can more effectively take advantage of their own customers. CR claimed that 46 percent of the 800,000+ loans reviewed were underwater, with owners owing $3,700 more (on average) than what the vehicle was actually worth. But we’re still just scratching the surface on how dark this is all becoming.

Consumer Reports utilized information disclosed to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in 2019 and 2020 to investors of auto loan bonds, rounding out its research pool with thousands of pages of regulatory filings, court records, trade publications, industry reports, financial records, public documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, and interviews with more than 90 federal and state regulators, advocacy organizations, consumers, lawyers, legal experts, academics, and industry groups.

That data led to a few realizations, starting with the fact that your credit score is largely arbitrary when it comes to how vicious your auto loan is going to be. While there was a prevalence of individuals with scores exceeding 720 to receive better terms, literally everyone (including subprime borrowers) was subjected to APRs ranging between zero and 25 percent. CR likewise worried that lenders were intentionally putting customers into loans they couldn’t possibly afford, with over half of all subprime borrowers getting stuck with payments that were higher than 10 percent of their annual income. But almost none of the lenders bothered to check up on that, resulting in 96 percent of all auto loans going to people who never had their income verified.

This has likewise resulted in a surge of delinquencies over the last few years and a staggering increase in the amount of debt being carried around by Americans. But perhaps most alarming is how nobody seems interested in adhering to the underwriting practices that were supposedly put into place to keep things running smoothly in the fairest possible manner. Credit scores seem to be used to punish the subprime market without really offering much protection to those with good scores.

Consumer Reports said that it reached out to all 17 lenders covered in the analysis, in addition to industry groups like the American Financial Services Association and the National Automotive Finance Association. Some opted not to respond, with everyone declining to answer every question posed. Most also made assertions that consumers have the ability to make informed decisions for themselves and that there’s a wealth of information online for those interested.

Industry groups and financial institutions likewise claimed that auto lending was sufficiently regulated in the United States, suggesting that CR research failed to “contain enough information to accurately compare the loans similarly situated borrowers received.” Double-digit interest rates were dismissed as anomalies while the increased number of delinquencies and repossessions were dismissed entirely as they saw themselves as the only way for some customers to get vehicular loans.

“Consumers understand that rates will vary from creditor to creditor,” said Ed McFadden, a spokesperson for the American Financial Services Association. “They have ample opportunity to research and shop.”

Considering extended loan terms and a slightly higher interest rate can effectively add thousands onto even a modestly priced vehicle, it’s not difficult to see why CR is so critical of modern lending practices. There’s really no other way to spin this. Consumers are either morons, unworthy of being cut fairer deals, or financial institutions (and the dealership intermediaries) are predatory assholes that never seem to assume responsibility for their actions. And it’s all going to continue to be exacerbated as vehicle prices increase and automakers attempt to shift toward a direct sales model that further nullifies customers’ ability to negotiate payments.

This is like how modern safety requirements technically make it borderline impossible for new manufacturers to exist or any of my other anti-regulatory rants. CR has identified several industries working together to use the existing principles in whatever way yields them the most money. If you have some spare time, I highly suggest reading the entire report and inspecting the relevant investigative materials. It’s quite good, loaded with specific examples of the aforementioned problems, and written by Ryan Felton — who is adept at putting together these kinds of stories.

[Image: Gretchen Gunda Enger/Shutterstock]

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Rare Rides: The 2000 Mercedes-Benz CL 500, a Finale Called Final Edition

Large, luxurious, and very serious, the first generation CL was also an SEC and S during its life. While Mercedes-Benz played the Nineties naming games with its lineup, the W140 soldiered on in two-door format as a last-of for a top-tier Mercedes coupe.

The W140 500 SEC and 600 SEC were introduced in 1992 globally as successor to the C126 (that’s coupe) variant of the legendary W126 S-Class. We’ve covered C126 previously in both standard and cocaine-inspired AMG variants, but never a W126. Look for it in a future Rare Rides Icons.

Both versions of the W140 were penned by Bruno Sacco late in 1987, during the middle of his career at Mercedes. Sacco was lead designer at Benz between 1975 and 1999. With the W140, he brilliantly continued the pillarless hardtop styling of the C126. Two models of SEC were initially available: The 500 used a 5.0-liter V8 that produced 320 horsepower, while the top-drawer 600 SEC had a V12. The most expensive car Mercedes produced at the time, it used a 6.0-liter engine that produced 394 horsepower and rocketed the coupe to 60 in 6.1 seconds. The 600 SEC was incredibly exclusive, and fittingly asked $132,000 in 1992. Adjusted for inflation that figure comes to an eye-watering $262,000. V12 models were identifiable almost solely via their V12 badges on the C-pillar and the 600 on the back.

The range expanded into other models over the years, as a less expensive 4.2-liter V8 was an option in some markets. On the other end of the spectrum, AMG models used larger and more powerful V12 engines of 6.0, 6.9, and even 7.3 liters. That largest engine allowed the CL 73 AMG a top speed of 199 miles per hour and was the engine Pagani chose to power the Zonda of the 2000s. Standard Mercedes-issued coupes were all limited by German tradition to 155 mph. A considerable number of horses were required to motivate the CL, since in any trim it weighed at least 4,500 pounds, and weighed about 4,900 pounds with a 12-cylinder lump upfront. All cars used a four- or five-speed automatic dependent on model year.

In 1994 the SEC moniker that Mercedes used for decades was replaced by an S, as the S 500 Coupe and S 600 Coupe more closely identified with their sedan sibling. It was a temporary measure though, as for the model year 1997 in Europe and 1998 in North America the S was swapped for CL, and the CL-Class was born. Models were then CL 500, CL 600, and so on. The car underneath changed little over the years, as Mercedes used their best build quality, materials, and technology in their halo coupe.

The W140 coupe was offered through 1999 in Europe and 2000 in North America, at which point it was replaced by the W215 CL-Class. The second CL was based upon the new W220 S-Class sedan. The W215 was noteworthy, as it was Bruno Sacco’s final design for Mercedes. Both the W215 and its 2007 successor (C216) were more modern, full of even more technology, much more complicated, and as a consequence has aged more poorly over the years. Both second and third-gen CLs can be found commonly on high-quality internet content like “You Can Get All This $200,000 Mercedes Coupe For $15,000 You Guys Like and Subscribe,” but the W140 SEC and CL have escaped such an undignified fate. Their quality, non-bling appearance, and limited production (26,022 total) have kept them under the radar.

Shortly before the end of its production, Mercedes offered a final run trim on the W140 CL which they creatively called Final Edition. Said special edition seems to be an “all options as standard” version of the CL 500, and in this instance pairs a nice navy metallic paint to a black interior, with sporty AMG-adjacent monoblock wheels. A testament to its build quality, today’s CL has traveled over 164,000 miles and looks brand new. Located in Spain, the future classic asks $15,235.

[Images: Mercedes-Benz]

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NHTSA Investigating Ram’s Diesel Pickups

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Ram

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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has opened an investigation into nearly 605,000 heavy-duty Ram trucks. A report from the regulator’s Office of Defects Investigation has tabulated 22 complaints from the 2019 and 2020 model years, all of which use 6.7-liter Cummins turbo diesel engines, spurring the NHTSA to launch a formal investigation. Complaints revolve around loss of motive power, with most incidents occurring above 25 mph and resulting in the “permanent disablement of the vehicle.”

While the public was not made aware of the investigation until Monday, the agency launched its probe last Thursday on October 14th. The goal will be to establish how widespread the presumed defect is, what exactly caused it, and any potential safety hazards relating to the issue. Some headway has already been made, however. 

Back in 2019, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (now Stellantis) issued Warranty Bulletin D-19-02 to dealers. The memo requested stores participate in a campaign to “collect, monitor and correct quality issues” on certain MY 2018-2020 Ram trucks equipped with the 6.7-liter Cummins. The NHTSA’s action summary states that this resulted in FCA and an unnamed supplier collecting and inspecting high-pressure fuel pumps.

Vehicles under suspicion include all Ram 2500, 3500, 4500, and 5500 HD pickups from the 2019-2020 MY. The NHTSA plans on looking into the trucks to determine whether or not it needs to press Stellantis to launch a recall. That means asking the manufacturer to give its take on the situation while it compiles warranty claims, injury reports, and whatever FCA previously had on those suspect fuel pumps.

Regulators have been incredibly hard on diesel vehicles ever since Volkswagen’s emissions scandal upended the industry in 2015. While a part of me wants to believe the NHTSA just has it out for Ram’s HD lineup (since a few have asked), it seems far more plausible that this was a standard, shrug-your-shoulders defect. Selective environmental regulations have made diesels cost more as they’ve gradually amassed a bevy of pollutant controlling hardware while also complicating powertrains to a point that has lessened their overall effectiveness. But the impact this has had on their reliability is less obvious and may have nothing to do with a bunch of subpar fuel pumps.

Let’s face it, U.S. regulators haven’t been shy about hitting manufacturers with emissions-focused recalls backed by the Environmental Protection Agency and/or California Air Resources Board in the past. If they wanted to chide Cummins or FCA/Stellantis over pollution, they could have done so overtly.

Stellantis has said it plans on cooperating with the NHTSA fully, launching an investigation of its own for good measure. So we should have some answers soon, including the name of the supplier. In the meantime, you might want to keep a closer eye on how your HD Ram is running if it falls under the purview of the investigation.

[Image: Stellantis]

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The Inaugural American Speed Festival Gets Off to a Smart Start

What if organizers put on a top-shelf car event, exhibiting some of the most significant race cars ever, had two days of sparse crowds and the final day getting effectively rained out, and came away with a feeling of great success? Well, that’s exactly what happened at the inaugural American Speed Festival at the M1 Concourse facility in Pontiac, Michigan just north of Detroit, just held Sept. 30 through Oct. 2, 2021. The ASF is an attempt by M1 Concourse, a garage condo and performance track “country club for car enthusiasts”, to craft an American flavored take on England’s Goodwood Festival of Speed. The festival is scheduled to be an annual event, and for the first iteration of the show organizers brought in scores of some of the most historically significant race cars in American racing history to do demonstration runs on the track at speed, if not in anger.

How significant? As I walked into the facility I saw a gleaming white and silver Porsche 917/30, one of just six 1,500 horsepower monsters that were so effective at dominating the original Can-Am series that they pretty much destroyed it. Nearby was a Maserati Tipo 61, affectionately known as the “Birdcage Maserati” because of its space frame made up of hundreds of pieces of narrow section tubing. Not far from both of those was an ex Parnelli Jones Lola T70 roadster, arguably the most beautiful race car ever, that competed in Can-Am before the 917/30. Over in the main paddock, there were a couple of Gurney Eagles that came out of Dan Gurney’s All American Racers shop in California, one of Herb Thomas’s Fabulous Hudson Hornet NASCAR racers, and two STP Turbine Indy cars (yes, they do sound a bit like a vacuum cleaner). Almost all of the cars were original and authentic, though the 1901 “Sweepstakes” car that Henry Ford used to establish his reputation as an automaker was a replica from the collection of the Henry Ford Museum, where you can see the original.

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Cliches like “off the charts” or “legendary” fail so I’ll simply say that the collection of significant race cars was truly superlative, and that’s even before mentioning the stars of the show. Jim Hall, whose Chaparrals had their own period of domination in sports car racing and who is one of the most innovative pioneers of racing, was to be honored as a Master of Motorsport at the ASF’s Saturday evening banquet.

Unfortunately due to concerns about the Covid pandemic, Hall, who is 86 years old, had to accept his award virtually, instead of in person, but he sent his son, grandson, a team of support personnel, and four of his Chaparral racers to the event. Car owners and spectators alike flocked to the Chaparral corral, where sat the original fiberglass tubbed Chaparral 2, the 2E with the groundbreaking high, active wing that applied downforce directly to the rear suspension, the 2F coupe which took that idea to international endurance racing, and the “Yellow Submarine”, Johnny Rutherford’s Indy 500 winning ground effects Chaparral 2K in it’s Pennzoil livery.

As someone who had a slot car set with a Lola T70 and a Chaparral 2, this was better than being a kid in a candy store, and I wasn’t the only person who felt that way. Everyone that I spoke with was simply blown away by what cars were at the event, and unlike at a concours, car show, or museum, most of the racing machines and other significant vehicles at the ASF could be seen running on the track.

The paddock was a bit like a real racing paddock, albeit with less pressure and less competition. Race cars require a lot of maintenance and repairs so there was some wrenching being done as well as adjustments to perform better on the track. Unlike at a real racing paddock, there wasn’t much competition and in fact, one of the car owners, who brought an ex-Can-Am 1970 Mustang sport coupe, told me that in my coverage of the event I had to mention the high level of camaraderie among participants. After its first stint on the track midday on Friday, the Chaparral 2F needed a master brake cylinder, which they were able to source from another car owner.

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The car owners were uniformly exuberant about how much they enjoyed the event.

That is why the organizers considered the inaugural American Speed Festival a success despite the lack of spectators. When I asked one of the facility’s PR guys about the fact that I hadn’t seen or heard very much publicity here in the Detroit area about the festival, he told me that they’d done some local radio ads but for the most part the publicity targeted affluent car enthusiasts outside of the Detroit area. Then he said that getting spectators this first year was secondary to getting the cars. M1 Concourse CEO Tim McGrane emphasized that to me, that the organizers’ focus was on getting great cars, the idea being that if the car owners were happy, they’d tell others. The truth is that the high-end car collecting and vintage racing hobbies are relatively small communities and word gets around.

If you ask me, I think that they are wise to use this “if we build it, they will come” approach. The festival at Goodwood didn’t become a bucket list event because folks want to see Lord March’s estate. It’s the cars that draw people and getting to see the kind of cars that the American Speed Festival got this year are exactly the kinds of cars that will, in the long run, allow the event to grow. Taking this organic approach, instead of hyping big attendance figures seems like the logical way to go.

As mentioned, the ASF is planned to be an annual event and is already scheduled to take place in 2022 and 2023 on the first weekend in October. To be honest, that’s about my only criticism of the event. Scheduling an outdoor event in Michigan, with its notoriously changeable weather, is always risky, and the facility was soaked by rain on Sunday. In truth, though, the weather was beautiful on Friday and Saturday, when the cars were on the track, as Sunday was planned to be a static car show, with additional vehicles. If I could offer a recommendation it would be to move the event back to sometime in the summer and have both track and static displays all through the event.

In any case, if you have any interest in racing and performance cars (there was a class for exotic road cars) I’d recommend making plans to attend next year when the American Speed Festival honors the 60th anniversary of the founding of Shelby American. Hmmm. There are just six 917/30 Porsches. Based on the organizers’ track record, no pun intended, if I were a betting man I’d wager that at least one of the six real Shelby Daytona Coupes will be on their track in Pontiac next October.

[Images and videos © 2021 TTAC/Ronnie Schreiber]

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Lordstown Motors Sells Home to Foxconn

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Lordstown Motors

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The troubled Lordstown Motors has announced it will be selling its Ohio production facility to the Taiwanese Hon Hai Precision Industry, better known as Foxconn. But this is not a case of the prospective automaker offloading its assets so it can pay off its debts in full retreat. Instead, Lordstown has asserted this is a necessary partnership that will help guarantee it can still deliver the all-electric Endurance pickup truck.

Terms stipulate that Lordstown Motors will sell the sprawling factory to Foxconn for about $230 million. Two years ago, the site was purchased from General Motors for a very breezy $20 million after the Detroit-based manufacturer decided to abandon the Chevrolet Cruze. Foxconn will also be buying up $50 million worth of common stock and effectively take responsibility for production at Lordstown Assembly. However there is a laundry list of things that need to be done before pickup assembly is even an option. 

The duo have yet to formalize their agreement as to how the Endurance will be assembled (with Foxconn presumed to take the lead) or collaborate with the relevant suppliers so that production can be maintained. They will also need to assemble the vehicles that will be used for the testing, validation, and verification, in order they can get the necessary regulatory approvals for moving forward.

Foxconn is assumed to be jumping in because it’s a multinational entity with trillions in revenue and ties dispersed across the technology sector and eager to expand into vehicle production. Some of its biggest clients have included Amazon, Apple, BlackBerry, Cisco, Dell, Fisker, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Huawei, Intel, Microsoft, Motorola, Nintendo, Sega, Sony, Toshiba, Vizio, and Xiaomi. Globally, Foxconn has more than a million employees and it remains the largest employer in mainland China by far.

Despite the prospective automaker having gotten itself into trouble of late (not that Foxconn is lacking in terms of scandal), news of the deal caused Lordstown shares to increase by as much as 12 percent on Thursday evening. Bloomberg reported that the stock climbed by 8.4 percent during regular hours, closing at $7.98.

From Bloomberg:

The accord gives both companies something they badly need. Lordstown Motors gets a partner that will hasten the startup’s move into large-scale production, which will help lower the high costs required to make EVs. Foxconn gets a plant in North America where it can build its open-source electric vehicle platform and do contract manufacturing for partners like Fisker Inc.

“It’s less about a facility sale than a strategic partnership,” Lordstown Motors Chief Executive Officer Dan Ninivaggi said in an interview. “You have to find a way to get scale in the auto industry. Foxconn has a vision. They’ve got enormous capabilities in manufacturing and they will be able to fill that plant faster than we could.”

Foxconn’s manufacturing prowess is irrefutable and it’s likely the firm was responsible for manufacturing at least one gaming console, computer, or cell phone you’ve previously owned. It also appears to be getting the better deal here since Lordstown had grown vocally desperate over the summer. Finances had reached a point where the company no longer knew if it would be able to reach the production phase and it is currently under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission and Department of Justice over its deal to go public — in addition to some allegedly false or misleading statements made by former management, including company founder and ex-CEO Steve Burns.

While the partnership does provide the cash-strapped EV startup with more funding, Foxconn now owns its only manufacturing facility and has the ability to jumpstart vehicle production ahead of plans to assist Fisker (likely using the same facility).

On a longer timeline, this could bode similarly well for Apple’s sporadic interest in building an automobile. But it’s a little early to presume anything right now. We’ll be impressed if Lordstown Motors manages to adhere to its promise of delivering its pickup within the first half of 2022.

<img data-attachment-id="1766264" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/06/lordstown-deathwatch-another-unflattering-sec-filing-emerges/lordstown-motors-endurance-prototype/" data-orig-file="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Lordstown-Motors-Endurance-prototype.jpg" data-orig-size="2000,1333" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="Lordstown Motors Endurance prototype" data-image-description="

Lordstown Motors

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-8.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-1.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1766264″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-1.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”407″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-1.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-7.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-8.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-9.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/lordstown-motors-sells-home-to-foxconn-10.jpg 120w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

[Image: Lordstown Motors]

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Volkswagen Group: Audi Employs Ken Block, Porsche Making 718 Electric

<img data-attachment-id="1774616" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric/audi-block/" data-orig-file="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Audi-Block-e1632344516704.png" data-orig-size="2867,1674" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="Audi Block" data-image-description="

Audi

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-2.png” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric.png” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1774616″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric.png” alt width=”610″ height=”356″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric.png 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-1.png 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-2.png 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-3.png 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-4.png 120w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

Despite being the target of a German lawsuit accusing the manufacturer of not being green enough, Volkswagen Group is probably the legacy automaker touting the merits of electrification with the most enthusiasm. While undoubtedly influenced by the diesel emissions catastrophe that cheesed off every regulator in the Western world, its brand has actively been delivering EVs and praising alternative energy automobiles whenever possible.

There was more of that this week. Porsche has reportedly decided to make the 718 to be an all-electric model by 2025 and Audi recently announced that it’s employing rally icon and Hoonigan founder Ken Block (who broke with the Ford Motor Co. earlier this year) to develop EVs.

Audi announced Block’s involvement on Tuesday by simultaneously releasing a video and interview. The video is about what you’d expect and the interview feels about as organic as a cube of polyethylene. Block is supposed to be joining the company to help develop electric cars but there isn’t much in the way of details in the interview. Instead, it served as a vehicle for the professional driver to praise Audi products (perhaps genuinely) and discuss how it shouldn’t matter what’s beneath the hood so long as the car goes fast.

In case you’ve never seen one of his videos, Ken Block likes to go fast and he mentions it with the frequency and subtlety of Sonic the Hedgehog throughout the release. As I’ve never witnessed him being verbose, this was likely the most authentic aspect of the interview. But the rest was sprinkled with enough corporate buzz terms to make it feel like he may have been coached by his new employer.

“By testing electric cars in different contexts, we want to showcase mobility and electrification in new and entertaining ways. Audi has done an incredible job of driving their vehicles into the future,” Block stated. “Hopefully, I can pick up on that and have a lot of fun with it at the same time. Audi technology has always had a huge impact on me. In the 1980s, the brand used to dominate one of my all-time favorite sports events — the World Rally Championship — in a way that truly inspired me. Over the years, I’ve always had a real fan’s appreciation for what Audi achieved in racing way back when, right up to modern-day motorsport. I have always been very impressed with their progressiveness and the fact that they are constantly looking ahead.”

This led to a statement on humanity and the ways we all need to live to create a progressive, pro-mobility future. But the overall gist from Ken’s discussion is that electric vehicles are part of that and everyone needs to get on board.

<img data-attachment-id="1774614" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric/block-audi-2/" data-orig-file="http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-5.jpg" data-orig-size="768,471" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="Block Audi 2" data-image-description="

Audi

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-4.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1774614″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”374″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-3.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-4.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-5.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-6.jpg 120w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

“Don’t get me wrong, I love the sound of combustion engines, especially the five-cylinder that Audi is so famous for,” he said. “That’s what I grew up with. Even so, I welcome change and whatever might make me go faster. Of course, I’ll miss the sound of the engine, but there are other ways to enjoy new technology and its sounds. The view that combustion engines are the answer because something would be missing without that growl is wrong. I have kids who haven’t grown up with those sounds for the past thirty or fifty years as I have and don’t care about them. They’re used to the idea that there are combustion engines and electric motors, each with their own sounds. To them, both are cool. We older people need to change our attitude and learn that the lack of a sound can also be very cool.”

What does all of this mean? Well, other than the fact that Audi is now paying Ken Block to say things, we’re not absolutely certain. The manufacturer has been extremely cagey on the details, only admitting that the Hoonigan executive will be helping to deliver “exclusive joint projects in the field of electric mobility” and already drove the classic Sport Quattro S1, V8 Quattro DTM, Audi RS E-Tron GT, and E-Tron Vision Gran Turismo prototype.

My guess is that this results in another gymkhana video where Block pilots an Audi-branded vehicle through tight spaces at unadvisable speeds. Perhaps there will even be a few new electrified products from the manufacturer with Ken’s signature on them — though his sitting through an entire development phase seems unlikely.

Meanwhile, Porsche is supposedly already working on a new EV that will end up replacing one of its best models. According to Car and Driver, the 718 will become a totally battery-electric vehicle for the 2025 model year. The outlet said that it ended months of speculation after Porsche unveiled the Mission R Concept (pictured) at the Munich auto show. It’s the correct shape and size to replace the 718 and will reportedly serve as the template for its successor.

<img data-attachment-id="1774610" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric/porsche-mission-r-concept/" data-orig-file="http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-11.jpg" data-orig-size="980,653" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="Porsche Mission R Concept" data-image-description="

Porsche

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-8.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-1.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1774610″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-1.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”406″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-1.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-7.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-8.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-9.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-10.jpg 120w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-11.jpg 980w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

From Car and Driver:

We haven’t seen the interior yet, but we are assured it will be the brand’s most futuristic yet, more forward-looking than the Taycan and a massive leap from the conservatively styled current 718 cockpit. In designing the user interface, Porsche is keeping the customer base in mind: In China, the most important market, the average age of a 718 buyer is just 31. We are told, “This will be the most modern Porsche.”

Sports-car fans have been concerned that an electric 718 could become excessively heavy; a Taycan, after all, comes in between 4,568 pounds for the entry-level model with the small battery and 5,199 pounds for the Turbo S Cross Turismo, despite its not-exactly-spacious package. The 718, on the other hand, will be almost a miracle of lightweight technology: The internal target weight is under 3,650 pounds.

Weight is one thing but the car also needs to be useable. If the Porsche Taycan taught us anything, it’s that diminished range can severely undermine what’s an otherwise desirable automobile. We’re also slightly concerned that future 718 models won’t be a cost-conscious alternative to the 911, but its main competition. The iconic 911 is said to remain internal-combustion-focused until at least 2030. Though an all-electric 718 will probably be able to match its acceleration before the speedometer reaches blistering speeds. Assuming there remains a divide between EV and ICE fans, this might not be a big issue and the same goes if Porsche can keep pricing below the $83,000 it charges for the Taycan.

However, it doesn’t really matter what the consumer wants or what it’s going to cost. Europe’s restrictive Euro 7 regulations have effectively painted all manufacturers into a corner. The European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association has claimed the proposed rules would basically kill their ability to continue developing internal-combustion engines, especially since regulators are considering real-world emission monitoring over the entire lifetime of a vehicle. Assuming Porsche still wants to build high-performance vehicles with juicy spec sheets inside the EU, they’ll have to be electric.

<img data-attachment-id="1774612" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric/porsche-mission-r-concept-rear/" data-orig-file="http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-16.jpg" data-orig-size="980,653" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="Porsche Mission R concept rear" data-image-description="

Porsche

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-13.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-2.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1774612″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-2.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”406″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-2.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-12.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-13.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-14.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-15.jpg 120w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/volkswagen-group-audi-employs-ken-block-porsche-making-718-electric-16.jpg 980w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

[Images: Volkswagen Group]

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Twist: NHTSA Tesla Autopilot Probe Now Includes Other Automakers

<img data-attachment-id="1770456" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/08/study-suggests-evs-cost-more-to-service/electriccarschargingstationcloseupphoto-vehiclerechargeablebatteriescharing/" data-orig-file="http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/twist-nhtsa-tesla-autopilot-probe-now-includes-other-automakers-5.jpg" data-orig-size="1000,667" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"Shutterstock","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"Copyright (c) 2016 Virrage Images\/Shutterstock. No use without permission.","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"Electric,Cars,Charging,Station,Closeup,Photo.,Vehicle,Rechargeable,Batteries,Charing.","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="EV charging tesla superchargers tesla charging station EVs" data-image-description="

Virrage Images/Shutterstock

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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has been doing a deep dive into Tesla’s Autopilot to determine if 765,000 vehicles from the 2014 model year onward are fit to be on the road. We’ve covered it on numerous occasions, with your author often making a plea for regulators not to harp on one company when the entire industry has been slinging advanced driving aids and distracting infotainment displays for years.

Apparently someone at the NHTSA either heard the blathering, or was at least of a similar mind, because the organization has expanded its investigation to include roughly a dozen other automakers.

On Monday, letters were issued to major manufacturers — reportedly including BMW, Honda, Toyota, and Ford Motor Co. — requesting a “comparative analysis amongst production vehicles equipped with the ability to control both steering and braking/accelerating simultaneously under some circumstances.”

Bloomberg was the first to learn of the regulatory notices and stated that they included comprehensive documentation on how driver-assistance features work for each company, as well as how they know when and if a system was engaged in the event of an accident. Since the Tesla probe originally started by investigating vehicle crashes in the presence of rescue and law-enforcement vehicles, the NHTSA also wants to know how various systems handle their presence. Automakers were asked by regulators to respond no later than November 17th, 2021.

This is probably something the Department of Transportation should have been looking into years earlier, rather than allowing the industry to implement features that debatably went onto the market unproven. Now we’re in a situation where driving aids have become the norm and regulators are just starting to get serious about looking into some of the resulting complications. But it’s difficult to say what’s right when regulations often have unintended consequences and rarely seem to take the larger picture into account.

It’s not difficult to imagine a scenario where the NHTSA wants all manufacturers to network all vehicles with emergency responders to prevent future incidents where an automobile goes haywire near some flashing lights and road flares. While that would almost assuredly result in a technical violation of the Fourth Amendment, counties lacking such protections have already implemented traffic enforcement centers (e.g. China) that track networked vehicles in real time and individual automakers have data hubs on U.S. soil doing roughly the same thing.

But that’s just one possible scenario.

Regulators could just as easily attempt to establish a set of rules relating to how, when, and where these systems can be operated. A certification and testing protocol could also be implemented to ensure their effectiveness or automakers might be forbade from implementing certain functions entirely. Nobody but bureaucrats hold any love for red tape, and it’s bound to result costly recall campaigns. However doing nothing might leave millions of vehicles on the road with potentially hazardous safety and convenience packages and I haven’t the faintest idea whether that’s going to be the best or absolute worst solution to this problem. There are several issues here begging to be addressed (safety, privacy, a lack of standardization, increased costs, manufacturing complexities, etc.) but so many regulatory actions turn out to be counter productive that it makes one hesitant to endorse anything.

As pickles go, this one is taking up the whole damn jar — thanks partially to regulators dragging their feet and out-of-touch legislators having next to no idea how any of these systems worked. Rather than examining things seriously six or seven years ago and attempting to establish a competent regulatory framework that could be updated as new technologies cropped up, the government now has to play catchup and plot a course of action while it’s still learning how these systems function.

[Image: Virrage Images/Shutterstock]

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Vaccine Mandates Being Considered By Auto Industry, UAW

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Michael Vi/Shutterstock

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw-2.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1773672″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”407″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw-1.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw-2.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw-3.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw-4.jpg 120w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/vaccine-mandates-being-considered-by-auto-industry-uaw-5.jpg 1000w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

With the Biden administration having announced that it would start requiring companies to vaccinate employees, automakers and UAW are finding themselves in a sticky situation. Unions had previously said they wanted to hold off on endorsing or opposing mandatory vaccinations until after they discussed things with the industry and their own members. Considering Joe Biden said he wouldn’t make vaccines mandatory less than 10 months ago, employers are getting caught with their pants around the proverbial ankles.

Automakers had previously been surveying white-collar workers to see what they wanted to do while upping on-site COVID restrictions, but operating under the impression that any hard decisions were likely a long way off and left entirely to their discretion. Now the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration is planning a new standard that requires all employers with 100 (or more) employees to guarantee their workforce is fully vaccinated or require any unvaccinated workers to produce a negative test result on a minimum weekly basis. 

Employers that fail to implement the stated requirements could face fines of nearly $14,000 per violation, according to the White House, with penalties also doubling for those who refuse to wear masks during interstate travel. Those are potentially steep fees when you’re employees number in the thousands. Union officials have said they’re considering the matter without committing to more than absolutely necessary — though the UAW officially opposed vaccine requirements in the past.

From UAW President Ray Curry:

“The UAW has and continues to strongly encourage all members and their families to be vaccinated unless there is specific health or religious concerns. We know that this is the best way to protect our members, coworkers and their families.

We are reviewing the details of yesterday’s announcements and the impact on our members and our over 700 employer contracts.

In the meantime, we continue our member commitment to practice safety in every one of our worksites by following protocols including masks, sanitizing and reporting any exposure or symptoms of the virus. At the UAW we all understand that fighting this pandemic and protecting our families is key to our survival.”

Assuming the union ultimately decides to endorse the vaccine decree, it’s likely going to be fracturing its membership. While I am hardly against vaccinations, I strongly support informed consent and speaking candidly about this has resulted in autoworkers frequently confessing they’re similarly opposed to forced vaccinations. Many have said they would immediately quit their jobs, matching a recent Washington Post poll claiming 70 percent of unvaccinated workers would simply abandon their positions if vaccine mandates are instituted. It’s my assumption that the industry will have a sudden, catastrophic staffing shortage were it to move forward with the Biden plan.

Automakers have been similarly noncommittal, with manufacturers (including Ford, GM, Stellantis, Honda, and Toyota) stating they encourage staff to get vaccinated and want to adhere to all government-issued health protocols. But they typically steer clear of addressing the Biden plan directly, possibly indicating some hesitancy. That said, it hasn’t even been a full day since the vaccine mandate was announced and their HR and legal departments are probably wringing their hands as they ponder upon what’s to be done and the fallout it might create.

Every statement automakers have been willing to make thus far can be paraphrased into “hold on … we’ve got to think about this,” followed by a paragraph about how they believe in vaccinations and want to adhere to recommendations coming from the relevant health experts. Conversely, very little has been said about the rights or preferences of their employees.

I’m not going to beat around this bush. The entire premise of these mandates seems insane to me, bordering on wicked. As an American, I always thought the whole premise of the country was predicated upon the shared belief that personal liberties and freedom of choice trump everything else. But that doesn’t seem to be what’s coming down from the top anymore. The rhetoric being used by Joe Biden is egregiously confrontational, including statements like “we’ve been patient, but our patience is wearing thin” as he made sweeping assertions about how the unvaccinated are stifling national unity and progress. He also confusingly stated that vaccinated workers need to be “protected” from the unvaccinated.

Assuming vaccines are effective, shouldn’t it be the other way round? What exactly are we shielding people from when new strains continue to manifest, can still be spread amongst the vaccinated, and the shots we currently have are targeting older COVID variants that have lost steam?

The economic and social stress this is likely to place upon the industry and country as a whole will be nothing short of monumental. Protests have been erupting across the globe all summer. Truckers have started organizing in numerous countries and have refused to deliver to areas imposing strict COVID rules, exacerbating food shortages in urban areas. In the United States, the same was true for cities that opted to defund police departments. Now they’re starting to talk about strikes focused on vaccine and mask mandates while they’re already experiencing a severe shortage of drivers. Imagine if that spills over to an automotive sector that’s already been beleaguered by the semiconductor shortage, their suppliers, and every other industry you rely on.

[Image: Michael Vi/Shutterstock]

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An Exploration of the Cars and Chronographs Connection

shiv.mer/Shutterstock.com

They say that the first auto race happened about five minutes after the second car was built, and there was probably an obvious winner (heck, the first “official” US auto race only had six starters, and two finishers). But progress begets parity. Before long, the cars started to get closer to one another in terms of performance and the drivers’ relative talents became more and more important to ensuring victories – but talent is a tough thing to eyeball. You need something a little more precise.

What you need, is a watch. Ideally, something you can depend on to deliver accurate results, lap after lap, shine or rain. Maybe something Swiss, you know?

Alas, anyone who wears a Swiss luxury watch is a douchebag… right? Maybe not.

QUALITY CHRONOGRAPHS BECOME ESSENTIAL

In the early days of aviation, before radar, you needed to know four things to know where you were. First, you needed to know where you started from, which was relatively easy. Next, you needed to know what direction you were headed, but we’ve had good compasses since the 12th century, so that’s also easily done. After that, you need to have some idea of how fast you were going – which, weirdly, people figured out way back in 1732. Finally, you had to know how long you’d been up in the air.

If you knew those four things and some basic geometry, you could figure out where you were. This was important for all kinds of reasons, and became more important with the advent of aerial reconnaissance during the first World War, because what good is spotting the bad guys’ crucial military installation if you can’t tell the good guys back at base precisely where it is, right?

Right!

Back in the early days of flight, though, dependable, accurate chronographs were nowhere to be found. Not until Breitling introduced the world’s very first modular automatic chronograph movement.

Almost immediately, Breitling chronographs found their way into any and every aircraft that was worth a damn. Pilots started wearing Breitling wristwatches, too, carefully synced up to the one in their instrument panel – and pilots were cool. Pilots flew in the fucking sky, and that was basically magic back in the early 1900s. Most people just lived and died on the ground, which sucked. Flying didn’t suck, though, and pilots didn’t suck, so if you wanted to at least look like you didn’t suck you bought a thing that made you look like a pilot.

That thing, more often than not, was a Breitling wristwatch. That made the Breitling family one of the wealthiest in all of Europe, and that brings us to Willy Breitling.

BENTLEY AND BREITLING

Willy was the grandson of Léon Breitling, who first invented the modular automatic chronograph movement. By now, you know that those chronographs were in all the cool airplanes and on all the cool wrists. And, eventually, they found their way into Walter O. Bentley’s race cars.

It’s not entirely clear if Walter O. chose the chronograph for functional reasons or if the collaboration was an early exercise in branding on Willy’s part. What is clear, however, is that Willy Breitling was delighted. He was a huge fan of Bentley’s racing efforts – and how could he not be? The only British entry at the inaugural 1923 LeMans race, Bentley finished fourth. Bentley raced again in 1924 and took its first victory that year. From 1927 to 1930,  Bentley won every race, cementing its place in automotive lore and making English nationalists super proud, probably.

Obviously, Willy had to have one. Not just one, either – throughout the 1940s, it would seem that Willy’s was a familiar face on the roads between Geneva and La Chaux-de-Fonds, and (according to Breitling’s website) he was almost always spotted behind the wheel of one of his beloved Bentleys.

That’s where the connection between Breitling and Bentley was born, if not the connection between watches and cars. It makes sense, in a way. If you wanted to look like a cool-guy pilot and had a bit of money, you could buy a watch that made you look like a pilot. Pilots weren’t the only cool guys, though. Racecar drivers were cool, too. If you wanted to look like a cool-guy race car driver and had a lot of money, you could buy a car that made you look like a race car driver.

All of which, if we’re being honest, kind of makes Willy Breitling the arch-prototype of the expensive car/expensive watch, second-generation member of the lucky sperm club douchebag, right?

I mean, kinda. Yeah, but there’s more to it than that.

A GAME OF INCHES

It’s been said that football is a game of inches. At the highest levels, the fastest guy on the field can get to where the ball is being thrown a fraction of a second before the second-fastest guy. Racing is the same thing. The recent dominance of Sir Lewis Hamilton and the Mercedes factory team is made even more incredible by virtue of the fact that the slowest guy out on the track (these days that’s a spoiled, egg-headed Russian playboy with a penchant for sexual assault) is driving a car built with less than a third of the budget that Mercedes has and has yet to be more than 7 percent slower on any given track.

It’s the miracle of parity – and we can be properly astonished by it, in part, because of incredibly accurate timepieces that can tell us when three different drivers in three different cars absolutely nail the same lap time to within a ten-thousandth of a second.

So, yeah. Expensive watches are a bit douchey, but that’s OK because we can take the good with the bad and pretend to ourselves that we can quantify the talents of the Schumachers and Montoyas and Sennas of the world based on the tickings of our man-jewelry.

Besides, we’re all a little bit douchey for caring about our wheeled A-B appliances the way we do, anyway. I mean, sure, some of us care a little bit more about some cars because their all-wheel-drive systems, turbochargers, and oversized rear wings make us feel like cool-guy race car drivers. Another bunch of us can probably think of a joke about Subarus that doesn’t start with, “knock-knock”, too. Me? I’m a sucker for fatally flawed cars like hideously unreliable Lancia coupes from the 70s and the quirky, slab-sided Consulier GTP. I’d even be tempted to swing on a Suzuki X-90, too, if I ever stumble across a clean one.

What about you? Whether it’s a techno-hyped Tesla or an air-cooled bug, you can probably find some analogy in the constant connectivity of your Apple Watch or the miracle of mass-produced industrial efficiency that is the $19.95, 10-year battery life, dead-nuts reliable Casio F-91W. If you can care about the gears and springs and electronics that form your car, is it so weird to care about the gears and springs and electronics that form your watch?

I don’t think so. Now, help me write off this limited-edition Lancia Stratos Zenith collaboration box set I’m about to win on eBay by sharing your opinion about the connection between cars and wristwatches in the comments section and letting us know what that connection means to you. Are you inspired by the legend of Paul Newman’s Rolex Daytona or impressed by the exclusive, hand-built, ultra-lux timepieces being rolled out by Richard Mille. RM is certainly sponsoring enough motorsports to be worth a mention here, no? What about Tudor? And what about the original car/watch combo of Bentley and Breitling? Did the brand’s sponsorship of the VW-owned Bentley’s Speed 8 LeMans racer add legitimacy to that connection, or cheapen it? You’re the Best and Brightest. You tell us.

[Image: shiv.mer/Shutterstock.com]

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GMC Canyon AT4 OVRLANDX Off-Road Concept

<img data-attachment-id="1772618" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept/revealed-today-at-overland-expo-mountain-west-the-gmc-canyon-at-3/" data-orig-file="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/GMC-Canyon-AT4-OVRLANDX-Concept-005.jpg" data-orig-size="5700,3800" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"4","credit":"","camera":"Canon EOS 5DS","caption":"Revealed today at Overland Expo Mountain West, the GMC Canyon AT4 OVRLANDX concept elevates Canyon\u2019s capability while exploring GMC\u2019s vision for the nameplate\u2019s future. Designed for the premium overlanding enthusiast, the concept vehicle shows how Canyon could be customized for ambitious off-road adventures.","created_timestamp":"1627949812","copyright":"","focal_length":"58","iso":"400","shutter_speed":"0.0025","title":"Revealed today at Overland Expo Mountain West, the GMC Canyon AT","orientation":"1"}" data-image-title="Revealed today at Overland Expo Mountain West, the GMC Canyon AT4" data-image-description="

GMC

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-7.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1772618″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”407″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-6.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-7.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-8.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-9.jpg 120w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

GMC introduced an interesting concept at Colorado’s Overland Expo Mountain West 2021 this week and the timing couldn’t have been better. While North America has always appreciated off-road vehicles, there’s been an overnight explosion in the number of people considering 4×4 adventuring as a hobby. Troubled times have encouraged individuals to embrace the kind of cars that can tackle any terrain while doubling as a mobile campsite, and the Canyon AT4 OVRLANDX Off-Road Concept certainly seems capable.

Although the hypothetical production model probably has a better chance of becoming canvases for online influences than carrying anybody through a genuine disaster. This is something GMC likewise appears hip to, as the whole point of the concept SUV is to show what can be done with the Canyon, a little creativity, and a wad of cash reserved for aftermarket accessories. 

<img data-attachment-id="1772616" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept/revealed-today-at-overland-expo-mountain-west-the-gmc-canyon-at-2/" data-orig-file="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/GMC-Canyon-AT4-OVRLANDX-Concept-004.jpg" data-orig-size="5700,3800" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"6.3","credit":"","camera":"ILCE-7RM4","caption":"Revealed today at Overland Expo Mountain West, the GMC Canyon AT4 OVRLANDX concept elevates Canyon\u2019s capability while exploring GMC\u2019s vision for the nameplate\u2019s future. Designed for the premium overlanding enthusiast, the concept vehicle shows how Canyon could be customized for ambitious off-road adventures.","created_timestamp":"1629308345","copyright":"","focal_length":"47","iso":"400","shutter_speed":"0.00125","title":"Revealed today at Overland Expo Mountain West, the GMC Canyon AT","orientation":"1"}" data-image-title="Revealed today at Overland Expo Mountain West, the GMC Canyon AT" data-image-description="

GMC

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-11.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-1.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1772616″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-1.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”407″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-1.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-10.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-11.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-12.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-13.jpg 120w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

While the pickup starts at $28,000, the OVRLANDX Off-Road Concept defaults to the 3.6-liter V6 that’s standard on the AT4 variant (MSRP $40,195, including destination). Considering the base model is still pretty large for a “midsize” pickup and comes with an anemic 2.5-liter, the decision to go with the 308-hp V6 makes sense. Ditto for sticking with the AT4, which is effectively a budget version of the off-road-friendly Chevrolet Colorado ZR2. However, the torque-rich 2.8-liter Duramax diesel (181 hp/368 lb-ft of torque) would have been a similarly good fit, if not better for overlanders interested in maximizing their fuel economy and towing proficiency.

“We wanted to showcase GMC Canyon with this concept and punctuate GMC’s commitment to premium, off-road capable vehicles. Consumer reaction to this concept’s design will help us further serve the growing market of buyers leading authentic outdoor lifestyles,” said Buick and GMC Global Vice President Duncan Aldred upon the concept’s introduction.

But what kind of items does one require if you’re interested in leading an “authentic outdoor lifestyle?”

According to GMC, a factory-lifted, extra-wide, off-road chassis with enhanced underbody coverage is the place to start. Then they add rocker panel protectors, cast-iron control arms, Multimatic DSSV dampers, and upgraded front bumper with a winch, some integrated recovery points, electronic locking differentials, wheel flares, a swivel mount for the full-size spare tire you’ll be needing, and guylines to protect your windshield from branch attacks.

Minus the tree protection, which doesn’t look as though it would stop anything more serious than a twig, the resulting package seems like a competent off-road vehicle and the AT4 was already a solid place to start. GMC said the OVRLANDX Off-Road Concept yields a 27.7-degree approach angle and a full 10 inches of ground clearance thanks to the 33-inch BFGoodrich KM3 Mud-Terrain tires on 17-inch AEV Crestone wheels. It’s also supposed to be able to make it through over 32 inches of standing water thanks to its custom snorkel intake.

It sounds pretty good. But remember this isn’t a real product, just a vehicle the manufacturer hopes you’ll try to recreate with your own GMC Canyon. And the brand had plenty of recommendations for roof-mounted tents, solar panels, places to affix jerry cans or traction boards, and just about every other item one might want when camping in or driving through an untamed environment.

<img data-attachment-id="1772620" data-permalink="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept/with-over-20-premium-off-roading-features-the-gmc-canyon-at4-ov/" data-orig-file="https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/GMC-Canyon-AT4-OVRLANDX-Concept-007.jpg" data-orig-size="5700,3800" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"4","credit":"","camera":"Canon EOS R5","caption":"With over 20 premium off-roading features, the GMC Canyon AT4 OVRLANDX concept was designed to be everything an overlanding enthusiast needs. Confident capability comes from features like the truck\u2019s heavy-duty front bumper with winch, front and rear electronic locking differentials, and 33-inch BFGoodrich KM3 Mud-Terrain tires, enabling a 27.7-degree approach angle and 10.0 inches of ground clearance. For longer adventures, drivers could enjoy the convenience of features like a camp kitchen, topper-mounted tent and truck bed storage system.","created_timestamp":"1627950510","copyright":"","focal_length":"39","iso":"100","shutter_speed":"0.016666666666667","title":"With over 20 premium off-roading features, the GMC Canyon AT4 OV","orientation":"1"}" data-image-title="With over 20 premium off-roading features, the GMC Canyon AT4 OV" data-image-description="

GMC

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-23.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-4.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1772620″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-4.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”407″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-4.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-22.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-23.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-24.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-25.jpg 120w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

If you’re wondering why the Caynon and not something larger, like the Sierra, it’s all down to the demographics. The smaller of the two pickups is helping GMC rake in new customers, specifically younger adults who are the most inclined to build their truck up into an end-times 4×4. This Canyon AT4 OVRLANDX Off-Road Concept is simply a template for them to use in a bid to procure more sales and it certainly seems to have done its job.

It’s not going to get everyone, particularly those who are seeking longer-term solutions to vehicular living or a tiny home on wheels. But it’s bound to get the creative juices flowing for someone interested in driving to remote destinations without relying on the surrounding infrastructure more than absolutely necessary — perhaps netting the Caynon a few more sales in the process.

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GMC

” data-medium-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-27.jpg” data-large-file=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-5.jpg” class=”aligncenter size-large wp-image-1772614″ src=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-5.jpg” alt width=”610″ height=”407″ srcset=”http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-5.jpg 610w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-26.jpg 75w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-27.jpg 450w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-28.jpg 768w, http://lntransportation.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/gmc-canyon-at4-ovrlandx-off-road-concept-29.jpg 120w” sizes=”(max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px”>

[Images: GMC]

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