In a recent Fastlane livechat, GM’s North American boss Mark Reuss revealed that: Chevrolet re vamp in ads is well under way with Susan Docherty–you will like it a lot–shows the car, and uses “excellence for everyone”….you will really like it. When asked if he was saying that “Excellence For Everyone” would be the new Chevrolet tagline,  Read More →

On September 19, 2008, William Hippsley, 74, was behind the wheel in the parking lot of a shopping center in Brigg, South Humberside, UK. Outside, his wife Brenda, 69, helped him park his car. Suddenly, Hippsley’s car shot forward, dragged his wife 130ft across the parking lot – and killed her. The car was a Toyota  Read More →

All right, I have a thing about short cars. I haven’t spoken to a therapist about it yet. Perhaps its just a reaction against the obesity crisis in modern cars and trucks. But where did they all go? There were once so many of them. Well, I’m going to collect all of them: Have the  Read More →

GM’s recent reinstatement of 661 culled dealers has put pressure back on Chrysler to come to arrangement with the dealers it shed during last year’s bankruptcy and bailout. Rep. Chris VanHollen, the sixth ranking Democrat in the House or Representatives, tells Automotive News [sub] that with GM buckling to dealer pressure, the time has come  Read More →

Chinese bought 46 percent more cars this February than in February 2009. This according to official data by the China Association of Auto Manufactures (CAAM), as reported by China’s state news agency Xinhua. The avid TTAC reader is not surprised. A week ago, we predicted numbers along these lines, simply by looking at GM China’s February  Read More →

One of my pet gripes about the media and celebrities is the lack of follow-up and accountability. Remember all the hoopla about Steve Wozniak’s Prius with the mysterious electronics glitch that he could manipulate to create UA? My take was that obviously his cruise control had a minor bug that only showed up at over  Read More →

A federally funded ticketing blitz in the state of Virginia landed a total of 6996 traffic tickets this weekend. The blitz, dubbed “Operation Air, Land & Speed” coincided with frantic efforts by state officials to close a$2.2 billion budget deficit. Supervisors ordered state troopers to saturate Interstates 81 and 95 to issue as many tickets  Read More →

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy  Read More →

So, how do you spin the bankruptcy of the world’s largest automaker? Former GM spinmeister Steve Harris recently took an hour to help prepare future generations for the day when they too will have to soft-pedal the inevitable collapse of their very own lumbering giant employer. Bonus revelation: [the presidential task force was] very interested  Read More →

The personal transportation choices of auto executives has always been an easy point of reference for members of the mainstream media looking for an easy story. From Alan Mulally’s Lexus to Akio Toyoda’s Davos Audi getaway, auto execs’ use of non-company vehicles is always good for a quick “gotcha” headline. But no story in this  Read More →

In the TTAC Pedal Series “Toyota Gas Pedal Fix Simulated: Friction Reduced, But By Too Much”, I anticipated that the crude shim fix for the recalled CTS “sticky pedals” would result in an uncomfortable pedal feel at the least and  quite possibly unsafe characteristics at worst. A quick refresher: a carefully controlled degree of friction  Read More →

“What should I buy?” Well these days it really doesn’t matter as much as you would think. The marketplace is absolutely riddled with 300+ late models to choose from and most of them are perfectly fine daily drivers. A Toyota? A Buick? A Mitsubishi? For most folks it really doesn’t matter. I’m not kidding. Their  Read More →

The Geneva Auto Show always reminds me of one of my prize items of late sixties memorabilia: the 1969 Automobil Revue catalog that was always issued in conjunction with the Geneva show. Here are a few scans from some of the ads, which show another glaring reason for the collapse of the USSR: their car  Read More →

This Saturday is turning into a visual sort of day (NHTSA data dive fatigue ?) with an emphasis on vintage ads and photo-shops. How about a combination of the two? Hemmings blog found these at Lowtech, and they brought a smile to my working-on-Saturday face. Nice 1953 Chebby! And the kids and ladies are duly  Read More →

Last week, Professor David W. Gilbert testified at a house hearing and said he had replicated the unintended sudden acceleration in Toyota’s vehicles. Toyota, and their testing lab Exponent tried Gilberts method and said he was right. “But Toyota said it also created the same response in vehicles made by competitors, which it said rendered  Read More →