That’s very Swedish car. The last Saabs offered a similar juxtaposition. The S60/V60 soldiered with an old dash design (2004 vintage) and the nav screen was mashed in for the 2010 reboot. It would look a lot nicer if you could somehow hide that little screen.

For many years the Colt sedan was offered as a Dodge or an Eagle Summit.

I don’t see a precedent here, though. This seems like a moderate application of trade law rather than something new. The judge was able to cite six specific design elements that infringed on the “trade dress” of the Jeep, and that’s not counting the grille design, which Mahindra changed as little as possible so as to…

That part of the dealer experience can be bad, too. Car dealers are paid to move inventory, and that means they’ll try to get people’s butts in the cars they want to sell rather than the cars the people are trying to explain they want. People often wind up with trim levels or even models that they really didn’t want…

It could be an indication the owner takes fastidious care of the vehicle. I could see a situation where the buyer would do a thorough independent PPI and go ahead with an offer to get an unusual 4-Runner. But still, I would never buy, especially an older car with lots of miles, without experiencing the steering and…

Mini is not offering leases on the S E. Probably because BMW sees dealerships littered with unwanted i3s.

Well, a bigger version of the Niro. Would a hybrid Tucson handily outsell the Niro hybrid? I think so.

More specifically it was the Celica Supra that was pitched against the Z in the late ‘70s because it had an inline-six and a longer wheelbase than the 4-banger Celicas.

I believe Lotus NA headquarters is in Michigan.

Lotus still makes the Elise/Exige and there’s nothing wrong with them. They just don’t pass U.S. regs and it’s not worth it for a small outfit like Lotus to make those kinds of changes.

“Toyota doesn’t make bulletproof engines...” keep in mind this engine design is more than a decade old. Port injection!

Absolutely. A lot less.

Lotus is almost the last car to use the 2GR-FSE, which does not have direct injection. With its V6 engines, Toyota has moved two generations ahead: direct-injection and on-demand Atkinson cycle. There wasn’t much chance Toyota would use 10-year-old engine technology on its higher-end sports car.

Yeah, that was weird. I get that the reviewer couldn’t wring out something like this on public roads very well. But something more than “totally fine as a daily driver” would have been nice. And then there’s useful mechanical tidbits like get the manual if you want the Torsen diff.

He’s referring to the 718, which offers—among many many other things—colored seatbelts for a steep upcharge. It’s pretty easy to get a 718 Cayman up to six figures.

I immediately thought 10-12K based on condition. Maybe closer to 12K depending on how much those Coventry Whitley wheels are worth. Demerits being iffy tire choice and the really dull color scheme.

Most early Vegas had bad valve stem seals. They degraded quickly. The engine only held six quarts of oil so you constantly had to be filling it or the engine would overheat. And overheating this engine just once was more than enough to kill it.

From what I recall, the Chevette made a lot less power than anything in the Vega. The beefiest engine you could get through the entire production run was a 1.6 with 70 hp. But it was also much smaller and lighter than the Vega.

Yeah, the Saginaw boxes were for sure heavy and old. The 5-speed offered later was a much more modern Borg Warner T-5.

Awesome story. I never knew my great-grandparents and their cars, but my grandfather was always wistful for his first car, a 1931 Ford Model A. He went through a succession of really cool VWs, including some rarities. But his last car was a Ford Five Hundred with zero options, also in Maine.