The Car Aficionado’s Jennifer Harrington thinks courteous drivers are a dying breed. Is she right, or is it a local thing? Her guess, based on personal observation of drivers refusing to let people in, yield the passing lane, and such, is that the increasing about of distraction within the car is a major problem. She […]
CNN reported today that the United Auto Workers union will walk out of General Motors plants at midnight, in the first strike since 2007—which would also make it the first strike at the post-bankruptcy General Motors. Their prior contract expired this morning. The head of the union negotiating team cites large gaps on pay, health […]
Rivian has yet to produce a single truck for retail sale, but it will co-produce a truck with Ford (a $500 million deal), gained $700 million in investments in a deal led by Amazon, and just got $350 million from Cox Automotive, which will help it to market and deliver the trucks when they finally […]
Yesterday, GM announced several recalls, covering all of its brands. The sturdy, reliable truck-based wagon range was hit by a power brake vacuum pump that can fade over time; the company is recalling the 2015-17 Escalade, 2014-2018 Silverado/Sierra, and 2015-2018 Suburban/Tahoe/Yukon. Rather than change out the pump, the company will reprogram the computer to compensate. […]
This week, there were two interesting and related events in the electric-truck industry: Tesla announced it was pushing back its electric pickup to November, and Medium published a story claiming Amazon was planning to buy electric pickup company Rivian. Tesla is always pushing back its vehicles and features, so another pushback isn’t too surprising, but […]
GM has thrown in the towel on using its own telematics, and will instead use software from Google in all of its cars. You may have avoided giving your location and personal information to Google so far, but if you drive a Chevy, Buick, GMC, or Cadillac starting around 2021, it will use Google’s voice assistant, […]
The latest replacement for the original Jeep (Willys MA and MB) might be made by GM Defense. Field tests in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, led the Army to select three prototype Infantry Squad Vehicles for further development. One, made by GM Defense, was based on the Chevrolet Colorado; it uses both custom and desert-racing parts. The […]
Tesla has delayed the “smart summon” feature, which it claimed would be on its cars by now—and, with that delay, has also pushed back a $1,000 price increase for the “self-driving” package. Elon Musk, head of Tesla, had claimed that the feature would be available in mid-August, but it’s been delayed by around one or […]
If it seems familiar, you’re probably at least forty years old: Ford has issued a recall on certain SUVs because they might start rolling while in Park. What’s more, the dash won’t show any warnings, and the gear won’t show up in the PRNDL. It was a problem that affected hundreds of thousands of cars […]
GM has long been rumored to be developing a competitor for the popular Jeep Wrangler. The rumors started way back when they still had Hummer, with one model based on their large SUVs and another on the TrailBlazer; a third was always in the works to go after the Wrangler. Even now, they were supposed […]