Well look what decided to show its face before the official reveal.

The all-new Dodge Dart was scheduled to be revealed at the Detroit Auto Show, however images and a preview video of Dodge’s new small sedan has been released.

Since this is not an official reveal, details are sketchy but rumours have it that either a 1.4 litre, 2.0 litre, or a 2.4 litre engine will find itself under the hood. It’s clear that there will be more than one engine option as an R/T version is expected to bow in the not too distant future.

It’s clear from the interior shots that a 6-speed manual will be available, but what’s unclear is whether the automatic option will be a 6-speed or a rumoured  9-speed automatic. Yes, you read that right, Chrysler is apparently working on a 9-speed auto. If it were my money, I’d wager that any intro of a 9-speed would find it’s way onto more premium models.

With that said, one of the main goals of the Dart’s development was to make it as fuel efficient as possible, so perhaps a 9-speed auto might be plausible. The Dart is supposed to be fairly light weigh as well. The result is an expected fuel efficiency rating of 6 L/100 kms combined.

One thing that is clear is this is not a successor for the Caliber, which has recently gotten the axe. Dodge says the Caliber is a hatchback and the Dart is a sedan, so therefore it can’t be a replacement. Um, okay.

More details are expected to come, but for now enjoy the video above.

What do you think of Dodge’s new offering in the compact segment?

[Inside Line]

I recently had to rent a car for my day job and reserved a mid-size. When I got there to pick up the vehicle they told me they had a shiny new silver Dodge Caliber waiting for me. Aside from the fact that the Caliber is not considered to be a mid-size, I had to insist on another vehicle. Luckily another vehicle has available so I took it, but I also said “you must get that a lot” right after she announced the Dodge Caliber was the vehicle I’d be driving.

“Actually we get specific requests for the Caliber,” she replied. Shocked, I could only muster an abashed look followed by “really?”

“Yeah but it’s either a request to specifically get the Caliber or a request to get anything but a Caliber,” she continued. It seems the Caliber is either a love it or hate it car. Put me in the hate camp.

The good news, for us in the hate camp anyway, is that Dodge has officially stopped production of the Caliber today. I can’t lie, I might have cracked open a celebratory beer when I heard the news.

When the Caliber came onto the scene in 2007 to replace the equally bad SX 2.0 (aka Neon 2.0) it was met with polarizing opinions and mixed reviews. The car’s chunky, sloppy styling matched with a garbage Jatco-sourced CVT, an unrefined ride, no feedback to the steering wheel, poor interior layout and materials, and lackluster fuel efficiency made it easy to label the Caliber as a joke compared to its competition. Exclusive features such as a cooler-like glove box for drinks and a drop down stereo for tailgate parties was not enough to overlook just how terrible the Caliber really was.

Dodge then tried to come up with a credible contender to the Honda Civic Si and Chevrolet Cobalt SS. The Caliber SRT-4 (pictured above) was probably the only interesting iteration of the Caliber but they somehow managed to make it uglier than the more sedated versions. On top of that, it still lacked the refinement and precision of the Civic Si.

So generally an overall fail in my books, however if you are one of the few on the love-the-Caliber bandwagon, sorry for your loss.

The good news is the Caliber’s replacement is expected to come in the form of a re-badged Alfa Romeo which should make Dodge’s new offering in the segment much more competitive. The replacement can’t come soon enough.

I would say R.I.P to the Caliber, but I’ll just end by saying good riddance.

[The Detroit News]

]]> http://www.cardriven.ca/2011/12/dodge-finally-stops-producing-the-caliber/feed/ 0 http://www.cardriven.ca/2011/09/alfa-romeo-based-dodge-caliber-replacement-spied/ http://www.cardriven.ca/2011/09/alfa-romeo-based-dodge-caliber-replacement-spied/#comments Fri, 23 Sep 2011 21:22:54 +0000 admin http://www.cardriven.ca/?p=3775

Canadians are going to get their first taste in decades of what Alfa Romeo has been up to lately, even if it will be wearing a Dodge emblem. The replacement for the Caliber will be largely based on the Alfa Romeo Giulietta, so much so that it seemed the only real changes would be swapping the Alfa badges for Dodge badges. A recent spy pic somewhat confirms this.

What you see above is actually a four door version of the Giulietta. The Giulietta has traditionally been a hatchback and since the Caliber is a hatchback it was originally thought to come to our shores in that form. The pic either suggests otherwise or suggests that there will be at least two different body styles for the Caliber successor. The signature Dodge crosshair grille in the picture actually doesn’t fit the Italian face too badly.

This Caliber replacement (rumoured to be named the Hornet) is currently set to officially bow at the 2012 Detroit Auto show. No engine specs have been released yet but the 1.7 litre four cylinder which makes 232 horsepower that comes in the current top trim level of the Giulietta would make an excellent version of an SRT-4, no?

[KGP Photography via Autoblog Canada]

We’re half way through 2011 so it’s a good time to check in and see which models are most appealing to Canadians so far. Honda’s Civic is holding strong as the number one selling car in Canada, while Ford’s F-150 takes best selling truck and best selling vehicle overall.

Here’s the complete list:

1) Ford F-150 – 46,825 units

2) Ram Pickup – 30,459 units

3) Dodge Caravan – 29,986 units

4) Honda Civic – 26,371 units

5) Hyundai Elantra – 24,283 units

6) Ford Escape – 23,183 units

7) GMC Sierra – 22,225 units

8 ) Chevrolet Silverado – 19,233 units

9) Toyota Corolla -18,853 units

10) Chevrolet Cruze – 18,769 units

No big shockers here. I’m a little surprised that the Ford Focus didn’t make the list considering it’s now a credible contender. But Canadians obviously love their pick-up trucks and compact vehicles. Stay tooned to see where each vehicle places at the end of the year and if there will be any new additions to the list.

[Auto 123]

When Dodge introduced the Magnum back in 2004, I was pretty torn about it. The idea of there being a full-size wagon that wasn’t in the premium segment was really cool. The downside? Well, it was made by Dodge and that meant it was going to be about as good as Michael Jordan playing baseball. Not to mention it didn’t really look all that great.

The Magnum’s time was short lived on this earth as it was discontinued in 2008. But it may be making a return.

Ralph Gilles, president of the SRT division at Dodge, recently hinted to Automotive News that a successor is in the works. While he didn’t come right out and say it, he did mention that he was probably the biggest fan of the Magnum SRT-8 (which made an impressive 425 horsepower) and was sad to see it leave. But now since Chrysler was bought out by Fiat, there are many more wagon aficionados within the company, many of whom are eager to see the return of some sort of large wagon like Magnum. When asked if that meant a Magnum successor Gilles replied, “stay tuned, great things are coming”.

As cryptic as that response was, it does seem to bode well for wagon lovers, of which I self-identify as. If Dodge does make a Magnum replacement, it will likely be 10 times better than the one before it since Dodge is now starting to make credible product -better interiors, better styling, better handling and the like. And with Fiat at the reigns you can bet that there will be room for perhaps smaller wagons down the line if the rumoured Magnum successor is well received. So, I say go for it. The new Durango (which was rumoured to be called the Magnum before it debuted) would make an excellent large wagon if it were lowered to an acceptable height.

What do you think? Should Dodge take another stab at the wagon market?

[Automotive News]

Since Fiat is now calling the shots at Chrysler, the brand as seen its misfortunes reverse in a big way. The result is sub-par product (see almost every model in the Chrysler/Dodge lineup) that has now been successfully refreshed to be more competitive. Unfortunately, one car that did not get a much needed make over is the Dodge Caliber. It continues to soldier on unchanged which is a big problem considering how Ford and Chevrolet have stepped up their compact segment game with the Focus and Cruze.

Well the Caliber hasn’t  been forgotten, in fact, it’s on schedule to be completely redesigned for 2013. And by redesigned, I mean it will essentially be a completely different car. The new Caliber is expected to largely be an Alfa Romeo Giulietta except styled as a a Dodge. Not a bad move at all. The new Caliber is expected to show its face at the 2012 Detroit Auto Show and go on sale in 2013. That puts its debut almost on par with Alfa Romeo’s return to Canada, which apparently has been delayed. Styling conflicts and an apparently picky CEO have been reported as they cause.

This gives Ford and Chevrolet ample time to eat up Caliber sales, however considering the rave reviews the Guilietta receives in Europe, the new Caliber could very well be worth the wait. Since it will be a completely new car, let’s hope Chrysler decides to give it a completely new name as well.

[Ward's Auto]

Forbes, the people obsessed with making top 10 lists about, well everything, has just released its list of the worst vehicles on the road. How do you make such a list without accusations of being biased or opinionated? Well with the way Forbes did it, they essentially compiled six studies done by Consumer Reports on the most reliable, best and worst safety, best and worst fuel efficiency, best and worst value, and highest cost of ownership. They then compiled a top 10 list made up of seven American makes, two European makes and one Japanese make.

The Cadillac Escalade embarrassingly took the top score for least value, highest cost of ownership and worst safety scores. I’ll throw in that the Escalade is probably the easiest to steal for good measure.

The Chrysler Town & Country took worst reliability and faired pretty badly for cost of ownership. The Jeep Wrangler and Liberty scored for poor reliability and fuel economy while the Dodge Nitro and Dakota shared in those honours failures as well.

Along with the Escalade, GM took some hits with the Aveo, Colorado and Tahoe Hybrid making the list. All got marks for worst reliability, high cost of ownership and worst safety results.

The two Euros to make the list were both from Mercedes-Benz. The S-class made the list for high cost of ownership and low fuel efficiency scores while the Smart Fortwo was dinged for poor reliability and value.

The lone Japanese vehicle on the list was the Nissan Titan for poor fuel efficiency, reliability and cost of ownership.

With the exception of the three imports which are low volume sellers, people still seem to not get that the above mentioned domestics don’t excel in much. Yet they still sell in large numbers. Are there just that many stupid people out there? But before anyone starts on an anti-domestic vehicle tirade, it should be noted that not a single vehicle from Ford made the list.

[Forbes]

Chrysler announced today that a next generation Viper will finally rear its head next year. The current Viper has been on about a billion year life cycle and was well overdue for a redesign.

Probably the biggest news is that the next generation Viper will come with stability control. It will be the first Viper ever to have it. Why has Chrysler been omitting stability control for decades? Well, they apparently wanted to market the Viper as a raw performance car. Aka real performance driver’s should be able to reign in the beast snake with pure driving skill, not electric nanies. So what changed? Well it’s likely that the new regulations coming in the next two years that forces all manufacturers put stability control as standard on all their vehicles is the culprit. Or the life saver. Depending on how you look at it. I would point out that this likely has Viper purists shouting blasphemy from the hills, but, I’m not sure if Viper purists even exist.

Other news is that the new snake will get anywhere from 600-700 horespower, likely from a V8 rather than the V10 currently offered in an effort to reduce fuel consumption.

Chrysler has set its sites  the Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 and Nissan GT-R as the new Viper’s main competition, and if that’s the case, they better come up with something that’s 100% better than the outgoing model because those two cars have already proven their worthiness.

[Chrysler]

Seriously, what an idiot.

Police in the Niagra Falls area nabbed a guy in a Dodge Neon SRT-4 for going 233 km/h in a 90 km/h zone. The police report also stated that he was driving that speed on bald tires no less. However, considering the guy spent $25,000 in upgrades, those tires were likely racing compound tires.

Oh yeah, if that first part didn’t sink in, let me repeat it. He spent $25,000 in upgrades. For a Neon. Yeah.

The accused motorist recently went into court trying to avoid the $3,651 fine by claiming his car was a regular Dodge Neon (aka a piece of crap) that is incapable of reaching such speeds even if he tried. However that defense didn’t go over so well when the court was presented with an ad that said motorist created selling his SRT-4. The ad detailed the $25,000 he had put into it to make it 420 horsepower capable along with a “Stage 3″ turbocharged engine, upgraded suspension and brakes.

So basically there are about 3 fails to mention here:

1) FAIL for going 233 km/h in a 90 km/h zone. That’s just plain stupid.

2) FAIL for coming up with a somewhat clever defense but then ruining it by advertising just how fast your car really is online.

3) For dumping $25,000 into a terrible car that isn’t worth anything and never will be? BIGGEST FAIL OF ALL. In case you were curious, dude is selling his piece of crap for $9,900. Yep, great investment there, douchebag.

[Niagra Falls Review]

Beggers can’t be choosers I guess.

It would’ve been amazing to have the Alfa Romeo Giulietta in its current form, but apparently North Americans will have to settle for a Dodge version. It’s probably because the vomit inducing Caliber is scheduled to end its 5 year cycle in 2011. It will be officially dicontinued next year, so something needs to replace it and the Giulietta is a good fit.

As long as Chrysler doesn’t Americanize the design too much, it shouldn’t be too bad. Like I said, we’re lucky we’re getting the Giulietta at all.

We should also consider ourselves lucky as this likely won’t be the only Alfa to grace our shores as Fiat head Sergio Marchionne has promised at least 20% Italian influence into the faultering Chrysler brand.

Marchionne is also a Canadian, so thankfully he’s hooking us up with some sweet Euro product. Maybe we’ll even see some Canada only models? One would hope.

[USA Today]

My head is swarmed packed with puns and cheesy jokes right now.

Apparently in Wake County, North Carolina, a truck carrying bee hives broke down on the side of the highway. A passing police officer stopped to offer assistance and called a tow truck. The officer decided to wait with the broken down transport truck until the tow truck arrived as it was very early in the morning before sunrise. Turns out that was a bad idea because by the time the tow truck came by the sun had risen which meant it was a fresh new day for the bees.

They they came out of their hives and started swarming the officer and transport truck driver! But luckily the bees rightfully hate Dodge Chargers so much that they then turned their attention to the officer’s Charger police cruiser! Oh the hilarity! And actually the officer sought refuge in his police car, but ended up being trapped there due to the amount of bees.

Bee keepers from the University of Carolina were then called in to take care of the bees’ apparent love/hate for the Dodge Charger. When enough were taken off the car, the policeman was able to drive away.

Autoblog has a caption contest going for this story. How about:

“Sting operation backfires”

“Dodge Charger charged with swarmings”

“Officer regrets honey dip donut choice from Tim Horton’s”

“Winnie the Pooh arrested for stealing honey, bees react strongly”

“Flower has bees arrested for sexual assault, bees insist pollination”

“Choice of Dodge Charger for police force has everyone buzzing”

I could go on… unfortunately.

[Autoblog]

By Kevin Harrison

Alright everyone, it’s time to get over yourselves. Why? Because you know damned well that SUV in your driveway isn’t quite adequate enough to haul people or stuff, yet you try to get away with it because you say minivans aren’t cool.

Well, you’re right. They aren’t.

But know what’s even less cool? Buying a car for image rather than practicality. If your SUV hasn’t spend an ounce of time off-road, then you are just as image driven as Heidi Montag.

Because of people like you, the minivan population is actually starting to decline. Ford’s once popular Windstar turned Freestar no longer exists, Nissan has halted production of the Quest due to slow sales and Hyundai has scrapped the Entourage after only two years on the market!

But there’s one minivan that has survived the tide, despite the wave of foolish resistance from the public. That’s right, the vehicle that started the whole minivan craze back in the 80′s is still the number one selling van in North America.

Does it deserve such an accolade?

The Grand Caravan has been redesigned for the 2009 year and pretty much remains the same for the 2010 year in terms of options, trim levels and the like.  Don’t let the SE trim fool you, my tester was the base model. Which is just as well because this is the minivan that most people would consider buying anyway.

Off the top I’m going to point out what you’ve already noticed: the styling is pretty boring. In fact, from some angles it looks quite awkward. To be fair, there’s only so much that you can do with the design of a minivan, but even the previous generation Caravan had more character than the new one does. It was much more shapely. This Grand Caravan’s more boxy appearance makes it seem like it should’ve been the evolution from the Caravan circa 1995. The good news is, due to the more boxy shape, the new Grand Caravan can haul a lot more stuff than the previous generation can. With every single row of seats down, you can get 143 cubic feet of space.

On top of all that, Dodge has invented something very smart (a rare occurrence for them). The stow n go seating is brilliant. All you need to do is fold all the seats into the floor and voila, you have a large, flat, cargo surface. I was able to carry a massive tent, two tables, 10 cases of pop, 7 coolers, 4 boxes of buns, two boxes of meat a large display sign, a banner sign and two boxes of miscellaneous stuff with even a bit of room to spare! Before you start thinking I’m a psycho, all that stuff was obviously not for my personal use, I was helping out at a public event.

Stowing the seats into the floor is easier than making fun of Spencer Pratt. With most other vans, the seats don’t fold flat or they need to be taken out completely. Then you have to find somewhere to put them if you don’t have a garage and they are also very heavy. Credit where credit is due Dodge, good job on this.

Unfortunately Dodge didn’t do such a good job with the interior. Materials are cheap to the touch and the centre stack is huge and awkwardly placed. The driver has quite a ways to reach just to reach the volume knob. Other buttons that are closer to the passenger side require you to move out of your driving position and stretch to reach them. Then you need to settle in and make yourself comfortable again. This is a particularly dangerous thing to do if you are in motion. The quality of the sound system is pretty average.

The column shifter is placed right next to the wheel, but it isn’t the traditional column shifter, it is the same shifter that manufacturers use when they place it between the seats. It takes some time getting used to, but eventually you do.  One very unusual thing is that you can actually switch the gears yourself…really? In a minivan that has a four speed automatic and a 175 horsepower engine, you’re going to give it a manual option as if it were a performance sedan? On top of that, the shift method is ridiculous. To up shift you need to push the lever to the right, and to down shift, push to the left – not up and down like traditional manumatics. You don’t get used to it either.

Likewise, you don’t get use to the jolty shifts of the automatic transmission. I’m not sure why any manufacturer still uses four speeds, but this van needs an extra gear to settle it the hell down. It can never decide which gear is the appropriate gear to be no matter what speed you’re going. This is one of the numerous reasons why I am an avid manual transmission fan. When in cruise control mode, it’s almost is if you have to wake the engine up if you wish to accelerate using the control on the steering wheel. There is quite a bit of nothing happening before the engine realizes about three hours later that you wish to speed up.

As mentioned, the base engine produces 175 horses from a 3.3 litre V6. You’d think they’d be able to tweak much more power out of it considering the size of the engine, but alas no. As a result, the Grand Caravan does 0 to 100 in about a week. There are much more powerful engines to choose from in higher trim levels and it would be well worth your while to get the more powerful engine, especially considering there’s only a one mile per gallon difference in fuel consumption.

Oddly enough though, the absolute lack of power is really my only gripe from the performance aspect of the Grand Caravan. I’m not sure how Dodge has done this, but the Grand Caravan is actually decent at handling and there is actually some feedback to the steering wheel. But that’s a bit like saying Bill O’Reilly is less of a douchebag than Rush Limbaugh. He’s still a douchebag. And the Grand Caravan is still anything but a performance vehicle. It’s just for a minivan, it actually isn’t bad. I’ve driven smaller, lighter cars that had more body roll than the Grand Caravan has. It felt quite planted.

Despite quality issues and lack of refinement, I now see why this minivan is so popular. It does everything a minivan can do and then some. And it can do it for a decent price. Starting at just over $20 grand combined with typical Dodge giving everything away discounts, the Grand Caravan would be a hard minivan to pass up on.

That being said, and despite my earlier rant on people not buying them, I recently told my friend Dan that if I were to ever – at any point in my life – purchase a minivan, he has my full permission to punch me in the face. I care way too much about performance to ever own one and maintain that I will always own a performance car no matter what.

The thing is, though, I’m in the minority. 90% of the car buying population don’t care one heap about performance and therefore a minivan should be high on their list if they need to haul lots of people are stuff.

Scratch that, the Dodge Grand Caravan specifically needs to be high on there list if they need to haul people are stuff. Not SUVs.

Price: $20,945

Pros:

• Stow n go is brilliant
• Space capacity
• Surprising handling capabilities
• Price
• Good fuel consumption

Cons:

• Shaky Dodge reliability
• Poor resale value
• Interior quality
• Engine and automatic transmission set up is horrible

Overall: 8/10

Really? That’s it?

Way back since the inception of this blog we saw spy shots of the 2011 wearing a full camouflage suit. It wasn’t terribly interesting but it gave the impression that a fairly substantial redesign was in the works.

Well some fool over at Dodge left the front end of the 2011 Charger completely uncovered for prying eyes to see and it looks as though there isn’t much going on besides an evolutionary face lift. Yawn..  Then again leaving the Charger unmasked could be something done on purpose in order to hype up the car. It’s going to need all the help it can get.

We see that the new Charger is going to have a more douchy looking angrier face with more angular headlamp clusters while the grille has been redesigned to look taller and come with real fake chrome. Since Charger owners only care about raw power and nothing else (such as styling, handling, quality, fuel consumption etc) you can be assured that the new Charger will have plenty of power and that the HEMI engine will stick around.

God, I can’t wait until Fiat/Alfa Romeo gives Chrysler back its credibility.

Ford is again doing quite well in sales thanks to some credible product offerings, one of which is the all new Mustang.

Even though the Camaro has a loyal following in pop culture, that hasn’t swayed people in the muscle car market. In the States last month the Stang sold 10, 225 units while Chevy was able to move 8,931 Camaros. I won’t even bother mentioning how Dodge did with the Challenger. Let’s just say it isn’t posing much of a challenge. Heh.

Ford has been winning many of the unavoidable comparison tests between the two pony cars, but Chevy hopes new revamped engines for 2011 will help it gain some ground.

Which would you choose?

[Autoblog Photo Credit: EGM Cartech]

Watch out Honda, zee Germans are coming!

The Civic has been the best selling car in Canada for over a decade – they even have a television commerical boasting about the Civic’s longstanding success.

But that commerical may turn out to be a bit embarrassing now that VW’s Golf took top selling honours for the month of February for the first time ever.

Apparently we have all but forgotten about high gas prices because the Dodge Ram, Chevy Silverado and Ford F-150 were also among the top sellers last month.