Car Driven’s 2011 Car of the Year Nominees Are…

For the first time ever, Car Driven will be announcing its Car of the Year (COTY). Mostly because this is the first year for this blog, but also because unfortunately I don’t have the means to test every new vehicle myself this year. But that never stopped me from making my own pics for AJAC’s COTY awards last year, so why not?

So with much thought and deliberation I’ve narrowed down the nominees to five cars overall. Every new 2011 vehicle, no matter what the segment, is considered. However to keep things simple, I’ve opted to not separate them by categories this year. That means the new Honda Odyssey was technically considered alongside the Ferrari 458 Italia. Since both are obviously very different vehicles made for very different purposes, I decided to choose all nominees based on how well each vehicle is suited for Canadians. That means everything from performance, price, quality, safety, fit & finish were considered. However to keep it fair, each of those criterion are relative to the vehicle segment. So for example the Ferrari 458 Italia is compared against other supercars. And the Honda Odyssey against other minivans. The vehicle that presents a clear, absolute best case for itself wins.

I’ll probably do categories next year, but for now we’ll go with this. And I’m working a lot harder to try to test all the new vehicles for next year to make a more informed decision, press vehicles are pretty hard to get your hands on (in the meantime, check out all the vehicles I’ve tested so far). And to keep it simple, I’ve narrowed it down to 5 vehicles.

Find out what they are after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ward’s 2011 Engines of the Year Announced

This year’s engine of the year award winners are full of repeat winners and a few surprises.

The first big surprise is the Nissan LEAF winning this award. Mostly because it doesn’t even have an engine, it’s has an electric motor only. What was Ward’s reasoning? Apparently since the LEAF feels like a regular car (i.e four doors, five seats, an accelerator and brake) it deserves this award. That’s like saying since Stephen Harper has arms, legs and a face he should win a beauty contest.

Another big surprise is the engine/electric motor set up in the Chevy Volt. With the electric motor primarily propelling the car, it’s a wonder why it’s on the list. Ward’s sites reasons similar to the LEAF for its choice.

But despite those odd choices, the one that shocked me the most was Chrysler’s 3.6 litre Pentastar V6 making the list. This has been a traditionally awful engine. Just terrible. However since Fiat has taken the reigns, it appears they have put some work into this engine making it much better. It can be found in the 2011 Dodge Avenger and Chrysler 200.

Volvo also picked up an award for the 3.0 litre inline six that it uses in the redesigned S60. Ward’s says this engine almost rivals BMW’s 3.0 I-6 as it is buttery smooth, has great mid-range pick up and has virtually no turbo lag. Quite the statement, I’ll have to try it out to see if it stacks up.

Speaking of BMW, they unsurpsingly won once again for their N55 3.0 litre twin scrolled turbo engine for the 5th year in a row. I can wholeheartedly agree with this decision after experiencing the 135i (read my test drive in the post below).

BMW also won a second award for the 1.6 litre turbocharged inline 4 that it uses in the Mini Cooper S. With more power, more efficiency and little turbo lag, it helps make the Cooper S quite the little performance machine.

Volkswagen picked up two awards as well. One for the supercharged V6 found in the Audi S4 and one for new Clean Diesel 2.0 litre TDI found in the Golf, Jetta and Audi A3. The former delivers all encompassing performance while the latter does exceptionally well at combining efficiency with performance.

Rounding up the list is the Ford and Hyundai. After reintroducing the 5.0 litre V8 found in the Mustang they were actually able to make a car that could keep up with the BMW M3. Enough said.

Hyundai on the other hand won for its 5.0 V8 as well found in the base Genesis sedan and the upcoming Equus flagship sedan. It won for keeping power plentiful while being even more efficient than the previous engine.

Congrats to all the winners!

[Ward's]

Test Drive: 2010 Ford Fusion Hybrid

By Kevin Harrison

The problem with being good at something is that you likely won’t be good at it forever. And even if you are, there’s always someone who will surpass your greatness. If they’re at the bottom and you’re on top, they’ve got nothing to lose so they’ll take more risks to get to that number one spot. If you’re on top you likely won’t change your game up – just keep doing what you’re doing.

Take the car world for instance. Ford was the number two automaker for a good decade, but I never understood why. Their products were cheap, but you got what you paid for. If it wasn’t Explorers rolling over, it was Windstars stalling on the highway. If it wasn’t the sheer blandness and lack of effort put into the Taurus, it was, well, pretty much the same for the Focus. Yet people readily handed over their cash to Ford for sub-par product, much in the same way people hand over cash to McDonald’s for sub-par food. So Ford really didn’t have to do anything – they were still on top.

Toyota, meanwhile, wasn’t exactly on the bottom, but they were aiming for that top spot. Dedication, quality, fuel efficiency, reliability was Toyota’s plan to lure away loyal Ford customers and it worked. Ford got too comfortable on top and Toyota went in for the kill.

Now Toyota is the number one automaker. But it seems Toyota is now the one feeling a bit too comfy being the number one automaker with recalls on almost every single one of their product and and unwillingness to shake things up.

Ford is vying for the top spot yet again, so they’re taking more risks. And you really gotta take a risk if you’re willing to take on the mid-size sedan market where the Camry is sitting quite comfortably on top of most people’s car shopping lists.

Has Ford built a Camry killer, and is it enough to unseat Toyota’s reign at the top?

Read the rest of this entry »

Civilian Ford Transit Will Be Produced

Have you ever looked at a Ford Transit and thought to yourself, “Damn, if it had side windows and alloy wheels, I’d definitely buy one”? No, me neither. But Ford is betting that enough people have thought that before, so they’re producing a civilian version of the tranitional work van.

On top of windows and alloys, the civilian Transit (actually called the Transit XLT) will also come with fog lights, a painted grille and will be a five seater only. That means there will be massive amounts of cargo room in the back. And with a rating of 9L /100 kms highway, it will be decently efficient as well.

So huge amounts of cargo room, head room, great gas mileage, very maneouverable and European looks. Maybe making a version available to the public isn’t a bad idea afterall. It certainly makes a great alternative to most full-size SUV’s.

[Ford]

Ford To Reduce Stake in Mazda

Ford has announced today that it plans to reduce it’s 11% stake in Mazda to 3.5% effective November 19th aka tomorrow.

It’s an interesting move. On the one hand, in this economy, downsizing is probably the safest way to go. GM was forced to do it and Ford has done so by getting selling of Land Rover, Jaguar, Aston Martin, Volvo and killing off Mercury. Mazda is really the only brand it has any stake in now (besides Lincoln).

On the other hand, Mazda is on a roll and has been for the past few years. Keeping a higher stake in a brand that is surely to continue to do well in the future may not be a bad idea. Perhaps that’s why Ford decided not to sell the entire stake. 3.5% in the grand scheme of things, is still pretty significant afterall. As a result, Ford says the two companies will continue to share ideas and technologies.

[Mazda, Ford Photo Credit: Autoblog]

R.I.P Ford Ranger

I’ve never been a pick-up truck guy. When I was about 5 years old I thought they were pretty cool, but back then I also thought tucking your sweater into your pants was cool too.  Now that I’m older and out in public without my sweater tucked into my pants, I can appreciate a good pick-up truck, but they still don’t do a whole lot for me. I’m really more of a performance enthusiast.

But there was always one truck that strangely intrigued me and that was the Ford Ranger. I guess I found it interesting because Ford pretty much has deemed the Ranger to be the black sheep of the family for a long time now. They neglected to do any upgrades or updates to the truck at all. As a result, the Ranger has gone essentially unchanged since 1993. And yet, Ford still sells 75,000 Rangers in North America every year. What?! How are people still buying an almost 20 year old design? That’s what intrigues me. There must be something special about that truck for it to continually sell so well.

And now comes word that Ford has finally decided to kill it off. The Ranger has one more year left, then the production cycle will end in 2011. There is no replacement planned either, at least not for North America. There will be a new Ranger debuting for the rest of the world quite soon, but we will be the only land mass that won’t be able to buy it. Why?

According to Ford, three reasons. 1) The new global Ranger will be too close in size to its big brother the F-150. It’s about 90% the size of the big full-sizer. Ford is afraid the new Ranger would canabalize F-150 sales. 2) The compact pick-up truck has been on a steady decline for years in our market, down to only 2% sales. Since North Americans are a bunch of fools, we still are of the mindset that bigger is better. The Ranger is really the only true compact pick-up truck that you can buy today. 3) According to Ford, most interested buyers don’t buy the Ranger because it’s a truck. They actually buy it because it’s one of the least expensive fuel efficient vehicles in the showroom. Since the arrival of the new Fiesta, that is no longer true.  Um, did they forget about the Focus?

Anyway, for those reasons, we will not be getting the Ranger replacement in our market and the current version will be killed off. I think I may try to get a test drive done on the current Ranger to see what all the fuss was about for the past 20 years.

Until then, R.I.P Ranger. Your demise is the unfortunate result of backwards North American thinking.

[Autoblog]

Test Drive: 2011 Ford Fiesta

By Kevin Harrison

Don’t you hate it when someone else’s tastes have a negative affect on you? For instance, I have an inhuman ability to eat spicy food. And I mean spicy. Think of the spiciest thing you’ve ever had, I guarantee I’ve had spicier. And if I haven’t, I guarantee that I am able to handle it better than you. This may seem like bragging, but it’s really just abnormal. In fact, it’s damned inconvenient. Since my tolerance for spice is so high (thanks to my heritage and just plain growing up with the stuff) it’s hard to find truly spicy food in Halifax that meets my satisfaction. Believe me, I’ve tried. Why? Because North Americans can’t handle spicy food. North Americans apparently prefer blandness. I am seriously addicted to spicy food, so sometimes living here is like an alcoholic living in a prohibition nation.

North American tastes have also been screwing me over in the car world as well. It’s because Americans prefer unnecessarily large vehicles that have a billion horsepower but handle like they are driving on marshmallow roads, and look as though they were designed for Flava Flav. Chrome and shininess everywhere. Basically, tackiness everywhere.

Because of this, we have been deprived of amazing vehicles like the BMW 535d, the Ford Focus RS, and the Audi A1.

Recently there’s been an interesting change, however. It seems the folks at Ford, who make tremendous vehicles for the European market, have finally had a light bulb go on in their heads. Instead of building two versions of the Focus, why not just sell the good one globally? Indeed, why not try selling other product here too?

So here we are, with the Ford Fiesta. The little car is finally available on our shores. Even though we now have Euro Fords, have they still been Americanized for our stupid tastes?

Read the rest of this entry »

Oh Hi: 2011 Ford Explorer

After being more of a tease than Marilyn Monroe with teaser shots, Ford decided to finally release the 2011 Explorer for all to see.

The team at Ford had quite the challenge as the demand for SUV’s has dwindled significantly, let alone for the Ford Explorer which is now quite long in the tooth. The public just isn’t interested in gas guzzling, body on frame SUV’s anymore. Poor fuel consumption, harsh ride and horrible handling capabilities really just don’t seem appealing anymore (I don’t know why they were ever appealing in the first place).

So for the first time ever Ford has been the Explorer a unibody design on the same platform as the Taurus and Flex. It is, as Ford puts it, a crossover. However I always tend to use that term with caution, but we’ll go with it for now.

This new Explorer will initially get a choice of either a normally aspirated 3.5 V6 or a 2.0 litre four cylinder Eco-boost. These engines will be 30% more efficient regarless of which engine you choose.

For more info and pics, click here.

Hyundai Set to Introduce 5-litre Genesis Coupe!

Hyundai really wants to be taken seriously in the performance world and its Genesis Coupe makes an excellent arguement for both value and performance. It is a great looking, great handling car. The 2.0T has some zing to it and the 3.8 GT will put a grin on your face.

But Hyundai is taking aim squarely at the muscle car market. The Challenger, Camaro and Mustang all offer variants of muscle that can churn out anything in the 400 horsepower range. Hyundai wants a piece of that pie.

So they are reportedly developing a 5.0 litre V8 that will pack 429 horses and 376 pound feet of torque. Yum.

That 5 litre obviously means inevetiable comparisons to the Mustang’s newly introduced 5.0 litre engine in the 2011 model. Since the Mustang can apparently now hold its own in the bends (for the first time ever in its life) it should be quite the entertaining battle.

[Car and Driver]

Mustang Beats Camaro In Sales For May

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]

Volkswagen Golf Best Selling Car in Canada for February

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.

Done Deal: Volvo Will Be Sold to Geely

Guess Li Shufu was just being over dramatic?

Ford announced at a press conference in Sweden today that that country’s biggest automaker will find itself with a new owner.  Chinese company Geely, had long been considered the front runner for the bid, and is now the official owner.

The deal sees Volvo going to the tune of $1.8 billion dollars as expected including other physical assets. Ford will also have no stakes left in the brand as Geely will take 100% ownership.

Any Ford technology that found itself into Volvo models will be licensed for use by Ford.

Shufu has promised to keep Volvo separate from Geely, so hopefully we won’t be seeing Volvos with any Geely technology in them.

The Chinese government has yet to approve the sale, however they are expected to do so shortly.

Volvo-Geely Deal Gets Rocky

For some reason, Ford is trying to get rid of Volvo right when they are starting to make interesting product. The new 2011 S60 has shown that it’s got some soul, their wagons and SUV’s are still doing quite well, and the C30 is expanding to get more people into the brand. Sounds quite promising, no?

Well the truth is, Volvo really hasn’t been too profitable for Ford even though they have benefited tremendously from Volvo platforms and safety technology.

Still, Volvo is leaving Ford with some bad indegestion like a Swedish meatball and as a result, the brand has been up for sale since 2008.

Chinese car company Geely, has been the front runner in the deal and it was though that the deal would become officially, uh, official back in February.

This obviously didn’t happen and now comes word that the deal has reached a bit of a snag.

Read the rest of this entry »

Oh Hi: 2012 Ford Police Interceptor

Get used to that face, because you will now have to be on the lookout for Tauruses hiding behind bends and bushes waiting to nab you with their radar gun.

As expected, the Taurus will take over patrolling duties from the Crown Victoria, which can now fully enjoy its retirement. Ford officially stopped selling Crown Vic’s to the public, but continued on producing them for various police forces across the continent.

There are no specific details out yet, but there’s a good chance that a tuned version of the Taurus SHO could make its way under the hood. Ecoboost technology would likely be included as well.

Dodge has been producing interceptor versions of the Charger for a while now, and GM hopes to get a piece of the pie when it introduces a Chevrolet Caprice interceptor in the very near future. The Caprice will essentially be a Pontiac G8 badged as a Chevy, and there are no plans to sell it to the public.

Who knew there was such stiff competition to be the unofficial supplier to the police? To all the police officers that frequent Car Driven, what would be your interceptor of choice? Charger, Caprice or Taurus?

A few more pics after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

This is What Happens When You Don’t Take Bailout Money

Your sales go up. Way up.

Of course, incorporating new product and upping the quality of existing product helps too.

Ford has done both and is definitely fairng the best out of the big three. The public seems to be rewarding their hard effort with increased sales, even in low volume segments. The F-150 SVT Raptor is already selling way more than predicted and now comes news that the 2011 Mustang ain’t doin’ so bad either. In fact, the 2011 Mustang is selling three times more than the 2009 Mustang did. The V6 is particularly doing well accounting for over half of the 2011 Mustang’s sales. We’re guessing that the 305 horsepower engine that returns 7.8 L/100 kms in fuel economy is the big draw.

The California Special edition is also doing well as it has also sold three times as much as two years ago. There apparently was already 11,000 orders for Mustangs placed in January and that number is expected to increase.

Time to step up your game, Challenger and Camaro.

We can’t wait for the Fiesta and Euro Focus to arrive!