Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Automotive Addicts

Automotive Addicts

Best Buy To Sell Electric Cars?

Posted: 09 May 2011 12:21 PM PDT


Ford's Focus Electric. Image: Ford Motor Company

When you need a case for your iPhone, a BluRay DVD player, a laptop computer or a gaming system, chances are good you head to Best Buy. The Minneapolis-based retailer has come out on top of the retail electronic wars, outlasting once dominant rivals such as Circuit City and CompUSA. One secret to the success of Best Buy has always been diversification, and the retailer was among the first appointed distributors for Brammo electric motorcycles. They followed up on this success by gaining the distribution and installation of Level 2 chargers for the Ford Focus Electric and the Mitsubishi I EV. Now that they've got their foot in the EV door, the retailer thinks it makes sense to expand into EV sales.

Best Buy's Chad Bell oversees the retailer's transportation product offerings, and he was quoted by Autoweek as saying, "We are having conversations with some of the (EV) startups. I would say the conversations are going well. We are very excited about several partnerships that we can't talk about yet."

Referring to the retailer's 1,101 stores nationwide, Bell went on to say, "We probably get more traffic in a weekend than some of these dealers do in a month."

While it's clear that Best Buy could significantly improve the odds of success for an EV startup company, Bell thinks their distribution model could work with established automakers as well. The retailer already has a relationship with both Ford and Mitsubishi, and they're beginning dialogue with other traditional automakers as well. Even if Best Buy never gains the distribution rights to the Ford Focus Electric or the Chevy Volt, automakers may well rely on the retailer to train customers in tasks such as smart phone integration or EV charger optimization. In either case, Best Buy has positioned themselves for growth as the EV market expands.

Source: Automotive News

If It’s Tuesday, This Must Be Daytona: One Lap of America

Posted: 09 May 2011 10:46 AM PDT


Team Angry and Team Slightly Annoyed prepare for the 2011 OLOA.

As far as I know, I wasn't dropped on my head as a child. I can't recall eating leaded paint, and I don't think my mom let me play with a plastic bag over my head. Somehow, however, my developmental years took a wrong turn and I consider epic road trips to be fun. When a buddy called me up and offered me an expense-paid seat as a transit driver on this year's One Lap of America, it didn't take me long to say "sure", even though it meant 10 days on the road, living on coffee, beef jerky and energy drinks. As a transit driver, I wouldn't even get to compete in the bulk of the events, but it didn't matter: I was still running away to join the circus.

One Lap of America is the evolution of the original Cannonball Baker Sea-To-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash, which was started by Brock Yates in 1971 to protest the 55 mile per hour speed limit. The original Cannonball event was blatantly illegal, since the whole point was to drive from New York to California as quickly as possible. By 1979, the Cannonball had attracted too much media attention and too many unqualified participants, so Yates pulled the plug after the '79 run. In 1984, Yates began running an event dubbed, "One Lap of America", in the spirit of the original Cannonball. Instead of focusing on public roads, One Lap left the competition for the racetracks, interspersed with grueling transit drives between tracks. The early OLOA events were the stuff of legend, with drivers racking up as much as 10,000 miles over 10 days.

This year's event was, thankfully, much shorter. In eight days, we racked up around 3,700 miles and ran events at 10 different tracks. We drove 700 mile transit legs, through rain and rush hour traffic and drivers who really needed a good beating. We blatantly ignored speed limits and learned that a factory skunkworks Dodge Challenger SRT-8 will pull a Z06 Corvette and a Porsche 911 GT3 RS. We learned that Five Hour Energy works for 4 hours and 45 minutes (on me, anyway), and that you can function on four hours sleep for a lot longer than you think you can. Overall, we had fun, even if mechanical problems caused us to miss the last event.

Here's my advice: bookmark the One Lap of America website, and start planning for the 2012 event. It isn't inexpensive to run, but nothing worthwhile ever is. You'll probably break your car, you'll run yourself to the point of physical collapse and you'll spend a week or so afterward in a catatonic daze. You'll piss off your wife (or your husband), and you'll stay in hotels with some "interesting" wall art. You'll also meet some amazing people and drive some of this country's best tracks, which makes all the suffering worthwhile. I'm still running on empty from the 2011 OLOA, but I know this: I'll be back, in my own car, for the 2012 event.

2011 Hyundai Elantra GLS – Compromise or Contender?

Posted: 09 May 2011 07:56 AM PDT


Image: Hyundai

In the interest of full disclosure, I admit I am not a typical automotive journalist.  I don’t test new press fleet vehicles, don’t evaluate a new interior every week, and the majority of my knowledge comes from my own extensive research and a bit of real-world experience.  Call me an armchair journo, like I would imagine many enthusiasts to be.  I don’t often get to see the shiny new toys up close and personal, let alone get my hands on them.  Being naturally skeptical, I often wonder just how close to MY reality many car reviews are.

You see, at the end of the day I’m a working mom who happens to love cars, with issues of practicality to consider for my next vehicle.  I’m not yet at the point where I can pick what I WANT, but rather need to pick what best fits life’s demands at the moment.  Budget, space, and maintenance costs all trump the “fun to drive” factor even though I’d rather it be the other way around.  And so, I’ve often felt I will have to compromise on my next set of wheels.

A few weeks ago, my family and I returned to my husband’s shiny new (like, 800 miles on the odo new) Mazdaspeed3 in a parking garage to find that some jackwagon had scraped the back bumper as they reversed (we’re guessing).  The Mazda went into the shop and he was given a 2011 Elantra GLS as a rental.  I’ve been itching to test one out since seeing all the positive buzz, and have been waffling back and forth with putting the E on my shopping list.  One hundred and forty-eight horsepower sure does look puny next to the Speed3′s two hundred and sixty-three.  Unfortunately, the Speed3 doesn’t meet the “space” requirement as above, so it’s not a contender for me but I digress.

Coming from my own ride, a Mazda6, the Elantra looks petite and low to the ground.  The paint is beautiful, or would have been if the rental agency had slapped a decent coat of wax on the thing (this one was Phantom Black, but I have also seen the Indigo Blue Pearl in person and it’s outstanding).  Getting in, I noticed the seats were nicely bolstered and supportive and everything seemed to fit around me just right.  It had a weird “fossilized french fry” smell but I’ll chalk that up to rental car funk.  This was the base model with auto transmission and no other packages but still well-equipped.   I ended up driving it for its three-day tenure with us.  I had pretty low expectations – after all, this thing has less power than my ’03 base model 6 and is geared to achieve up to 40mpg on the highway.

Image: Autoblog

Consider my expectations surpassed, to say the least.  I often wonder if some automotive writers have become jaded over the years, after having driven so many wonderful machines.  What, I wondered, would someone in the “real world” think of it?  What’s it like in everyday driving, not on a closed track?  The first thing I noticed was the brakes were rather touchy and it didn’t take much gas to get the car to move.  I pulled into traffic expecting to floor it and was pleasantly greeted with a burst of speed.  The next thing was to take it on the highway where I had no trouble merging with those doing 80mph, and the E happily downshifted when I needed to pass some crawlers.

At this point, I was trying the sport-shift but it’s set up backward from the 6 – up to upshift, down to downshift.  Seems logical but not at all what I was used to.  Something else I wasn’t used to was two more gears than I normally have.  Slushbox or no, six speeds certainly helped make it more fun.  I took the curving off-ramp cautiously not knowing how the tires would respond but they held their own.  Not on-rails smooth like the Speed3 but definitely minimal body roll and I never felt out of control (the ESC may have been helping here…my 6 doesn’t have it and I’m not used to cars that do).

Inside, the base stereo provided plenty of enjoyment to my commute and I am curious how the 360-watt in the Limited sounds.  My inner geek was thrilled with the option of plugging in a USB stick for music.  The plastics were to my liking and I even pushed my finger into the dash – squishy – something I never would have even thought to do a few years ago before every car-related outlet started harping on it.  The backseat was spacious and accommodating for my family’s needs and the trunk, cavernous.  I was overjoyed to find how easily the Hyundai turned into parking spaces, although the very light steering at low speeds took some getting used to (sort of like the wheel in an arcade game).  That being said, it did weight up nicely at speed.  I am pretty sure the rental was out of alignment so my assessment of the suspension isn’t totally fair, but it did soak up the potholes of my daily trips easily.  I’m used to harsher setups, and going over railroad tracks in the Elantra actually felt better than in the 6.

Image: Hyundai

It doesn’t have the sweetest-sounding exhaust note and the horn elicits a polite “meep!” when pressed, but in the grand scheme of things those aren’t considerations I find important anyway.  HIDs are the only option missing from my wish list.  If I did buy one, it would likely be the Limited with nav (in Red Allure, please).  I understand it’s not an apples-to-apples comparison, but for me it has come down to the Elantra and the 2012 Civic Si.  I still plan to test an Si one day, of course, but I have been more than impressed with the E.  I figure it’s got to be a good car when you’re sad to turn in a base model rental that smells like old cooking oil, right?  If you’re looking for raw power and RWD then obviously this is not for you.  But if you’re looking to replace your old Civic or Corolla (or even “downsize” from a bigger car if you don’t need the space), want something for decent gas mileage, and see your car as something more than an appliance, I definitely recommend the new Elantra.   Now, if they would just throw a turbo in there, badge it an R-Spec, and sell it here I would be set for the next ten years.

Ndamukong Suh & New Chrysler 300 Featured in ‘Imported From Detroit Homecoming’ Commercial

Posted: 09 May 2011 06:27 AM PDT


Detroit Lions defensive tackle and NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year, Ndamukong Suh, is featured in the latest Chrysler commercial continuing the ‘Imported From Detroit’ theme this time rocking the all-new 2011 Chrysler 300. To celebrate Mother’s Day over the weekend, the commercial has Suh returning home in Portland, Oregon to his mother. For an approach that is much less dramatic as the famous Super Bowl Chrysler 200 Commercial featuring Eminem, this one is still impressive. Good job Chrysler!
Posted by Didik Rg at 6:10 AM

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