It’s pretty hard to see the Fiat 500 as anything other than a fashion accessory, lacking only a price tag fluttering from a door handle to be seen as some kind of teen girl’s handbag.
But really what we have here is an answer to a serious question about personal mobility, the thing that all the social scientists are wringing their hands about right now. What the Fiat 500 wants to be is its real self, the original 1936 Fiat Topolino.
And it all started with the two most important personalities in America at the time, Henry Ford and Mickey Mouse.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Fiat 500 Sport
Here is Senior Editor Erin Riches with a video review of the 2012 Chevy Sonic. This video covers the whole Chevrolet Sonic model lineup but the action footage is Erin driving our long-term Sonic LTZ.
See the video after the jump...
Donna DeRosa, Managing Editor
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Chevrolet Sonic LTZ
As the car sign-out clipboard made its rounds yesterday, I made a very wise decision. I knew I was heading to a housewarming party on a street with limited parking.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Fiat 500 Sport
The other night I got stuck in some pretty awful traffic. It ended up taking almost 30 minutes to get home from the supermarket, which was only a mile away. Besides fearing that my pint of Ben & Jerry's was turning into a milkshake in the trunk, the cabin started getting a little hot and stuffy. So, I hit the AC button.
Continue reading...
Categories: 1997 Mazda MX-5 Miata
What you see before you will soon be bolted to the underbelly of our 2012 Jeep Wrangler Sport. It's Mopar's new 3-inch "JK Wrangler Pre-Runner Suspension System - Stage III Performance" and we're going to DIY the installation and document the process.
No welding is involved, but there is a wee bit of cutting and drilling. Maybe some swearing. It should be fun.
Mopar sells two versions: part number P5156141 for the 2-door and P5156140 for the 4-door. Each costs $2,400 and includes everything shown on this bench.
The flyer I have here before me figures it take 6 hours to install assuming you are a Jeep dealer mechanic in full possession of the required skill, tools and equipment. The implication for those not looking for a DIY challenge is you can buy this setup at a Jeep dealer and pay them to install it for a nominal fee that probably amounts to whatever they charge for 6 hours of labor.
We fully expect it to take longer as we photograph the process for what should be the ultimate suspension teardown walkaround.
Dan Edmunds, Director of Vehicle Testing
Categories: 2012 Jeep Wrangler
Our Mazda3's six-speed auto, set in default drive mode, is pretty sluggish on the throttle input. It's a little out of character for a car, and brand, known for sharp reactions. In manual mode though, it calls up the neighboring cog surprisingly quick. Since I spend most of my time in traffic flicking the lever up or tapping it back, I figure my left foot should also do something useful. If you're shopping this car, just get the manual.
If you must have the auto -- someone in the family can't drive stick and refuses to learn -- or you just want that seven percent improvement in fuel economy over the previous auto, this is not a bad box to live with. Just know that you'll be rowing back and forth a lot. I'd be curious to spend an entire tank of fuel with this car to see how that style impacts our average fuel economy.
Dan Frio, Automotive Editor
Categories: 2012 Mazda 3
Last night, there was cold weather and a fair amount of rain, and the S60 didn't seem too crazy about it.
The cold start as I left from the parking structure here at work was rough. Made a pit stop at Whole Foods to get some groceries and the cold start after that detour was rough as well. I pressed the ignition button and the engine coughed and hacked for a moment or two, like a chain smoker with bronchitis, before finding its groove.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Volvo S60 T5
While walking my pup this morning, I walked past my neighbor's 199X Quest and couldn't help notice how dated it looks. Sure, most things, if not all things, from the '90s look outdated but it had me wondering how many people buy new cars with that thought in mind, how dated will their car of choice look in the future? After all not many cars age well.
In fact, name a car that you think has aged well. (And I realize that this may not be so much an issue with minivans as other car types.)
Hit the jump for a side by side look at this old Quest and our 2012 Nissan Quest.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Nissan Quest LE
Go ahead. Try to not watch the video. I dare you.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Jeep Wrangler
I had a deja vu moment as I got into our BMW X3 yesterday. The key fob felt familiar, but it was bigger and chunkier in my hand. The seat's excellent lumbar adjustments were at my fingertips as always, but as I settled in, I sure had a whole lot loftier vista than usual. The iDrive was right where it belonged, but it was a mere island in the Fineline Sienna wood-trimmed console. I couldn't initially find the USB port -- it was lurking under a phone tray. Phone pairing was a snap -- just like always.
What the heck, you ask, is she talking about?
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 BMW X3
I love manual transmissions. I love mastering a heel-toe downshift so that's it's only heard, not felt. But I'm having a little difficulty with our little Miata.
Continue reading...
Categories: 1997 Mazda MX-5 Miata
This Sunday I'll be going on a "business trip" to Vegas, where I'll be driving a couple cars we haven't tested before. I could have requested our Audi A8 or BMW X3 for my journey, but why go with a safe, boring choice? And so I'll be taking our long-term Fiat 500.
This car doesn't have the best highway ride -- it's not harsh per se, but it is bouncy over the expansion joints -- and the wind noise is pretty significant at 70 mph. So we'll see how long it takes for this stuff to annoy me, or maybe it never will. The seats in this car are pretty cushy for a microcompact and seem like they might be road-trip-worthy.
I'm also going to hook up the car's special USB stick so we can track mpg in Fiat's EcoDrive program. Carroll started us down that path back in December, but we haven't been very diligent about tracking our driving habits, and Fiat doesn't make that super straightforward, as you have to download an application to your computer and then set up your own login credentials -- seems like it would be easier if Fiat just let you log into a website with one account that's unique to the car. But whatever, I'll use the Vegas trip to log some data in EcoDrive and report back.
Anything else you'd like to know about how our Cinquecento fares on this road trip?
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Fiat 500 Sport
No, that's not a new long-term car. I just wanted to show you our new app. We optimized our Edmunds app for the iPad and we think it looks pretty great. We're really excited about it and we hope you are, too. You can read the details here: http://edmu.in/edmipad
If you previously downloaded the Edmunds app to your iPad, you basically got the iPhone app repurposed for the pad. But this update is completely new and designed specifically for your iPad. It also includes a lot more features from the main Web site. And it's free.
Play around with it and let us know what you think. If you have any issues with it or suggestions, feel free to let us know so we can pass your comments on to our mobile team.
Here are some screen grabs. Click to enlarge:
Donna DeRosa, Managing Editor
One thing I like about driving bigger SUVs (and I do like SUVs) is that they have large outer mirrors. Newer cars, like some recent BMWs we've had through here, have tiny outer mirrors due to aero and, more importantly, styling considerations.
Most carmakers realize that on big SUVs you need big mirrors for lane-changing and backing up, and that functionality is priortized over styling given the size of these vehicles.
But this isn't the case on our long-term 2012 Ford Explorer XLT EcoBoost. It has disappointingly small outer mirrors. They would be fine if they were on a regular sedan, but not on this thing.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Ford Explorer XLT EcoBoost
Quite some time ago, we dug out some of the seat cushion foam to allow more headroom for our taller drivers. It's been a while since I drove the Miata, but I had the chance last night. I think we need to add some foam back in.
Continue reading...
Categories: 1997 Mazda MX-5 Miata
OK, our S60 doesn't need xenon headlights. The standard halogens are fine from a lighting standpoint. But having xenons would help support the premium feel of the rest of the car. It just doesn't quite seem like a luxury sedan with that yellowish halogen illumination. (FYI: The illumination in the photo looks a lot better than it does in person.)
Getting (adaptive) xenons for the T5 is surprisingly affordable -- MSRP is $800. After the jump I've listed some other entry-luxury sedans and how much it'll cost you got get xenons on them.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Volvo S60 T5
The eBay auction on our 2011 Chevrolet Volt ended last night and while we got eight bids, none were high enough to meet the reserve. We started the bidding at $27,500 and after a few days it had gone up to $30,001.99. With about a day left in the auction, we slightly lowered the reserve and the "buy it now," price, hoping it would generate some last- minute bidding.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2011 Chevrolet Volt
(photo by Scott Jacobs)
With January sales showing a 56-percent increase year-over-year, the Camry is enjoying a bit of a hot streak, and the model owes much of its current success to the SE trim. SE models accounted for only 7 percent of total sales in the previous-generation Camry, but in the wake of the car's 2012 redesign (which recast the SE as the line's most performance-oriented trim, with larger tires and a sport-tuned suspension), SE sales have swelled to 35 percent of the Camry's mix.
During an interview on Monday at the recent National Automobile Dealers Convention in Las Vegas, Bob Carter, Toyota's group vice president of U.S. sales, said that the manufacturer plans to exploit the SE's popularity by bumping it up to 40-42 percent of total Camry production. Carter noted that the SE is especially popular with younger female buyers, and their presence has lowered the average age of all Camry buyers to 45 -- a figure that's lower than the segment average.
Warren Clarke, Automotive Content Editor
Categories: 2012 Toyota Camry SE
The Japanese arm of Honda's P.R. effort produced a video that went up on its YouTube channel last week. Considering the recent resurgence of all things NSX, this might be the right time to share this look back and look forward at the (Honda) Acura NSX. The chronological video pulls from archival testing (without the Senna footage), public-relations, and racing clips and it finishes with some pretty slick Polyphony Digital (Gran Turismo) X-ray magic revealing some more detail about the proposed 2012 Acura NSX powertrain. Click through to view...
Continue reading...
Categories: 1991 Acura NSX
We thought we could dodge the rain, but we were wrong. The plan was to bring our 2012 Jeep Wrangler to the obstacle course at Hungry Valley with both sets of tires for a shoot out.
Our goal was to see how the performance of our Jeep would change over the same stretch of ground -- see if the extra RTI and ground clearance afforded by the big 33-inch BFG tires would be obvious to the naked or camera-aided eye. Scott Jacobs came along to take stills while John Adolph shot video.
But things began looking gloomy when we finally arrived, so we dialed back our plan to push the Jeep to its absolute limit and settled for a simpler back-to-back comparison we knew we could finish before we all got dumped on.
The big BFG Mud-Terrain KM2s went first, for no other reason than they were already on the Jeep when we arrived.
Continue reading...
Categories: 2012 Jeep Wrangler
