2012 Acura TL Review

The 2012 Acura TL front view.I am not a fan of plastic surgery. Too many botched jobs out there reminding us every day that the nose wasn't really that big or other bits weren't really that small. In the case of the 2012 Acura TL, however, I'm prepared to say that sometimes a nose job is really what the patient needed.In case you don't remember the 2009, 2010 and 2011 TL, here's the "before" picture:The 2009-2011 Acura TL front view.If you think it's not so wonderful in pictures, trust me...that's a flattering angle. A change was needed...and now, we have one. The TL is, as it was before 2009, a conventionally handsome sport sedan.The good...

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2011 Chrysler 300 Review

The 2011 Chrysler 300.This is the second 2011 Chrysler 300 the press fleet folks have sent our way in the past few months. I wrote about the first one for High Gear Media's Carnewser.com a couple of weeks back.  That first car came option-free...sporting a price tag $7590 less than the 2011 Dodge Charger reviewed here on TireKicker in late September.The Carnewser.com piece focused on my trying (and failing) to understand why Chrysler, working to set itself apart as an upscale brand would build and sell such reasonably priced examples of their flagship, the 300. Since then, though, word has come that Chrysler's dropping the ax on the Dodge...

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2011 GMC Terrain Review

The 2011 GMC Terrain.As easy as it is to take potshots at badge engineering (taking one vehicle, putting a different grille, taillights and nameplate on it and calling it something else), think about what it must be like to be a corporate cousin of a big volume brand like Chevrolet. You need product or your brand won't survive, and the fact, even prior to the great recession and Carpocalypse, is that the bucks aren't there to build unique vehicles for each brand. Platform sharing...and the more blatant badge engineering...are the only way to go. That's GMC's lot in life and has been for decades. They finesse it by positioning themselves as more...

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2011 Kia Optima Hybrid Review

The 2011 Kia Optima Hybrid.As impressed as we were with the 2011 Kia Optima just a month ago, nothing could have prepared us for the Kia Optima Hybrid.Here's the recipe: Take everything that makes the Optima a winner, and add a hybrid powerplant. But make it a hybrid powerplant that delivers the mileage. 24 mpg city/34 highway in the gasoline Optima becomes 35 city/40 highway in the Optima Hybrid...good enough to vault into 7th place on TireKicker's Top 10 Fuel Savers, ahead of smaller, lesser-performing cars like the Honda CR-Z and Lexus HS 250h.The 2011 Kia Optima Hybrid rear view.Best part of it all? The price spread between gasoline...

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2012 Fiat 500C Review

The 2012 Fiat 500C.Regular TireKicker readers know I am hype-averse. The more something gets promoted, plugged, built-up, the more skeptical I am about it. So, a dumb commercial featuring J. Lo and the Fiat 500C is a great way to turn me all the way off:And, I'll admit...even before that started airing, I had my doubts about the Fiat 500. It looked like another super-sized re-creation (the original 500 could probably fit in the passenger space of the new one) of a cute car from 50 years ago that almost no one in North America has ever seen, much less driven. And the changes required by government regulation and consumer preferences in the intervening...

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2011 Hyundai Elantra Review

The 2011 Hyundai Elantra.It's the one-two punch the Japanese have been dreading. A little over two months ago, we reviewed the 2011 Hyundai Sonata...the upshot being that Hyundai, for 20 years the Korean underdog, had now built a credible competitor to the Toyota Camry and the Honda Accord (and everything else in the family sedan segment too...Focus, Malibu, Passat...).Well, just as Accord has Civic and Camry has Corolla...Sonata has Elantra...but it's better than that. The Elantra, the smaller of the two, is as good in its class as the Sonata in its and maybe better. It's reminiscent of the days when Accord and Civic were so good you couldn't...

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2012 Chevrolet Cruze ECO Review

The 2012 Chevrolet Cruze ECO.Comes now our third test of a Chevrolet Cruze in the past five months. Each one has been a different flavor. We started out with the loaded Chevrolet Cruze LTZ. Loved it, but for $24,000 and change as tested, we'd better have.Then just about two months ago, it was almost the opposite end of the spectrum...the Chevrolet Cruze 1LT (one level up from the base Cruze).  Also a thumbs-up, and at a more reasonable $18,995.Now it's the Chevrolet Cruze ECO. What makes an ECO an ECO? Well, mostly it's the 1.4 liter ECOTEC engine mated to a six-speed manual transmission with ECO overdrive. But to tell it apart from...

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Mahindra launches XUV 500

Mahindra has launched its new global sport utility vehicle XUV 500 at a staggering price of Rs 10.80 lakhs. The company will begin bookings from Saturday.Two versions of the vehicle will be available, the W6 and W8 in both two-wheel and four-wheel drive.The W8 has been priced at Rs 11.95 lakh, ex-showroom, Delhi while the W6 has been priced at Rs 10.8 lakh for the two-wheel drive versions. The price of the XUV500 W8 AWD version is Rs 12.88 lakh ex Delhi.The XUV500 is powered by a 2.2-litre M-Hawk engine that develops 140bhp and a whopping 330Nm of torque.The XUV 500's interior gets sporty intrument panel, elegant leather wrapped dashboard, cool...

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2011 Dodge Charger Review

The 2011 Dodge Charger.I'll admit it. I was among those who thought naming a four-door sedan "Charger" was an act of sacrilege and doomed to failure. After all, the real Dodge Charger was a two-door. Well, as Ralph Waldo Emerson put it, "foolish consistency sucks" (or something like that). Fact is, Dodge has built a very good sedan and calling it "Coronet" (the four-door the original Charger was based on) would have been a far worse idea.And, Dodge has dialed up the menace factor for the 2011 Charger. Look at the picture above. That's a six-cylinder family sedan. Pretty cool.It helps enormously that under the new sheetmetal is a new six...the...

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2011 Mazda MX-5 Miata Review

The 2011 Mazda MX-5 Miata Grand Touring PRHT. A sure-fire smile inducer at TireKicker is to toss us the keys to a Mazda MX-5 Miata. Tight, quick, fun...everything the MGs, Triumphs and Healys of the 60s were aiming for, but could never quite get that quality thing down. It's been about a year and a half since Mazda put one in the press fleet, and it's a scientific fact that your body never outgrows its need for a week in a primal roots sporting machine, so we borrowed one from Chapman Mazda in Phoenix. And the one we got was the least primal of the bunch...the Grand Touring PRHT.What's that? Well, it's an MX-5 Miata loaded with just about...

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2012 Infiniti M Hybrid Review

The 2012 Infiniti M Hybrid rear view.In a break with (sometime) TireKicker tradition, we're showing you the rear view of the Infiniti M Hybrid first, because it is how you will most likely see one. You see, just yesterday (9/21/11), no less than an adjucator from the Guiness Book of World's Records and the UK's CAR Magazine certified the M Hybrid as the world's fastest full hybrid. Now, its 0-60 time of 5.0 seconds is plenty impressive, but CAR decided real speed is best measured in quarter-miles, and there, the M Hybrid did it in an average of 13.9 seconds...tying the 1/4 mile performance of a 1982 Lamborghini Countach, coming within...

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2011 Jeep Patriot Review

The 2011 Jeep PatriotIt was easy to dismiss the Jeep Patriot when it first hit the streets (and trails) a couple of years back. Part of it was guilt by association, having been introduced to the public at the same time as the first-ever non-Trail Rated Jeep, the almost identically-sized Jeep Compass.But while the Compass was (and is, despite some upgrades) a Jeeped-up Dodge, the Patriot was (and is) a real Jeep. In many ways, it's the spiritual successor to the 1984 Jeep Cherokee.1984 Jeep CherokeeYes, if you dial the wayback machine 28 model years in reverse, you'll find people wondering what was up with this very small Jeep, which replaced...

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Every Breath You Take: OnStar's Watching You (Even If You Cancel)

New privacy policy at OnStar: Starting in December, they're tracking your car and your speed even if you cancel your subscription. And they reserve the right to sell the data. Story from Wired Magazin...

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The 10 fastest cars of 2011

Every year, car manufacturers roll out new makes and models that push technology to the breaking point. Edmunds.com, an automotive-information Web site, evaluates these cars and explains what consumers are getting for their money. This includes engine design, cosmetic details, and, naturally, speed.The evaluations are based on the opinions of Dan Edmunds, the site’s director of vehicle testing. He’s the one who actually test drives the cars, so CNBC.com spoke with him to get his thoughts on 2011’s 10 fastest models. ” I don’t think there’s a stinker in the bunch,” he said.Some of the cars on this list are new models out this year, or rolling...

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