NAIAS 2010 Industry Day Preview

[Joey D]

So my buddy scored us passes to the NAIAS Industry Preview, meaning I got to see everything before the general public. The show wasn't as bad as last year but it still wasn't the best show I've ever been too. There was a lot missing from the show and I'm fairly confident the only American company that is going to survive is Ford since they actually get it with their new products. Oh and another I learned is a lot of cars have token back seats.

I also skipped a lot of cars since you see them every day on the road.

Outside the Show
Delta Airlines MINI, I thought it was cleaver enough to take a picture of it.

BMW
The BMW Concept Active E, they really need to work on their names.

BMW 2002, I love old school cars like this

Worst. Naming. Scheme. Ever!

MINI
Beachcomber, I loved it and I'm excited to see what the SAV/SUV/CAV whatever the hell it is looks like.

MINI E #008

JCW Clubman, proving something overpriced to begin with can become even more overpriced!

VW
Jetta TDI

The Honey I Shrunk the Audi aka Volkswagen Compact Coupe Concept

Chrysler
Lancia Chrysler Delta, last year it was the Lotus Europa, this year it's a Lancia. Seriously the US people gave you zillions, figure out something.

Viper ACR 1:33 with a cool Laguna Seca decal

Coolest Chrysler Ever!

Second coolest Chrysler!

Third coolest?

The Fiaslyer 500 Electro

Dodge's engineers fail at physics so their trucks drive on the ceiling. Obey gravity...it's the law!

Scion/Toyota/Lexus...aka Snooze Fest
Ummm....what?

Rally car

Convertible little t BIG C

FT-CH Concept aka "Imma Gunna Eat Your Children!"

That over priced Lexus they drove on Top Gear two weeks ago

Still rendering

Government Motors
Holy 🤬 🤬! It's a Cadillac CTS-V Coupe/Fastback/Two Door...based on the promo video this this causes global weather change and explodes!

Cadillac Bling Bling Bling Yo Dawg It's Platinum XTREME Touring Sedan

The Buick Insigna Vampire Edition with Fangs!

My tax dollars paid for an Arcadia's plastic to be painted body colour and then sold as a luxury edition.

The ZR-1

Chevy Pokemon

The Aveo RS XTREME small car that will transform into an auto bot, the hot model told me that the car won't really look like this when it's released however it'll be similar.

The Al Gore Special Socket To Me Edition

Mazda
Happiest Freakin' Car in the world just got faster

Racing RX-8

Saleen
It has 1000hp

Land Rover
Should be in my garage

JAAAAAAAAGGGGGGG
It looks even more French in person but it's still an awesome looking car.

Bentley
The second most happy car in the world

Morgan
Old School

New School

Lotus
Elan, the awesome one.

One of the 9,162 editions of the Elise

The lady's hat

Token back seats

Tesla
It's electric...ya ya ya it's electric [/Metallica Garage Inc.]

Dirty Tesla

Now, correct me if I'm wrong but Detroit is not in New York.

Kia
Most interesting Kia

Chinese Cars
F3DM Hybrid

That's a helluva word, what is a dangerneveropenhot anyways?

Refined Delicate? It felt like an early 90's Cavalier.

The Noble Elise MR2?

Really? You're going to pull me over in that?

Amphibious Car

1982 called, they want their sci-fi Star Wars gauges back

Narrow-minded? Sure but not as narrow as this car!

THE REVENGE! The revenge of what? Orange?

Ford
Fiesta, cool little car.

Focus of Win

Ford's answer to Jurassic Park...ba bah ba bah baba baaaa ba bump bump baaaa.

It was a remote controlled fire hose nozzle, I need that in my life.

Still truckin

Honda
Cool if it wasn't battery powered

GM guy spying on the Ridgeline

Most Awkward Car ever!

Mercedes-Benz
The Hans Solo

The GT5 Cover Car

SL

Token back seats

Audi
Electric TT

Exploded Fairy Lights

 

[buickgnx88]

Now, correct me if I'm wrong but Detroit is not in New York.

Looks like their whole line is skewed to the right...

Really? You're going to pull me over in that?

"Are you the police?"
"Campus...police."

 

[TB]

If they sell that with AWD and doors, they have at least one buyer.

 

[Joey D]

If they sell that with AWD and doors, they have at least one buyer.

They will, next year. That is essentially what the MINI SAV is going to looking like.

 

[Omnis]

Eww, those bulgey headlights on the Focus totally ruin it for me.

 

[Philly]

I enjoyed the captions. Fun post to read. 👍 Looks like a pretty fun show to go to. I'm looking forward to Chicago sometime in the next month.

The BMW Concept Active E, they really need to work on their names.

They are Germans, after all. They just call it what it is. No creativity required!

 

[Boffin]

That REVENGE thing looks - yeah - pretty damn awesome.

Seeing a bit of Ford GT with the roofline. And facts or stats?

 

[McLaren]

Man, Chrysler is so boring when it comes to naming the special edition Vipers. The one in Joey's picture;

1:33 Edition Dodge Viper ACR.

Really?

 

[Philly]

But it's got a built in map, in case you ever get lost.... And happen to be at Laguna Seca.

 

[Joey D]

That REVENGE thing looks - yeah - pretty damn awesome.

Seeing a bit of Ford GT with the roofline. And facts or stats?

It's a rebodied Ford GT:
http://www.autoblog.com/2010/01/12/detroit-2010-revenge-verde-supercar-adds-mean-to-its-green/

 

[homeforsummer]

Great photos Joe 👍 Comments made me laugh.

The CR-Z is cool regardless of the drivetrain though And I'm amazed to see the Ranger looking the same as ever. I wonder if they'll ever replace that thing.

It ticks me off that we haven't got a 2010 motorshow in the UK this year of any significance though. If the same happens in 2011 I'm actually going to fly over for a few of yours...

 

[YSSMAN]

A friend of mine got to drive that Tesla when it came through Grand Rapids a few weeks back. It was one of those days that it had snowed out of the blue, and he said it was pretty awesome to toss around in the mush.

Good photos otherwise, definitely makes me excited to see what shows up in Chicago when I go. Except I'll be there with people. And they smell bad. And get in the way of your photos.

 

[FoolKiller]

Thanks for the pics. It is nice to see this stuff from a non-media perspective.

The CR-Z is cool regardless of the drivetrain though

The idea is cool. The end result was disappointing to me. Without a test drive it looks like a car that has all the joys of driving a hybrid (fights insomnia) without the fuel economy. But hey, if I don't look under the hood and just admire the outside, it is cool. Well, as cool as the illegitimate child of an Insight and CR-X can be, which I surprisingly like the look of.

Knowing how things go with concepts in the US market though, the styling choices that make it look cool to me will probably be dropped and then we are left with another boring to drive hybrid.

Basically, as of this moment, I agree with Jalopnik.
http://jalopnik.com/5445212/honda-cr+z-122-hp-33-mpg-worst-of-all-worlds
But as they point out, it brings much needed driver involvement to hybrids, and as a step in that direction this car may very well play an important role in bringing average joe's that love cars into the world of green cars. God knows the only exciting green cars are out of our price range right now.

 

[Jim Prower]

I've had about enough with the Chrysler bashing.

Otherwise, nice pics.

 

[Joey D]

Thanks for the comments everyone!

I've had about enough with the Chrysler bashing.

They are an awful company and they rebadged a rather awful Italian car and tried to pawn it off as their own.

 

[homeforsummer]

The idea is cool. The end result was disappointing to me. Without a test drive it looks like a car that has all the joys of driving a hybrid (fights insomnia) without the fuel economy. But hey, if I don't look under the hood and just admire the outside, it is cool. Well, as cool as the illegitimate child of an Insight and CR-X can be, which I surprisingly like the look of.

Knowing how things go with concepts in the US market though, the styling choices that make it look cool to me will probably be dropped and then we are left with another boring to drive hybrid.

Basically, as of this moment, I agree with Jalopnik.
http://jalopnik.com/5445212/honda-cr+z-122-hp-33-mpg-worst-of-all-worlds
But as they point out, it brings much needed driver involvement to hybrids, and as a step in that direction this car may very well play an important role in bringing average joe's that love cars into the world of green cars. God knows the only exciting green cars are out of our price range right now.

I can definitely see why people are disappointed with it - I'm sure many were expecting more power, and the rest were expecting better economy. Some were probably expecting lower weight too.

I also reckon it makes far less sense in the USA than it does in Europe say, or Japan. Power is useful in the US, not so much in the rest of the world where it's more crowded and roads are smaller.

However, nobody has actually driven it yet, so everything is as yet unconfirmed. Especially economy. Those figures seem very pessimistic and no doubt were recorded in the car's standard driving mode, rather than "Eco". Fun of course is more subjective, and we'll have to wait for road tests for that. The performance figures don't seem to bad for me - not staggering of course, but at roughly the same performance as my MX5 they'd be more than enough for me, I'd suspect.

If there's one new car I get to drive this year, the CR-Z is the one I'd want to have a go in. So I'll reserve final judgement until I've had a go at a dealer.

 

[Jim Prower]

Thanks for the comments everyone!



They are an awful company and they rebadged a rather awful Italian car and tried to pawn it off as their own.

Except it's not really awful. The worst thing about Fiat's buying experience is the dealership...the cars run perfectly fine.

Y'know...give 'em a chance over the next few years. If I'm wrong, I'll eat my words.

 

[vspecmaster]

can't wait for monday! great pics

 

[Joey D]

Except it's not really awful. The worst thing about Fiat's buying experience is the dealership...the cars run perfectly fine.

Y'know...give 'em a chance over the next few years. If I'm wrong, I'll eat my words.

Eh they've had their chance, they've failed. We've owned several Chryslers and they were all crap. The Mercedes deal didn't really do them any favours eithers. Really the only domestic auto maker I car about is Ford.

 

[Cano]

man that Kia kicks ass.

 

[FoolKiller]

However, nobody has actually driven it yet, so everything is as yet unconfirmed. Especially economy. Those figures seem very pessimistic and no doubt were recorded in the car's standard driving mode, rather than "Eco".

Jalopnik even stated that their figure was based on the manual driving. I have heard 36-38 for the eco mode.

 

[homeforsummer]

Jalopnik even stated that their figure was based on the manual driving. I have heard 36-38 for the eco mode.

36-38 is actually the figure being thrown about for the CVT transmission, and the manual tranny is said to get 31/37. I was surprised at first that the CVT figures are better (as a well driven manual should be able to beat any auto on economy) but then I suppose for 95% of people a CVT would be more efficient as it's far more likely to be in the right "gear" than most drivers, with regard to economy.

There's no word on the eco mode yet though from a quick look around the net it seems to gain another 5+ mpg on average in the similar 2nd gen Insight.

I also occasionally post on the Ecomodder forum and there, people seem to be averaging 15% better than EPA in hybrids (17% for the new Insight and 15% in the Prius). In Civic Hybrids, people are getting over 20% better economy than the EPA reckons.

Of course, not everyone drives like a hypermiler, but I reckon you don't need to. I have fun in my car and I'm still beating EPA figures by 17% on average. I just also know how to drive economically when I'm not aiming for the red line. But I'm banking on EPA's figures being a little pessimistic.

Unfortunately nobody is going to lend me a CR-Z to prove my point, but I'd be willing to bet decent money that I could use a CR-Z day to day in cold and rainy England with no special hypermiling techniques, in the Sport setting, and still beat EPA's figures.