This time, there’s none of that stuff about towing a gazillion pound trailer, or stacking the box with a giant load of iron ingots. Nope, with the 2013 Ram 1500 pickup truck, it’s all about fuel economy—to the point where a perusal of the published specifications does not unearth information about payload or towing capability. It’s not that it is unavailable. It’s just that the story here—as almost everywhere these …
2013 Honda Fit EV Review: If the 2013 Honda Fit EV were a fictional character, it could be Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, or the Hulk and Bruce Banner. Either way, it would way more fun than frightening. Credit that to the Fit EV’s three drive modes. The EV is the new electric car from Honda, which also has been poking around in hybrids and fuel cell vehicles. In fact, …
2013 Chevrolet Malibu and 2013 Chevrolet Camaro Review: In the passionately competitive automotive world, embellishment often trumps originality. There’s usually excitement when a manufacturer introduces an all-new car or truck. As with a movie debut, the enthusiasm soon fades, at different rates depending on the public’s attention span. That’s why the automakers carry alterations in their hip pockets, ready to go when needed. They go by various descriptions, which Automotive …
2013 Subaru XV Crosstrek Review: Subaru has a knack for the counterintuitive. That’s an outsider’s way to describe the 2013 XV Crosstrek, an all-new entry from Japan’s master of all-wheel drive and boxer engines. But it would flummox Subaru insiders, who consider the tidy crossover to be completely in keeping with their tradition. After all, this is the company that stayed the course when the industry stampeded toward truck-based sport …
2013 Volvo S60 Review: Merging smartly into the lengthening line of modern less-is-more vehicles, Volvo brings us its 2013 Volvo S60 T5 sports sedan. The last time we looked, the S60 was a T6, an all-new 2011 model with 300 horsepower from a turbocharged, inline six-cylinder engine and all-wheel drive. It delivered 18/26 city/highway miles to the gallon and had a starting price of $38,550. It was a way of …
2013 Mercedes-Benz GLK350 Review: Never mind the tussle over whether the glass is half empty or half full. To hear the Mercedes-Benz people tell it, the 2013 GLK’s glass is full to the brim. That’s despite the fact that the company’s smallest SUV is only about half new. Mercedes says it’s been redesigned, but it is what the vehicle business calls refreshed, usually done half way through a model’s life …
Cadillac is getting into the bracket business. It has nothing to do with the NCAA’s March Madness basketball tournament. It has everything to do with validating the company’s self-proclaimed—and once widely accepted—title as “the standard of the world.” With the decision to deep-six its mid to large rear-drive STS model and the full-size, front-wheel drive DTS sedan, which was aimed at the codger cohort, Cadillac was left with only the …
2013 Nissan Altima Review: With its zero gravity feature, the 2013 Nissan Altima conjures dreams of floating serenely above snail-moving, bumper-to-bumper traffic. That alone would get customers pounding down the doors in this era of maddening gridlock. Alas, it doesn’t work that way. It’s all about the new front seats. But even there, it doesn’t mean that the folks up front will arise, rapture-like, through the sunroof. However, it does …
