If you don't eat, sleep and breathe cars, or devour car magazines in minute detail, there's a good chance you don't know all the technological terms that pop up in the media, new car advertising and literature.
Despite all the hype for electric cars and hydrogen fuel cells, experts say we'd better get used to pumping gas, but we can look forward to much better fuel economy down the road.
It's no surprise that more used cars are sold every year in America than new cars. One reason is obvious -- they're less expensive, which has become an even bigger factor as new-car prices, not to mention fuel costs, keep rising. And, by opting for a used car, you avoid the biggest expense associated with buying a new vehicle -- depreciation.
The tiny Smart ForTwo, recently introduced in the U.S. car market, gave a less-than-stellar performance in its first crash test by the federal government's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
They're easy on gas -- and easy on your wallet, too. But unlike typical low-bucks/fuel efficient cars, these wagon-like, roomy-on-the-inside crossover vehicles are good for more than just commuting.
I remember driving in eastern Pennsylvania one winter following my brother home on an hour-long trip. It had snowed earlier that morning, and by the time we got on the road the plows still hadn't reached the back roads we were on.
Car makers are confident they can meet new government rules calling for a national fleet average of 35 miles per gallon. But it will take a big technological push, they say.
The number of new cars considered the safest by the insurance industry nearly tripled in the past year
Some car companies just can't leave well enough alone. After all, if you have the best-selling car eight of the past nine years, have projections to sell 420,000 more next year and your new model has won just about every automotive award available, except the Indy 500 Milk Bottle, why would you place the engineering equivalent of a graffiti mustache on it?
Gas is getting more expensive and yet you still want a fun drive, right? For some car buyers, a genuinely fast ride with excellent handling, braking, tech and entertainment makes for a big fun-to-drive factor.
If you don't eat, sleep and breathe cars, or devour car magazines in minute detail, there's a good chance you don't know all the technological terms that pop up in the media, new car advertising and literature.
Despite all the hype for electric cars and hydrogen fuel cells, experts say we'd better get used to pumping gas, but we can look forward to much better fuel economy down the road.
It's no surprise that more used cars are sold every year in America than new cars. One reason is obvious -- they're less expensive, which has become an even bigger factor as new-car prices, not to mention fuel costs, keep rising. And, by opting for a used car, you avoid the biggest expense associated with buying a new vehicle -- depreciation.
The tiny Smart ForTwo, recently introduced in the U.S. car market, gave a less-than-stellar performance in its first crash test by the federal government's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
They're easy on gas -- and easy on your wallet, too. But unlike typical low-bucks/fuel efficient cars, these wagon-like, roomy-on-the-inside crossover vehicles are good for more than just commuting.
I remember driving in eastern Pennsylvania one winter following my brother home on an hour-long trip. It had snowed earlier that morning, and by the time we got on the road the plows still hadn't reached the back roads we were on.
Car makers are confident they can meet new government rules calling for a national fleet average of 35 miles per gallon. But it will take a big technological push, they say.
The number of new cars considered the safest by the insurance industry nearly tripled in the past year
Some car companies just can't leave well enough alone. After all, if you have the best-selling car eight of the past nine years, have projections to sell 420,000 more next year and your new model has won just about every automotive award available, except the Indy 500 Milk Bottle, why would you place the engineering equivalent of a graffiti mustache on it?
Gas is getting more expensive and yet you still want a fun drive, right? For some car buyers, a genuinely fast ride with excellent handling, braking, tech and entertainment makes for a big fun-to-drive factor.
More than 35 years after the death of the original muscle cars, Detroit is once again poised to produce modern muscle cars by the thousands.
WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. (AP) -- Scott Dixon has been unbeatable in the three races the IndyCar Series has staged at Watkins Glen International.
By now, you're pretty savvy when it comes to buying a new car. You know all about dealer-invoice pricing, depreciation and extended warranties. There's still one last chance, though, for the dealer to get the better of you. A new model's options list can be a minefield, and if you're not careful you could end up spending 20% or more above what you intended for your car. So it pays to know whether an option is good for you or just for the dealer.
BEST YIELDS
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has added the Hyundai Santa Fe, a midsized SUV, to its list vehicles that earned the group's Top Safety Pick award.
New statistics released Thursday by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety show that, overall, driving has gotten much safer in the last 11 years.
Ford is recalling 527,000 Escape sport-utility vehicles because of a problem in the antilock braking system that could cause fires, the company said Tuesday.
Plans to add crash prevention technology to all new passenger vehicles by 2012 could save up to 10,000 lives each year on U.S. roadways, a Department of Transportation official said Thursday.
Plans to add crash prevention technology to all new passenger vehicles by 2012 could save up to 10,000 lives each year on U.S. roadways, a Department of Transportation official said Thursday.
General Motors will unveiled a new compact car for its Saturn division at the Chicago Auto Show on Wednesday.
Toyota unveiled the redesigned 2008 Toyota Highlander at the Chicago Auto Show Wednesday.
General Motors will unveil a new compact car for its Saturn division at the Chicago Auto Show on Wednesday.
Ford's new Edge crossover SUV earned the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's "Top safety pick" award, getting top scores for front, side and rear impact safety.
Some people, no matter how much they have, want to be sure they have more than everyone else.
After some changes to make the requirements more stringent, no U.S. models earned The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's Top Safety Pick Award.
The National Traffic Safety Administration has opened an investigation into reports of fires in some Ford Escape and Mazda Tribute small SUVs.
Mercedes-Benz's GL-class and R-class SUVs are the top-ranked choices in a Consumer Reports rating of five top luxury SUVs.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced a proposed rule Thursday that will require Electronic Stability Control on all passenger vehicles in the United States.
For some reason, the emotional experience I had with the new Jeep Compass was the opposite of what I'd experienced with its Chrysler Group sibling, the Dodge Caliber.
Do you know how many gears your car's transmission has? If you're like most people, you'll probably guess "four." And you'll probably be right.
Proposed federal rules designed to make car roofs stronger in case of a vehicle rollover, already under attack as too lax by safety advocates, are now being criticized by automakers as too tough, according to a published report.
I regularly get expensive cars to test drive, and I've parked plenty costing $100,000 and more in the garage near CNNMoney.com's office. Attendants there usually have no problem putting them with - you know - the other cars.
You wouldn't think a Scandinavian country would produce very good convertibles. It's a little like getting your sweaters from Hawaii.
Below is a list of the trademarked names used by various car brands for their Electronic Stability Control (ESC) systems.
A new study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety indicates that crash deaths on American roads could be reduced by one third if all vehicles were equipped with the Electronic Stability Control.
When the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety first started performing its own front crash tests in the mid-1990s, about half the vehicles scored "Marginal" or "Poor."
If you're shopping for a more fuel-efficient car, you need to get a handle on what poor fuel economy really costs you. And you'll need to take a hard look at what you actually need in a vehicle.
Not too long ago, if you wanted a real high-performance vehicle -- one that started fast, accelerated quickly and cornered hard -- you bought a sports car.
For getting a lot -- six people plus lots of stuff -- into a small space, the Mazda5 may just be the current champ.
More than any CD changer, more than any heated or ventilated seat, the most sought-after option in a car these days is a full complement of safety features.
MONEY's car tests don't involve stopwatches. Instead, trunks are loaded up, kids shuttled, vehicles parallel-parked--in other words, what you do with your car in the real world. Value is the other ...
More than any CD changer, more than any heated or ventilated seat, the most sought-after option in a car these days is a full complement of safety features.
The Chicago Auto Show is usually not one of the bigger automotive events of the year, at least in terms of media attention. The fact that it comes fairly close on the heels of the Detroit Auto Show, the grand-daddy of them all, probably doesn't help. This year's show, however, included quite a few notable cars.
It used to be that if you wanted a car that was really safe, you paid for it. Safety was a luxury you found in expensive European cars like Volvo and BMW.
These days, auto companies tout their crash-test ratings and advanced safety features in ads because they think safety sells. But might they be better off hawking cruise control and a full-sized spare tire?
Mini, the BMW division that makes the trendy little Mini Cooper, revealed a longer concept version of the Cooper at the Frankfurt Motor Show Monday.
Honda Motor Co. unveiled a new version of the Honda Civic Tuesday. The car will be available for the 2006 model year.
If General Motors created a Hummer and everybody liked it, would it still be a Hummer?
I'd been through the security routine at our parking garage plenty of times, so I reached down on the inside of the driver's door and released the trunk latch on the 2006 Hyundai Sonata before the guard even had to ask me to.
When the Mazda Miata drove onto the scene in 1989, the tiny roadster rekindled America's waning love of convertibles. Other automakers rushed to join the convertible party, but their efforts largel...
I'm still not sure what to make of the Audi A3, but I like its looks.
Being a savvy consumer isn't easy these days. Here we have thirteen great ideas to get you started. One thing to keep in mind is that bargaining never goes out of style.
Seven years after its introduction, the Volkswagen New Beetle will get an updated look and a bigger engine under the hood.
Porsche released the first official photos of its new hard-top sports car Monday.
Ford Motor Co. will show off a high-performance version of its Sport Trac sport utility truck at the 2005 New York Auto Show which begins later this week.
BEST SPORTS CAR
Toyota unveiled designs for a production version of the FJ Cruiser sport/utility vehicle first shown as a concept car two years ago. The new SUV was introduced at the Chicago Auto Show Wednesday.
Last summer, DaimlerChrysler introduced the Chrysler 300 SRT8, a more powerful version of the already formidable Chrysler 300C luxury sedan.
Q. We followed your advice and bought a 2004 Acura MDX at a discount. The manual suggests using premium gasoline. Do I really have to pour the high-priced stuff into this car?
Ford Motor Co. has released illustrations of a concept vehicle, a new version of the Explorer Sport Trac sport/utility pick-up, scheduled to be unveiled at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January.
We drove them all and drove 'em hard. Sedans, sports cars and sport utes. Coupes and crossovers. Minivans and pickups. With cars and trucks being unveiled at a record pace, we tested more than 40 a...
General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. are expanding the use of anti-rollover technology on their popular sport/utility models, addressing a major safety risk for the vehicles.
Minivans don't usually get to preen on the red carpet at awards time. But if practical families were doing the judging, the new Odyssey would trump anything else we drove this year.
From our comfortable perch, on drives from the California high country to the Boston suburbs, the 300 revealed itself as MONEY's Car of the Year.
I was sitting in the driver's seat of a 340 horsepower Dodge Magnum with its nose between a pair of orange traffic cones in a largely empty football stadium parking lot.
Hi-tech features like electronic stability control and traction control can help keep your car from skidding out of control of wet or snowy pavement. But they can only make the most of the whatever traction your tires have available to them.
Honda's gas-electric hybrid Insight edged out the Toyota hybrid Prius for the most fuel-efficient vehicle, according to the government mileage readings, while the Dodge Ram pickup was measured as the worst gas guzzler.
Electronic stability sensors seem to be effective in reducing rollovers and single-vehicle crashes, especially in SUVs, safety regulators said Thursday.
It's become the game everyone hates but everyone plays: watching the dials spin at the gas pump, holding your breath like a roulette player, wondering how high the stakes can climb for a lousy tank...
When National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released a new round of star ratings for rollover resistance last week, many media reports pointed out that SUVs had "improved" in their stability.
For a city whose denizens spend more time on the subway than the freeway, New York still manages to grab the automotive spotlight for a few weeks each spring.
For a city whose denizens spend more time on the subway than the freeway, New York still manages to grab the automotive spotlight for a few weeks each spring.
Detroit's North American International Auto Show has spent recent years cementing its position as the nation's prime venue for showing off new cars and trucks.
Most people know a good car when they drive it. Unfortunately, most people don't get to drive that many.
Every good country song, it seems, has a pickup truck. But the latest pickups look ready for a night at the opera. That's especially true of the redesigned Ford F-150 (pictured above), the deluxe e...
It's an all too familiar scene to anyone with a driver's license. You're cruising along, maybe too relaxed, and it happens: A patch of ice, an unexpected puddle, whatever, and the car fishtails. Yo...
Unless you inhale two packs a day, getting in a car may be the biggest risk you regularly take. More than 42,000 people died on the nation's highways in 2001 (14% of them pedestrians and bicyclists...
It's the biggest disconnect in the automotive world. As millions of consumers clamor for an ever-growing SUV lineup, regulators, politicians and pundits savage the same vehicles for their fuel-thir...
It took Sharon Greenwald one year to build her Briarcliff, N.Y. house--and another six years to furnish it. "You want to do it right," she says, "and if you put a deadline on yourself, you are goin...
Driving instructors like to warn anxious students of the perils of tunnel vision. On the road, it's the big picture that counts. Would that more consumers heeded that lesson at car-shopping time. L...
Even for seasoned denizens of the snowbelt, white stuff on the ground can mean white knuckles on the steering wheel. But while no one would dream of donning flip-flops to shovel the driveway, many ...
Pity SUVs. The big lugs suffer nonstop abuse--for bullying smaller cars, guzzling gas, flipping over. So what do we do when we're not nominating sport utilities as Scourge of the Planet? We buy the...
And you thought great car deals would vanish a few weeks after the "Keep America Rolling" TV ads went off the air. Not so. Desperate measures on the part of car dealers anxious to clinch any sale m...
Get into a new Corvette in red, white or the new Electron Blue. Jam down the accelerator and feel the pure exhilaration delivered by this made-in-America beauty. Chevrolet reminded everyone of the 'vette's fine points with the top-of-the-line Z06 introduced last year. This year's Z06 got a further horsepower boost to 405 for its 5.7-liter V-8 engine, but it comes only in a hardtop with a six-speed manual transmission. So if you want a slick-looking convertible with automatic transmission, you'll still get plenty of kicks from the standard, 350-hp engine.
Best concept. To you, it may look like a glorified go-cart. But to more than 200,000 drivers in Europe and Japan, DaimlerChrysler's eight-foot-long "smart car" (right) is a very big deal. Think of ...
In Hollywood, it's Oscar season. On my calendar, it's time for another set of awards--my annual honors for the best cars of the year, for the shining stars on wheels. And this year, I'm more glad t...
As the late afternoon sun peeks through the pine trees, I am steering the new 2002 Ford Explorer through 12 inches of fresh snowfall in the mountains northeast of Phoenix. As I rumble down a hill a...
Back in 1989 I was piloting a little Subaru mini-car called the Justy ECVT through the rowdy traffic on Manhattan's West Side Highway. Spotting an opening ahead in the adjacent lane, I nailed the t...
Every now and then, a blend of original design, word-of-mouth and skillful auto company hype creates a kind of mania over a new model. The car sells out before it's available, and suddenly everyone...
Some advice to innocent drivers worldwide: Be very, very afraid. Porsche, the platinum standard of sports cars, has just done something frightening. It has made its latest fire-breathing flagship, ...
What the new century will bring drivers--computer guidance systems, crash avoidance technology, electric power--is little more than conjecture. Yet one thing is certain: This century is starting of...
When it comes to cars, you may have strong opinions on Fords vs. Chevys or the merits (or evils) of minivans and sport utilities. But few people have any convictions, not to mention knowledge, abou...
When you shop for a new set of wheels, you want to pay as little as possible. Our list of '99 prices for 385 of the most popular cars, minivans, sport utilities and pickup trucks can help you do ju...
If you want ample space for gear or passengers, you may think you have only two choices: a sport utility vehicle (SUV) or a minivan. SUVs remain the sultans of sales. In the past five years, their ...
It was hardly lust at first sight. Early photos of Mercedes-Benz's new sport-utility vehicle, the ML320, an M-Class, implied a cross between the sneakerish Toyota RAV4 and the blimpy bulk of a mini...
REMOVABLE WINDOW TINTS Those polyester window tintings are great for blocking out scorching sun in the summer but a pain to scrape off in the winter. Solar Stat of Miami, Florida, has come up with ...
Here's Joe Isuzu to tell you about those nifty new imported four-wheel-drive wagons:
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