The Car Tech blog

Read the full 2009 Suzuki SX4 Sport Technology (Navi) review.

(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)

When most people see the 2009 Suzuki SX4 Sport, they don't immediately think about the Japanese automaker's rally pedigree. They don't think about high-revving turbocharged powerplants or all-wheel drive vehicles that are in this car's DNA. Instead, they think of a cheap econo-box, which is a shame, because there is a lot to like about this modest little sedan.

The SX4 offers a level of mobile search data that rivals the best OEM systems.

(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)

For one, the SX4 Sport comes standard with an unconventional, but (as we learned) very useful, navigation system. It matches its competition for handling and outclasses them in power. The SX4 Sport also gets four-wheel disc brakes, 17-inch alloy wheels, fog lamps, and an aero package. You get all of this for hundreds of dollars less than the most base-model compact sedans from Toyota or Honda.

Read the full 2009 Suzuki SX4 Sport review.

Click here to compare the 2010 Insight Hybrid with the concept.

(Credit: Honda)

Honda has released the first photo of the production version of its would-be Prius-killer, the Insight hybrid. So what has changed since the concept was unveiled at the 2008 Paris Motor Show? Let's take a look at the two cars side by side and find out.

Click here to compare the 2010 Honda Insight production model with the concept.

(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)

People used to think of hybrids as economy commuter cars, then Lexus launched the RX 400h. This SUV proved that a hybrid could be luxurious, comfortable, and still achieve excellent mileage. CNET Car Tech does an in-depth review of the RX 400h, taking it on road trip to Los Angeles to find some of the worst traffic in the country, the kind of place where a hybrid performs best. Read our review to see how this car, soon to be replaced by a seriously updated model, fares.

Read the full review of the 2008 Lexus RX 400h.

(Credit: Automotive News)

Automakers in Europe plan new business models for electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids before 2011.

The business models will eliminate the need for gasoline stations. Energy will be supplied by utility companies. The automakers also will need to take into account the life span of batteries, which will depreciate and wear out quicker than the cars themselves.

Toyota Motor Corp., Daimler, Renault-Nissan, Volvo, and General Motors are among the carmakers that plan to bring plug-in hybrids and full-electric cars to market in 2011.

When that happens, carmakers, utility companies, and battery suppliers will need to be ready to take over the role of energy suppliers from oil companies. This will require a restructuring of energy supply arrangements and infrastructure.

But the industry also needs to examine such areas as calculations of operating costs, vehicle depreciation and billing systems.

"We have to prepare for a new era in our industry like never before," Thomas Weber, Daimler board member for R&D, told Automotive News Europe. "Managing financial conditions is crucial for a successful electrification of cars."

... Read more

(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)

CNET's Bonnie Cha gives the Navigon 7200T GPS device a thorough review, finding many advanced features and an affordable price. Along with voice command, text-to-speech, pedestrian and bicycle modes, the 7200T offers free traffic reporting. But she isn't as impressed with the device's user interface. Check out the review to see the 7200T's final rating.

Read the review.

Ford Motor made electric vehicles a centerpiece of a turnaround plan presented to Congress on Tuesday, saying that it will introduce an all-electric van for fleet use in 2010 and a sedan in 2011.

The Big Three U.S. automakers are scheduled to return to Washington, D.C., this week with the hopes of negotiating loans to forestall a collapse from lack of cash.

All three companies are seeing a continued dip in sales, but Ford is considered far better off financially than General Motors and Chrysler. Ford on Tuesday said it could be cash-flow positive from operations by 2011, but it is still requesting up to $9 billion in loans, which CEO Alan Mulally said will act as a "critical backstop or safeguard against worsening conditions, as we drive transformational change in our company."

The business plan lists cost reductions--including plant closings and the sale of its much-criticized corporate aircraft--and investments in smaller, fuel-efficient cars and a line of electric vehicles.

Its product plans calls for:

• A commitment to improve fuel efficiency across its fleet: 14 percent for 2009, 26 percent for 2012, and 36 percent for 2015--all compared with 2005 overall fleet mileage.

• At the North American International Auto Show, Ford will discuss its "vehicle electrification plan." That will include a family of hybrids, plug-in hybrids, and all-electric, or "battery electric," vehicles scheduled to debut in 2012.

Its first product will be a van-type vehicle for commercial fleets in 2010 and a sedan in 2011 with a goal of making battery-powered cars cost-effective. The cost of batteries make plug-in hybrid or all-electric vehicles significantly more expensive than gasoline engine cars.

Ford said that it will work with unnamed battery and electric-vehicle powertrain providers to bring its electric cars to market.

The company said that it intends to invest $14 billion in efficiency and it will introduce in cars its EcoBoost technology, which it unveiled at last year's North American International Auto Show.

The company also said that it is exploring the sale of its Volvo car division.

(Credit: Automotive News)

DETROIT--An electrically driven supercharger produced by Eaton Corporation will be used in a fuel cell vehicle made by Shanghai Automotive Industries Corporation for the 2010 Shanghai World Expo.

The small-scale supercharger, called a fuel cell cathode blower, has been combined with a brushless motor and moves air through the fuel cell stack, where oxygen in the air combines with hydrogen to generate the electricity that powers the vehicle.

SAIC plans to supply 20 hydrogen-powered vehicles to the 2010 event.

Eaton's Automotive Group, of suburban Detroit, supplies power train, emissions, and safety components for light and commercial vehicles.

(Source: Automotive News)

Read the full Infiniti FX50S review.

(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)

Whether the Infiniti FX's bulbous curves can be considered beautiful is debatable, but one thing we know for certain is that--in FX50S trim--it certainly is imposing. With muscular front fenders, a large dark chrome grill, and a pair of the most aggressive headlights we've ever seen on an SUV, the 2009 Infiniti FX50S prowls the streets looking like an angry hippopotamus on 21-inch wheels.

Before you laugh, there's something you should know about the hippo. It is one of the most aggressive animals in the world, and is often regarded as the most dangerous animal in Africa and can prove quite agile and powerful when provoked. Surprisingly, despite its stocky shape a hippo can quite easily outrun an Olympic sprinter.

The same goes for the FX50S. With its mighty 5-liter V-8 and continuously damping controlled suspension, when equipped with the Sport Package, this is one big SUV that will surprise you with its speed and nimbleness. Put the seven-speed automatic transmission into the Sport mode or slap the paddle shifter for a rev-matched downshift and the FX50S will throw you back in your seat as it rockets forward with a roar.

The FX50S isn't all power and brutality. Inside the cabin is a surprise of a different kind, with luxurious leather trim and a very advanced cabin tech packages.

Read the full Infiniti FX50S review.

When I was in elementary school back in the early 1960s, nuclear energy was going to be the Greatest Thing Ever. Electricity was going to be so inexpensive that electric meters would be a thing of the past. Nuclear-powered cars would run for a year on a pellet of fuel the size of a vitamin pill. Nuclear energy would power ships, aircraft, and just about everything.

Right...With the exception of military ships--submarines and aircraft carriers--nuclear transportation has been a complete washout. Since the Three Mile Island disaster 30 years ago, nuclear power has been a bad word in the U.S., although that may change, and may have to change, in the future. Nuclear hype could be seen as one of the earliest recorded instances of vaporware.

But now we have hydrogen. The most common element in the universe. Hydrogen promises limitless clean energy. No more dependence on foreign oil. Maybe I'm an old cynic, but the hype is starting to sound familiar.

I found this article while perusing the Net earlier today.

It's an excellent article, and has many good points. Where is the hydrogen fuel coming from? Hydrogen may be the most common element in the universe, but here on planet Earth, it's locked up in, mostly, hydrocarbons--you know, like oil and natural gas. Why spend energy refining it out of natural gas when we could run cars on natural gas? Hydrogen is also a component of water, but so far, it takes more energy to liberate it from water than can be obtained from that hydrogen. Fuel cells, as currently developed, require platinum. There is a reason that platinum is expensive--there isn't much of it, at least readily available. And there is little, if any, platinum here in the U.S. Are we merely trading foreign oil for foreign platinum? (and this argument also works for the lithium for lithium ion batteries.)

High energy-density, fast-recharge batteries may be more viable than hydrogen. The necessary electric infrastructure is already mostly in place; the same can't be said of any hydrogen infrastructure--which wouldn't necessarily be analogous to the current petroleum infrastructure. Small, powerful, quickly-rechargeable batteries would be good for more than transportation. How many battery-powered devices do you have?

In recent months, I've driven three very different high-fuel economy, low-emissions "green" cars. Two were gasoline-electric hybrids: the Toyota Camry Hybrid and the Honda Civic Hybrid. The third was the Volkswagen Jetta TDI turbodiesel. How do they compare in driving experience and fuel economy?

Hybrids are environmental poster children, but diesel, green? Well, yes, if it has a modern clean diesel engine, designed and built to run on ultralow sulfur diesel fuel and equipped with the latest aftertreatment technologies. The Jetta TDI was recently named "Green Car of the Year" at the 2008 Los Angeles Auto Show.

The cars were not driven back-to-back over the same roads in the same conditions, so this is not a scientific comparison. The two hybrids were regular weekly test cars, driven on local city streets, backroads, and highways in as much the same manner as is possible with two different vehicles at different times. The TDI was driven on the canyon roads, secondary roads, and freeways of the Los Angeles area during the press introduction.

2009 Toyota Camry Hybrid

(Credit: Toyota)

Toyota's full hybrid system has been refined over the years for smoother transitions between power modes and greater electric-only operation. Most of the time it's very smooth, and often silently electric up to as much as 30 mph in light-throttle driving as when starting--and accelerating slowly--or creeping in traffic. With the 2.4-liter, 147-horsepower engine and 141-hp motor working together to produce a maximum of 187 hp when needed, power is never inadequate, even for passing or acceleration at 60+ mph highway speeds. To me, the greatest drawback is the sometimes nonlinear throttle response. The electric motor kicks in to add power when the managing computer says so, and that sudden, not necessarily expected, surge can be a little annoying if you're a control freak about drivetrains. Such people probably won't be hybrid buyers, and the power surge is really no worse than what is experienced when an older automatic transmission hunts for a gear on a hill or hesitates before downshifting. Annoying but not serious. Fuel economy: EPA 33 city, 34 highway; I saw 35, not bad at all for a car this size.

2009 Honda Civic Hybrid

(Credit: Honda)

Honda's "Integrated Motor Assist" (IMA) hybrid system started life as electric motor assistance for a gasoline engine. Think electric turbocharger. More recently, it can operate at times in electric-only mode, at least according to Honda's literature. If my Civic Hybrid did that during my time driving, I failed to notice. Which means either a) I had a heavy foot (guilty) and it never did, or b) the system is very, very smooth in transition. More investigation required. On the plus side, throttle response was no different than for a gasoline engine/CVT transmission combo, predictable with no surprises. The Civic is smaller and lighter than the Camry, with a sportier suspension tuning, for a more enthusiastic driving experience. Downside: the 1.3-liter engine does most of the work, assisted by a 15kW (20 hp) electric motor for a system maximum of 110 hp and 123 lb-ft of torque. Around town low-speed performance is very good, but highway acceleration is leisurely at best. At one point on a steep highway grade,I had the car flat-out to try to maintain a 65-mph speed to keep up with traffic. It managed, barely. And I watched the then-35mpg average drop very quickly to 27. EPA ratings are 40 mpg city, 45 highway. I saw 34. Sometimes a small engine working hard uses more fuel than a more-powerful engine that is not pushed as hard.

2009 Volkswagen Jetta TDI Sedan

(Credit: Volkswagen)

Volkswagen has been number one in diesel car sales in the US since the days of the Rabbit Diesel in the '70s, not that that is a huge number. Current diesel technology has come at least as far as gasoline-engine technology in the past thirty years, and thanks to electronic direct fuel injection, improved combustion chamber design, turbocharging, and sophisticated in-vehicle treatment of the exhaust gases, today's TDI is as far from a slow and smoky Rabbit as a Corvette ZR1 is from the sadly de-powered disco-era 'Vette. For people whose idea of driving involves as much control as possible, the new Jetta TDI is even offered with a manual transmission (in the base model, at least) as well as the DSG automated manual. In a spirited drive through the LA canyons, trying my best to get the worst mileage possible, I could go no lower than 32 mpg with the stick. Note that no freeway or even city miles were involved, strictly backroad fun. In more sedate conditions, with the DSG, and with some freeway driving, mileage improved to 38. Drivers who tried for the best possible mileage managed 44. The EPA lists the manual at 30/41, with 29/40 for the automatic.

YMMV, of course for mileage. But high mileage and low emissions are not necessarily only hybrid attributes. The choice of hybrid or diesel is a personal preference. If you drive extensively in stop-and-go traffic, or do much city driving with time spent stopped getting 0 mpg at stoplights, condolences, and a hybrid makes sense. If you spend more time on the open road, consider one of the new-generation diesels.