It’ll Look Low-Res Just a few days ago, pictures of what might be the new BMW M2 leaked all over the internet. Hey, it wouldn’t be a BMW without a few leaks. Now, these photos are best described as awful and could, in fact, just be renders designed to confuse us? High shots with a wide-angle lens in poor lighting never showcase a car well, so it’s hard to judge how successful the design is....

Lift the playfield on a pinball table and you’ll be greeted with a veritable rats nest of wiring and components that will make the most seasoned of electricians recoil with horror. All those wires tangle around and through hundreds of mechanical, electrical, and digital components, each and every one just waiting to fail at the next spin of a silver ball. Owning a vintage pinball table and keeping it running can feel like a Sisyphean task....

[Editor’s note: Is Seagull really such a strange name? Remember, children, that the Soviet bigshot-limo was called the GAZ-13 Chaika, and “chaika” means “seagull” in Russian. So it’s not that weird, right? A Soviet limo isn’t weird. – JT] First, a little bit of context on BYD. In 2002, Chinese conglomerate BYD acquired Qinchan Machinery Works and promptly set about transforming it into an automotive subsidiary. Two decades later and BYD is China’s largest electric vehicle company, selling 911,141 EVs in 2022....

Just in case you somehow forgot about Brubaker Boxes (maybe you took a 2×4 to the head or accidentally mixed pills into your M&M satchel, I don’t know what you crazy people do) I’ve written about them multiple times at The Old Site. At its simplest, the Brubaker Box is a 1970s-era Volkswagen-based kit car. The Brubaker Box was one of the first to have a sort of sporty, low one-box van approach to a kit car, creating something that felt futuristic, strange, yet also undeniably practical and desirable....

I’ve been writing a bit about the Illinois Railway Museum (IRM) since I first discovered it in August. That’s partly because I’m still incredibly fascinated with the place. I’ve been living in or near northeast Illinois for my entire life. Heck, I’ve been living about 25 minutes from the museum’s property for more than four years now. Yet, I never heard of this place until the summer. Sheryl and I have visited IRM three times already, and two of those times were within the span of a single week....

First, I have to just say that the Petersen’s very early Microbus was really lovely. I mean, look at it: Fantastic, right? So, this is a pre-1955 Type 2, which means it looks like this around back: …and this is where my questions start, questions for which the only people who could probably have given me any sort of real answer are not just long dead, they’re long dead across an ocean, in Germany....

— כאן חדשות (@kann_news) September 5, 2022 In this setup, the dog is on the driver’s lap and has both paws on the wheel. While a driving dog is a cute idea, it’s a pretty bad idea to put anything between the driver and the steering wheel other than a seatbelt. Police in the Jerusalem area clearly didn’t share the driver’s sense of humor, and I can see why. Having space to let hands move freely is fairly important for making sure any avoidance maneuvers are smooth and successful, and that’s before even considering the impact on crash safety....

Lexus LFA The development of Lexus’ only supercar didn’t start under the Akio Toyoda era, but it certainly finished under it. A bespoke V10, an obsession to detail, and incredible sound engineering make the LFA one of the all-time greats. In an age where performance cars are either quieted by turbochargers or entirely silent, a car that sends shivers down your spine with its noises is worth whatever it may cost....

Volkswagen really needs to take credit for not only the popularity of this layout for decades, but also for its demise. They pushed the rear engine format with a full line of cars- there was the Beetle on one end and the Transporter on the other, and they filled the middle with sedans, coupes and wagons like the Type 3 and Karmann Ghia. source: wikimedia, Fast Lane Cars, and Hemmings However, Volkswagen’s last rear-engined car was sort of a disaster....

You can see Doug’s take on this remarkable concentrated dollop of luxury here: While I generally agree with Doug’s assessment, I’d like to emphasize that I have a lot of un-ironic fondness for this thing. I’ve actually always thought the Toyota/Scion iQ is a real design and packaging triumph, in its way. Sure, that back seat is tiny, but it exists, and for two parents and a little kid, the iQ/Cygnet is capable of doing things almost nothing else can for its size....

Just so you understand the full situation, here’s how it played out. It started with this message from David: David did ask for honest opinions here, so he’s getting what he wanted. I saw the Saab wheels and my first reaction was this: Because, of course the Saab Inca wheels would be better. They’re always better. At this point, we were all having fun, gleefully enjoying the combination of wheel and car, and then whammo:...

First, think about the cars you’ve owned or driven, and think about where the various controls were. For most of them, there’s certain conventions you can expect: lights on stalks or perhaps dash knobs to the left (on an LHD car) of the wheel, indicators on a stalk, HVAC in lower center, usually below the radio, and so on. Now think about where the rear window defogger switch was on those cars....

If you’ve owned a motorhome or a travel trailer before then you know what I’m talking about. RVs take the difficulty that comes with owning a house and combines them with the difficulties of owning a car, truck, or bus. Something will almost always be broken and if you’re unlucky, it won’t be a cheap fix. Take my parents’ 2007 Thor Adirondack 31BH for an example. When they picked the 36-foot trailer up in 2016 I saw the telltale sign of water damage: bubbling in the outside walls....

Last week, reader James L took us across the Atlantic to tease us with sporty English sedans and wagons with American Ford V8 power. Developed out of the ashes of BMW’s sale of Rover Group, the MG ZT was meant to be a sportier version of the stately Rover 75 sedan. But Rover didn’t stop there; i5 decided to turn its front-wheel-drive Rover 75 and MG ZT sedan and wagon into a rear-wheel-drive hot rod using firepower from America....

[Full disclosure: Ford let me borrow this Bronco Sport Outer Banks for a week so long as I returned it with a full tank of gasoline and wrote an article on it.] What Makes It Tick? Given how the Bronco Sport is based on the Escape, it shouldn’t be surprising to hear that things under the skin are nigh-on identical. All Bronco Sport models, save for the top Badlands trim, get Ford’s 1....

Yes, the 2023 Chrysler 300C is essentially a Dodge Charger Scat Pack in luxury duds. This means 485 horsepower, 475 lb.-ft. of torque, and a quoted zero-to-60 time of 4.3 seconds. Brisk stuff. Power goes to the rear wheels through an eight-speed ZF-derived automatic gearbox and a limited-slip rear differential for proper two-tire fires. Bringing everything back down to sane speeds is a set of four-piston Brembo brakes, while adaptive dampers will try their best to make the big Chrysler a bit like a linebacker in ballet flats....

If anything, there’s a reason for Lincoln’s smallest crossover to wear a bit of a long face. The optional zesty 2.3-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine has been axed, which is rather unfortunate. While choices of a 250-horsepower two-liter turbocharged gasoline engine and a 266-horsepower plug-in hybrid are quite sufficient for the segment, the 295-horsepower range-topper was sneakily potent. Instead of performance, Lincoln now seems to be focusing on advanced driver assistance systems....

Welcome to The Morning Dump, bite-sized stories corralled into a single article for your morning perusal. If your morning coffee’s working a little too well, pull up a throne and have a gander at the best of the rest of yesterday. Robot, Take The Wheel! Automatic Emergency Braking is getting better, and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety is considering updating its AEB test procedure to better suit real-world conditions....

For any fan of European cars, that name should be instantly familiar, like an old jumper tucked in the back of your closet. For anyone who isn’t, allow me to introduce a legend. Back in 1963, Lancia launched a sensible sedan called the Fulvia. Two years later, it unveiled a coupe version that blew the world away. Not only did it feature Lancia’s quirky narrow-angle V4 engine, it was drop-dead gorgeous....