Colors the World Gone
PPG has prepared this rather self-explanatory chart showing the relative color popularity for cars in North America, Europe, and Japan. While the European and Japanese cars are awkward mish-mashes of hues, look how well balanced the North American car is! We like a variety of colors while apparently the rest of the world is stuck in a crushing rut of silver, gray, blue, and black. We're comfortable with our rainbow! OK, who wants to start the first chorus of "Kumbaya"?
Facts & Rumors
Fact: A bunch of automotive journalists has come together and announced they will present a "World Car of the Year" award next year. Can't they just give it to the '69 Camaro and consider the issue settled for all time?
Fact: The Ford F-150 has been named Canadian Truck of the Year.
Rumor: Chevy has given the green light to a production version of the Nomad concept wagon shown at this year's Detroit Auto Show. It will be based on the same "Kappa" rear-drive architecture as the Pontiac Solstice.
Rumor: GM is also rumored to be considering the Kappa platform as the basis for a new small Cadillac.
Fact: A 16-year-old boy in New Jersey convinced an Ohio BMW dealer to ship a new $123,000 760iL sedan to his high school. According to an Associated Press report, the teenager ordered the V-12-powered sedan from Midwestern Auto Group, telling them his bank would confirm the wire transfer and submit the necessary forms by mail. When the people from the dealership called the bank to confirm, they were in fact talking to the boy pretending to be a bank officer. After taking possession of the car on January 27, the boy took the car to Raleigh, North Carolina, where he sold it to another dealer. The youth, whose name hasn't been released because of his age, has been arrested.
Fact: Paul Newman will lend his voice to the upcoming animated feature Cars, which is being produced by Pixar, the company that has produced Toy Story and Finding Nemo. The computer-animated film, which takes place in a world of cars, should appear around Christmas of 2005.
Rumor: Chevy has at least a couple of Colorado pickups running around with turbocharged versions of the Vortec 3500 inline-five, and this could be the basis for a Colorado SS pickup.
Fact: The NHRA is selling T-shirts featuring the logos from long-dead, but fondly remembered, California dragstrips on its Web site at store.nhra.com. They've got to be the coolest T-shirts on Earth.
Chrysler Takes Flite
According to everything coming from DaimlerChrysler, the five-door Airflite concept car shown by the company at March's Geneva Motor Show in Switzerland accurately reflects the styling themes that will become the hallmark of the company into the foreseeable future. But the real treat isn't the styling-it's the rear-drive chassis upon which the Airflite is built that will make or break the company.
The new LX chassis is DaimlerChrysler's first rear-drive platform since the old New Yorker left production after the '89 model year. In the Airflite, power comes from a heavily styled 3.5L V-6, but this platform is fully capable of supporting V-8s, and at least one Hemi-powered version will be in production for the 2005 model year. The high-performance Mopar musclecar could very well be back in full force by the middle of this decade.
The Airflite looks muscular without being cartoonish, the front end shares a family resemblance to the Crossfire, the wraparound windshield is reminiscent of '65 Imperial, and the pillarless four-door design is something the world desperately needs. We're also growing fonder of the sweeping Marlin-like roof too-despite our best efforts to continue mocking it.
Our advice to DaimlerChrysler is to drop out a couple of doors, toss in a 5.7 Hemi, and call it Barracuda.
By Jonathan Wong
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