When Toyota crashed the domestic automakers’ pickup party with the arrival of the 2007 Tundra, the truck-buying public took notice. Bad news struck the Tundra from the start, though, as heavy rebates were needed to move the new truck, and numerous quality issues were reported. Toyota has since addressed those issues, but one problem has continued to follow the truck: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gave the Tundra a four star rating for front driver and passenger collisions, denoting a 11-20% chance of serious injury in a 35 mph crash. That’s one fewer star than the competition from Dodge, Chevy, and Ford, and a big-time marketing disadvantage for Toyota. The four star rating became a bit more puzzling when the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety named the Tundra a Top Safety Pick for 2008. Toyota seemed dumbfounded as to why its truck received a four star rating, but the Japanese automaker may have received some vindication for the 2010 model year.

The star power of the Tundra has finally been amped up for the new model year, as NHTSA is now giving the Double Cab and Crew Max configurations of the truck a five star rating. The regular cab Tundra hasn’t been tested. There have been several changes to the 2010 Tundra, including interior and exterior updates, plus a new 310 horsepower 4.6-liter V8 engine. Pickuptrucks.com contacted Toyota to see what structural changes were made to the Tundra to improve its crash test scores, and Toyota reportedly told the website that no structural changes to the trucks frame were made, and no safety enhancements have been added. Interesting.

[Source: Pickuptrucks]

Internet rumors are a funny thing. Back during the last presidential campaign, 10% of voters polled thought Barack Obama was a Muslim… until his campaign staffers came out and denied he was a Muslim. Then 14% of us thought he was a Muslim. And you can see the same thing happening with another bout of “Top Gear is dead!” rumormongering. Seriously folks, the “TG is dead” gossip that accompanies the end of every single season is getting just as old as “Will Brett Favre come out of retirement?” Both have surpassed the point of story and are now borderline ritual. Actually, it’s looking like this year, Favre’s staying on the farm down in Mississippi. Which makes the Top Gear rumors even more annoying.

The last segment of the last episode of Season 13 showed an uncharacteristically toned down Clarkson waxing extra-poetic about the Aston Martin V12 Vantage and how he fears that because of environmental worries, the busted global economy and the particularly British “War On Speed,” that the days of the supercar are finished. As a result, he seems a bit sad. So sad, in fact, that many around the globe (and especially those at their keyboards) started in with the inevitable, “Top Gear is dead” refrain. Well, that and James May might have been seen crossing a street not wearing any shoes. But guess what? Everyone’s favorite car show is coming back for a 14th season.

According to both The Sun and some website called Top Gear, Jezza, Hammond and May are going no where. Says Clarkson, “I can assure everyone I’ll be back in November doing Top Gear. We’re filming the next series and already have several things in the can. I couldn’t think of anything I’d want to do more.” So you heard it here first – Top Gear Season 14 starts in November. Amazing what a bit of research can do, no?

Speaking of which – we unearthed Clarkson’s actual review of the V12 Vantage. And much unlike the three sentences he said about the car for the now infamous segment, Jeremy didn’t like Aston Martin very much at all. See, Jeremy thinks that the real top Aston is the DBS. But it costs $269,000. Now, the V12 Vantage goes for $209,000, but is the new car 99% of the DBS for $60,000 less? Says Jezza, “I was pondering this earlier on today while blasting down a sun-flickered Cotswold road in my wife’s 4.7-liter V8 Vantage convertible. And then the obvious answer hit me: The car I’d buy is the one I was in.” Indeed. For those interested parties, the notorious video is posted after the jump.

Although the Frankfurt Motor Show is still a month away, images of the 2010 Mercedes-Benz E-Class Estate (”wagon” to us ‘Mericans) have leaked out ahead of its official reveal in Germany.

The E-Class Estate joins the thoroughly revised sedan and coupe variants of Merc’s mid-sizer and will undoubtedly grow both longer and wider than the outgoing five-door. Although the majority of the interior has been ported over from its siblings, the Estate’s party-pieces are its folding rear seats that can be laid flat, a new cargo area nestled within the trunk and a set of rear-facing jump seats bound to make the kiddies car-sick on the Autobahn.

Mercedes’ range of four-, six- and eight-cylinder powerplants will carry over from the other Es, including a 204-hp, turbocharged 1.8-liter and a 388-hp 5.5-liter V8. Both rear- and 4Matic all-wheel drive should be available when the E-Class Estate goes on sale in Europe late next month.

After a decade of competing with the GT1 big dogs in the American Le Mans Series and the 24 Hours of Le Mans, this weekend marks the start of a new era for Corvette Racing. The race at Mid-Ohio this Saturday (we’ll be on hand live) will mark the debut of the all-new GT2 Corvette C6.R. For the last two years, the Corvettes have run without any factory competition in the ALMS GT1 class, and with GT2 being where all the action is, Chevrolet has decided the time was ripe for a change.

The original GT1 C5R debuted in 1999, and in 2005, the team transitioned to the then-new C6.R body style. Over the years, competitors like the Dodge Viper, Aston Martin DBR9 and Ferrari 575 have come and gone, but the Vettes have soldiered on to fight the good fight. After farewell races at Sebring, Long Beach and Le Mans earlier this year, the GT1 cars have been retired. Mark Kent, GM Racing manager, Doug Fehan, Corvette Racing program manager, Tadge Juechter, Corvette chief engineer, Johnny O’Connell, driver No. 3 Compuware Corvette C6.

Color us unsurprised that the new 2010 Ford Taurus earned a coveted Top Safety Pick rating from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. After all, the previous-generation Taurus took home the award in 2008 and 2009 and the pre- name-change Ford Five Hundred was a Top Safety Pick way back in 2007.

In order to win the Top Safety Pick award, the IIHS says “a vehicle must earn the highest rating of good in the Institute’s front, side, and rear tests and be equipped with electronic stability control.” Click here and you’ll see that the 2010 Ford Taurus got solid green marks all across the board.

We’d love to show an image gallery of the 2010 Taurus crash test results, but none are available. The last full-size Ford sedan actually crash tested by the IIHS was the 2007 Five Hundred.

Capitalist-on-steroids Jim Cramer of Mad Money fame (or, if you’re a Daily Show fan, infamy) thinks Cash For Clunkers is a great idea. This might surprise some of you (and shock us), but here’s his reasons why:

1. If the total price tag of C4C is $4 to $5 billion dollars, big deal – we spent more than that on Corn Flakes in Iraq.
2. General Motors and Chrysler are already welfare queens, at least C4C lets them move some metal.
3. C4C gives Ford, which Cramer calls “the most important auto company with the best lineup of fuel-efficient cars” a chance to stop burning cash, offer refinancing and perhaps equity offers (i.e. offer some common stock).
4. The environment will be cleaner – “We are doing something good against global warming.”

Cramer does go on to say that certain parts of C4C smacks of The New Deal, but Clunkers’ (relatively) small price tag is a cheap way to clean up the environment, fight unemployment and move inventory. Says Jim, “[i]t worked for the Chinese with their vouchers to spend, it’s working here. What’s the issue? Come on Senate, go make it bigger!”

[Source: Blogging Stocks | Image: Rusty Jarrett/Getty]

Fiat’s plan for re-entry to the U.S. market includes Alfa Romeo, as well as pumping up its Chrysler interests. While Alfa has desirable hatches like the MiTo and the 147, the company thinks it might have the best luck relaunching in the States with its upcoming Giulia sedan. The Alfa Romeo division is a money sink right now for Fiat, and successfully re-entering the US market could open the door to better financials. To make the relaunch of Alfa feasible, the brand is going to have to share with Chrysler.

Chrysler has the LX platform, which could potentially be reworked and used for the new Giulia, is being examined as one way to get an Alfa model launched and built in the U.S. without crushing Fiat with shipping and import costs piled on top of being expensive to build in the first place. The LX is heavier than might be ideal, though it has been engineered to support all-wheel drive, and the rear-wheel drive default of the longitudinal powertrain layout is inherently more sporty if tuned properly. Alfa’s got its own platform, the C-Evo, which could be bulked up to underpin the Giulia, and it, too, is a front-engined, RWD layout that could potentially bring an appropriately athletic feel.

Neither platform is exactly perfect – both are aging, and the competition in the segment is stiff. The futures of Alfa and Chrysler appear to be intertwined, with both brands relying on the same basic hardware to launch new or updated models that need to be successful for Sergio Marchionne’s plan for world domination to actually work.

[Source: Bloomberg]

Consumer Reports says Ford’s Fusion Hybrid is equal to Toyota Camry, only sportier

Ford’s new 2010 Fusion Hybrid has earned plenty of accolades since it debuted at the Los Angeles Auto Show last fall, and the latest praise comes from Consumer Reports. In its most recent round of testing, the entire Fusion lineup did well, but CR singled out the hybrid model and declared it “essentially tied” with long-time favorite, the Toyota Camry Hybrid. The Fusion racked up 34 mpg, beating out the Kia Optima in a test of mid-size family sedans.

Compared to the Camry, CR agreed with most other reviewers that the Fusion felt sportier:

“The new Fusions are very impressive especially the Hybrid,” said David Champion, senior director of CR’s Auto Test Center. “The Hybrid successfully blends excellent fuel economy with driving pleasure, something all other hybrids have failed to do.”

Lorenzo Lamas, everybody’s favorite Bold and Beautiful Renegade from the 1990s, has announced a new motorcycle company named, imaginatively enough, Lorenzo Lamas Cycles. Just as Steven Tyler did when he decided to get into the custom motorcycle scene, Lamas contacted an established builder, in this case Ralph Randolph of Knockout Motorcycles, to actually engineer and assemble the machines.

So far, LLC has released four motorcycle renderings, two of which – the Reno Rocket and the Badlands Bomber – are slated for a public debut this week at the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. All of LLC’s machines seem to be based on production frames and will reportedly be equipped with Twin Cam engines from S&S and tires from Avon.

We’re sure the timing of this announcement has nothing at all to do with the new E! reality series The Lamas Life, where Lorenzo will reportedly make amends with his son A.J.

Another day, another bunch of news items about Cash For Clunkers (a.k.a. C.A.R.S.). With Friday’s Senate recess date fast approaching, the Obama Administration is reportedly pushing the body’s 100 members there to get their acts together and vote for more funding to keep the program alive. Two senators who had been seen as potential roadblocks to getting C.A.R.S. the quick $2 billion that the House has approved, Dianne Feinstein (D) and Susan Collins (R), have now said the Administration had “eased their concerns” and are now in favor of granting the funds.

Not everyone is pleased with how the White House is dealing with the program, though. After campaigning on a platform of more transparency, the Obama Administration is reportedly now refusing to release C.A.R.S. records on the 157,000 rebate requests that it has received thus far. The Department of Transportation is still saying it will make this information available “soon,” but hasn’t given any specific time at to when it will do so. Without a glimpse into the full details of which cars are being sold and which are being traded in – and where all of this is happening – it won’t be truly clear to see who is winning and who is losing with the initiative. We have some ideas, of course, but we’d like to see the big picture already.

[Sources: The Associated Press; Reuters | Image: Kevork Djansezian/Getty]