Episode 934 – What Overcapacity in Europe?, Hybrid Cost Savings, Goodyear Brews Soy Tire Latte
July 24th, 2012 at 11:28am
Runtime: 7:21
A Finnish company Valmet makes its money by building cars for other manufacturers that lack capacity, which seems like an oxymoron in Europe nowadays, but Mercedes just hired them to build 100,000 cars. Ford says it has shaved 30 percent from the cost of its latest hybrid by sharing parts and in-sourcing development. Goodyear announces it’s looking at replacing petroleum with soy-based oils in tires. All that and more, plus a look at the Volkswagen Golf R!
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Welcome to Autoline Daily for July 24th. I’m John McElroy and here’s some of the latest developments taking place in the automotive business.
WHAT OVERCAPACITY?
Up in Finland a company called Valmet has done a bang up business with its automotive assembly plant. It’s made Boxsters for Porsche, it’s currently making the Fisker Karma, and now Mercedes-Benz has contracted the plant to make A-classes. That’s because Mercedes completely ran out of production capacity to meet demand of the A-class. Valmet will assemble 100,000 of the cars from 2013 to 2016. How ironic that with all the manufacturing overcapacity there is in Europe, Valmet has built a successful business around making cars for companies that don’t have enough capacity.
HYBRID COST SAVINGS
Yesterday Ford announced that the plug-in version of the C-MAX will deliver a 20 mile electric range and a 550 mile combined range. Today the company announced that pricing for the car will start at $33,745 and with a $3,750 federal tax credit, the price drops to about thirty grand. But the big news is, Ford cut the cost of the hybrid system by 30% by bringing more development in-house and by sharing parts and components from other vehicles on the same platform. Thirty percent is a lot, and shows the value of brining work in-house instead of outsourcing it.
SOY TIRE LATTE
Did you now that about 7 gallons of oil goes into making one tire? That’s a big reason why Goodyear announced it has found a way to replace petroleum with soybean oil. The company says it should be able to get soybean oil based tires on the road around 2015 and that using soybean oil may also improve tread-life by as much as 10 percent.
CARROLL SHELBY DISPUTE
This next one is disgusting. Carroll Shelby’s family has been fighting over his estate, and his remains. Now the fight is over and Shelby’s last wife and three children agreed to split his ashes five ways with two shares going to the wife and one each to the children. I’m tempted to say that Shelby must be turning in his grave as they fight over his remains, but in splitting his ashes five ways he can’t even be doing that.
PICK-UP TRUCK STEP
If you own a pick-up truck and hate climbing in and out of the bed, this could be perfect for you. Called the Elephant Stand, it’s a steel plate that attaches to the hitch assembly, no special assembly is needed it just slides into place. You just spin the stand out and lock it into place with a pin and then you can use it as a step to get into the bed of your truck. The Elephant Stand is rated to hold over 600 pounds and can be bought online for $170 including shipping and handling.
VW GOLF-R
(Today’s feature can only be seen in the video version of this program.)
No doubt the R is helping sell more Golfs. So far this year sales are up 34% in the American market. Even so, while sales are up, the volume is not that great, only about 12,000 cars. No doubt VW has plans to take that higher.
Be sure to join us this Thursday night for Autoline After Hours where me and the Autoextremist, Peter De Lorenzo, will take the show over to Bob Lutz’s garage. We’ll show you his collection of cars, and no doubt he’ll have a lot to say about the car business from the vantage point of someone who used to be an insider and doesn’t have to be as careful about what he has to say. Not that Bob Lutz ever held back. Remember if you can’t join us for the live show, you can always catch it whenever you want on our website at Autoline.tv, or get the podcast at the iTunes store.
And that wraps up today’s show, thanks for watching, we’ll see you tomorrow.
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Comments (23)
July 24th, 2012 at 11:58 am
From yesterday, Chuck I hope you realize my statements and opinions are based on reviews done by a number of automotive media types, where the bottom line on the latest 3 and 5 series is that they have lost that BMW magic touch when it comes to handling, as they have gotten bigger and heavier, they have lost that special handling capability that owners loved so much and made the brand what it is today. I have never ever driven one of them so I’m just going by what I see and read.
July 24th, 2012 at 12:30 pm
So much for RIP!!!!
July 24th, 2012 at 12:52 pm
Will the use of soybean oil by Goodyear increase the cost of soybeans which will increase the cost of livestock products since this is a major feed stock? What is the percentage/amount of reclaimed rubber from used tires being factored into the production of new tires?
The VW Golf-R is way over-priced for my taste.
The styling inside and out is boring!
Valmet realized this niche would arise and is taking full advantage, too bad the redesign Medcedes A class looks horrible. The old design was much more aerodynamic and youthful.
There should be a monument erected to Carroll Shelby where is ashes can rest in peace. someone at Ford or Nascar should speak to his family about this idea.
Nice to see Ford is reducing the cost of hybrids by insourcing the R&D and using a common vehicle platform is the form of the C-Max. I wish Nissan would do the same with the Leaf and the Versa Hatchback. Offer the Versa Hatchback in Gas, Hybrid and full-electric (Leaf) versions using there common body/platform. The New Versa Sedan SV is horrible and should be scraped for the older version or consolidated with the Sentra. The only real problems with the old versions of the Nissan Sentra and Versa is the use of way too much hard “cheap looking ” plastic on the interior panels and dash of those models. All Nissan needed to do in spend a little more money on the interiors and update the powertrains as they have done with the New 2013 Altima. I hope someone at Nissan is listening.
Great idea for the “Elephant Step” however it is way overpriced and anybody with a scrap piece of steel plate can fabricate something similar in about an hour.
July 24th, 2012 at 12:56 pm
It is very sad about the squabbling over remains. Perhaps Mr. Shelby should have left specific instructions to be scattered over a racetrack.
It seems the common theme at Valmet is the connection with German automakers (except Fisker – the exception to the rule) producing good quality, desirable, volume vehicles for the lower end of the luxury market. Good for them and I wish them luck. Sometimes it helps to be neutral.
Soy tires? Are they bio-degradeable? When you fry the soy-based tires, do they smell like Chinese food?
July 24th, 2012 at 1:07 pm
When it gets real hot, will these tires start to melt and make the car a handful to control? When they start having protests and burning tires, will they cause the streets to bet all full of cooking oil? What a freaking mess!
July 24th, 2012 at 1:07 pm
GET not bet
July 24th, 2012 at 1:19 pm
With Apologies in advance:
So they’re parting out an original Shelby?
RIP, Mr. Shelby
July 24th, 2012 at 1:25 pm
HtG how can he?
July 24th, 2012 at 1:35 pm
@ #7
HtG, that is so bad, its good. May I use that?
July 24th, 2012 at 1:42 pm
9 I don’t think I could say it out loud, C-Tech.
July 24th, 2012 at 2:10 pm
OK I can’t resist, RIP (rest in pieces.)
July 24th, 2012 at 2:46 pm
The heirs are exhibiting a political
morality, greed just for the heluvit.
July 24th, 2012 at 3:37 pm
Fortunately for Carrol it just doesn’t make any difference to him (it’s just his mortal remains); family, what are you going to do?
My point (pedro #1 today) relating to my yesterday’s remark; the standard never lowered (IMO), BMW, perhaps didn’t raise the bar, but the others, i.e. Audi, Cadillac rose to the challenge, took no prisoners and exceeded what was brought to the table. (They the contenders didn’t reach equality because BMW lowered the bar but because they made better vehicles). And with all this said, BMW is still right at the top (they just have company).
July 24th, 2012 at 3:46 pm
I think BMW has joined the “bigger has to be better” mindset that just about every single manufacturer has adopted in the past dozen years or so, Suzuki tried to do something different with the Kizachi and they failed miserably even though by all accounts it is a very nice vehicle that drives well but did not try to match its competition in size and it has cost them dearly, most buyers in that class won’t even look at it.
July 24th, 2012 at 4:00 pm
So, why not buy a used Golf R at half the price and save yourself from buyer’s remorse. I think a used Subaru WRX-STI would put that car to shame and you be a a lot happier.
Never buy a new car, period. It’s a horrible investment.
July 24th, 2012 at 4:36 pm
When Motorweek on PBS editorializes about how the 3-series BMW has become poofy and is no longer the taut sport sedan it once was, then BMW has ceded ground to the other mfgs because Motorweek normally gush over everything that costs more than $30k.
July 24th, 2012 at 4:43 pm
Brett, MW gushes over anything on wheels, they even had nice things to say about the Yugo when it came out.
July 24th, 2012 at 4:57 pm
pedro,you’re going to have to catch me when I faint! I can’t believe the C-max will be a “real” US made Ford. Besides the assembly,even the transaxals and batteries will be made here in Mich,I believe! Now,I hope the quality/reliability is just as good as my Mexican assembled Milan.
July 24th, 2012 at 5:29 pm
The transplants don’t seem to have any problems with their American built cars, yet Detroit still does, could the UAW have anything to do with it? I’m sure not, just a coincidence.
July 24th, 2012 at 10:13 pm
Regarding Ford bringing more serious work in house. Great. This has been a growing theme at Ford since the mid-2000′s after the fiasco with the Mercury Marauder and Mustang 4.6 liter hi-po V8s that often performed poorly after “outhouse” development (ie., too much outsourcing of engineering) resulted in substandard results. Lets hope it continues as Ford (and GM and Chrysler) has been notorious over the decades for getting religion and then backtracking just a few years later as financing guys constantly seem to take over, like fiends lurking in the basement ready to pounce on any company that has a major philosophy to nurture a long term high quality product and image.
July 25th, 2012 at 7:46 am
@ #19
According to J.D. Powers long-term (3year) customer surveys, the U.S. built foreign brands from Honda, Toyota, and Nissan have marginally higher problems than the imported models still.
July 25th, 2012 at 10:34 am
I can’t believe it’s the American assembly line personnel to blame for it all, it has to be a supplier issue as well.
July 25th, 2012 at 11:23 am
CR just released a video on the BMW 7 and just like the 3 and the 5 they’re disappointed with the steering and handling compared to its predecessors, actually steering buyers to other models in that class.