AD #2763 – Mazda CX-30 Impressions; Volkswagen Offers to Buy Navistar; GM Confirms Hummer Revival
January 31st, 2020 at 11:56am
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Runtime: 10:14
0:07 Coronavirus Causing Production Cuts
0:40 Volkswagen Offers to Buy Navistar
1:23 Autoliv Develops Airbag for eScooters
1:59 GM Confirms Hummer Revival
2:44 Stroll Buys Stake in Aston Martin
3:17 Aston May Cancel EV Plans
3:56 Lincoln Dumps the MKZ
4:32 Why U.S. Tool & Die Industry Is Struggling
6:23 VW Donates Atlas SUVs To Help with Technician Training
7:16 Mazda CX-30 Impressions
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This is Autoline Daily reporting on all aspects of the global automotive industry.
CORONAVIRUS CAUSING PRODUCTION CUTS
That coronavirus could really hurt automotive production in China this quarter. Aptiv, the supplier of high tech automotive technology, predicts that automakers will cut production by 15%, which we calculate to be about a million vehicles. As China limits travel in the country, many workers who went home for a week long national holiday may not be able to return to work soon. Most global automakers and suppliers depend heavily on the Chinese market, so this will reverberate through the entire industry.
VOLKSWAGEN OFFERS TO BUY NAVISTAR
Big news in the world of heavy trucks. Volkswagen is offering to buy out Navistar for nearly $3 billion. VW already owns part of Navistar through its truck subsidiary called Traton. Navistar builds medium and heavy duty trucks sold under the International brand. It also makes school buses, defense vehicles and engines. The stock market clearly loves VW’s offer. Navistar’s stock price shot up 53% on the news. But it’s not clear if the deal with go through. Billionaire Carl Icahn is Navistar’s largest shareholder, and it’s unclear if he and another venture capital firm, will go along with the deal.
AUTOLIV DEVELOPS AIRBAG FOR ESCOOTERS
A few years ago, electric scooters began popping up in cities across the world. Their popularity is growing because it’s a cheap, easy and convenient way to get around. However, with more usage, there’s more riders getting injured. So Autoliv developed, you guessed it, an airbag for eScooters. It just completed initial tests and found that the airbag helps reduce injuries to both the head and chest. It’s not clear if this will go to the market. Autoliv says it needs to do more tests and will continue to develop the concept.
GM CONFIRMS HUMMER REVIVAL
Well it’s official. General Motors confirmed it will revive the Hummer name as a GMC electric truck. It will crank out 1,000 horsepower, along with 11,500 lb-ft of torque and move from 0 to 60 MPH in just 3 seconds. The GMC Hummer EV will make its debut in a Super Bowl ad this Sunday and it will be unveiled at an event on May 20th.
STROLL BUYS STAKE IN ASTON MARTIN
Canadian billionaire Lawrence Stroll is buying a significant stake in Aston Martin. Stroll will invest 182 million pounds for a 16.7% stake, which will earn him the title of executive chairman on Aston Martin’s board. As part of the agreement, Stroll will rename his Formula One team from Racing Point to Aston Martin F1 in the 2021 season. Stroll’s son Lance is one of the drivers for Racing Point, along with team mate Sergio Perez.
ASTON MAY CANCEL EV PLANS
It looks like Aston’s first move with its cash infusion may be to cancel its plans for electric cars. The Rapide E, which is almost complete, is said to be under review. And the electric Lagonda, which was supposed to debut in 2022, has been pushed back three years. Electric cars are very expensive to develop, and Aston Martin does not seem to have the financial wherewithal to do it at this time. Instead, it will do hybrids. Meanwhile, Aston will rely on its first SUV, the DBX, to greatly boost sales and bring in a lot more money.
LINCOLN DUMPS THE MKZ
We first reported in 2017 that there were no plans to replace the Lincoln MKZ after its current design cycle, so it should come as little surprise the automaker will axe the sedan this year. Its sibling, the Ford Fusion will also be going away. The MKZ was the first model to come out when Ford launched its effort to revive the Lincoln brand in 2012 and is made at the company’s plant in Hermosillo, Mexico. That facility will prepare for production of new Ford vehicles as the automaker makes the switch from sedans to trucks and utility vehicles.
WHY U.S. TOOL & DIE INDUSTRY IS STRUGGLING
There’s a lot of talk about a U.S. manufacturing renaissance but that’s being threatened by a downturn in the tool and die industry. A recent study from Harbour Results found that 10 different tool shops closed in the U.S. in 2019, laying off 2,000 workers. But this year, 75 mold and die shops will close. So, what’s happening in the tooling industry? On Autoline This Week, Laurie Harbour, the President and CEO of Harbour Results, explained why we’re seeing all these closures.
Laurie Harbour, President & CEO, Harbour Results
“Although tooling is absolutely critical for every part on a vehicle, there’s a lot of competition coming out of China but we’re also sort of going through a bit of an evolution in the design of an automobile. So, as we move to electrification and autonomous product, the vehicle itself is changing and the OEMs are kind of in that R&D mode and design phase right now. So some future launches have slowed with some of the uncertainty in the market and the need to go into a new type of mobility. We are seeing them do more facelifts or heavy facelifts and less all-new vehicles, at least for the time being. And so that’s slowed down some of the demand for tools. And frankly, China has become a very big threat, the plastics, tooling and stamping industry is part of their ‘China 2025’ plan. And so, as a result, they’re being very aggressive on tooling from China. So, as OEMs need to cut costs to invest in vehicles, they’re turning to China for a lot of their tooling and that’s having an impact.”
For more about the troubles facing the U.S. tool and die industry, you can watch that show right now on our website, Autoline.tv or you can find it on our YouTube channel.
VW DONATES ATLAS SUVS TO HELP WITH TECHNICIAN TRAINING
There’s a shortage of automotive technicians in the U.S. just as so many of them are reaching retirement age. So Volkswagen is trying to help fill the gap. Over the next few months, Volkswagen will donate 31 Atlas SUVs, and more importantly diagnostic equipment, to high-school shops, technical schools and career centers across the country. It’s a very good step, but the U.S. is going to need more companies doing what Volkswagen is doing. The shortage is so acute, it will take tens of thousands of new technicians every year to meet demand.
Is Mazda’s new CX-30 any good? John will be here next to share his impressions on the small crossover.
MAZDA CX-30 IMPRESSIONS
Man do I like Mazda’s, everything from the MX-5 Miata to the CX-9 crossover. I just got finished test driving the all new CX-30 and I think Mazda’s have some of the best styling in the market right now: sleek, well-proportioned and with a great stance. They drive so well. The steering is direct with solid feedback, the braking is so easy to modulate, and the throttle response is crisp. The interior is very cleanly laid out and controls are easy to find. To me, Mazda almost feels as if it’s a sub-brand to Audi. And yet sales in the U.S. were down sharply last year. I don’t know if it’s a problem with marketing or dealers, but the problem is clearly not with the cars. Having said that there are a couple of things that really annoy me. The parking brake automatically sets every time you start the car. I was always trying to back up only to have it not budge because the brake was on. Even after days of driving I kept forgetting to release the brake before driving off. You know why? Because no other car company in the world automatically sets the parking brake every time you start the engine. I don’t know why Mazda is the only one to do this. The other thing that bugs me is that there is no seek or scan on the radio. If you want to change a channel on SiriusXM, for example, you have to push down on the big rotary knob on the center console, turn the knob to the channel menu, push down on the knob again, scroll to the station you want, and push down on the knob again. Every time you choose the channel guide it automatically resets to channel 0, so you have to scroll through every station to get the one you want. Yes, you can pre-set your favorite stations, which saves some steps. But if you want to choose one station above your pre-set you have to go through the whole rigamarole I just described. Little things like the parking brake and radio channels are annoying every time you drive the car, and it would be so easy for Mazda to fix it. I don’t think that would turn the sales situation around, but it sure would make customers love their Mazda’s even more.
But that’s it for today, thanks for watching and have a great weekend.
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Comments (44)
January 31st, 2020 at 12:14 pm
I admit that Mazda had a very nice interior, at least the part shown in the photos. I am not thrilled by its styling, however.
You correctly point out Mazda’s perennially dismal AND declining sales in the US, and seem to not know why. How about their reliability? I remember a time when FOrd and Mazda had a lot of collaboration and both of them had the same below average (or worse) reliability.
Another reason may have been Mazda’s earlier and really silly ad campaign, when some silly kid uttered “zoom zoom” whenever he saw a bloody Mazda. You can bet lots of serious buyers would never buy a car who has that silly an ad campaign, and that includes me.
Finally, what kind of a stupid name is CX-30? Where did this “30″ come from?
January 31st, 2020 at 12:21 pm
e-scooters. TO call this tiny skateboard a scooter is a TERRIBLE name, and REAL Scooter companies like PIaggio should SUE the hell out of the clowns who stole the name and put it on those annoying toys.
As I was listening to the show, when I heard “E scooter”, I immediately of course thought of the vast millions of REAL Scooter-like EVs used by young and old all over CHINA, ever since my first visit there in 2006, and even more today.
January 31st, 2020 at 12:27 pm
Hummer revival sounds promising. If GMC can hit the same targets as the Cybertruck in terms of performance and price it could a leader in the EV truck segment because it certainly looks better.
Still think its a mistake for Ford to kill the Fusion and MKZ. Especially after the news Autoline provided this week that sedan sales may finally at their bottom and be leveling off.
Sean; I also wonder on the drop in tool and die shops has been in part due to the availability of rapid prototyping like 3D printing. You still need production tools but if you can cut out the tools for prototypes you just reduced everything in half.
January 31st, 2020 at 12:34 pm
Sean, in the Aston article, you mention that EVs are very expensive to develop. I’d like to hear more about that. With all of the suppliers in the industry clamoring to find customers for the EV components they have developed, I would think it would be fairly easy and take far less time for a company like Aston to develop a new EV. They really only need to develop the size, platform and styling. Plug in the EV components and software from suppliers and do some drivability fine tuning. Seems much simpler and less expensive than developing an ICE powered vehicle.
January 31st, 2020 at 1:22 pm
Mazda needs more dealerships to compete as a mainstream brand.
I wasn’t aware of the Mazda parking brake and radio control “quirks,”, but, especially if you can’t disable the auto parking brake thing, it would keep me from buying their cars. I never use a parking brake, unless I’m parking on an unusually steep hill, and there aren’t any hills either of the places I live. I park manual cars in 1st or reverse, whichever I’ll used next, and park automatics in park. There’s no need to use a parking brake at all.
January 31st, 2020 at 1:28 pm
5 with manual cars I used the parking brake all the time. SOmetimes it was really useful even when the car was in motion, as when at a traffic light on a steep hill.
With auto cars, I never use it, but sometimes it engages by accident as my boot hits the thing or some other way, I see a message on the dash and I release it.
January 31st, 2020 at 1:31 pm
2 Wheeled things configured more-or-less like today’s “e-scooters,” but without power , existed decades before Vespas, Cushmans, etc., so it seem reasonable to use the term scooter for them.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/120517784672
As far as the devices themselves, I’m certainly not interested, but I like my 600cc Honda SilverWing scooter, which is much different.
January 31st, 2020 at 1:32 pm
6 I occasionally use the parking brake with a manual, when starting uphill, like when I had my van in San Fransisco years ago.
January 31st, 2020 at 1:38 pm
4 I, too, would think it should be cheap and easy to develop an EV, unless all of the companies making motors and electronics just refuse to sell them to customers. Giving an EV “character” to justify Aston Martin prices would be difficult, though. I guess Porsche has advance orders for their way-too-pricey Taycan, but we’ll see how long that lasts.
January 31st, 2020 at 1:49 pm
In the supplier industry and especially the tool and die sector, the Chinese are eating everybody’s lunch in North America. They are delivering finished product and in particular finished dies below the price of steel. Many companies have been quietly selling their equipment and outsourcing themselves the finished tools or dies. That’s a strategy which will undoubtedly lead to extinction like so many other sectors.
January 31st, 2020 at 1:54 pm
John I did drive a Mazda rental a few months ago and although it didn’t have the E-brake auto engage I also found little things about it annoying. I was using it to travel about 600 miles for work so of course I traveled thru the range of many radio stations and not having a seek or scan was annoying. I believe it also shut the radio off, including any phone calls going through the infotainment system as soon as the key was shut off. Again no other manufacturer does that and not sure why Mazda thought it was a good idea. Its not!
January 31st, 2020 at 2:01 pm
With Mazda, for me the problem is brand perception. I love the styling inside and out but the pricing pitches Mazda against Toyota, which I perceive as a more prestigious brand. I compare Mazda’s to KIA’s, where KIA’s lower price always wins. I looked long and hard at the Mazda CX-5, but the KIA Sorento was a bigger SUV at a lower price. Easy decision.
January 31st, 2020 at 2:17 pm
11 While Kia has some good models, esp the Telluride lately, you must really be out of your mind to believe that… it is like Mazda. Kias are cheap Hyundais, and Hyundais were the ones selling for $5k in the 90s, where you could get two Civic sized Hyundais for the price of One Civic.
January 31st, 2020 at 2:21 pm
Mazdas are supposed to be the poor man’s BMW, as much as a FWD car can ever compete with a RWD. They are supposed to be fun to drive. I was very impressed with the INTERIOR of this one, it was imacculate, both the leather and the other materials, no god-awful silver plastics pretending to be aluminum, the curse of non-luxury cars.
January 31st, 2020 at 2:25 pm
GMC Hummer 0-60 three seconds*
*When equipped with optional booster rockets and driven down a hill. Expected range, 100 +/- miles, priced at $129,000+.
Line forms on the left. Right behind the lemmings running off the cliff…
January 31st, 2020 at 2:35 pm
The problem I have seen with Mazda’s is reliability with age is not good is what I see in our shop and most people don’t buy another one.
January 31st, 2020 at 2:40 pm
The VW support of technician training is a good start but way too little for the demand. Without repair technicians, a major business model is at risk, selling high margin spare parts.
In an in-depth interview (see YouTube link at 25:25), Elon Musk states “The incumbent car companies make most of their money from selling spare parts to their existing fleet at high margins and their new cars sell at a zero margin or even at a loss.” It is like free razors but profit in the blades or low cost inkjet printers but expensive cartridges
Having qualified technicians plays an important role in sustaining the replacement parts flow in existing cars … or so Elon reports. Perhaps Autoline might address this in the future?
January 31st, 2020 at 2:48 pm
Remember the 100s of orders for the Tesla Semis? Why have they not being built? I saw a video that claims the problem is the availability of battery cells, as these giant vehicles need way too many of them, so making one of them means you do not make dozens of Model 3 or Y’s. (Musk has said so himself when asked)
January 31st, 2020 at 2:53 pm
16 My sister had a Mazda 5, the last actual minivan sold in the US. She mostly liked it, but had some trouble with it, a transmission controller, a leaky shock or two, and probably something I’ve forgotten. I think it had about 80K miles when she sold it.
January 31st, 2020 at 2:56 pm
15 good one lmao
January 31st, 2020 at 2:59 pm
I would guess if all the scooter people wore a proper helmet it would certainly help protecting them.
January 31st, 2020 at 3:02 pm
12 The “Sorento” name always bugged me, like all of the deliberately mis-spelled words GM has been known for using as car names. Why not Sorrento, Prism, and Cruise, or just come up with a different name?
January 31st, 2020 at 3:09 pm
22 Maybe the “Sorento” is named after a small Illinois suburb of St. Louis, rather than the city in Italy mis-spelled.
January 31st, 2020 at 9:50 pm
The 31 VW’s and dia. tools will be appreciated by the schools. Photo ops for everyone. Not a DAMN thing that addresses the deeper reasons for the tech shortage. You have older experience techs leaving dealers and indy shops to make more money using their talents and (expensive) tools in other industries (a few are with SPIN, Ford’s e-scooter rental subsidiary). Younger techs are struggling to pay for tools and make a decent living. There are not many professions which require you to invest in $10K or more in tools. When has a computer programmer had to buy their own computer? Dealers will need to offer more pay, OEM may need to provide tools to technicians, not just diagnostic tools (which are shared).
February 1st, 2020 at 5:04 am
22 How come every misspelled name bugs you except the legions misspelled by Toyota or Lexus?
LEXUS itself is misspelled Luxus. (=luxury in latin)
Prius is misspelled Primus (=no 1 in latin)
I find them far more offensive than just a silent r in Sorento
February 1st, 2020 at 8:07 am
24 I’m ok with Lexus and Prius, because they aren’t easily confused with real English language words, like misspelled Sorrento, or worst of all, misspelled prism. I’m ok with Camaro and Sportage too, because they are made up names, not real words.
If Toyota called their big SUV Sekwoya, I wouldn’t like that either, but it wouldn’t be nearly as bad as Prizm, because it wouldn’t result in millions of people not knowing how to spell a real word.
February 1st, 2020 at 8:18 am
https://electrek.co/2020/01/31/jim-cramer-cnbc-fossil-fuels-death-knell/?fbclid=IwAR1Er8Ceymq1z0BYGgW40zZenNg2hWUoaie0yQjojtstiMIsmd6zXbS7r7o
Meanwhile the unhinged loudmouth on CNBC believes that fossil Fuel stocks are the new Tobacco
February 1st, 2020 at 8:52 am
25 100% disagree. Cruze may well be in the dictionary 10 years from now, as it is just a more efficient way to write “Cruise” without the STUPID silent letters. Same as “night” and “nite”. WHile this atrocity “Sequiya” or whatever is really hard on the eyes and the ears and makes no sense whatsoever.
February 1st, 2020 at 9:20 am
27 So you think GM’s misspelling of words should change the dictionary? Whatever
February 1st, 2020 at 9:24 am
26 Maybe Cramer’s talking about 10 years from now, when oil stocks may be the “new tobacco.” Coal stocks probably already are.
February 1st, 2020 at 9:26 am
27 You should like “crooz”? It doesn’t have that silent “e” like “cruze.”
February 1st, 2020 at 11:21 am
Isn’t it time for Force India/Racing Point/Aston Martin F1 to end the nepotism, and put a competitive driver in the second car? Perez outscored Stroll 54 points to 21, and Perez out qualified Stroll in all but 3 of the 21 races in the 2019 season. Wouldn’t someone else, like maybe Hulkenberg do better?
February 1st, 2020 at 1:54 pm
“CORONAVIRUS CAUSING PRODUCTION CUTS….we calculate to be about a million vehicles”
on a daily, weekly, monthly, annual basis?
February 1st, 2020 at 3:46 pm
Motorweek has two long term vehicles it updated recently.
The Insight Honda, not a plug-in, got an amazing 52.4 MPG LONG term
The utter loser Mitsu Outlander PHEV, while it IS a Plug-in, got only 35!!!!!!
(its electric only range is only 22 miles, but still. WHat a dog!)
February 1st, 2020 at 4:37 pm
looking at my old C&D and R&T and their glowing reviews of the 2014 Tesla Model S I did a search for the Performance version and found this gem (its bright red paint looks good with the dark interior but may be a bit too loud for a non-Ferrari). The only owner did 22k miles a year in Florida, for a total of 90k, but only in 5 years, the battery even has another 3 years of warranty, and the price includes several accessories. The dealer is rated a perfect 5.00 from 8 customers. Asking price is still barely below $40k.
https://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/detail/789559347/overview/
February 1st, 2020 at 4:39 pm
In fact 35 the owner only had it for 4 yrs 1 month, so there is almost 4 years warranty left (not that I worry about this battery)
February 1st, 2020 at 4:54 pm
34 The Insight slightly beat a Prius in CR’s mpg 54-52 “overall” rating. The two had very similar “road test” ratings.
The Outlander is not remotely comparable to either. It’s a CUV, 10 inches taller, and 600-700 pounds heavier, in non-hybrid form, probably 800+ pounds more as the PHEV. I certainly agree that the 22 mile electric range would be fairly useless to a lot of people. CR hasn’t tested the Outlander plug-in, so I don’t know what mpg they would have gotten, but the EPA rating was a mediocre 25 mpg combined on gas only, while the similar size RAV4 hybrid got 40 combined EPA, and 37 overall in CR’s testing.
February 1st, 2020 at 5:01 pm
34 The Motorweek people must have a fairly light right foot with the Insight. While I have gotten very good mileage with my hybrids, I’ve been about 10% below the EPA combined rating, when I divide out the first 10-15K miles.
February 1st, 2020 at 5:20 pm
37 the Outlander, being a PLUG-IN, when the Insight is NOT, is more than comparable. If I had one, I’d get 100 MPGes since the 22 miles range would cover 100% of my weekly needs except for Saturday and the rare invitations which are 20-30 miles away.
it should get much more, not less, than the non-plug-in hybrid. Of course if they took it on long trips all the time, it defeats the purpose. Plus I doubt this truck would be comfortable on such trips.
February 1st, 2020 at 5:31 pm
39 MPGE is totally meaningless for a plug-in hybrid. It depends entirely on how you drive it. With that Outlander, if you do all of your driving on the 22 miles of plug-in range, it will be around 80. If you drive it a significant distance on gas, it will be about 25-30. A good plug-in hybrid should get almost hybrid-like mpg if you never plug it in. A Prius Prime does, and I think the Honda Insight or Clarity, whichever one is sold both ways does.
February 1st, 2020 at 5:48 pm
https://southpark.fandom.com/wiki/Toyonda_Pious
Speaking of intentionally butchered car model names, and the Prius which does not even sound like the Primus (=First), having no “m”, there was an episode of the wild “South Park” show about 14 years ago, titled “Smug Alert!”, where the names (probably for legal reasons) were changed to “Toyonda” and, even better, “Pious”, which at least is a real word and it had the intended meaning here.
February 1st, 2020 at 6:45 pm
41 To most people, Prius is a nonsense word, as is Lexus. Four friends of mine have Priuses, for the same reason I’ve had them. They are affordable, utilitarian liftbacks that are very reliable, and get exceptional gas mileage. Yeah, some people have bought them to make a statement. Maybe Woz did, but my friends and I have bought them for how well they function.
February 3rd, 2020 at 8:54 am
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4oCBDQNlpU
A great, very recent 28 Jan 2020 and informative video examining VW vs Tesla. Predicts that VW will be the 2nd BEV maker after Tesla in 2025.
February 3rd, 2020 at 2:09 pm
34/37
I could drive it back and forth to work + an errand or two every day and plug it in every night and not use any gasoline.
Then I could use it on long highway trips as I do with our 2016 SEL.
Terrible, just terrible. Again, the sky is blue where I live.
They were supposed to introduce the updated PHEV with 50% more range for 2019 (as they sell in Europe), but I believe that the merger/acquisition by Nissan scuttled that because they want to introduce an all-new Outlander off the Rogue platform sooner rather than later.