Thursday, May 08, 2003

HZA's Spring Future Cars Special. New cars are coming out and you need to know my opinion before buying. Why? I don't posess a deep knowledge of automobile mechanics, but my sensible style and boyish good looks should suffice:

Nissan Titan Crew Cab. Nissan's first full sized truck and Japan's biggest export since Godzooky. Kia Amanti. The Korean version of the Buick LeSabre. Kim-Chi and Nuclear Weapons optional. Saturn Ion Red Line. Saturn's "performance upgraded" sports coupe to compete with the wimpy Lancer OZ Rally Editions of the world. Suburu Baja Turbo. They put a turbocharger in the worlds second or third ugliest car. Trunk hauls a bushel of 4X4's comfortably. Chevy Malibu Maxx. As if the Chevy Malibu was that much more desirable. Audi Nuvolari Quattro. Sub-Compact economy car from Audi. Packing a miserly Twin-Turbo 5 Liter V10 Engine, the EPA expects 28 MPG City / 32 MPG Highway. Put this high on your list of grocery getters and day to day drivers. Pricing to be in the $12-16,000 range. Lamborghini Gallardo. Last year Acura threw down the gauntlet with the Base RSX. Lamborghini has decided to answer Acura's challenge with the Gallardo. Not quite as fast or nimble, or even as good looking, the Lamborghini Gallardo will be on sale this fall in select Chrysler-Jeep dealerships. Daewoo Scope. Straight from Daewoo's mouth: "It combines the dynamics and maneuverability of a sports car with the robustness of an all-terrain vehicle." A Geo Metro w/ 4WD and plenty of 'tude. BMW M3 CSL. An approx. 200 lbs. lighter version of the latest version BMW M3. It cost roughly 30 grand more than the standard M3 so expect the price/performance ratio to drop if you weight 400 lbs. or more. Ford Freestar. Ford's new Minivan should re-ignite the California Rice Burner craze. Expect lots of aftermarket parts for this one. Mazda RX-8 X-Men Car. Mazda USA will be giving out a free set of Hugh Jackman's Pompadour used in the first and last scenes of X2 : XMEN UNITED or a free tank of gas. It's your choice. Aston Martin AMV8 Vantage. If you're willing to schill out the dough for this hyper-exotic, Aston Martin includes a white man in a suit to clean your windshield at every stop for up to 4 years or 50,000 miles (see inset). Honda Accord XV Concept. Honda Motors North America has said the Honda Accord XV Concept shown at the 2003 Detroit Autoshow could point to future Honda designs. Taking retro cues from the classic 1987 Honda Accord, the XV Concept sports a 1.8L I-4 mated to a 5-Speed Manual Transmission. Some of the technology won't make it to production, some will. "Although we predict only the driver side view mirror will make it to production, the bubbles in the tint job, cracked hub caps, deteriorating paint job and mushy breaks probably won't." Honda said.

posted by HZA | 9:49 PM | email | archive