Sausage Fest - 16 May 2023

FOLLOW UP: LOS ANGLES SUBURB TARGETS STREET TAKEOVER CULTUREFollowing on from the recent news of Australia fining spectators of street takeover events, a Los Angles suburb, Pico Rivera, are introducing similar laws. Spectators up to 500 feet away can be fined up to $2000. Vehicles used in the event can be permanently confiscated. California already has tough rules for such events but this goes further. Click here to read more from The Drive. US AIRBAG RECALL REJECTED BY SUPPLIERARC, the maker of 67 million airbags that the NHTSA has ordered be recalled because a found defect has created “an unreasonable risk of death and injury", has rejected the recommendation. ARC state that the NHTSA’s eight year investigation has failed to show a "systemic or prevalent defect” in the inflators. To learn more, click this BBC News article link here. JAGUAR LAND ROVER SHOWS SIGNS OF FINANCIAL RECOVERYThanks to JLR’s supply chain woes easing slightly, their fourth quarter financial results are much improved on the previous year. Revenue is up 49%, production is up 24%and order books are still holding around 200,000 vehicles. Click this link to Jaguar Land Rover’s own press release on this matter. VW SHAREHOLDERS MEETING ATTACKEDDuring the shareholders meeting for the Volkswagen Group, protesters threw cake at executives and bared their chests as they highlighted the company’s green credentials and working in the Chinese region of Xinjiang, where human rights violations are reported. You can read more by clicking this link to the Raw Story article. TESLA OTA UPDATES EQUATED TO HACKER ATTACKSTesla is having to defend their Over-The-Air (OTA) updates in a court as it is claimed the software changes impacted the performance of the batteries, including making them inoperable. The lawyer for plaintiffs is stating this is equivalent to a hacker attacking a system and is using California's Computer Data Access and Fraud Act and California's Computer Fraud and Abuse Act as the basis for their case. To learn more, click this Autoevolution article link here. For some context on OTA updates for cars and why they are jolly hard to get right, click this article link from Ken Tindell. INDIA PROPOSES BAnning diesels in cities by 2027A committee set up by the Indian Government proposes the ban of diesels from cities and high density urban areas by 2027, but with quite a caveat as it does not include two and three wheeled vehicles as they get a reprieve until 2035. The committee proposing the moves also states that from 2024 new delivery vehicles in urban areas need to be electric, but the country is seriously behind on investment in EV infrastructure. You can read more by clicking this Jalopnik link here. TOYOTA DATA LEAK UNDETECTED FOR A DECADEToyota has confirmed that a misconfigured cloud data bucket has been accessible by anyone since 2013. The company were at pains to clarify that whilst car details have been accessible personally identifiable information was not, but also location data is so we are not sure that stacks up. Click this DarkReading article link to find out more. CORNWALL RESIDENTS ASKED ABOUT ACTIVE TRAVEL HABITSCornwall Council and partners are asking residents to take part in an active travel survey, in order to help them understand what influences those who do. The aim of the study is to reduce car use in the county. More can be read about this by clicking the BBC News article link here. BUSINESSES PLUG-IN GRANT INCREASEDThe plug-in grant for businesses has increased £500, to £1,500, with immediate effect. The Office for Zero Emission Vehicles (OZEV) keeps the rates under constant review and is empowered to change them at any time. Click this AMOnline article link to learn more. If you like what we do, on this show, and think it is worth a £1.00, please consider supporting us via Patreon. Here is the link to that CLICK HERE TO SUPPORT THE PODCAST NEW NEW CAR NEWS - MG CybersterMG launched their EV convertible sports car, the Cyberster, in London last week. The claim is it is the world’s most affordable EV coupe. Whilst that is technically correct it will set you back from £55,000, which is quite the price jump in the rest of the MG range. However, this is a good looking car and we wait to see how many leave dealerships. Click this Autocar article link to read more. Lotus Type 134 Lotus has announced some details, akin to teasing really, what their entry level vehicle will be. A compact SUV, rivalling the Porsche Mecan in size, that will also be “engineered to look, feel and drive a Lotus", as it states in the linked Autocar article. We are not fans of the render provided by the publication and expect it will look different in reality. A lot rides on this car though, with expectation being it will be worth half the sales of the company by 2028. Click the link here to find out more. Honda e:Ny1Honda has revealed three electrified SUVs as they try to catch up to market. The first is the stupidly named e:Ny1, which is a renamed Chinese model that is itself an electric HR-V with more screens and a refashioned nose. Expected to cost around £30,000 and have a range of 256 miles, with expectation it will be sold later this year. You can find out more, by clicking this Autocar link here. Honda ZR-VSecond of the three new reveals is the ZR-V hybrid, which is slotting into a new segment in Europe for Honda, as it sits between the e:Ny1/HR-V and CR-V. This too though is already in another market, this time the US, where Alan has seen these on the road. We are not keen on the looks but then we are struggling to get excited about the sheer volume of SUVs being given to us by manufacturers. This will be priced as roughly £40,000, have a 2.0 petrol mated with two electric motors to provide 181bhp, whilst emitting 130g/km CO2 and 50mpg on the WLTP test. For more on this car, click this Autocar link here. Honda CR-V PHEV and e:HybridThe final car revealed by Honda is the Mitsubishi Outlander - sorry - the CR-V in either PHEV of e:Hybrid formats. Whilst it does look astonishingly similar to the Outlander, it is their largest European model. This is to go toe to toe with the likes of the Toyota RAV4. Click this Autocar link to read more. Honda Civic order books open againHonda has confirmed that they have cleared enough of the order backlog to open their order books for the Civic, in the UK, once again. Click the Autocar link found here to learn more. Mercedes-Benz end CLS productionMercedes has ceased production of the CLS, after nineteen years of production as it needs the capacity for their new E-Class model. You can find out more by clicking this Autocar link. Volvo delays EX90 production due to software woesVolvo has announced that it will delay production of the all electric EX90 as they iron out the problems they are having with its software. No details have been given about what those issues are. Autocar has more on the story, which you can read by clicking this link here. GM planning a European returnGM is planning to return...