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Autonomous tech will drive motorheads off the road

While autonomous technology could make car travel much safer and more efficient — and automakers and marketers are salivating over the prospect of a "passenger economy" that could potentially generate $7 trillion by 2050 — those of us who enjoy driving are not so stoked. Experts have predicted that as autonomous vehicles are deployed in large numbers, human-driven cars eventually could be outlawed on public roads due to the carnage they create, which is currently more than 41,000 deaths a year in the U.S. alone and climbing. Such scenarios have driving enthusiasts envisioning a "Red Barchetta" style nightmare becoming reality, making Rush lyricist Neil Peart a clairvoyant as well as one of rock's most badass skin-pounders. But there could be a couple of refuges left for motorheads, and they won't be on public roads. As Popular Science's Joe Brown points out in a recent editorial, we're seeing a wave of vehicles being offered by legit mainstream automakers that aren't made for public roads. The poster child of this vanguard is the 2018 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon, which comes with a crate full of goodies that lets you turn the already formidable street-legal muscle car into a drag-strip dominator. Brown also notes that two out of five of the Ford GT's driving modes are for use on the track, "catering to the $450,000 machine's club-racing clientele." We're also currently enjoying the heyday of production off-road-ready pickups that kicked off with the Ford Raptor in 2009. The latest salvo in this escalating war of overachieving trucks is the Chevy Colorado ZR2 that can take on the likes of California's Rubicon Trail without issue. Brown also gives a shout-out to his magazine's Grand Award Winner, the Alta Motors Redshift MX, which "isn't even allowed on public roads" and is "meant for bombing around motocross tracks, big backyards and single-track woods trails." If you follow Brown on Instagram, you know that he's also a two-wheel aficionado, and he points out that sales of off-road bikes are leaving street machines in the dust. Sales of off-highway motorcycles rose 29 percent between 2012 and 2016, according to the ­Motorcycle Industry Council — compared to 6 percent for road-bike sales during the same period. "That's a nearly 400-percent drubbing," Brown remarks.

Minor updates coming to 2017 Chevy Volt

The 2016 Chevrolet Volt has just appeared at dealerships, but already the talk has turned to the mildly updated 2017 model going on sale in a few months. The new Volt has already won the 2016 Green Car of the Year award and is sparking a noticeable uptick in sales over the outgoing model. Chevy is now planning to keep interest in the second-generation Volt strong with some tweaks and increased availability. The main equipment change to the 2017 Volt will be the option of adaptive cruise control on both the base LT and uplevel Premier, according to CarsDirect. While the Volt already offers safety technology such as blind-spot monitoring and forward collision warning, adaptive cruise has been conspicuously absent. But the largest change will be that the 2017 Volt gets nationwide availability. GM decided to focus on strong markets for the original Volt when it chose where to introduce the new model. Buyers interested in the second-generation model have until now been limited to making purchases in states such as California, Maryland and the Northeast. This will all change soon. Conversely, you can have a 2016 Nissan Leaf now in all 50 states, or a 2016 Toyota Prius very shortly. But in our first drive of the Volt, we found it to be, "an efficient, no-compromise EV" and worth the wait for those who don't live in the states with the strictest emissions laws. Perhaps the reason the 2016 Volt is already being given an injection of dealer incentives is because of its relatively short lifespan. The 2017 Chevy Volt should arrive on dealer lots by spring 2016. Featured Gallery 2016 Chevrolet Volt: First Drive View 24 Photos News Source: CarsDirect via Green Car Reports Green Chevrolet Electric Hybrid ev sales

2016 Chevrolet Malibu Hybrid Quick Spin [w/video]

If a Chevy Volt is like a hybrid that prefers its electric motor, then the new Malibu hybrid is like a Volt you never have to plug in. That's partly because you can't plug it in, but more because the Volt and the gas-electric Malibu share a lot of major components. Since we happen to like the newly refined Volt, that's good news for the larger family sedan. The shared parts include the blended braking system, A/C compressor, the auxiliary power module, and most of the hybrid transaxle (what you might call a fancy electro-transmission). In the Malibu, the electric motors use neodymium magnets for efficiency and power, while the Volt has weaker ferrite magnets to reduce drag, and the Volt also gets an extra clutch to lock out the engine. The two use different batteries, with their size, power capabilities, and chemistry suited to the task for each vehicle. Unlike most of the midsized sedan leaders, the Malibu has never had a full hybrid option. For a few years in the last generation, Chevy offered the Malibu Eco with a version of GM's eAssist mild-hybrid system, which featured a small motor-generator in place of an alternator hooked up to a bigger battery that could harvest energy during deceleration and add some back in when you hit the throttle; it also brought engine stop-start functionality to save a little more fuel. But it saved only a little fuel, so eAssist was nixed in favor of a more efficient four-cylinder with a standalone stop-start system. Driving Notes Mode switches between gas and electric are just as smooth as in the Volt. No shudder or weirdness in the throttle. It drives as much like a gas-only car as any midsized hybrid does. The blended braking system is also noticeably well sorted. There's no deadness in the pedal, no touchiness, and no artificial, wooden feeling when you step through the regen portion of its travel. There's nothing abrupt or jarring about any of the experience, and the Malibu's baked-in quietness helps to deal with noise from the somewhat coarse 1.8-liter gas engine. Engine startup and shutdown are noisy from outside, but much less noticeable from within. The 2016 Malibu is larger yet lighter. The hybrid weighs about 125 pounds more than a comparably equipped 1.5T. You don't notice the extra weight, but there is some space eaten out of the trunk by the battery.