2005 Chrysler Crossfire Hard Top - Beautiful Car In Fantastic Condition on 2040-cars

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Ward's Automotive Ten Best Engines of 2014 dominated by diesels, turbos

With the Car and Driver Ten Best decided, the North American Car and Truck of the Year finalists announced and Cadillac, Ram and Subaru chalking up wins with Motor Trend, it's fair to say that the automotive awards season is in full swing. The next set of trophies to be handed out will be from Ward's Automotive, which has announced the winners of its 2014 10 Best Engines.
The latest contest was marked by the widespread emergence of diesel power and the continued success of turbocharged engines. There was even an electric motor on this year's list. In fact, only three of the ten winners were naturally aspirated and only two winners returned from last year.
"We weren't looking to throw the bums out, as they might say about an election. We were just really impressed with the flood of new powertrains," said Ward's Automotive Editor-in-Chief Drew Winter. Those new powertrains include the 83-kilowatt electric motor from the Fiat 500e, the 1.0-liter, EcoBoost three-cylinder from the Ford Fiesta and the 2.0-liter turbodiesel from the Chevrolet Cruze.

180,000 new vehicles are sitting, derailed by lack of transport trains

If you're planning on buying a new car in the next month or so, you might want to pick from what's on the lot, because there could be a long wait for new vehicles from the factory. Locomotives continue to be in short supply in North America, and that's causing major delays for automakers trying to move assembled cars.
According to The Detroit News, there are about 180,000 new vehicles waiting to be transported by rail in North America at the moment. In a normal year, it would be about 69,000. The complications have been industry-wide. Toyota, General Motors, Honda and Ford all reported experiencing some delays, and Chrysler recently had hundreds of minivans sitting on the Detroit waterfront waiting to be shipped out.
The problem is twofold for automakers. First, the fracking boom in the Bakken oil field in the Plains and Canada is monopolizing many locomotives. Second, the long, harsh winter is still causing major delays in freight train travel. The bad weather forced trains to slow down and carry less weight, which caused a backup of goods to transport. The auto companies resorted to moving some vehicles by truck, which was a less efficient but necessary option.

2021 Chrysler Pacifica refresh spotted with its new bits covered

The Chrysler Pacifica is the critical darling of the minivan segment, but FCA seems keen to make it even better with a 2021 refresh we're expecting to see later this year. From these photos, we can tell that FCA's beloved people hauler will get some front- and rear-end updates. The spy who captured these photos also passed along the fact that the engineers inside moved quickly to cover up its interior, hinting that there will be news on that front as well. There might be more to this that we can't see from the outside. Rumors have been swirling for the better part of a year that Chrysler has plans to add all-wheel drive to the Pacifica's option sheet.  FCA has remained mum about this potential development, but it would be a logical step to keep the minivan relevant as the industry continues to feel the effects of crossover creep.  If it does come to fruition, this wouldn't be the first time FCA has offered all-wheel drive on a minivan, but historically the feature has come at the expense of another wildly popular option: the company's Stow 'n Go seating system, as the cubbies have always occupied the same space that would be needed to install a prop shaft to carry power to the rear axle. Maybe FCA's engineers have figured out how to combine the two, or will simply offer both as options that can't be combined as they have in the past. Given what appears to be the production-ready state of this particular test car, we may not have to wait long to find out.