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Cosworth double-feature is XCar's a drool-worthy look back

While American fans of Ford performance cars in the '80s and early '90s were loving the 5.0 Mustang, Taurus SHO and, for those who wanted to be a little different, the Merkur XR4Ti, British fans of the Blue Oval were getting their own unique take on speed. The Sierra RS Cosworth (which was similar but not identical to the aforementioned Merkur) and later Escort RS Cosworth were the stuff of dreams with huge wings, hood vents and big power for their time and class. XCar Films aims to find out whether it is little more than nostalgia that makes these classics famous or it really is their legitimate performance. Thanks to its Formula One and racing success, Cosworth was already a well-established performance name in the UK by the time it began selling tuned engines to Ford for the Sierra and Escort. The Sierra RS Cosworth hit the scene in 1986 with a turbocharged, 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine with 204 horsepower and rear-wheel drive. Its huge wing at the back signaled it immediately as something special, and it proved to be a performance powerhouse on and off the track. When it was retired, Ford replaced it with the Escort RS Cosworth that used an upgraded version of the same engine with 217 hp, all-wheel drive and an even bigger rear wing to net yet more racing victories. XCar really gets into the spirit of the time, opening the video with the lo-fi grain of '80s and '90s TV, but to find out whether the Cossies stand up to modern scrutiny, you have to watch the video below. Stay tuned until the end to enjoy them at their best with some vintage motorsports footage. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

Major automakers urge Trump not to freeze fuel economy targets

WASHINGTON — Major automakers are telling the Trump administration they want to reach an agreement with California to avoid a legal battle over fuel efficiency standards, and they support continued increases in mileage standards through 2025. "We support standards that increase year over year that also are consistent with marketplace realities," Mitch Bainwol, chief executive of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, a trade group representing major automakers, will tell a U.S. House of Representatives panel on Tuesday, according to written testimony released on Monday. The Trump administration is weighing how to revise fuel economy standards through at least the 2025 model year, and one option is to propose freezing the standards through 2026, effectively allowing automakers to delay investments in technology to cut greenhouse gas emissions from burning petroleum. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has not formally submitted its joint proposal with the Environmental Protection Agency to the White House Office of Management and Budget for review. Even so, last week, California and 16 other states sued to challenge the Trump administration's decision to revise U.S. vehicle rules. Auto industry executives have held meetings with the Trump administration for months and have urged the administration to try to reach a deal with California even as they support slowing the pace of reduction in carbon dioxide emissions that the Obama administration rules outlined. One automaker official said part of the message to President Donald Trump at a meeting on Friday will be to consider California like a foreign trade deal that needs to be renegotiated. Automakers want to urge him to get automakers a "better deal" — as opposed to potentially years of litigation between major states and federal regulators. On Friday, Trump is set to meet with the chief executives of General Motors, Ford, Fiat Chrysler and the top U.S. executives of at least five other major automakers, including Toyota, Volkswagen AG and Daimler AG, to talk about revisions to the vehicle rules. Senior EPA and Transportation Department officials will also attend. Environmental groups are eager to keep the rules in place, saying they will save consumers billions in fuel costs. A coalition of groups plans to stage a protest outside Ford's headquarters in Michigan.

How tariffs in China could cause a meltdown in the American South

While BMW is clearly a German company, the crossovers that are exceedingly important to it are actually made in Spartanburg, South Carolina. And more than that, the Spartanburg plant (physically located in the town of Greer) is where the corporate know-how and capability for those vehicles is concentrated. These are the vehicles – specifically, the BMW X3, X4, X5, X6, X7 – that drove record growth for the company in 2018, according to BMW. But whatÂ’s most notable about BMW Group Plant Spartanburg, given current events, is that according to the U.S. Department of Commerce it was the largest automotive exporter by value for the fifth year running in 2018. ThatÂ’s worth emphasizing: largest automotive exporter by value. Not GM. Not Ford. BMW. And where might one assume that more than a few of those X vehicles are shipped to? China. Some 360 miles southwest of Spartanburg is Mercedes-Benz U.S. International, Inc., in in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama. It started building vehicles in 1997. Since then, Daimler AG has invested in excess of $5.5 billion in the facility. It manufactures the crossover now known as the GLE, formerly the ML-Class. It also makes the GLE coupe and GLS. Daimler describes the Tuscaloosa facility as “the traditional home of SUV production” for those vehicles. When it reported its global 2018 sales, Daimler noted that on a global basis SUVs account “for more than a third of all Mercedes-Benz sales.” According to the Chinese finance ministry, on December 15th the Chinese government will impose a 25% tariff on automobiles (and a 5% tariff on auto parts) from the U.S. Certainly this is going to have a direct effect on the sales of vehicles that are manufactured in the U.S. and exported to China. BMW and Mercedes are going to take it on the chin for the vehicles that they make in plants that they invested in so heavily in the U.S. Which could potentially mean that people in places like Greer, South Carolina, and Vance, Alabama, are going to find themselves in the crosshairs of the combatants. Soo too could Lincoln, which produces vehicles in places like Louisville, Kentucky (Navigator), Chicago, Illinois (Aviator) and Flat Rock, Michigan (Continental). Although the Tesla Gigafactory 3 is rapidly nearing completion in Shanghai, it is worth noting that vehicles built in Fremont, California, are being sold in China in numbers that donÂ’t make Musk unhappy.