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Toyota, Mazda form electric car technology venture

TOKYO — Toyota has established a new venture to develop electric vehicle technology with partner Mazda, seeking to catch up with rivals in an increasingly frenetic race to produce more battery-powered cars. Policymakers in key markets like China are pushing a shift to electric cars over the next two to three decades, while relatively new rival Tesla is gaining momentum and diesel cars are going through the fallout of the Volkswagen diesel scandal, pressuring traditional automakers to crank up plans for fully electric vehicles (EVs). At the same time, declining battery costs are enabling more power to be packed into cars, making an electric car future easier to imagine. Toyota said in a statement the new company will develop technology for a range of electric cars, including mini vehicles, passenger cars, SUVs and light trucks. Toyota will take a 90 percent stake in the joint venture, called EV Common Architecture Spirit Co Ltd, while Mazda and Denso Corp, Toyota's biggest supplier, will each take 5 percent. The plans build on a partnership announced in August when Japan's biggest automaker agreed to take a 5 percent stake in Mazda and two said they would jointly develop affordable electric vehicle technologies. Although Toyota is providing most of the financial firepower and existing EV know-how, Mazda's engineers have gained the admiration of the industry with breakthrough technologies such as its compression ignition engine announced last month. Shares in Mazda surged to end the day 3 percent higher, while those in Denso rose 1.8 percent. Toyota shares were flat. Both automakers are somewhat behind rivals, with neither having a fully electric passenger car on the market yet. After years of focusing on bringing hydrogen fuel cell vehicles to the market, Toyota last year set up a division to develop electric cars which is led by President Akio Toyoda, and said it plans to introduce EVs in China in the coming years. Toyota has also announced it will bring a game-changing solid-state EV battery to market by 2022. That division would continue as a separate entity from the new joint venture, a Toyota spokeswoman said, while adding that the two teams would co-operate on technology development. Mazda has an R&D budget a fraction of Toyota's, which has made it difficult to develop electric cars on its own. Even so, it has said it plans to launch EVs in 2020.

Toyota, Honda, Mazda and Nissan recall 3.4 million vehicles for faulty airbags

Most vehicle recalls that take place these days are a result of some problem that happens during the manufacturing process by the automaker, but as we see here, parts suppliers can also factor in to problematic safety issues. Automotive News is reporting that a total of 3.4 million vehicles produced by Japanese automakers between 2000 and 2004 are being recalled globally due to faulty airbags produced by an outside supplier, Takata Corp.
According to the report, vehicles from Toyota, Honda, Nissan and Mazda are being recalled because of passenger front airbags that do not inflate properly. Globally, Toyota is said to be recalling around 1.73 million cars including 510,000 in the US composed of Toyota Corolla, Matrix, Sequoia and Tundra as well as the Lexus SC430 for the 2001 through 2003 model years; this is the second time this year the 2003 Corolla and Matrix have been recalled for an airbag problem. Honda is recalling 1.14 million models, Nissan another 480,000 and Mazda 45,463. The article says that Takata supplied faulty airbags to non-Japanese automakers, but it did not specify which ones.
Honda and Toyota have released information on their own websites about the recall, while Nissan and Mazda have not yet commented. Read official press releases from Honda and Toyota, below, and look for updates as we have word from the others.

24 Hours of Le Mans live update part one

We tasked surfing journalist Rory Parker to watch this year's live stream of the 2016 24 Hours of Le Mans. What follows is an experiment to experience the world's greatest endurance race from the perspective of a motorsports novice with a profanity-laden stream-of-consciousness writing style. Parker lives in Hawaii and spends far more time spearfishing than behind the wheel of a car. Jump ahead to Part Two here, and Part Three here. Big Money and billionaire hobbyists and rockets on wheels. Jets belching French color smoke overhead. Balance of power fuckery. Plenty of water on the ground this morning. Absurdly expensive motorcars lined up in the pissing rain. Fast twitch lunatics behind the wheel. Chomping at the bit. Let's go let's go let's go! Race hasn't even started, Ford #67 maybe dealing with clutch issues. Karma? That beautiful bastard Brad Pitt's out on the track, waving the tricolor flag. It's a standing start in "Noah's Ark" weather and the 2016 24 hours of Le Mans is go! First lap takes place behind the safety car, finished in a record setting 8 minutes 27 seconds. Wrong kind of record maybe, but this is the first time I've set my mind to watching the whole damn race. Feel like I'm part of history. 3:00 AM on Kauai, a little too early for life. Sucking down coffee like a maniac. Don't fall back asleep. Got my hands on four hours of rest, how much more can I need? Better be enough for the next twenty four hours. Gonna get kinda punchy toward the end. Jason Statham on the scene. Four feet of solid muscle, non-existent hairline. Lovely wife peanut gallery sitting next to me calls him the "best race car drive in the world." Not sure if she's serious. Toss up, could go either way. Statham's a funny guy. Heir to the Bruce Willis comedy action crown. Really good in the movie where the fat comedy lady plays a spy. Ford's on the road. Problems with gearbox pressure, apparently. Nearing a half hour in and the safety car is still on the track. Hellish amounts of water on the ground, in the air. Visibility is garbage. Getting better. Twitter wags, "Not with a bang but a whimper." Just building suspense. Mother Nature felt like killing some people today, race officials need to dial back the drivers until it dries a tad. Normal inclination would've seen 'em flying, guaranteed early lap wrecks. Sad news for that bloodthirsty part of my lizard brain I try and keep suppressed. Good news for humanity. #12 in the pit for a bit.