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Our favorite mid-engine Corvette theories and rumors

The mid-engine Corvette! We just saw blurry photos through the foliage, and are hearts are all aflutter because it means that this car is real. And it's the most " never before" Corvette since 1984. Which leads us to all kinds of wacky theories and speculation. Everybody knows something or heard from a guy. None of those guys (or gals) from GM are talking to Autoblog, to be clear. But that won't stop us from stirring the pot. Let's go over a few point-by-point. The pushrod engine will be replaced by an overhead-cam V8 Car and Driver has repeatedly reported that an overhead-cam engine will come after the mid-engine Corvette's debut with an old-school pushrod. We've heard the same thing firsthand, albeit from a source with no connection to the development of the Corvette or powertrain. "At some point two valves can't pass future emissions regulations," said the guy we know. While the pushrod engine is compact, the design makes it difficult - if not impossible - for sophisticated variable valve timing (and lift) systems that control combustion with more precision. Hasty conclusion: The pushrod engine has a finite life in front of it. This one's a lock, it's a just a matter of when. Bowling Green's new paint shop is really the mid-engine assembly line Credit to Reddit for this one. Like we said, everybody knows a guy. But let's look deeper. The new paint facility costs $439 million dollars and adds 450,000 square feet, almost half the size of the existing plant. Plus GM announced another $290 million in upgrades at Bowling Green Assembly. That sure sounds like a lot of money, but you can actually spend that much on a paint booth. Porsche spent 500 million Euros (about $561 million dollars) to add the Macan assembly to its Leipzig, Germany plant in 2014. Chrysler shelled out $850 million for a paint shop in Sterling Heights, Michigan. GM spent $600 million for a new paint shop at the Fairfax (Kansas City) plant. Honda, on the other hand, is working on a thrifty $210 million project in Marysville, Ohio that includes a 300,000 square foot expansion, and the low-volume Acura NSX facility only cost $70 million. Hasty conclusion: The square footage and cost could easily mean a new assembly line instead of (or in addition to) a paint line. And if the NSX plant was really that cheap, GM could have hidden a similar sum in its existing announcements.

Saturn Vue ignition switch leads to new group of GM recalls totaling 312k

General Motors has another spate of recalls to announce. This time they cover 312,280 vehicles worldwide, including 269,041 of in the US, in a total of six campaigns. In 2014, the automaker has recalled 29,079,765 vehicles worldwide, with 25,754,356 of those in the US.
The largest among them covers 215,243 units of the Saturn Vue from 2002-2004 model years worldwide, 202,115 in the US. It's possible for the for the key to be removed even when the ignition isn't in the OFF position. The company knows of two crashes and one injury caused by this problem. Dealers are checking the parts and replacing the ignition cylinder and key set, if necessary.
Next is 72,826 models worldwide (48,059 vehicles in the US) of the 2013 Cadillac ATS four-door sedan, 2013 Buick Encore and 2013 Chevy Trax in Canada. It's possible that the for lap belt pretensioner to retract but not to lock, which could increase occupant movement during a crash. Both front, outboard lap belt pretensioners are being replaced, and a stop-sale is in effect on unsold models until the problem is repaired. There are no known crashes or injuries, though.

Cadillac introducing V2V communications on 2017 CTS sedans

While Audi has introduced vehicle-to-infrastructure technology in select cars in select cities, Cadillac is focusing on vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications, and it all starts with the CTS sedan. Starting this month, the company will be adding V2V equipment to 2017 models. The feature will be standard on cars in the US and Canada. These V2V devices will allow these new Cadillacs to communicate with each other up to 980 feet away. The cars will be able to transmit and receive information on speed, direction, and location. An example of how this data can be used is in detecting a car coming up a side street that could pose a possible collision risk. The cars will also be able to transmit data about brake use, hazard lights, and low traction situations for advance warning of hazards. The warnings can be displayed on the instrument panel and heads-up display. Currently, the system only communicates with other CTS sedans equipped with the technology. According to Chris Bonelli at Cadillac part of the reason is that the CTS will be the only car with the equipment on US roads at the moment, but it also isn't currently set to communicate with other cars if they were to be offered right away. However, he said that the company is absolutely willing to work with other companies to make the system compatible if or when other cars are offered with the technology. This V2V system also doesn't send data to any sort of network, instead only communicating with nearby cars. For the time being, this precludes the possibility of receiving road condition information from cars that are farther away. But as Cadillac points out, it should work under any conditions with no delay since it isn't dependent on information from a network. As far as security is concerned, Bonelli told us that the Cadillac system does have firewalls and other security measures to keep it protected from interference. He also said the cars don't store any data they receive. In addition, none of the data could be used to identify a particular person. The cars use a radio frequency set aside by the government for this use. The introduction of this technology also puts Cadillac well ahead of proposed legislation by the Department of Transportation. The organization wants this type of short-range V2V communications equipment to be a standard feature by 2023, believing the technology could prevent many injuries and deaths due to crashes. Related Video: