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2017 Honda Ridgeline enters the landscape block war

In the test of pickup truck beds, if steel is apples and aluminum is oranges, Honda wants you to know that composites are pineapples. Chevy recently performed a test in which its own Silverado was pitted against its most obvious competitor, the Ford F-150. A loader dropped over 800 pounds of landscaping blocks into the two truck beds, and Ford's aluminum bed ended up with more damage than Chevy's steel bed. Check that test out right here. Honda apparently wasn't content to let Chevy throw stones alone. In a new test, the Japanese automaker replicated the block-drop test using its brand-new Ridgeline truck, which features a composite bed. As you'll see in the video above, there was very little damage to the high-strength plastic bed of the Ridgeline after a similar load of landscaping blocks were dropped from a loader. Without being on hand at any of these tests, we can't say with any degree of certainty that they match up in severity. But they all look pretty similar, and this is actually a test that Honda performed in front of journalists ( ourselves included) earlier this year. We visually inspected the composite bed of a Ridgeline after a demonstration just like the one on video above, and can confirm that there was basically no damage to Honda's truck. Chevy went an extra step by flinging a heavy toolbox into the Silverado and F-150; Honda didn't match that particular test. Does any of this matter? That's up to truck buyers and owners to decide, naturally, but we doubt anyone would actually dump a load like this into their own truck. And it's also worth noting that a heavy-duty spray-on bedliner would probably minimize damage to the metal surface below, whether steel or aluminum. If nothing else, it's memorable marketing. Related Video:

Camaro spy shots show subtly different grille, front fascia

It looks like there some changes in store for the Chevrolet Camaro - the only thing is that we just don't know what Chevy has up its sleeve. Looking at these spy shots, we'd initially be inclined to think that there is just a minor facelift or a new special edition, but upon closer inspection, there are a few oddities about this car that definitely have us intrigued.
The most obvious difference on this prototype is the slightly restyled front fascia with a smaller lower air inlet and the two-bar grille. Then we get to some of the car's mysterious details. For starters, this fascia has the SS vent above the grille, but it looks to be blocked off. Granted this could just be a one-off piece used for testing. What really piqued our interest was at the rear of the car where it has quad exhaust outlets that are used on the ZL1. Could this be the LS7-powered Camaro that we reported on back in December?
At this point, your guess is as good as ours as to what we're looking at here, so let us know in the comments what you think this could be.

Chevy Cruze CNG available from Crazy Diamond Performance

Anyone out there who can somehow find a second way to link Pink Floyd to natural gas vehicles gets a prize. Because so far, we have one Michigan-based company called Crazy Diamond Performance (Shine On You Crazy Diamond being a longtime Floyd fave) that's setting out to convert Chevrolet Cruze vehicles to run on compressed natural gas (CNG). All in the name of cheaper fuel and domestic security, of course. Crazy Diamond says it can offer a converted CNG-powered Chevy Cruze for a price as low as $26,000. That four-cylinder version has 130 horsepower and an 8.5-gasoline-gallon-equivalent capacity that provides a full-tank range of as many as 250 miles. Pony up another $2,000 or so and the peppier, turbocharged CNG Cruze can be yours. The company says it will provide a 100,000-mile powertrain warranty and is trying to get EPA certification for its conversions. The selling points are cheaper fuel (CNG is about half the cost of regular gasoline in some parts of the country) and homeland security (CNG reduces dependence on foreign oil). The only production passenger vehicle CNG in the US is the Honda Civic CNG, which sells in very limited numbers. Check out Crazy Diamond's flyer here. Featured Gallery 2015 Chevrolet Cruze LTZ: New York 2014 View 13 Photos News Source: Crazy Diamond Performance via Hybrid Cars, Green Fleet Magazine Green Chevrolet Natural Gas Vehicles CNG