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Camaro chief: 'rock-star' 4-cylinder set for Mustang fight

It was inevitable, the 2016 Chevy Camaro had to have a four-cylinder engine. The archrival Ford Mustang packs a spunky 2.3-liter EcoBoost four-banger, and everyone from BMW to Subaru uses four-cylinders to great effect to power their sports cars. Now it's Chevy's turn. Again. The Camaro ran the infamous Iron Duke four-cylinder with 88 to 92 horsepower in the 1980s. It was a fuel-economy play at a time when performance was not a priority. After the 1970s muscle-car era, output even for the V8s didn't top 200 hp again until the mid-'80s. Thankfully for enthusiasts, things have changed dramatically in the last 30 years. The gen six Camaro will offer a 2.0-liter inline four-cylinder with 275 horsepower. It's the standard engine, slotting below the 335-hp V6 and the 455-hp V8. But don't mistake the new I4 for an Iron Duke encore. Camaro chief engineer Al Oppenheiser called it a "rock star" and said cars equipped with it feel lighter than V6 models. The four-cylinder (295 pound-feet at 3,000-4,500 rpm) also summons more torque in quicker fashion than the V6 (284 lb-ft at 5,300 rpm). Chevy expects the Camaro to hit 60 miles per hour in "well under six seconds," according to press materials. The Mustang EcoBoost (310 hp, 320 lb-ft) clocks times in the low to mid five-second range. "We're not doing it just so we have one," Oppenheiser said. "We're not doing it because like in gen three you're forced to do it because of fuel economy. We're doing it because it belongs in the car. It has a distinct character." Speaking with Autoblog recently at the Detroit Grand Prix racecourse on Belle Isle, Oppenheiser said he expects the I4 to attract a younger crowd to the Camaro and will put up stiff competition against the V6 for sales. "I've read blogs where younger folks won't buy a Camaro because it doesn't have a 2.0-liter turbo or a turbocharged four-cylinder," he said. "So we're going to excite them." While we talked a lot about four-cylinder engines, Oppenheiser also elaborated on the V6 (It's pretty damn good, too. We drove it.) and the new Alpha platform that the Camaro borrowed from Cadillac. Here's the rest of our edited conversation. Autoblog: Talk a little bit about the four-cylinder – the first turbo four-cylinder ever for Camaro. Do you have any idea what the take rate's going to be? Al Oppenheiser: I think it's going to surprise a lot of people. It's actually a fun car to drive. It's got a really good balance of turbo noise and exhaust note.

2022 GMC Sierra Denali Ultimate vs. 2022 Ram 1500 Limited Longhorn vs. Ford F-150 Limited | Luxury truck interior face-off

GMC's new uber-expensive 2022 Sierra Denali Ultimate is the latest luxury truck to nudge toward six-figure territory. With demand for upmarket half-tons surging, GMC's otherwise-solid pickup found itself in desperate need of an interior remodel. For 2022, we're getting just that, and it appears ready to take the fight to the segment's best, including the 2022 Ram 1500 Limited and 2022 Ford F-150 Limited. Here's the new Denali Ultimate interior in all of its full-grain, open-pore glory. 2022 GMC Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate vs. 2021 GMC Denali  Not only did the material quality and styling both improve greatly, but the new truck also gets a completely different shifter setup (truck buyers don't like column shifters anymore, apparently). It would actually be difficult to overstate the quality of the upgrade here; the photos really speak for themselves. It's also worth noting that in addition to looking significantly more upscale than the model it's succeeding, the new Denali interior also differs a bit more from its Chevy counterpart than its predecessor did. Here's the new Silverado High Country for reference: While some elements do carry over, the entire dash design is different, down to the positioning of the heating and cooling vents. While the main HVAC controls are essentially carried over, note that they're pretty much the only ones. Even the horizontal bar of switches running along the center stack is positioned differently between the two. Yep. This is a pretty big upgrade over the 2021 cabin, and clearly the range-topper in GM's truck hierarchy. But what of the competition? 2022 GMC Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate vs. 2022 Ram Limited Longhorn Southfork This one's tough. We're going to have to spend time in them back to back, but the Ram Limited, with its various anniversary editions and other special permutations, is certainly the interior to beat. To our eyes, the Sierra's more horizontal layout is a bit more modern and perhaps luxurious-looking than the more upright cabin treatment of the Ram, but it's tough to say for certain from photos. Both the Denali Ultimate and Ram Limited carry their upscale feel into their back benches too, which is something we can't say quite as confidently about our next contestant.  2022 GMC Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate vs. 2021 Ford F-150 Limited The Ford F-150 Limited holds its own, but it's probably the least photogenic of the models we've looked at here, at least apart from the outgoing Denali.

Bosch fined $57.8 million by DOJ for price fixing and bid rigging

The US Department of Justice has been investigating bid rigging and price fixing among automotive parts suppliers for years, and so far the agency has leveled nearly $2.5 billion in fines against 34 companies. The latest business to be caught in this ongoing crackdown is Germany's Robert Bosch GmbH (Bosch), the world's largest independent auto component maker, and it agrees to pay a $57.8 million criminal fine to the Feds. According to the DOJ, Bosch has agreed to plead guilty to pricing fixing and bid rigging for spark plugs and oxygen sensors supplied to the former DaimlerChrysler, Ford and General Motors. The rigging is said to have occurred between January 2000 and July 2011. Bosch also allegedly played foul with starter motors sold to Volkswagen from January 2009 until at least June 2010. Bosch and other companies allegedly conspired on the pricing for bids to submit to automakers, and sold the parts at noncompetitive prices. The DOJ filed a one-count felony charge in US District Court for these actions. The company's plea is still subject to court approval, though. Bosch is only the third European company to be charged in this investigation, according to the DOJ. So far, many of the fined businesses have been from Japan, including Takata, NGK and others. Some execs have claimed price-fixing has been the standard operating procedure in the auto parts industry for a long time. Robert Bosch GmbH Agrees to Plead Guilty to Price Fixing and Bid Rigging on Automobile Parts Installed in U.S. Cars Robert Bosch GmbH, the world's largest independent parts supplier to the automotive industry, based in Gerlingen, Germany, has agreed to plead guilty and to pay a $57.8 million criminal fine for its role in a conspiracy to fix prices and rig bids for spark plugs, oxygen sensors and starter motors sold to automobile and internal combustion engine manufacturers in the United States and elsewhere, the Department of Justice announced today. According to the one-count felony charge filed today in the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Michigan, Bosch conspired to allocate the supply of, rig bids for, and to fix, stabilize and maintain the prices of, spark plugs and oxygen sensors sold to automobile and internal combustion engine manufacturers such as DaimlerChrysler AG, Ford Motor Company, General Motors Company and Andreas Stihl AG & Co., among others, in the United States and elsewhere.