2006 Ford Taurus on 2040-cars

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Ford GT to be revived, Le Mans battle upcoming

Ford dominated the 24 Hours of Le Mans from 1966 to 1969, scoring four consecutive wins. Wouldn't it be great if the Blue Oval could go back to France for the 50th anniversary of that performance and show it can still compete in international endurance racing? Actually, the latest rumors indicate that could be exactly the case, and the car taking that checkered flag could be another revival of the Ford GT.
As the rumblings go, Ford wants to use a new supercar to take another crack at Le Mans, after considering some other possible alternatives. Substantiating these musings are reports that a Blue Oval rep was reportedly on hand for a recent meeting about 2016 GTE-Class rules, according to Road and Track. That would put the new GT in the same racing class as the Corvette, Ferrari 458 Italia, Porsche 911 and others.
It's not all about racing, though. If you win on Sunday, you want something to be able to sell on Monday. The revived GT is reportedly still a mid-engine supercar, but the exact engine is unclear. It's possible that it could even be shown or announced at the Detroit auto show in January, according to Motor Trend.

Translogic 174: Ford envisions the future of parking

Translogic visits Georgia Tech for a glimpse at the future of parking. First, we demo the Ford remote parking program by driving a golf cart around campus from the comfort of an off-site lab; think of remote parking as a virtual valet. Then we see how Ford's "parking spotter" works, a crowd-sourced way of finding an open space. Along the way, Translogic host Jonathon Buckley chats with Ford's global director of vehicle electrification and infrastructure, who explains how these innovative parking concepts could help us get around more efficiently. Have an RSS feed? Click here to add Translogic. Follow Translogic on Twitter and Facebook. Click here to learn more about our host, Jonathon Buckley. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT Jonathon: You turn the wheel and the cart turns the wheel because we've got to remember that the carts 150 meters down that way. I should use yards because I'm not in Australia any more. Welcome to Translogic. I'm Jonathon Buckley. Every year in this country we spend over 70 million hours looking for parking. We think that's a pretty miserable way to spend that time but Ford Motor Company and Georgia Tech have taken this problem head on by developing a parking spotter experiment and some pretty cool remote driving functions to go with it. When it comes to remote vehicle repositioning, you guys have been so far using golf carts?Mike: That's right.Jonathon: What's the goal with this type of technology?Mike: As you probably know, car sharing is becoming one of the emerging trends in mobility. With that, any type of sharing program that we looked at around the world, one of the common challenges it has is that during the end of the day, or the nighttime hours, there's something that has to happen to get all the assets back to where they need to be for the next day. Cell phone technology and broadband technologies have advanced so far that we can remotely control a vehicle from anywhere it the world. For example, we could actually take this and create a virtual valet. You and your significant other pull up to, say, a restaurant. You could potentially get out of the vehicle and then the call center could take your vehicle and park it for you. You wouldn't need to do anything [00:02:00] else other than arrive at the restaurant.Jonathon: The whole thing's pretty intuitive. It works exactly as you imagine a golf cart would work. The only difference that there really is is there's just a little bit of latency that you have to account for.

2020 Ford Escape hybrids vs other crossover fuel sippers: How they compare on paper

Along with a new generation of Escape, Ford also reintroduced the world to the 2020 Ford Escape Hybrid. And if that weren't enough, Ford is adding a plug-in hybrid version. This is a sign of the times: people are more crossover crazy than ever, but are also seeking ways to use less fuel, whether it's for environmental or purely money-motivated reasons. The Ford hybrids aren't the only fuel-efficient compact crossovers on the market. They will be going head-to-head with conventional hybrids including the 2019 Kia Niro, 2019 Nissan Rogue Hybrid and 2019 Toyota RAV4 Hybrid. There are other plug-in hybrids including the 2019 Subaru Crosstrek PHEV, 2019 Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV and the plug-in version of the 2019 Kia Niro. There are even a couple diesels in the form of the 2019 Chevy Equinox and 2019 GMC Terrain. So we've rounded up the details on all these crossovers to see who leads and lags in criteria such as power, fuel efficiency, space and price. Check out all their details below. 2019 Subaru Crosstrek Hybrid View 68 Photos How do their engines and fuel economy compare? Conventional Hybrids and Diesels Let's face it, if you're buying one of these crossovers, one of the things that matters most to you is just how frugal with fuel they are. We'll start off with the conventional hybrids and diesels, and the clear victor is the Kia Niro, which in base FE trim, manages to hit 50 mpg combined. This is thanks to it sharing its powertrain with the Hyundai Ioniq, the Hyundai equivalent of the Toyota Prius. Buyers should take note that only the FE returns such high fuel economy. The LX and EX drop to 49 mpg, and the S Touring and Touring get 43. Even then, the least efficient Niro is the most efficient of the normal hybrids and diesels. It is nearly the least powerful, though, with 139 horsepower. Just behind it is the Toyota RAV4 Hybrid. It delivers 40 mpg combined, and it has an ace up its sleeve: it comes standard with all-wheel drive. Every other vehicle in this powertrain group has front drive standard, and the Niro isn't available with all-wheel drive at all. If that weren't enough, the RAV4 Hybrid also boasts the most power at 219 horses. While we can't say anything about Escape Hybrid fuel economy, we do know that it will make 198 horsepower, which is close to the class-leading RAV4. The least powerful of these is the Equinox and Terrain, and they return the worst fuel economy at 32 mpg.