2012 Lincoln Mks Awd Sedan 4-door 3.7l2012 on 2040-cars

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Ford and Lincoln design honcho leaves to head Nissan North America design

Last Friday, David Woodhouse suddenly resigned from his dual positions as Ford's director of global strategic design and director of Lincoln design. In a post not long after leaving, he praised the efforts of his former team over the past six years he headed design at Lincoln. Among other products, that crew gave us the redesigned Navigator, the Continental concept and production sedan, and the Aviator concept and production crossover. Car Design News reports Woodhouse traded Michigan for California, taking the role of VP at Nissan Design America in San Diego. He officially assumes the position July 1, and will also serve on the Japanese automaker's Global Nissan Design Management Committee. Woodhouse has spent more than 25 years in the design department, starting with BMW and work on the Mini and Range Rover brands, followed by a brief stint with Cadillac of Europe. For the past 20 years he's been with Ford, coming on board with the Ford's former luxury arm known as the Premier Automotive Group — Jaguar, Land Rover, Aston Martin, Volvo and Lincoln. He became Lincoln's design director in 2013, introducing the world to the design language labeled "quiet flight." He described the language's details as "anti-wedge body gestures, S-curves wherever possible, and an emphasis on horizontal lines at every opportunity to create leaner, longer, wider emphasis on the exteriors, and create equilibrium, balance, and calmness on the interiors." A much shorter way to describe it is: revitalized Lincolns. The U.S. luxury maker's new and overhauled products have been praised for their lines by critics and by paying customers. The brand's done so well it's hard to remember when the MKC concept was a revelation, and that goes on Woodhouse's resume, too. That's some special juju to take to Nissan, where Woodhouse will lead both Nissan and Infiniti design focused on the North American region. Nissan has a solid if uninspiring lineup that sells well here, while Infiniti, as the luxury brand, is the bigger issue. Infiniti sedans glide on the contrails of a design language more than 10 years old. The money-making crossovers and SUVs haven't made a splash in about the same time, since the long-ago FX45. Nissan's plan to update 70 percent of its lineup over the next few years and Infiniti's transition to an all-electric brand makes right now the perfect time to break into riveting designs for the street. Woodhouse replaces Taro Ueda, who moves into a global role with Nissan.

Coach Door Everything! This low-volume Lincoln Continental needs to inspire future Lincolns

One of the stranger vehicles that came through the press fleets last year was the 2020 Lincoln Continental Coach Door Edition. And it was strange for a wide array of reasons. It’s an extremely limited-production model; Lincoln only built 150 examples, plus another 80 of the 2019 80th Anniversary Edition that first featured the same rear-hinged doors. ItÂ’s also obsolete, since Lincoln ended production of the base Continental last year. And even if Lincoln kept building Continentals, the model was effectively obsolete in a world dominated by crossovers and SUVs. Plus, as weÂ’ll touch on in a bit, its driving dynamics were rather old-school for better and worse. But after spending some time with this odd car, it became clear that Lincoln managed to make something special, and the coach doors shouldnÂ’t die with the Continental. Before we dig deep into what the car is like and the lesson Lincoln should learn from it, hereÂ’s a quick refresher. The rear-hinged Continental started with the 2019 80th Anniversary Edition as a run of 80 cars, followed by the 2020 Coach Door Edition. To give it the fancy doors, as well as the extra length they required, Lincoln partnered with Cabot Coach Builders in Massachusetts. They took a Black Label model with the twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter V6, made the body modifications, and also added a few custom interior touches. Besides those changes, itÂ’s just like any other Continental Black Label. Well that, and it costs nearly $40,000 more. LincolnContinentalCoachDoors_03_HR View 36 Photos Since nothing really changes mechanically, thereÂ’s nothing about the Coach Door EditionÂ’s driving experience that sets it apart from a similarly equipped Black Label. The 400-horsepower twin-turbo V6 pulls hard all through the rev band and with no waiting. ItÂ’s a bit coarse for a luxury car engine, but the performance makes up for it. The relatively old six-speed automatic is quite smooth, though shifts are slow. Ride and handling change quite a bit depending on whether youÂ’re in the normal comfort mode or sport mode. Comfort mode does a great impression of the floaty, bobbing land yachts of the past, which is accompanied by quite a bit of body roll. Pop it into sport mode, and the body roll is significantly reduced, the steering weights up, and control is massively improved. It almost feels nimble. But the ride becomes stiff and bumpy, not something befitting a mini limo. So itÂ’s a mixed bag.

Dealers mobilize to protect their margins from automaker subscription services

Six individual auto brands — Lincoln, Cadillac, Porsche, Mercedes, BMW and Volvo — have established or are trialing a vehicle subscription service in the U.S. Three third-party companies — Flexdrive, Clutch and Carma — run brand-agnostic subscription services. And three automakers — Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and General Motors — have also launched short-term rental services. Dealers, afraid of how these trends might affect their margins, are building political and lawmaking campaigns to protect their revenue streams. So far, three states are investigating automaker subscriptions, and Indiana has banned any such service until next year. It's certain that those three states are the first fronts in a long political and legal battle. Powerful dealer franchise laws mandate the existence of dealers and restrict how automakers are allowed to interact with customers to sell a vehicle. On top of that, Bob Reisner, CEO of Nassau Business Funding & Services, said, "Dealers and their associations are among the strongest political operators in many states. They as a group are difficult for state politicians to vote against." In California earlier this year, the state Assembly debated a bill with wide-ranging provisions to protect against what the California New Car Dealers Association called "inappropriate treatment of dealers by manufacturers." One of those provisions stipulated that subscription services need to go through dealers, but that item got stripped out when dealers and manufacturers agreed to discuss the matter further. In Indiana, Gov. Eric Holcomb signed a moratorium on all subscription programs by dealers or manufacturers until May 1, 2019, to give legislators more time to investigate. Dealers in New Jersey have taken their campaign to the state capitol, asking that the cars in subscription programs get a different classification for registration purposes. Automakers run the current subscription services and own the vehicles. Sign-ups and financial transactions happen online or through apps, leaving dealers to do little more than act as fulfillment centers to various degrees, with little legal recourse as to compensation amounts when they're called on to deliver or service a car. That's a bad base to build on for business owners who've sunk millions of dollars into their operations.