1964 Lincoln Continental on 2040-cars

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Tesla offered nuclear plant in France, and more | Autoblog Minute

Longtime GM design chief Ed Welburn retires, Lincoln says it has high customer interest in Continental, and could Tesla build the Model 3 in France? Senior Editor Greg Migliore reports on this edition of Autoblog Minute. Show full video transcript text [00:00:00] General Motors' long time Vice President of design, Ed Welburn, announced his retirement this week. He joined GM in 1972 and he's just the sixth design chief in GM's 108 years. He's being replaced by Michael Simcoe who is Vice President of design for GM's international operations. Now Ed Welburn's time at GM dates back to when he was 11 years old. He wrote a letter to the company saying he wanted to be a designer. [00:00:30] Someone at General Motors got back to him and the rest is history. Lincoln already has 40,000 hand raisers for the new Continental. Now those aren't Tesla figures but it's still a very healthy number and shows a lot of interest for its new flagship sedan. The Continental will replace the MKS in Lincoln's lineup. Continental will be in showrooms this fall and it will offer a 3.0L V6 twin-turbo with 400 HP. Lincoln President Kumar Galhotra said, "No other Lincoln vehicle has [00:01:00] generated this much interest in this little time." This week in Tesla news, Reuters reports that a French government official has offered Elon Musk the site of a an old nuclear reactor to build a car factory. The reactor, which is located in the Alsace region of France, is set to close at the end of this year. Now this notion is not that far fetched. Musk says that he would consider it. Meanwhile demand for the Model 3 continues to be strong and has attracted hundreds of thousands of hand raisers. [00:01:30] Those are the highlights form the week that was. Be sure to come back this Saturday for my full recap where I'll have additional insights into the automotive industry. For Autoblog, I'm Greg Migliore. Autoblog Minute is a short-form video news series reporting on all things automotive. Each segment offers a quick and clear picture of what's happening in the automotive industry from the perspective of Autoblog's expert editorial staff, auto executives, and industry professionals. Lincoln Tesla Autoblog Minute Videos Original Video

Ford to add Android Auto and CarPlay to 2016 SYNC 3 cars via update

Ford is updating a large number of 2016 model year cars equipped with SYNC 3 infotainment software, adding Android Auto and CarPlay to the vehicles with a free, over-the-air update via Wi-Fi, or using either USB or going through their dealer. The upgrade will be available for around 800,000 vehicles in total, giving a huge number of Ford car owners the chance to get big infotainment improvements without having to buy a newer model car. The OTA update option is also a big step for Ford – it's the company's first for software ever, and it's one of the major reasons that Ford recently hired around 400 new mobile smartphone engineers, the company tells me. For CarPlay, users will still also need to upgrade their vehicle's USB hub to make this work (which will also incur a dealer visit and a cost), but for those on Android, all that's required is a simple software installation. The USB install method is also faster, but the Wi-Fi update option is the start of the company's efforts to really increase its OTA update program, which will be used for security improvements as well as infotainment bumps. Even with a dealer visit and hardware upgrade for CarPlay, this sounds like a worthwhile thing for 2016 vehicle owners to do. CarPlay and Android Auto are huge upgrades vs. most in-car software, offering navigation and entertainment options that follow you from your phone to your car. Retroactively offering this kind of thing to car owners is a definite change in tone for carmakers, since they typically use these kinds of things as incentives to get people interested in vehicle model updates. But as data becomes increasingly important to automakers as a business, it makes sense to encourage greater in-car use of devices.Written by Darrell Etherington for TechCrunchRelated Video: Auto News Ford Lincoln Technology Infotainment android

2013-2017 Ford Explorer recalled over rear suspension issue, again

Ford is recalling about 375,000 Explorer SUV models built between 2013 and 2017 in North America to fix a potential defect in the rear suspension. In "North America states and provinces where corrosion is common," which we take to mean areas that experience harsh winters and heavily salted roads, "a fracture of the outboard section of the rear suspension toe link" is possible on affected vehicles. Ford says 350,000 of these models were sold in the United States and another 25,200 in Canada. This isn't the first time Explorers of this generation have been recalled for fractured toe links. Back in the summer of 2017, 1.2 million Explorer models were recalled over toe links that could fracture if subjected to "frequent full rear suspension articulation (jounce and rebound)." A little over a year earlier, 75,000 Explorers were recalled over, you guessed it, rear toe links that may not have been welded properly. It's not just Explorers that Ford has recalled over rear toe links. Earlier this year, the automaker issued a recall that covered nearly 230,000 Ford Flex, Taurus and Lincoln MKT models. All of these recalled vehicles ride on similar unibody underpinnings that Ford calls the D4 platform. We can't say whether these other D4-based vehicles will get another recall as the Explorer has. Ford says it is aware of as many as 13 crashes and six injuries attributable to the toe links covered under this most recent Explorer recall. Owners will need to visit their preferred dealership, which will "complete a torque inspection of the cross-axis ball joint and replace it as necessary," according to Ford. Related Video: