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J.D. Power study identifies top seats for your tush

File under News your fanny can use: The seating systems in the Ford Escape and Edge, the Audi A3, Chevrolet Cruze, Kia Cadenza, Porsche Cayenne and Toyota Tundra received top marks in a new J.D. Power study on seating and seat belt quality and satisfaction. The J.D. Power 2017 Seat Quality and Satisfaction Study asked more than 77,000 new owners and lessees of 2017 model-year cars and light trucks to rate their vehicle's seats and seat belts within the first 90 days of taking ownership. The survey is broken up into seven vehicle segments and scored on total seat problems per 100 within each segment, with awards presented to the seating system supplier. Canadian auto supplier Magna won three of seven first-place awards for its seating systems in the A3, Escape and Edge. Ireland-based Adient got top marks for its seats in the Cadenza and Cayenne. Lear Corp. won for the Cruze, and Avanzar Interior Technologies scored highest for seats in the Tundra. J.D. Power says its study is intended for automakers and suppliers with quality and satisfaction information to be used in developing and marketing seating systems. "But the results are just as interesting to a consumer audience," the company says. "After all, some drivers spend a considerable amount of time behind the wheel, and it's helpful to know which vehicles offer the most comfortable seats for those long commutes." Ain't that the truth. Ford was the only automaker whose seat systems, both manufactured by Magna, received top honors in two segments: the Escape for mass-market compact SUV and the Edge for mass-market midsize/large SUV. J.D. Power says it used 22 attributes to measure seat quality, three measures of seat belt quality and 12 to measure satisfaction. Awards were presented to the seating suppliers. Related Video: Image Credit: Audi Auto News Design/Style Audi Chevrolet Ford Kia Porsche Toyota Safety JD Power seats

Alonso wants an NSX, but did Honda block him from Le Mans?

One of the biggest changes in store for the 2015 Formula One World Championship will see Fernando Alonso moving back to McLaren. That means he'll be driving under Honda power for the first time, after spending the bulk of his career driving for Renault and Ferrari. And being Honda's new poster child, as the two-time World Champion is fast discovering, has its advantages and its drawbacks. According to the latest reports, Alonso had been negotiating a clause in his contract with McLaren that could have seen him driving a Porsche 919 Hybrid at Le Mans this year, but Honda reportedly stepped in at the last minute and scuttled the plan. The drive would have been Alonso's first in the famous 24-hour race, after having had the honor of waving the flag at La Sarthe last summer. In one of the wilder rumors that emerged during the prolonged silence over his move for this season, the Spaniard was also linked to a potential return for Ferrari to Le Mans. That prospect came to naught, and now the Porsche deal has been wheeled into the garage, as well. The upcoming F1 season is expected to be one of transition, adjustment and development for McLaren and Honda, but the Japanese automaker's involvement in his hiring may not be all bad news for Alonso. Following the reveal of the new Acura NSX, Alonso tweeted "You still don't know, but one day we will be together..." followed by a series of heart-eyed smiley-face emoticons and accompanies by images of Honda's new supercar. The implication is that the two-time World Champion is expecting to get his talented hands on an NSX of his own, and we can certainly see how Honda would appreciate the imagery of Fernando driving around in its flagship. Even if it doesn't, though, we're sure McLaren would be glad to hook him up with a company car of its own – though Lewis Hamilton encountered some trouble securing (a very specific) one for himself. Even discounting the front-running F1 machinery he's been tasked with piloting on track to an impressive 32 career wins, Alonso has had some lustworthy company cars at his disposal over the years. At Renault, he had a Megane RS to drive, and during his last stint at McLaren, he had an SLR 722. But since signing with Ferrari, he's been given the keys to FCA models as varied as a Ferrari FF, a special 599 GTO, a Maserati GranCabrio, a Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT and an Abarth 695... and those are just the ones we know about.

2017 Porsche 911 Carrera experienced from the passenger seat

Autoblog joins Porsche for Rennsport Reunion V at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, the fifth international gathering of all things Porsche. If you've ever had a picture of a Porsche on your wall or dreamed of owning a certain model, either that very car or one just like it is here. Watching three 917 racers blaze over the rise at the front straight and down into turn one can make a viewer think, "So this is how Steve McQueen felt..." It was a modern Porsche that delivered one of the highlights of the first day, though: we rode shotgun for three hot laps of the track in the new turbocharged 991.2-series 911 Carrera S, with Thomas Krickelberg, director of powertrain for the 911 model line, our pilot. We cornered him and August Achleitner, vice president of the 911 product line, for a few questions about the changes. What do you call the standard 911 now that it has turbocharged engines? Carrera. If you're wondering what to call the standard 911 now that they have turbocharged engines, the answer is: Carrera. Krickelberg said, "In-house we call them 'little turbo' and 'big turbo,'" but the Carrera is a model line within the 911 model line, the big boy 911 Turbo is a second model line within the 911 family. One will continue to be called Carrera, the other simply Turbo. The move to turbocharging came to serve the twin kings of performance and fuel economy, but engineers played around with numerous configurations. A non-turbo engine displacing about 4.0 liters – that's as big as the 9A1 engine block can go – was considered, but that setup couldn't deliver the desired fuel efficiency. Krickelberg said engineers considered a small-displacement block of around 2.0 liters, but that was abandoned because "takeoff behavior was worse" because the turbo was called upon to do too much of the heavy performance living. Krickelberg added, "Not only that, but there was a too big a gap between real-world fuel economy and homologation fuel economy." Base Carrera and the Carrera S models haven't used the same engine displacement since the 996 series departed at the end of 2004. Achleitner said, "We found 3.0 liters is the best solution to get the best mix of fuel and air in combustion chamber - it offered the best geometry, bore and stroke, and the size of the walls.