1-owner! Clean Carfax! Well Kept & Maintained! Always Serviced At Toyota!!! on 2040-cars

Auto blog

MotorWeek remembers retro icons, Supra and NSX

It's easy to poke a joke here and there about John Davis, the long-time host of MotorWeek. His voice is so monotonous that, from time to time, if you closed your eyes, you may think it's generated via a computer. But you have to give him and the rest of the show a lot of credit. The program has been on the air for decades, giving people direct, straight-down-the middle automotive reviews.
MotorWeek's massive back catalog of reviews are slowly making their way onto YouTube, and they provide a fascinating chance to look back on how performance cars rank against their contemporaries from back in the day. Two recent additions include the show's old looks at the 1986 Toyota Supra, the dawn of the third-generation model, and the now-iconic 1991 Acura NSX.
Both reviews are interesting in their own way. These days you hear nary a negative word about the original NSX, but MotorWeek isn't afraid to point out a few flaws. And the Supra really shows the progress of suspension tuning in the intervening decades because it has some serious body roll in the corners. Scroll down to check out both videos and get a blast from the automotive past.

Toyota gives up more information on Frankfurt-bound Yaris Hybrid-R concept

Toyota has undeniably carved out a niche for itself as the industry's leader in hybrid propulsion. What started out with the original Prius in 1997 has, over the past sixteen years, ballooned to what Toyota reports as a global hybrid portfolio of 23 models. But few (if any of them) are particularly exciting.
That's where the Yaris Hybrid-R concept comes in. Set to be showcased along with the rest of Toyota's hybrid and fuel-cell lineup at the upcoming Frankfurt Motor Show next month, the concept starts with one of the Japanese auto giant's least exciting models and upgrades it to more enticing territory. Toyota Motorsport GmbH - the same Cologne, Germany-based division that operated the company's F1 team, currently runs its Le Mans program and gave us that bonkers 650-horsepower Lexus LS - has slotted in a version of Toyota's new 1.6-liter Global Race Engine and paired it with a couple of electric motors for hybrid propulsion and through-the-road all-wheel drive.
Like the TS030 Hybrid LMP1, the Yaris Hybrid-R concept uses a super capacitor (instead of a conventional battery) to store the regenerated brake energy and give it upwards of 400 horsepower. That's about all Toyota is revealing at this point, but this is the first time it has confirmed the project is based on a Yaris, of all things, and the confirmation comes with the solitary teaser rendering you see above. Check out the press release after the jump and watch this space for more as Frankfurt fast approaches.

Foreign automakers pay from $38 to $65 per hour to non-union workers

As leaders for the United Auto Workers gather in Detroit for their Special Convention on Collective Bargaining to work out the negotiating stance for this year's new labor agreements with the Detroit 3 automakers, what they most want to do is figure out how to eliminate the two-tier wage scale. However, the lower Tier 2 wage has allowed the domestic automakers to reduce their labor costs, hire more workers, and compete better with their import competition. As it stands, per-hour labor rates including benefits are $58 at General Motors, $57 at Ford, and $48 at Fiat-Chrysler – a reflection of FCA's much greater number of Tier 2 workers. The Center for Automotive Research released a study of labor rates (including benefits) that put numbers to what the imports pay: Mercedes-Benz pays the most, at an average of $65 per hour, Volkswagen pays the least, at $38 per hour, and BMW is just a hair above that at $39 per hour. Among the Detroit competitors, Honda workers earn an average of $49 per hour, at Toyota it's $48 per hour, Nissan is $42 per hour, and Hyundai-Kia pays $41 per hour. The lower import wages are aided by their greater use of temporary workers compared to the domestics. Automotive News says the ten-dollar gap between those foreign camakers and the domestics turns out to about an extra $250 per car in labor, which adds up quickly when you're pumping out many millions of cars. That $250-per-car number is one that, come negotiating time, the Detroit 3 will want to reduce, as the UAW is trying to raise both Tier 1 and Tier 2 wages. Another wrinkle is that the domestic carmakers are considering the wide adoption of a third wage level lower than Tier 2. Some workers who do minor tasks like assembling parts trays kits and battery packs already make less than Tier 2, but the UAW will be quite wary about cementing yet another wage scale at the bottom of the system while it's trying to fight a bigger battle at the top. News Source: Automotive News - sub. req., BloombergImage Credit: AP Photo/Erik Schelzig Earnings/Financials UAW/Unions BMW Chevrolet Fiat Ford GM Honda Hyundai Kia Mercedes-Benz Nissan Toyota Volkswagen labor wages collective bargaining labor costs