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April Fools' Day brings Jeep Sedan, Hyundai N Roadster, Toyota Yaris pickup and more

There is one day out of the year when public relations professionals have permission to lie to journalists and to the public: April Fools' Day. Manufacturers release details about wild, weird and wacky new technology, concept vehicles and services. Some take it to obvious outlandish extremes (Jeep Sedan anybody?), while others plot to mislead with products that are just outside the realm of possibility. Check out all the "jokes" below. BMW Motorrad BMW doesn't want to exclude anybody from experiencing the thrill of high-level racing, so it is introducing 'iRace" autonomous programming on its S 1000 RR sport bike. It includes beginner, sportsman, advanced and unlimited driving modes, and stores GPS information for all Superbike world championship tracks. Hyundai Hyundai is wrong for this. The Hyundai N Roadster is the work of South Korean designer Yeonjoon Park and features a 2.0-liter turbocharged engine, rear-wheel drive and a hard convertible top. Hyundai says this is a "concept (for now)," but we think it'd make a seriously great Mazda Miata competitor. Honda Honda wins the award for the best interactive gimmick, as its press release for the '90s-inspired special-edition Pastport includes a live hotline number with a message from Fred Savage. Call 1-833-PASTPORT for more information. Jeep Put the Jeep Cherokee face on the Chrysler 300's body, and voila! The 2019 Jeep Sedan is born. We can't decide if the name or the rendering is better. Land Rover Accessibility to charging ports is of major concern to anybody with a plug-in vehicle. So, with the recent launch of the Range Rover P400e and Range Rover Sport P400e, Land Rover is putting forth an effort to install more stations around the globe. First up is Scotland's Isle of Skye. Adventurers need juice too! Lexus Australia Lexus expands its Encore service to include doggos. The new service, called Enpaw, will take pups to luxury boarding kennels in style. Toyota U.S. Toyota created the Yaris Adventure pickup for "those who want to tell their friends they own a truck but never veer off pavement." It's part Mazda 2, part RAV4, 100 percent ute and it looks ... great? Creating a new segment might be all fun and games to Toyota, but Ford is reportedly considering a Focus-based ute in a similar, albeit larger, style. Toyota Australia Toyota is launching a new HiAce van, and it's already getting a limited-edition variant called the PieAce.

Japan wants to boost fuel-cell numbers 100x by 2020

How many hydrogen refueling stations will Japan need? Can each station handle 250 fuel-cell vehicles? They can in the Japanese government's new plans for hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle growth and station deployment throughout the country. With Prime Minister Shinzo Abe continuing to trumpet fuel cells as the advanced powertrain of the future, the government says the number of fuel-cell vehicle on its roads will multiply by 100 within the next four years, according to the Japan Times. Specifically, Japan, which is home to about 400 fuel-cell vehicles today, hopes to have 40,000 by 2020 and a whopping 800,000 by 2030. More importantly, Japan has 80 stations either in operation or slated to be deployed soon, and hopes to double that number by the end of the decade. For perspective's sake, the US has about two-dozen publicly accessible hydrogen fuel cell stations today, according to US Department of Energy. The newer ones are can dispense 100 kilogram a day, which can fuel 20-25 cars a day. Japanese automakers Honda and Toyota appear to be trying to do their parts in the H2 plan. Earlier this month, Honda started leasing its Clarity fuel-cell vehicle in Japan and is planning to bring them to California later in the year. The vehicle, which is priced at about $68,000 in Japan, is said to be able to travel about 466 miles on a full hydrogen tank, per the more lenient Japanese driving cycle (roughly 300 miles on the US scale). Honda will start production at a rate of 200 vehicles a year. With skin in the game, though, Honda indicated late last year that it was frustrated with what it said was the slow pace of fuel-cell station deployment in Japan, according to Bloomberg News. Honda was collaborating with hydrogen supply company Iwatani Corp. on what they called a "Smart Hydrogen Station," though that concept was in its testing phase as of last December. The Mirai also started sales in Japan and debuted in limited numbers in California last year. Last fall, Toyota set a rather lofty goal of selling 30,000 fuel-cell vehicles a year by 2020 as part of its Toyota Environmental Challenge 2050. Related Video: News Source: Japan TimesImage Credit: YOSHIKAZU TSUNO via Getty Images Green Honda Toyota Hydrogen Cars

Poor headlights cause 40 cars to miss IIHS Top Safety Pick rating

Over the past few months, we've noticed a number of cars and SUVs that have come incredibly close to earning one of the IIHS's highest accolades, the Top Safety Pick rating. They have great crash test scores and solid automatic emergency braking and forward collision warning systems. What trips them up is headlights. That got us wondering, how many vehicles are there that are coming up short because they don't have headlights that meet the organization's criteria for an "Acceptable" or "Good" rating. This is a revision made after 2017, a year in which headlights weren't factored in for this specific award. This is also why why some vehicles, such as the Ford F-150, might have had the award last year, but have lost it for this year. We reached out to someone at IIHS to find out. He responded with the following car models. Depending on how you count, a whopping 40 models crash well enough to receive the rating, but don't get it because their headlights are either "Poor" or "Marginal." We say depending on how you count because the IIHS actual counts truck body styles differently, and the Infiniti Q70 is a special case. Apparently the version of the Q70 that has good headlights doesn't have adequate forward collision prevention technology. And the one that has good forward collision tech doesn't have good enough headlights. We've provided the entire list of vehicles below in alphabetical order. Interestingly, it seems the Volkswagen Group is having the most difficulty providing good headlights with its otherwise safe cars. It had the most models on the list at 9 split between Audi and Volkswagen. GM is next in line with 7 models. It is worth noting again that though these vehicles have subpar headlights and don't quite earn Top Safety Pick awards, that doesn't mean they're unsafe. They all score well enough in crash testing and forward collision prevention that they would get the coveted award if the lights were better.