2006 Toyota Land Cruiser 4wd 182k Miles Dealer Serviced 3rd Row! on 2040-cars

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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

Japanese dealer petitioning Lexus for luxury van [w/poll]

Used to be that if you wanted a luxury automobile - especially one to be chauffeured around in - your choices were basically limited to a sedan. It could be bigger or smaller, more or less expensive, depending on your needs and budget, but it was always going to have four doors and a trunk. But these days the rich and famous are looking elsewhere for their commodious forms of pampering transportation. There are, of course, the crossovers and SUVs, which only seem to be getting bigger and more expensive thanks to the likes of the Mercedes-Benz G-Class, Range Rover L and upcoming Bentley sport-ute. But luxury vans are becoming the new big thing.
That's the point that one dealer in Japan is trying to make to Toyota. The dealership owner himself reasons that if he's going out on the town, he's likely to take his chauffeured Lexus LS. But if he's taking a few friends along, even the biggest sedan isn't going to cut it. So he takes a Toyota Alphard (pictured above, also known as the Vellfire), a JDM van that's even bigger than a Voxy/Noah or Sienna but hardly a high-end affair. That's why he's asking Lexus to make a luxury van.
The idea may seem a little far-fetched, but isn't without precedent. It didn't take much for Lexus to transform the Land Cruiser into the LX and thus create its first luxury SUV. And as Mercedes has shown with pimped-out versions of the Sprinter and now with the debut of the new V-Class in Geneva, there's clearly a market for it... in some countries, anyway. The only question in our minds is how long it's going to take other luxury automakers to catch on, because let's face it: the Chrysler Town & Country ain't gonna cut it for those used to be driven around in a Maybach.

The Toyota GT86 Shooting Brake Concept is real

As a two-door wagon the shooting brake exists at the unusual but captivating intersection between practicality and sportiness. This Toyota GT86 Shooting Brake Concept is no different – it's a standard GT86, with no mechanical alterations save the grafted-on wagonette roof and hatch. It's fully functional, too, having turned some laps on Toyota's test tracks. It even has the blessing of Tetsuya Tada, the father of the Toyota 86 and its Subaru BRZ and (now rebadged) Scion FR-S, who's been protective of the original GT86 concept to the point of strenuously resisting any serious power upgrades. This isn't the first shooting brake concept we've seen from the Toyobaru twins, but it's the first Toyota-badged one. Subaru brought the Cross Sport Design Concept to the 2013 Tokyo Motor Show. So how did the GT86 Shooting Brake Concept happen? The story, as Toyota tells it, involves the company's Australian design team. They created a 1/4-scale clay model of the shooting brake, and showed it to Tada when he visited in late 2014. He was so impressed, Toyota says, that he had his hand-picked craftsman in Japan bring the idea to full-scale fruition. The Australian design team, in the outdoor-loving spirit of their country, immediately thought that the longer roof would be perfect for carrying surfboards and other unwieldy sports equipment. And it would be. Meanwhile, Tada and the rest of the Toyota corporation want to tamp down expectations. It's a design study, the company says, and it's just "testing the waters." Toyota won't rule anything out, and Mazda recently surprised everyone with the MX-5 RF's unusual and attractive targa model. Maybe in a world where Mazda felt confident enough to introduce the RF, Toyota can be daring enough to bring a sporty wagon to the masses. We can hope, and maybe if we all make enough noise together Toyota will make it a reality. Related Video: Featured Gallery Toyota GT86 Shooting Brake Concept Scion Subaru Toyota Coupe Hatchback Wagon Concept Cars Performance shooting brake toyota gt86 gt86