Archive for the ‘Cube’ Category

Do you avoid drinking out of clear plastic water bottles, using antiperspirants with aluminum, or cooking in non-stick pans? Use a water purifier and ionizer everywhere you go, always buy organic, mind your cold-water fish list, and have your tap water checked yearly?

If so, we've found either a new source of anxiety in your life or a handy tool to factor into your next car purchase.

HealthyStuff.org is a relatively new information portal for the Ann Arbor, Michigan-based Ecology Center, which uses an X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) device to test interior components in vehicles for substances "with known toxicity, persistence, and tendency to...

Think that the design of the Volkswagen New Beetle is more hideous than iconic?

Apparently you're not alone. Business Week has posted its "Fifty Ugliest Cars of the Past 50 Years," including a number of models present and past, and the New Beetle is just one of the newer and still-produced models on the list. Others include the Cadillac Escalade, Chevrolet Avalanche, Chrysler PT Cruiser, Honda Element, Hummer H2, Jeep Compass, Nissan Cube, and Toyota Prius.

They're particularly tough on the Escalade, sounding more like SUV-haters than design critics: "The perfect car design if fuel, practicality, maneuverability, and class mean nothing...

Korean automaker Kia seems to be on a roll these days -- at least on the design front. Its boxy Scion xB/Nissan Cube competitor, the Kia Soul, has held its own in the face of discerning auto journalists, and the sporty Kia Forte Koup looks to do similarly well. Now the company has shared renderings of its new premium model, the VG, which will arrive in Korean showrooms later this year.

The VG debuted at the Seoul Motor Show last spring as a front-wheel-drive concept dubbed "KMD-5", and rumor has it that the VG will remain a FWD when it makes its first American appearance at the 2010 Detroit Auto Show. Depending on public and press reaction...