It’s a classic tale, really. Man sees lottery giving away a Chevy Corvette and some cash. Man purchases scratch-off lottery ticket hoping to win said Chevy Corvette and some cash. Man wins the lottery—but the lottery can’t source a Corvette for the winner, and now lawyers are involved and you’re reading about the whole kerfuffle here. So maybe that isn’t a tale as old as time, but it sure is kind of amusing. Really, how could the Georgia lottery not have lined up a Corvette for the ultimate winner of its Corvette giveaway ahead of time? It’s like the U.S. Treasury sending you an I.O.U. for your tax return because it forgot to print checks.
Expectant new Corvette owner Dennis Kahler won the lottery fair and square, and according to the Corvette Forum where this is all laid out, his win was acknowledged in a letter from the Georgia Lottery. He also was told that [...]
Update: This post, which was originally published on December 5, 2019, has been updated to reflect the latest release date for “No Time to Die”. The film is now due to hit theaters on October 8, 2021.
James Bond is the quintessential spy. The orphan turned assassin likes to work alone, but frequently shares the silver screen with some pretty hot sheet metal. The second trailer for the latest Bond film, No Time to Die, gives us a more thorough look at the 25th Bond film that’s been postponed (again) and is now due to hit the big screen on October 8, 2021.
Like the first one, the newest trailer is packed with action. Once again, we see Bond’s Aston Martin DB5 with miniguns in its headlamps, as well as a number of Land Rover Defenders racing about off-road. This is the fifth and likely final James Bond film Daniel Craig will headline, and we [...]
I wrapped up 2020 the same way I started it, with a cross-country trip from Los Angeles to Houston. Last year I drove our long-term Volvo S60 to visit my family during the holidays and had such a great time that I decided to repeat it (and who knows, maybe it will become a tradition). This time, my chariot was our 2021 Toyota Venza—the hybrid-only SUV that serves as an alternative in Toyota’s SUV lineup to the off-road-looking RAV4. I’ve chaperoned the Venza since October, but this was the first time I took it on a long road trip, and overall it excelled at its job. Instead of opting for the direct route, I went via the scenic way.
My road trip started before 5 a.m. when I left Playa del Rey and headed south to San Diego, where I then took I-8 to Tucson. Instead of taking the direct and boring way on the [...]
Don’t expect French automaker Peugeot to return to the U.S. anytime soon. Now that PSA Group has merged with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles to create Stellantis, adding another brand to the U.S. market has lost its urgency. At this stage, no final decision has been made, says PSA Group CEO Carlos Tavares, who held his first press conference as Stellantis CEO today. But bringing back Peugeot, which left North America in 1991, is not a priority for Stellantis which will focus on making existing brands profitable in North America before adding new ones, Tavares said.
“We don’t need to introduce more brands than the ones we have in the U.S.,” Tavares said during a press conference that lasted almost two hours. And that wasn’t the only big revelation—another surprise to emerge from today’s Stellantis introduction is that the new conglomerate plans to keep all 14 of the brands being collated in the Fiat Chrysler–PSA Group merger.
[...]Batteries are fussy. You have to watch them like a hawk when charging or discharging them. Irregular voltage can hasten battery wear at best or trigger a fire or explosion at worst. So circuitry is included to monitor groups of perhaps 16 individual cells. These are currently connected to the main battery monitoring system by twisted pairs of copper wire—which adds a lot of mass, cost, and opportunity for failure at all these connection points. At CES 2021, there were two important wireless battery management system announcements: TI Automotive provided in-depth information on its system, and GM announced that the Ultium battery pack set to power the forthcoming GMC Hummer EV, Cadillac Lyriq, and Cadillac Celestiq, as well as future Chevys and Buicks, would feature a wireless battery management system.
