Hasta La Gadget!

Ford continues to add new fuel-efficient EcoBoost engines to power a variety of vehicles in its global vehicle lineup. Ford recently announced a new 1.5-liter EcoBoost engine that will join its lineup of fuel-efficient turbocharged engines. Ford says the new engine will help to meet the strong global demand for four-cylinder EcoBoost powertrains.

Ford now has the capacity to build 1.6 million EcoBoost engines annually with the addition of the new 1.5-liter model. By the end of 2013, Ford will have six plants across Europe, Asia, and North America producing EcoBoost engines. That is three times as many facilities producing these engines as Ford had in 2010.

The 1.5-liter engine is the fifth member of the EcoBoost family and will be produced initially at Ford’s facility in Craiova, Romania. Mass production of the new engine will begin later this month and Ford says that other manufacturing locations for the engine will be announced in the future. The first vehicle to get the new 1.5-liter engine will be the Ford Mondeo that will debut in China later this month at Auto Shanghai 2013.

The 1.5-liter engine will also find its way under the hood of the Fusion sedan in North America and the new Mondeo in Europe a later date. The engine uses an aluminum block and has twin-cams. It also features the integrated exhaust manifold introduced on the 1.0-liter EcoBoost engine. Ford says that the 1.5-liter EcoBoost will deliver similar horsepower and torque compared to its current 1.6-liter EcoBoost.

[via Ford]

Ford launches 1.5-liter EcoBoost engine is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Having the crown for the best car of the year is certainly something, but claiming the top spot for the best-selling car is just plain good for business. It’s turns out that the Ford Focus is the world’s top-selling vehicle of 2012, with a close second going to the Toyota Corolla, and third place going to Ford’s F-series of trucks.

The data comes from Polk, who monitors and gathers information on global new-vehicle registration data. According to the numbers, Ford sold just over 1.02 million Focuses in 2012, Toyota sold just under 873,000 Corollas, and Ford again sold just over 785,500 F-series trucks. However, what’s most interesting is what vehicle took the fourth spot.

Coming in fourth place, selling almost 770,000 units, is the Wuling Zhiguang, which is an odd-looking mini van that sells in China. Wuling is co-owned by General Motors and SAIC Motors, so essentially, GM’s top-selling vehicle in 2012 was this weird-looking thing. The only other GM vehicle in the top 10 is the Chevy Cruze, which came in at number 8 with 661,000 sold.

Other vehicles that appeared in the top 10 list include the Toyota Camry with 729,800 units sold, the Ford Fiesta selling 723,100 units, the VW Golf selling just under 700,000, the Honda Civic with 651,160 units sold, and the Honda CR-V at 625,000 sold.

[via Automotive News]

Ford Focus named best-selling car in 2012 is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Automotive manufacturers are using every trick in the book to squeeze more fuel efficiency of their vehicles to help buyers at the pump and to meet looming federal mandates for efficiency. One of the ways many manufacturers are doing this is by going to automatic transmissions that have more forward speeds. Having a transmission with more speeds allows lower engine RPMs on the highway leading to less fuel consumption.

In the past, many vehicles had used four or five-speed automatic transmissions. The six-speed automatic transmission became common over the last several years and now manufacturers are looking beyond that to seven and eight-speed transmissions. Ford and General Motors recently announced that they will jointly develop advanced nine and 10-speed automatic transmissions.

The two automakers say that the initial design and engineering work on the new transmissions is already underway. The new transmissions being developed will be used for both front and rear wheel drive vehicles and promise better fuel efficiency and improved performance. The agreement between Ford and GM marks the third time in the last decade the two automakers have collaborated on transmissions.

Previous engineering tie-ups between the two companies helped produce high-quality six-speed transmissions for front-wheel-drive vehicles. The two automakers have delivered more than 8 million of these transmissions to vehicles around the globe. The nine and 10-speed automatic transmissions will be used in just about every automotive segment including cars, crossovers, SUVs, and trucks. More details will be announced closer to the launch of transmissions.

[via Ford]

Ford and GM team up to develop advanced nine and 10-speed transmissions is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Toyota and Ford are battling over numbers, each claiming to have the top numbers and the bestselling global nameplate. First Ford published its numbers, which put itself in the top slot, only for Toyota to follow up a short while later with its own numbers, which trumped Ford’s and bumped the latter company down to second place.

The problem stems with deciding whose numbers are correct. According to Ford, which is going with data by R.L. Polk & Co., its Focus is the top-selling compact car at 1.02 million sales in 2012. Toyota disagreed, and stated later that same day that its Corolla is top, with sales clocking in at 1.16 million, a fairly substantial jump over the 872,774 sales pegged by R.L. Polk & Co.

This isn’t the first time Ford and Toyota have butted heads over which manufacturer’s vehicle outsold the other, with both having claimed top 6-month global car sales last fall. That time around, Ford used data from IHS Automotive, which neglected to include certain derivative varieties of the Corolla in its report. Not surprisingly, Toyota took issue with the data and claim.

According to Toyota’s US Vice President Mike Michels, “Corolla registrations attributed to Polk come up short by nearly 300,000 units. This discrepancy is glaring and we have requested clarification.” No response has been provided yet, however. Until things are clarified, Ford is maintaining its claim as being in the top position, something that is no small success in light of Toyota’s long history of domination in the car market.

[via Bloomberg]

Toyota says Corolla outsold the Focus despite Ford’s claims is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Ford has been hit with a class action lawsuit by its customers across fourteen states due to an issue with certain models subject to spontaneous acceleration with no way to stop. The lawsuit specifically concerns Ford cars from 2002 to 2010, with claims that the manufacturer deliberately hid the issue from buyers, resulting in the sale of vehicles that aren’t worth as much as the consumers paid.

Says the lawsuit, which was filed in a federal Huntington, West Virginia court on Friday: “Ford could have and should have prevented the dangers presented by these foreseeable incidents by including [a fail-safe system or brake-override feature]. Ford affirmatively concealed from plaintiffs and the other class members the defect.”

Specific models listed in the lawsuit include the 2002 to 2005 Mercury Cougar, the 2005 to 2010 Ford Mustang, and the 2004 through 2010 Ford Explorer. There are 19 plaintiffs listed that represent owners from 14 states across the US, ranging from Florida to New York and a bunch between. They hope to have representatives from every state by the time trial starts.

For those interested, this is case Belville v. Ford Motor Co., 12-cv-06529, U.S. District Court, Southern District of West Virginia (Huntington). Earlier this month, Ford recalled nearly 200,000 vehicles due to an issue that could potentially cause a sudden engine stall, which also posed a safety risk, although no crashes had been reported due to the issue.

[via Bloomberg]

Ford hit with class action lawsuit over spontaneous acceleration is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.