Girl Sushi Car Logos

This is what happens when women with a peculiar attraction to seafood and automobiles bring out the sushi knife and the tuna.

Clockwise from top: Lexus, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Fiat (slanted logo in use between 1968 and 2000), Audi (on bottom), Toyota, Mitsubishi, Subaru.

Photo Credit: Eva Mercz

Lexus Logo

Toyota has announced they need to recall about 214,500 2006-2008 GS300/350, IS250/350 and LS460/460L sedans over potentially faulty fuel delivery pipes.

The Japanese automaker is working with the NHTSA on the US recall, which centers around fuel pipes that can corrode, eventually resulting in a leak. The problem reportedly stems from certain ethanol fuels with low moisture content that can lead to rust, occasionally (but not always) triggering a dashboard indicator lamp indicating a system malfunction.

The affected GS, IS, and LS owners should be contacted about the recall via mail, and Lexus dealers have been instructed to install the replacement parts at no cost.

So much for any car manufacturer being without problems…

First off, let me apologize to Batman for ever inferring that he would drive such a vehicle. We all know the Dark Knight drives only the best, most badass cars on the planet. Sorry Toyota, but this ain’t it. From the mind of Jon Rådbrink, the Lexus Nuaero Concept car does look incredibly fast and futuristic; but then again a Toyota that doesn’t have room for a fake front air intake on the hood or exhaust cans in the back just isn’t right.

But to be fair, this Nuaero Concept isn’t a complete wash. As mandatory for any cool car, it does look good in black, it also is lightweight, and is loaded with technology, too.

Let’s start with how the car is driven. By the Interior screenshot below, the driver would need to make use of the drive-by-wire steering PAD and a completely customizable multi-point touch screen. Rådbrink argues that our hands are far more accurate for driving than our feet, so goodbye foot pedals.

Absolutely everything is controlled via the “steering wheel”. “Since the car is powered by electrical motors [found in each of the four wheels],” Rådbrink says, “there is no transmission and you break intuitively by pushing the steering wheel away from your body.”

And even with all this state of the art stuff, the 14.5-ft. long car is designed with lightweight materials meant to increase mileage and efficiency. How light is light? The Lexus Nuaero Concept tips the scales about as much as the tiny SMART fortwo. “I believe that this design paradox of low weight and large presence could be the way we’ll define premium in the future,” Rådbrink said. Just don’t forget the awesome car to bat-bike ejection system if this ever makes it into production.  Head on over to Jon’s site to see the fancy flash gallery.

In the latest round of customer surveys conducted by U.S. market research institute J.D. Power, Mercedes-Benz has become the recipient of not 1… not 2… but 3 accolades. Receiving 2 gold awards for the highest vehicle quality in their respective market segments are the E-Class and CLK-Class, while the Platinum Award was bestowed upon Mercedes Benz’s Sindelfingen plant. The Platinum award makes it the assembly facility with the best delivered quality worldwide. Overall, Mercedes improved one place over last year – ranking fourth in overall quality – and it was also the only European brand to win an individual model award.

How does J.D. Power arrive at the results? Market researchers investigate the satisfaction of American customers within the first 90 days of their vehicle purchases, evaluating the quality of both the concept and execution of the purchased vehicle. This year, the opinions of some 80,000 verified owners were tabulated, all of whom owned 2008 model year vehicles.

To learn more about the latest J.D. Power Quality Study as well as how the Mercedes-Benz brand fared, you can find the full details below and at J.D. Power’s Website.

Enjoy.

OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE

Latest J.D. Power Quality Study from the U.S.: Mercedes-Benz receives three awards for best product quality

Stuttgart – Mercedes-Benz is one of the most successful auto brands in this year’s customer survey conducted by U.S. market research institute J.D. Power. The Stuttgart car brand receives two gold awards for the highest vehicle quality in their respective market segments, and is also honoured for the world’s best production plant. This outstanding result is one outcome of the initiative launched by Mercedes-Benz to raise customer satisfaction and product quality.

In conducting the annual study, market researchers investigate the satisfaction of American customers with new vehicle purchases within the first 90 days, and evaluate the quality of both the concept and execution of the vehicle. Overall, Mercedes-Benz moved up one place against last year from fifth to fourth, and is the only vehicle brand with three models (CLK, E and S-Class) within the top ten passenger vehicles.

This year saw the E-Class and the CLK each receive gold J.D. Power Awards. According to the U.S. study, these models are the highest quality vehicles in their market segments. Furthermore, Mercedes’ Sindelfingen plant receives the Platinum Award, making it the assembly facility with the best delivered quality worldwide.

Copyright © 2008, Daimler AG

A late night shakedown run just ahead of the start of the Nürburgring 24H race ended with Toyota having with one damaged Lexus LF-A. Of course no official reason was given for the accident, but while the team was dealing with the aftermath of busted front bits and torn up tails, the sneaky spies at KGP got down to work. The sleuthy photographers snapped off some clear-as-day spy shots of the V10 engine, stripped down interior, suspension, carbon fiber under body tray and some very C2 Corvette-like door handles. Of course, this being a supposed super race car all we can do point and laugh at the car’s lap times.

According to the full spy report provided below, after repairs to the Lexus LF-A were complete from the late night crack up, the LF-A did start on the grid as planned, but only managed a best lap of 9:19.757. Shoot, a newbee at the wheel of a Cadillac CTS-V could have bested this car (we know race traffic probably played a roll, but we retain the liberty to compare apples to oranges).

Lexus’ race-prepped LF-A prototype crashed during their final late-night preparations and qualifying, before the start of the Nürburgring 24-hour race. The incident damaged the car, and squelched Team LF-A’s efforts to familiarize themselves with driving night-time laps on the ‘Ring. No specifics were available on the circumstances of the crash (did we say it was really, really dark?), but the LF-A limped back to the pits with damage to its lower front fender, and a serious gash to its rear quarter—both on the driver’s-side. The damage was serious enough to force Team LF-A to load the car onto a flat-bed and leave the pits, in favor of Toyota’s off-site ‘Ring workshop used during the industry testing periods.

Team LF-A sources said that, in order to recover from the crash, they managed a mere two-hours sleep to get the car ready for the race the next day. The LF-A managed to make the starting grid, but within the first hour of the race the car began smoking from the rear, forcing a pit stop. The diagnosis was oil leaking from the transaxle, and a two-hour fix was required to get the LF-A back under way. At that point the LF-A had little hope of climbing the leader board. Amid varied reports on the LF-A’s final results, our sources tell us that the Lexus covered 106 laps, and a best lap of 9:19.757 on lap 85. The LF-A’s performance was good enough to finish in 120th place overall.

When Lexus announced they would be launching the ‘F’ brand to compete with the Legendary BMW M-Division and Mercedes-Benz’s AMG, quite a few folks in the industry had a good laugh. Mainly because when you hear “performance driving”, Lexus is one of the last companies that pops up into mind.

However, striving to prove that Lexus can indeed make a stand in the high-performance segment, Lexus has announced dates and pricing for their very own Lexus Performance Driving Academy; and pricing is pretty reasonable for what you get to drive.

With an option of 2 different packages, including the Lexus Performance Driving Academy and the Lexus Performance Driving Academy Ultimate, pricing runs from $0 up to $295. That’s right, the first package offers two hours of driving experience with such models as the IS 250, IS 350, GS 460, GS 450h and a ride in the new IS-F for FREE. While the second package offers a half-day exclusive on-track driving experience with you in control of the new Lexus IS-F.

Spaces are limited, so head on over to the tasteoflexus.com to signup while you still can!

Representatives from AutoAlerts.com will be present so stayed tune for a full review this coming weekend!