UK Engine Production

While UK car making has slipped over the years, its engine production has increased. In 1999, 2.1 million engines were made. 50% Ford, 13% Nissan, 11.5% MGR and 9.5% Land Rover. Since then GM, LR and MGR have all ceased UK engine production and BMW has come in. So what is the situation today (2008) in Old Blighty with regard to who makes what?

1) Ford; two plants, Dagenham, c. London, and

Cash For Clunkers/Scrappage Schemes

In Europe, governments have tried to stimulate car sales with incentives to get people buying them in greater numbers. The German market has gone through the roof, such is its success. In other markets the reaction has been more moderate, although these schemes do get Joe Citizen into showrooms in larger numbers. Some manufacturers have gone beyond what the government offers; to sweeten the

Toyota/Lexus Steady

In 2005, Toyota/Lexus had 11.4% of the world's car/LCV market. It went to 12.1 in 2006 but 2007 and 2008 saw it steady on 12%. In that time (05-08), its Japanese component of unit manufacturing has gone down from 50% to 47.3%. USA car making has also gone down, from 18.1% to 14%, which surprised me. Canada from 4.4% to 3.6%, the UK from 3.8% to 2.7%. Meanwhile, Thailand is up from 6% to 7.2% and

JD Power Performance, Execution and Layout (APEAL) Study

You may be thinking that a survey on Performance, Execution and Layout (APEAL) would be done by people with nothing else to do with their time. Apparently, "vehicle models achieving high APEAL scores have been shown to benefit from faster sales, less need for cash incentives and higher profit margins on each vehicle sold".
So there, it does matter. How did various brands fare?

Luxury brands,

The End Of The Line For The X-Type

Ford commissioned the X-Type to take Jaguar into serious volume territory. The problem was they were in a hurry achieve this goal. The end result was a reasonably stylish car, if not quite the style a Jaguar car needed. Ford didn't understand Jaguar. It pushed fleet sales at the expense of profit, which hurt resale values. That damaged the reputation of the X-Type to private buyers and it never

New 2010 XJ Jaguar Revealed

I could say all sorts of things about the new XJ. However, it has basically the same underpinnings as the previous one. You see, the last one was brilliant underneath but was covered by a traditional body, which appealed to older buyers. That didn't cut it. As Jay Leno said at the unveiling, you can sell a young man's car to an old man, but you can't sell and old man's car to a young man. Now

Aston Swanning Around With Toyota

Aston Martin customers often have a small car as well to zip around in, so why not make it an Aston? AM are in a feasibility study with Toyota sell a small Aston based on the clever iQ car (Pic above). Some say it sounds silly but I don't for the following reasons:

1) It will drop the average carbon emissions per car for AM.

2) Beats a small car called a Citroen, Ford or Suzuki. I mean to say