Autos For Us

The newest Volkswagen Group brand in Australia, Cupra, is expected to sell more than 1000 cars in its first six months on sale.

The sporty Spanish offshoot of SEAT says it has taken more than 1500 orders since hitting Australia in May, and will deliver more than 1000 cars by the time 2022 draws to a close.

“The year has been a pretty wild ride for our customers and for us, but a tremendous success as well,” Cupra Australia brand director Ben Wilks told CarExpert.

“1500 plus orders, we’ll finally deliver more than 1000 cars. Of course we have had some cars that were slower to get here than we’d like, and that’s holding us up from a delivery point of view,” he said.

With 914 sales to date in 2022, Cupra is currently sitting near new electric brand BYD (845) on the sales charts, along with

Hyundai’s transition from internal combustion engine cars to battery-electric vehicles is already well underway, led by the flagship Ioniq 5 and Ioniq 6.

The brand’s ‘N’ performance division is now set on injecting some fun factor into battery-powered vehicles.

Its high-powered, dual-motor Ioniq 5 N debut EV is therefore being designed find plenty of favour from the current crop of traditional petrolheads out there.  

“We want to get the petrolheads who still today say they will never drive an EV because this is no fun,” said Hyundai Executive Technical Advisor and all-round N brand guru Albert Biermann.

“So we want to have some of those guys sitting in an Ioniq 5 N and going on track days with the Ioniq 5 N and giving that traditional-thinking petrolhead a good lesson as to what is a fast lap around a race track.

“[It] could be fun to

As reported last week, another Chinese brand is preparing to hit the Australian market in 2023, with dual-cab utes on the launch menu – both diesel and (shortly after) electric.

The company is called JAC Motors (full name Anhui Jianghuai Automobile Group Co., Ltd), and is State-owned, based in Hefei, and trades on the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

Little-known here, it sold more than 500,000 vehicles last year and claims to have exported more than 700,000 cars to 130 countries and regions in its history.

As well as making EVs, cars, utes, vans, trucks and buses, it’s also a tier one supplier of chassis, drivetrains and axles. Moreover, the company claims that among its 5000-strong R&D team are a subset dedicated to vehicles for western markets.

JAC also operates a Chinese joint-venture with Volkswagen, and is contracted to produce premium electric vehicles for fast-growing startup Nio through another joint venture announced

Volkswagen expects to record close to zero Golf hatchback sales in the first quarter of 2023 due to a supply issue affecting a specific chip.

A spokesperson for the company told CarExpert that VFACTS figures for the first quarter will consist solely of the unaffected wagon and any leftover hatchback stock.

The missing chip powers the reversing camera, and Volkswagen Australia says it won’t import vehicles without this feature.

Volkswagen is adamant, however, that the Golf isn’t being pulled from the market like the Ford Focus and that this is merely a temporary obstacle.

Customers looking to purchase a Golf and who don’t want to wait will be directed to the T-Roc, which the company says will be in very good supply next year.

The spokesperson also told CarExpert that Volkswagen is no longer the “Golf company” and that even with this supply blackout, the brand is still

Former Holden chief designer, Australian Mike Simcoe, has continued his march into the uppermost levels of management at General Motors (GM).

Starting January 1, Mr Simcoe will move into the role of senior vice-president, Global Design, having previously served as vice-president without the ‘senior’ tag attached.

The new title for GM’s head designer “signifies continued emphasis on design as GM accelerates transformation to an all-electric future”, the company told shareholders.

Mr Simcoe has led GM Global Design since 2016, after his work across Australia and the Asia Pacific drew notice from the very top. Prior to this he was responsible for design in GM’s international markets.

He joined GM in 1983 as a designer at Holden in Australia, became director of GM Asia Pacific Design in 1995 and executive director in 2003, and then moved on to become executive director of GM North American Exterior Design the following year.

Under

A virtual dual-clutch gearbox (DCT) dubbed ‘N e-shift’ is among the most interesting of a suite of technologies being developed for Hyundai’s first high-performance electric vehicle (EV), the Ioniq 5 N.

In development onboard the N brand’s ‘rolling lab’ concept known as the RN22e, said N e-shift feature seeks to match the overall feel of a paddle-shift action of the DCT in a petrol-fuelled N model.

There’s also intended to be an accompanying sound that mirrors the engine revs right up to the bap, bap, bap of the rev limiter, via speakers. At least, that’s the part the engineers are working on now in readiness for sign-off in around April or May 2023.

“The idea is to come pretty close to the feel and sound of the DCT in the i30 N hatch,” said Hyundai Executive Technical Advisor and all-round N brand guru Albert Biermann.

“This is what we want

The design of the new Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray hybrid has been revealed, not by a leaked patent filing, or unapproved photo taken at a factory or proving ground, but by the online configurator going live ahead of schedule.

User KK87 on the Mid-Engine Corvette Forum found the configurator, and managed to post screen caps of it before GM took down that part of the Chevrolet website.

From what we can see, the E-Ray seems to use the wider body panels fitted to the Z06. To help differentiate the two, the vents at the rear, the plastic trim around the side air intakes, and the blade that spans the grille and front intakes are all colour coded instead of being finished in gloss black.

The E-Ray also misses out on the Z06’s front splitters, side sill extensions, and large rear wing.

There doesn’t seem to be a visible flap for a

General Motors has filed a trademark in Australia for the Cadillac Lyriq, its flagship brand’s first electric vehicle.

There are two separate filings for the nameplate, both with a filing date of November 14, 2022.

“The Cadillac Lyriq name and logo were recently trademarked, which has caused speculation,” said a spokesperson for GM Specialty Vehicles, which imports and distributes GM vehicles in Australia and New Zealand.

“It is common practice for GM to secure key trademarks globally. GM has several brands registered, to protect them from unapproved usage.

“Given the strong interest, it’s not unusual for some registrations to create excitement.

“But we aren’t making any announcements about Cadillac and our focus is on Chevrolet Silverado and Chevrolet Corvette.”

GM doesn’t currently have any other local trademark filings for Cadillac products. For example, a search on IP Australia doesn’t reveal any listings for, for example, the Escalade. Nor are

If you’ve never driven a 2022 Ford Mustang GT before, and you jump in, sling it into Sport+ or Race mode, and stomp the gas, you’re going to think you’re driving a pig, and a very angry one at that.

You see, while you can drive the Mustang like you stole it from a train station car park in the dodgiest suburb nearest you, you really shouldn’t, not straight out of the box, and not until you’ve had time to become properly acquainted with this beast.

You need to learn its various drive modes and the behaviours in each one first, so that you’ll also discover that it’s mostly not a piggy wiggy, but rather a higher performance car that offers good on-road behaviour, and makes a great daily driver for sports car fans.

Under the hood is a 5.0-litre V8 delivering 339kW power and 556Nm of

With Europe, and then later Japan, the initial target markets, Abarth is going electric, with the 500e recently launched. Developed in partnership with its fan base, it will even include a sound generator to ensure lovers of the “roar” won’t have to give it up.

A special launch edition of the Abarth 500e called the “Scorpionissima” will be limited to 1,949 units worldwide, paying tribute to the company’s birth year. The launch edition comes in optional Acid Green or Poison Blue paint, new side graphics and one trim level.

It features exclusive diamond-Cut Titanium Grey alloy wheels and will be available in both hatchback and cabrio. The interior has a fixed glass roof in the hatchback, with rear privacy glass, some sporty pedals and a kickplate, engraved with the new Abarth lighting bolt logo.

The Dashboard is nicely laid out and features some sports mode screens, specifically