Table of contents for March 2, 2022 in Autocar

Morgan has turned to the start of its 113-year history as inspiration for an all-new £40,000 three-wheeler, the Super 3 – which, it believes, will lift vehicle production at Malvern to unprecedented levels and give the marque a bigger global presence than ever when it hits the market in August. The new model, Morgan’s first clean-sheet design since the Aero 8 in 2000, is a new take on the traditional three-wheeler that company founder HFS Morgan first started selling in 1909. It ditches the motorcycle-derived V-twin engine that has been a recurring theme in Morgan three-wheeler history in favour of a front-mounted 1.5-litre Ford inline triple, a normally aspirated 118bhp version of the one that powers the Fiesta ST. Unlike any previous Morgan three-wheeler, the Super 3’s engine is carried…

Genesis is primed to launch a wave of bespoke electric cars in the wake of the new GV60 crossover as it strives to establish itself as a stand-alone luxury brand. The Hyundai-owned firm plans to introduce its final combustion-engined model in 2025 and will usher in a family of eight bespoke EVs atop its parent company’s dedicated E-GMP platform, replacing its first-generation models over the course of this decade. The brand’s chief creative officer, Luc Donckerwolke, told Autocar that the imminent GV60 serves as “a taste of things to come” from the seven EVs that will follow it onto market. Asked whether Genesis’s new bespoke EVs will directly succeed its current petrol and diesel cars, Donckerwolke said the range won’t be so concretely defined by their physical footprints, but rather…

MANUFACTURERS HAVE BEEN working on autonomous cars for decades but the prospect (some would say, spectre) of driverless cars has become more likely in the past 10 years. A level-four autonomous car is one that requires no human attention at all, and to even get close to that, it will need at the very least the vision and cognitive powers akin to a human’s. Leaving the cognitive aspect to one side, the seeing bit is still the subject of intensive research but US firm Lumotive, founded in 2018, might have the answer. Vehicles need to be able to see a digital representation of what a driver sees to create a high-definition 3D map of their surroundings, including the size and position of all the objects around them. They also need…

The all-new Lada Niva, due in 2025, will spearhead a four-car family of offroaders, completed by a “big brother” Grand Niva and the existing Niva Legend 4x4 and Niva Travel crossover. The new Niva will be based on Lada parent company Renault Group’s CMF-B platform, as used by the overtly road-focused Renault Captur and Arkana SUVs, but the Russian manufacturer is looking at special modules to enable the Niva to live up to its forebear’s off-road capability. Lionel Jaillet, vice-president for product performance at Dacia and Lada, explained: “We’re trying to improve [the platform] as much as possible. The front and rear overhangs will be reduced and the technology will be adapted so that it’s even more capable than the [Dacia] Duster.” Lada will change the CMF-B’s dimensions and approach…

Mazda recently launched an updated version of the CX-5 SUV, its bestselling car, and is primed to unveil the CX-60 SUV as the first in a wave of hybrid models. As the brand embarks on a pivotal era of transformation and electrification, we caught up with UK managing director Jeremy Thomson to hear just how radically its positioning has evolved in recent years and how it could reach even loftier heights in the near future. What are your priorities? “Our aspiration is to become a credible alternative to the traditional mainstream premium, and that means non-German. We’re not looking to mimic German premium, because that’s very well catered for by the incumbents, and it’s probably impossible to beat them at their own game. But we do strongly feel that there’s…

Stellantis enjoyed a very healthy 2021, tripling its net profit and nearly doubling its operating income. Its net profit rose to €13.4 billion (£11.2bn), while its operating margin was up from 6.9% to 11.8%. The most popular of the wide-ranging group’s cars in Europe was the Peugeot 208 supermini, while the Jeep Wrangler SUV was its number one in the US. Stellantis has announced that its employees will benefit from a total of €1.9bn (£1.9bn) in bonuses off the back of the strong financial results. It expects to perform well again in 2022.…

HOW DO YOU speed up the development of new cars? The need to come out with relevant products faster has become much more acute as battery technology evolves ever faster and China in particular forces the pace of development. The penalty for getting it wrong has never been harsher, particularly in the EV and software-defined era. “The product life cycle of vehicles is so long that by the time you’ve launched a new vehicle, the technology can be very old,” said Neil Endley, global director for turnaround services at quality consultants Trigo. The speed at which the Chinese are replacing vehicles in particular is worrying traditional car makers. Nissan CEO Makoto Uchida voiced that fear recently, referencing the pace of China’s brands. “They do have the speed to market, which…

Portfolio diversification: two words that make investors feel all warm and fuzzy inside, the theory being that if you spread your investments across multiple types of assets, you will get improved returns and lower your risk. In other words, you shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket. However, such an approach doesn’t always guarantee success. Take Toyota, for example. For the past few decades, the Japanese manufacturer has taken a cautious approach with its ‘investments’, focusing on hybrid technology, hydrogen fuel cells and, to a much lesser extent, batteryelectric vehicles (BEVs). But this conservative BEV strategy has forced Toyota to play an aggressive game of catch-up to compete with rivals like Tesla that have achieved a stratospheric rise in market value over the past two years. Hence Toyota boss…

Sales of the Volkswagen T-Roc have exceeded expectations in many markets, including the UK, so it’s no surprise that the changes made halfway through its planned life cycle are rather subtle. There are tweaks here and there but nothing that fundamentally alters its appearance, performance or driving character in any great way. A new-look front end is the key exterior design change. It includes lightly reworked LED headlights (optionally with ‘IQ Light’ adaptive matrix projectors); a revised grille with a more heavily structured black plastic insert; an LED band either side of a larger VW badge; and a redesigned bumper with new-look air ducts and daytime-running lights. At the rear, there are lightly revised tail-lights with new LED graphics, as well as a reprofiled bumper. It also gets a revised…

MODEL TESTED xDRIVE50 M SPORT Price £96,905 Power 516bhp Torque 568lb ft 0-60mph 4.4sec 30-70mph in fourth na Fuel economy 2.4mpkWh CO2 emissions 0g/km 70-0mph 57.8m Some car manufacturers probably feel similarly about the advent of 2030, and the gradual enforced phasing out of the combustion engine that it will begin to bring to markets all over the world, as 1990s tech companies did about the arrival of the millennium bug in 2000. Just a few, however, seem bold enough to look at it like our young century’s greatest business opportunity. Having played a small but notable part in the emergent stages of the European electric car scene with the likeable i3, BMW has evidently got a busy few years of zero-emission launches planned – because, from a not-quite-standing start, the…

“When I first saw the Newbird, it all came flooding back – fondly,” says Peter Robinson, today a production supervisor at Nissan’s manufacturing plant in Sunderland, but back in 1987 a fresh-faced 19-year-old keen to make an impression in the trim and chassis shop. At that time, there were 490 people working at the plant, which had opened just a year earlier, in September 1986, assembling one model, the Bluebird, in saloon and liftback forms. Today, with Sunderland’s total production output now exceeding 10.5 million cars, more than 6000 toil away across a much larger site building Jukes, Leafs and Qashqais. Robinson, 54, is one of four factory veterans who I’ve headed north to meet. They’re the living embodiment of something very special: a great British (and Japanese) car-making success…

It’s appropriate, in a way, that Lotus boss Matt Windle – the man tasked with bringing the all-important Emira sports car to fruition – should have started his driving life in a Volvo 343, one of the least glamorous cars the Swedish marque has ever made. After all, legendary founder Colin Chapman demonstrated his earliest engineering prowess on the Austin Seven, one of the humblest cars going in Lotus’s formative post-war years. Perhaps it takes early familiarity with the lowest echelons of motoring to create machines like Lotuses, which deliver the finest dynamics while avoiding easy-win content like imposing size, impressive mass, huge power, lots of over-the-top luxury equipment and premium prices. There were indications that young Windle was heading for a successful career at the top of the automotive…

DRIVEN Lotus Emira The first all-new car from Lotus in more than a decade has finally arrived – and we’ve driven it INTERVIEW Henrik Fisker Famed designer has launched a car maker again. He tells us why it’s different this time FEATURE Kia EV6 road trip Matt Saunders once spent a week driving an EV to Scotland. It’s a quicker trip now… EVERY WEEK ROAD TEST Alpine A110 Légende GT Sports car’s softest suspension option meets its most potent engine DRIVEN Ferrari 296 GTB PHEV power arrives in a core Ferrari model. Matt Prior delivers the verdict SUBSCRIBE autocar.co.uk/subscribe or see p30…

MILEAGE 2541 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To find out if the reborn 500 in fully electric guise is just as charming to live with as it is to look at What does an electric supermini have in V6, carbonfibre-tubbed supercar? Our recent UK drive of the new Maserati MC20 revealed that it shares its infotainment system with the 500. Based on my experience of it in the Fiat, that can only be a good thing: the interface is easy to navigate, responds quickly to inputs and doesn’t overdo it on the icons. Although… what’s that adage about Italian cars and electrics? The 500 has twice now reset its units of measurement, defaulting to kilometres instead of miles, and enabled the function that sounds the horn whenever you lock the doors.…

There are few better choices than a Seat Leon if you’re after a wellrounded family car. We loved the previous model but the latest, fourth-generation car (on sale since 2020) is an even more attractive buy. It offers a versatile mix of petrol, diesel and electrified powertrains, as well as hatchback and estate bodystyles, and its refinement and equipment levels match those of its Volkswagen Golf cousin. The Leon is not just a clone of its German counterpart, though. Its handsome styling looks crisp and it’s involving to drive, thanks to a selection of smooth powertrains, tidy dynamics and progressive brakes. A smart-looking, uncluttered interior helps to make it a complete and capable package. The toughest decision will be choosing which powertrain to go for. The range opens with a…

There’s little that comes close to the sound of a high-revving internal combustion engine. As we sadly enter the twilight years of this type of motor, it’s time to celebrate what happens when you nail the tachometer needle up into the red zone by recounting the road cars with the greatest ability to send shivers down your spine. GMA T50 12,100rpm Gordon Murray never does things by halves, so when he decided to create the T50 supercar, it had to have a V12 with no forced induction or electrification in sight. Cosworth Engineering designed the 3.9-litre engine, which sounds and revs like a 1990s Formula 1 engine as it reaches a peak of 12,100rpm. It makes 641bhp, which seems modest compared with many of today’s hypercars, but lightness comes to…

Aston Martin is pushing ahead with plans to strengthen its image as a bona fide British rival to Ferrari and in 2023 will reveal an entry-level supercar with a mid-mounted V8 to take on Maranello’s new 296 GTB. It will be the third addition to Aston’s mid-engined supercar line-up, following the launch this year of the Cosworth V12-engined Valkyrie hypercar and the 2024 launch of the V8-powered Valhalla. The trio were shown together for the first time at the Geneva motor show in 2019, but Aston has since undergone a dramatic process of reinvention under new management and ownership, with the evolution of the Valhalla production car testament to a shift in priorities over the coming years. Like the Valhalla, the entry-level mid-engined supercar – originally called the Vanquish but…

How did you decide on the size of the Super 3? “Beyond the fact that we knew we wanted it to be as small and agile as possible, it was down to the size of the engine – which needed to be carried inside the body – and to the fact that we wanted to be able to carry big people. Once we’d decided the engine and the cabin package, we had the size.” Did you try to make it look like other Morgan three-wheelers? “No, though we did use some underlying principles that make a Morgan, such as the design of the rear body and the horseshoe-shaped nose cowl that’s similar in radius to the four-wheel models’. But even that cowl has extra functionality on the Super 3: it…

Kia has launched a 577bhp GT version of the EV6 and Hyundai is readying a hot Ioniq 5 as the first EV from its N performance division – and now creative chief Luc Donckerwolke has hinted that Genesis will follow suit. “There’s no reason to exclude that,” he told Autocar. “Performance versions don’t disappear with the ICE vehicles.” He didn’t go so far as to confirm technical details but said that Genesis will seek to compensate for the missing engine noise and power-delivery characteristics of a combustion engine, which cultivate a sense of “emotion” when driving.…

NEW DETAILS HAVE emerged of MG Motors’ bold plan to boost sales with the formation of a dedicated sub-brand for younger buyers. The marque is planning a new line of models under the ‘Cyber’ banner and Autocar sources have said the first car will be the all-electric replacement for the 3 supermini, codenamed EH32 and planned to take the name CyberE into production. They confirm the new hatch will be the first of four models from the Cyber sub-brand, which will be announced by MG at the Beijing motor show in April. The sub-brand’s line-up will include two SUVs, the CyberS (codenamed IP42) and CyberX (codenamed AS34). A production version of the two-seat MG Cyberster roadster concept is set to crown the new range, possibly with the name CyberB in…

YOU HAAS TO HAND IT TO ’EM People should be “more cognisant of the fact that whatever we’re doing in Formula 1, even if [a team] is last, it’s still phenomenal”, according to Alpine CEO Laurent Rossi. Taking long-time backmarker Haas as an example, he told Autocar: “People say ‘bah, Haas is crap’, but for 99% of the engineers of the world, it’s one of the most fantastic accomplishments ever. It’s like Nasa on wheels, combining the best of engines, suspension, gearbox and aerodynamics. It’s incredible, and everyone else is as well.” Just excuse the amusing irony in his French pronunciation of the name… MOST 4x4s BY FAR It’s official: SUVs are now more popular than they have ever been before. New figures from industry analysis company Jato Dynamics have…

THE TRADITIONAL TAKEmake-dispose method of tyre manufacturing is being challenged by a nascent British company with greener ambitions and an innovative route to market. Enso, which was formed six years ago, has developed more efficient and eco-friendly tyres exclusively for electric vehicles, distributed directly to fleets on a subscription model. “The advent of EVs and a growing awareness regarding the impact of tyre emissions on the environment inspired the formation of Enso,” said Gunnlaugur Erlendsson, the company’s founder and CEO. “Our purpose is to serve the EV sector in a sustainable way.” It’s a noble aim, but Enso faces competition from the world’s five major tyre makers, which together produce two billion tyres annually. Last year, Pirelli announced its first high-load tyre for EVs, which it claims can support 20%…

EXTREME E HAS returned for its sophomore season, racing once again in Saudi Arabia but this time at a new desert circuit near the ‘future city’ of Neom. Nico Rosberg’s RXR team, inaugural Extreme E champion in 2021, got its defence off to a perfect start by winning the first X-Prix of the year. New recruit Mikaela Ahlin-Kottulinsky (who raced for Jenson Button’s JBXE squad last year) was running third in the final before McLaren’s Tanner Foust smashed into the back of her Spark Odyssey. The American escaped from a big accident that ended his team’s rollercoaster Extreme E debut, with the race red-flagged. At the restart, four-time World Rallycross champion Johan Kristoffersson, in for Ahlin-Kottulinsky in the stillintact RXR, quickly demoted Cristina Gutiérrez, driving again for Sir Lewis Hamilton’s…

Toyota has shown that it is committed to ramping up its development of BEVs, but it is taking a very measured approach. Hydrogen, hybrids and synthetic fuels remain very much on the table at Toyota as powertrains of the future. Boss Akio Toyoda explained in a press conference in December: “It’s difficult to make everyone happy with a one-size-fits-all option. That’s why Toyota wants to prepare as many options as possible for our customers.” Such a nuanced approach is refreshing, especially in an industry that’s so often driven by market trends.…

There’s something about hand-finished and skunkworks cars that speaks to the imagination, which makes the origin story of the new range-topping DS 9, the E-Tense 360 4x4, quite appealing. In the ongoing quest to establish itself as a credible premium car player, DS has produced a fast version of its flagship saloon. At the same time, it is keen to emphasise the link between its road cars and its work in Formula E, so although all 9s are produced in China, a few examples get sent to DS Performance’s workshops in Poissy, where it builds Formula E cars, for a transformation. In addition to the standard 224bhp plug-in hybrid powertrain driving the front wheels, it gets a second, 111bhp electric motor on the rear axle, making it essentially the same…

In a career that’s hardly over-burdened with brilliant decisions, this is definitely one of my poorer ones. It’s 3.45am, I’m wide awake, my right bum cheek is so numb that it feels like I’ve had a local anaesthetic, my legs are bent at an awkward angle and there’s a piece of seat digging into my ribs. I’m trying to sleep in our McLaren GT and it’s not going well. But before we go any further, I should answer the question my six-year-old incredulously posed when he was told that his halfwit of a father was going to sleep in the car: “Why?” There is a semi-sensible reasoning behind my pain. McLaren says this is the tourer of its range, the car that’s most usable on a day-to-day basis – the…

Plenty of car firms have a rich motorsport heritage, but few can accurately claim that it’s baked right into their name like Cupra can. It’s hidden in plain sight: Cup Racing. What was once a badge used for Seat’s motorsport efforts and hot road cars is today a stand-alone brand with a broader, more rounded focus, but it still has competition at its heart. “Motorsport is still very important for us,” says marketing chief Thibaud Vincent-Genod. “It’s in our DNA, so it’s natural for us to look where we can be involved.” In recent years, its focus has been on touring cars with the TCR-spec Cupra Leon, expanding into the electric Pure ETCR series in 2021. But Cupra took a bold leap last year, becoming the first manufacturer to sign…

My wife and I took a 200-mile return journey in our Peugeot e-208 a few weeks ago, staying overnight. I can’t begin to recount the problems we had in recharging, but in summary: Chargers weren’t working, and when I phoned for help, I was told no technician was available until the next day, so I moved on with 29 miles remaining. I found a charger with two bays, one occupied, but a message on the screen informing me that only one car could be charged at a time due to “a lack of power”. I found a car that clearly had finished charging, but its driver was elsewhere (not an infrastructure issue but thoughtlessness, which I suspect will become more common). Chargers required me to sign up with full details…

France’s latest luxury limo RENAULT WAS DOING so well in the 1970s that it decided to return to the luxury class for the first time since before the war. Regrettably, the resultant 30 of 1975 suffered with its reliability, build quality and rust. Yet Renault persevered and in 1984 introduced an entirely new tour de force: the 25. “The 25 has a lot going for it: it is luxurious, fast, quiet and efficient both in terms of its mechanical refinement and use of space,” we said on first acquaintance with a 123bhp 2.2-litre four-cylinder GTX (there were also V6s and diesels). We found the claimed 0-60mph time of 10.3sec and MPG of 33.4 were about right, but comfort was more important. Here, the 25 really succeeded, being “as quiet as…

MILEAGE 7644 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To find out if this best-selling SUV is still above the growing ranks of rivals The Nissan Qashqai has a Sport driving mode. This surprises me a bit, because the Qashqai isn’t the sort of car you would think of as being sporty in any way, shape or form. That’s not meant as a criticism: the Qashqai is very good at what it does. But I would describe it using words like practical, durable and sensible. Sport? Not so much. Of course, lots of not very sporting cars now offer a Sport mode, I suspect because Sport is a better name than Practical or Sensible. Sport hints at a possibility of fun; it gives a sheen of performance. But here’s the thing about the…

When the word ‘skunkworks’ is attached to a car, you know you’re in for something special. It usually means an engineering passion project too unorthodox for mainstream backing. And that’s the case with this week’s Cult Hero, the BMW Z3 M. It’s an unbridled, rewarding and rare sports car that delivers an unforgettable drive. Developed in secret by BMW’s M division – because Munich’s higher-ups didn’t crave such a car – the Z3 M was eventually given the green light and introduced as a roadster in 1997 and a coupé in 1998. When production ended in 2002, BMW had made 15,322 roadsters and just 1112 coupés. That makes the coupé one of the lowest-volume production BMWs ever made and something of a unicorn. From launch in Europe, both bodystyles got…

Morgan bosses readily admit that the Super 3 will eventually turn into an EV, although for now nobody is keen to discuss details. The official line is that the company has “lots of plans for” this new monocoque chassis and that the internal steel bulkheads can be liberally moved about to house battery banks, inverters and smaller, differently sited electric motors. Back in 2016 at the Geneva motor show, the company unveiled the EV3, a superb-looking battery three-wheeler, along with a forward plan to sell 19 premium editions at £50,000-plus in 2019, its centenary year. The idea imploded: a promisingsounding battery and powertrain supplier simply defaulted at the last minute and it was too costly and too late to find a replacement. But the idea – and the EV3’s wonderful…

PORSCHE HAS BEGUN testing its third-generation Panamera sports saloon ahead of an expected start to UK sales by the end of 2023. The new Mk3 model, which goes by the internal working name 972, looks set to continue the German company’s long tradition for small, evolutionary changes between generations, with an exterior design that subtly progresses the look of the six-year-old second-generation Panamera. Underneath the steel and aluminium bodywork, though, Porsche is lining up more significant modifications for its BMW 8 Series Gran Coupé and Mercedes-Benz CLS competitor. With the two-year-old Taycan saloon leading Porsche’s electric vehicle push, the Panamera is due to receive a revised range of petrol powertrains, all with heavily reworked exhaust systems and tweaked software aimed at meeting the upcoming Euro 7 emission regulations. Along with…

Founded in 1991 and sold to London-based Greybull Capital in 2021, McLaren Applied is a technology developer that focuses on electrification, telemetry, control tech and analytics. An early pioneer of simulator usage in Formula 1 car design, the firm is committed to developing powertrains, vehicle development processes and motorsport solutions that improve efficiency and cut costs. In 2018, McLaren Applied collaborated on the CTU-400, a highly compact and lightweight EV motor, and has just revealed a new 800V silicon carbide inverter (above) that weighs only 5.5kg and can power EV motors with up to 469bhp, but it is not yet clear if this will be deployed in Kincsem’s hypercar.…

If you had to drive across the US in an electric car, how It’s 2384.5 miles, by the way, and the car is a basic rear-wheel-drive Porsche Taycan with the optional big 84kWh battery, which achieves a maximum range of 301 miles on the European WLTP test and 225 miles on the more pessimistic/realistic American EPA one. So how long would you spend plugged in? You would start in Los Angeles with a full battery and finish in New York with an empty one, of course, so you would get your first 300 miles (or so) for nothing and pant over the finish line. And you might stop, what, 10 times, for an hour each time, if you drove carefully and used only nice big juicy chargers. That’s not good…

UK-BASED ENGINEERING firm Viritech has begun a public funding round as it works to put its hydrogenfuelled Apricale hypercar on the road later this year. With ambitions to be a principal supplier of fuel cell technology to the commercial vehicle sector, the two-year-old company is offering shares through crowdfunding platform Crowdcube for £2 apiece – which it says will go towards developing the Apricale as a showcase of its engineering capabilities. The Apricale is currently in the “advanced mule testing” phase, but Viritech plans to show a “fully realised prototype this year as an essential stepping stone to low-volume production”. It would become only the third FCEV offered in the UK, after the Toyota Mirai saloon and Hyundai Nexo SUV. Viritech will also use the cash to develop a Formula…

The UK car industry is looking for suppliers closer to home as it overhauls its purchasing in the EV era. Much of that is driven by legislation, specifically Brexit. The deal agreed with the European Union, the UK’s biggest market, calls for a gradual decrease in parts sourced from outside the UK or EU from 60% now to 45% by the start of 2027. Given that the battery in a modern EV might account for half the value of the car, the race is hotting up to find local replacements for a supply base that is currently dominated by Asian producers. The UK already has two new battery plants confirmed, but making the battery cells alone isn’t going to dramatically increase local content. For that, the UK needs to get…

“The insurers wanted to write it off” MONDAY You know how fashionable it is to say we live in a car world where no one repairs stuff? Well, it’s just not true, and today I met a bloke who proves it. He’s Gerry Pennell, one of a network of quiet neighbourhood geniuses with the skills and wit to tackle jobs others can’t. He was finishing an Audi A3, 15 years old but healthy, whose owner had backed it into the tray of a truck, awkwardly mangling its tailgate and surrounding surfaces. The insurers wanted to write it off but the owner liked the car so Gerry (who’s equally adept at panels, paint and mechanicals) sourced a tailgate on eBay, cleverly split the outer surfaces to reshape them before uniting them…

It has been a long two years for European Tesla fans. The Model Y has been on the road in the US since 2020, but only now has the compact SUV arrived here. Based on the Model 3 saloon, the Model Y adds a degree of functionality, a chunkier stance and a heftier price. Starting at £54,990, the (officially 331-mile) Long Range tested here is one of two variants, alongside the £64,990 Performance. It uses the same battery pack as the Model 3, at an estimated 75kWh (Tesla is notoriously coy about capacities), which supplies energy to two motors, positioned at the front and rear, for 434bhp and 424lb ft of torque. That’s good enough for 0-62mph in a rapid 4.8sec – streets ahead of the Kia EV6’s 6.9sec time.…

Ford’s new Maverick expands the brand’s US and Canadian light-duty pick-up range to three. Slotting in below the bodyon-frame F-150 and Ranger, this unibody truck is built on the same platform as the Escape/Kuga SUV. Less thirsty than the often-huge alternatives, the four-door crew-cab Maverick won’t come to the UK, where Ford says it has buyers covered with the 20cm-longer Ranger. A 2.5-litre hybrid is the entry-level powertrain, but Ford has temporarily halted orders after the global chip shortage left it unable to meet demand. We drove a range-topping Lariat trim with AWD, the FX4 off-road package and a 250bhp 2.0-litre Ecoboost motor, which doubles the hybrid variant’s tow rating to 1816kg. The Maverick’s squared-off styling deliberately evokes the iconic F-150. The square theme continues inside, where the dashboard design…

WINNEBAGO JOURNEY 40P The top-cat ‘C’ Winnie is a 40ft-long monster with separate bathrooms and sleeping capacity for four. A 50in TV means evenings spent in Premier Inn car parks would be less monotonous, while a 454-litre diesel tank would mean fewer fuel stops. TORSUS TERRASTORM More bus than camper but with seating for 21, the Torsus has more than enough room to stretch out if you’re flying solo. Based on a Volkswagen Crafter 4Motion van chassis, it has 250mm of ground clearance and rally-bred suspension, so even Wales’s cattle grids won’t upset it. RIVIAN R1T Like the McLaren, this electric pickup truck has a disappointing lack of bathroom facilities. But it does have an in-built slide-out kitchen, so a hot meal is never far away, and third-party companies have…

Roll over As the current keeper of a vintage Rolls-Royce that has been in the family for more than 60 years, it really annoys me when you refer to the current Rolls-branded company, owned by BMW, as having a “117-year history”. You know better than this. BMW didn’t buy the history when it appropriated the logo in 1998; that’s still owned by the company in Crewe. Rant over. I’m going to go and sit in my dickey seat and calm down. A England Via email It feels wrong to ignore all that history on a technicality. The Goodwood firm has always been very conscious of the heritage. Plus Rolls plc is aeronautical now, with no automotive interests – KC The cable guide I’m now into my second year of Hyundai…

MILEAGE 1927 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT Can the Defender’s breadth of appeal really cover everything from disaster zone to congestion charge zone? Diesel: so much maligned these past years that it’s now on the cusp of becoming the minority powertrain of new car sales, long eclipsed by electric cars, soon to be eclipsed by plug-in hybrids and heading for the file labelled ‘history’. Yet here I am, driving around in a car powered by a 3.0-litre six-cylinder diesel engine – and I couldn’t make a case for anything more suitable. It’s powerful, smooth, refined, relatively economical (at around 30.0mpg) considering the Defender’s 2.2-tonne weight and, dare I say it, while acknowledging the life-threatening shortcomings of what it emits, relatively clean, given the toughest-ever emissions tests that it must now pass.…

An expert’s view DAN NORRIS, MUNICH LEGENDS “My favourite thing is the way it looks, because there’s something about it that was immediately classic from day one. It’s a timeless design and just sitting in it is a real event. The Z3 M is a model that should have never been made and it’s something that will probably never be made again. It’s a really exciting car and it goes like stink, too. For the money, it’s properly special, and I think it has still to have its day, value-wise. In terms of reliability, there are some issues relating to build quality and trim, but these are very predictable cars in that they’re pretty reliable mechanically.” Buyer beware… ■ ENGINE Oil changes are needed every 7000 miles for the S50…

WE DON’T SEE many kei cars coming out of Japan these days. It’s a shame, because the country has given us several excellent models that deliver keen value and pocket-sized fun, such as the Honda Beat and Autozam AZ-1. Luckily, a kei car that came to the UK in an official capacity was one of the best: the Suzuki Cappuccino. The tiny Targa-style two-seater was first officially imported into the UK in 1993 and deliveries lasted just two years. It was launched with a starting price of £11,995 – equal to around £25,000 today. Suzuki sold 1110 of them, but just 187 remain on UK roads today, with a further 459 on SORN, according to howmanyleft.com. The car’s increasing rarity means you should jump sooner rather than later if you’re…