Author: Sofia

Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius, a self-described “petrol head” who once ran AMG, says driving an electric AMG with a simulated V8 turned him into “a born-again Christian.” The comments, made in a new interview, are Mercedes’ clearest pitch yet that enthusiasts, not just early adopters, are supposed to love its next wave of EVs. Källenius made the remarks to Autocar’s James Attwood during a drive of the new C-Class Electric in Finland. The context was the Mercedes-AMG CLA 45, whose electric powertrain can simulate a V8 engine down to the pops, bangs, and feedback of virtual gearchanges. “When I first…

Photo: Kempower When it comes to public EV charging, more plugs may matter a whole lot more than bigger power numbers, according to new North American data from Kempower. The Finnish EV charger maker analyzed public charging sites connected to its ChargEye cloud software and found that plug count had roughly three times the relationship with site utilization as total installed charging power. Put simply, giving more EV drivers somewhere to plug in appears to be more useful than installing fewer chargers with a huge amount of power behind them. Kempower found a correlation of 0.63 between plug count and…

Elon Musk put a number on where he thinks SpaceX’s Starship program is headed by 2030, replying on X a day after President Trump signed a memo pushing the country toward 1,000 space launches and reentries a year. The exchange started when Aaron Burnett, co-founder of propulsion startup Mach 33, posted that “1,000 launches/reentries is the goal,” quoting White House science adviser Michael Kratsios on the newly signed National Space Transportation Policy. Burnett noted that the FAA’s own bull-case forecast reached only 385 annual launches by 2030, while his firm’s conservative model already put SpaceX alone near 940. Musk responded,…

On X, two drivers posted videos of FSD Lite v14.1 not stopping for objects in the road, namely fallen trees and wooden logs. FSD Lite is designed to run on Tesla’s Hardware 3, which has significantly less computing power compared to Hardware 4 used in later cars.  FSD Lite was introduced this June.  As Tesla tries to scale up its fleet of self-driving cars and roll out the steering wheel-free Cybercab, Full Self-Driving (Supervised) continues to stumble in serious ways.  One video posted on X on August 21 shows a user named Baldersonmichae using FSD on the road at night.…

Porsche has unveiled the 911 Challenge, a new track-only race car that brings motorsport hardware to the more accessible end of its racing lineup. Based on the road-going 911 GT3, the 911 Challenge uses the same naturally aspirated 4.0-litre flat-six, but Porsche has extracted a little more from it. The engine produces 508 hp, revs to 9,000 rpm and sends its power through a seven-speed PDK gearbox. Porsche has stripped away the airbags, passenger seat, carpeting, sound insulation and other road-car luxuries to save weight. In their place are a welded roll cage, racing seat, six-point harness, fire-extinguishing system and…

The developers behind the new Dubai VDX project are calling it the world’s first purpose-built commercial vertiport – and after receiving a green light from regulators the vertiport is ready to get started. Developed by Skyports Infrastructure, the new commercial vertiport is designed in to enable small, battery-powered aircraft to take off and land vertically without the need for conventional runways. The facility recently received regulatory certification issued by the United Arab Emirates’ General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA), which is crucial in its bid to operate commercial eVTOLs throughout the emirate. “This certification is a defining moment for Advanced Air…

Tesla is once again raising the price of the Cybertruck. Its entry-level and Premium trims increased $5,000 this week. Getting into even the lowest trim now costs $15,000 more than it did in February. Tesla has once again raised the price of the Cybertruck. The cheapest Cybertruck now starts at $74,990, up $5,000 from yesterday and a full $15,000 from its $59,990 price tag that Tesla (briefly) offered in February. That’s a fascinating strategy for a vehicle whose biggest problem is that relatively few people are lining up to buy it. In fact, it’s starting price is nearly double what…

When mounted inside the traction inverter, TI’s TMCS2100-Q1 multiaxial coreless Hall-effect current sensor enables more efficient, longer-range driving experiences for EVs. Photo: Texas Instruments A tiny new sensor from Texas Instruments (TI) could help future EVs squeeze more range from their batteries while delivering smoother acceleration and less motor noise. TI’s new TMCS2100-Q1 sensor is designed for the traction inverter – the part of an EV that controls how electricity moves from the battery to the motor. Think of the inverter as the motor’s power manager: It needs to know exactly how much electricity is flowing so it can deliver…

The Fast Lane EV YouTube channel took a Tesla Model 3 equipped with Full Self-Driving (Supervised) up what’s considered the steepest dirt road in the U.S.  The Tesla performed pretty well, despite the lack of lane lines and uneven road surface.  The folks from The Fast Lane EV are braver than I am. I don’t like letting driver assistance features like Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (Supervised) completely take over for me almost anywhere, never mind on a windy dirt road littered with rocks and construction debris. Especially when that dirt road also happens to be the steepest such road in America.…

American luxury brands were once relatively affordable. That’s no longer the case as the entry-level Lincoln costs $48,790. Over at Cadillac, you’ll need to shell out $46,595 for the XT5. When Lincoln unveiled the 2027 Corsair Hybrid earlier today, they noted it would be the “first introduction” to the brand for many people. This is hardly surprising as it’s their entry-level model, which is traditionally seen as a stepping stone. var adpushup = window.adpushup = window.adpushup || {que:[]}; adpushup.que.push(function() { if (adpushup.config.platform !== “DESKTOP”){ adpushup.triggerAd(“0f7e3106-c4d6-4db4-8135-c508879a76f8”); } else { adpushup.triggerAd(“82503191-e1d1-435a-874f-9c78a2a54a2f”); } }); However, the cost of entry has soared to $46,495…