2003 Car Review: Nissan Sentra 2.5 LE
Jan 10, 2003
By Des Toups Base price: $16,599 Price as tested: $17,139 EPA mileage: 23 city/28 highway It’s 2003, but Nissan has conjured up 1968 with a small car just like Detroit used to make: It goes like hell in a straight line but doesn’t like corners, just like the V-8-stuffed Falcons and Novas that once ruled the ... Continue reading
Dec 29, 2002
2003 Hummer H2 Base price: $48,065 Price as tested: $52,870 EPA mileage: not rated By Des Toups Nobody stares at a Chevy Suburban. Everybody stares at a Hummer H2, which collects eyeballs the way pockets collect lint. Which is the point, after all. No vehicle on the market commands -- and demands -- attention the way t ... Continue reading
2003 New Car Review - VW Passat W8
Oct 15, 2002
2003 Volkswagen Passat W8 Base price: $37,900 Price as tested: $38,475 EPA mileage: 18 city/26 highway By Des Toups Is it a luxury car if none of the neighbors can tell it's a luxury car? That's the $40,000 question posed by the Volkswagen Passat W8, which wears the same clothes as the $22,000 Passat 1.8T but sports tw ... Continue reading
Oct 8, 2002
2003 Honda CR-V EX Base price: $22,300 Price as tested: $22,740 EPA mileage: 22 city/26 highway By Des Toups Toyota may have invented the cute-ute as we know it, but Honda invented the cute-ute as we love it: tidy, car-based, inexpensive -- and something you didn't have to be a sorority sister to drive. Gimmick-free st ... Continue reading
Aug 22, 2002
2003 Mercury Marauder Base price: $34,495 Price as tested: $35,045 EPA mileage: 17 city/23 highway By Des Toups Huge and menacing in shimmering black, the Mercury Marauder -- a name resurrected from the 1960s applied to a sedan that dates to the 1970s -- aims to recapture the glory of big honkin' American iron. As a tr ... Continue reading
New Car Review: 2003 Ford Expedition
Aug 6, 2002
2003 Ford Expedition XLT Base price: $39,535 Price as tested: $41,420 EPA mileage: 13 city/ 17 highway By Des Toups The flabbiest of the big sport-utilities has spent some time in the gym for 2003, and if the new Ford Expedition isn’t exactly buff, it’s certainly bulked-up, tighter and wearing nicer clothes ... Continue reading
Review 2002 Subaru Outback H6-3.0 VDC
Jul 8, 2002
2002 Subaru Outback H6-3.0 VDC Base price: $31,895 Price as tested: $32,420 EPA mileage: 20 city/ 26 highway By Des Toups A six-cylinder engine makes the Subaru Outback feel like a different machine, more adult and more serene than its four-banger siblings. It also makes the rest of the Outback, by all standards a thor ... Continue reading
Jun 17, 2002
2003 Mercedes Benz SL500 Base price: $85,990 Price as tested: $101,105 EPA mileage: city/ highway: 15/22 By Des Toups Like its predecessor, the Mercedes Benz SL500 is destined to become a cliché, a rolling backdrop for rap videos and second marriages, but forget that for now. Mercedes waited 20 years to redo the ultim ... Continue reading
Jun 3, 2002
FOR RELEASE: June 3, 2002 GM Reports May Sales of 403,036 - Down 12 PercentVehicle Production and Earnings Outlook Improves for Second Quarter and Calendar YearGM Truck Sales Down 12 Percent - Cars down 12 percentCYTD Sales Down 3 percent - Trucks up 9 percent, Cars Down 15 Percent Overall Retail Sales Up 2 Percent For ... Continue reading
Review: 2003 Subaru Forester XS
May 26, 2002
2003 Subaru Forester XS Base price: $20,545 Price as tested: $25,445 By Des Toups The Subaru Forester, new from the ground up for 2003, remains the car-lover's cute-ute. It's interesting to drive, it's reasonably roomy, and it has what surely must rank as the industry's largest sunroof. It's handsome. It can be loaded ... Continue reading
May 13, 2002
2002 Audi S6 Avant: Uberwagon Base price: $58,700 Price as tested: $61,875 EPA mileage: 14 city/21 highway By Des Toups Given the almost weekly introduction of oddly shaped vehicles by automakers staking out territory in that new automotive niche, the crossover, it seems clear now: The Holy Grail is a car that can haul ... Continue reading
Apr 15, 2002
2002 Mercury Mountaineer Base price: $30,610 Price as tested $36,005 EPA mileage: 14 city/19 highway By Des Toups Pity poor Mercury, bringing the best-ever traditional sport-utility to market just as the market is moving elsewhere. The new-for-2002 Mountaineer is handsome, roomy, well-mannered and powerful, but it may ... Continue reading
Review : 2003 Acura 3.2 TL Type S
Apr 3, 2002
2003 Acura 3.2 TL Type S Base price: $33,480 Price as tested: $33,960 EPA mileage: 19 city/29 highway By Des Toups It would be easy to dismiss the Acura 3.2 TL as soulless, sprung from mundane family-sedan roots, labeled generically, darned near indistinguishable in a parking lot. Yet this Honda-derived sedan delivers ... Continue reading
Review: Volkswagon New Beetle Turbo S
Mar 28, 2002
By, Des Toups, free-lance writer in Seattle. His car reviews have appeared in AutoWorld, The Seattle Times and newspapers nationwide. 2002 Volkswagen New Beetle Turbo S Base price: $23,400 Price as tested: $24,400 EPA mileage: 24 city/30 highway What happens when a car that screams “Look at me!” no longer t ... Continue reading
The Auto Channel content library (since 1996) has grown to become the world’s most extensive and complete interactive archive of automotive centric news, articles, reviews and intense event coverage, presented to viewers as Text, Video and Images.
