This is the Morning Shift, our one-stop daily roundup of all the auto news that's actually important — all in one place at 9:00 AM. Or, you could spend all day waiting for other sites to parcel it out to you one story at a time. Isn't your time more important?
Enthusiasts love diesel engines for their massive torque and non-hybrid-laden efficiency. Enthusiasts generally don't like the Porsche Cayenne because it's not a 911. Heads will surely explode, then, with the announcement that the 2013 Porsche Cayenne will finally be offered in the U.S. with the company's 3.0-liter…
The tiny Volkswagen Up! concepts that VW flooded Frankfurt with this year won't see American shores — but if they perform as well as VW seems to think they will, Europeans should soak up all the extraneous exclamation points VW can build.
My navy suit wrinkled in transit to LA, so I did what any guest of the Ritz Carlton would do and sent it out to be pressed. It came back without pants. I look like a younger, poorer Richard Branson.
Toyota will revive the electric car they once killed with a Tesla-powered electric RAV4-EV at November's LA Auto Show, about the time that pesky Chevrolet Volt hits the market. Lay bets now on which will be recalled first. [Toyota]
GM's built a concept surf wagon version of their diminutive Chevy Spark for the Paris Motor Show complete with a surfboard rack and wood-paneled vinyl wrap. Huh, we thought Pierre don't surf.
Setting the Citroen Revolte Concept within a hundred yards of a Citroen DS 23 seems like a very poorly-advised show floor plan. It makes picture juxtapositions like this far, far too easy.
The Beijing Motor Show is big and has lots to look at. With so many booth professionals getting in the way, it was nearly impossible to take a clean photograph. Here are the leftovers we had to toss out.
The big selling point of the Mercedes SLS AMG are the gull wing doors, right? Well, a competitor has emerged, and this one's packing stereotypically racist dolls for sale. The DFM Vender Truck: It's got wings too.
The Hunan University State Key Laboratory of Advanced Design and Manufacture for Vehicle Body bus is epic. So much so we're naming it for the prestigious and made-up Jalopnik Best of Show for Tremendous Advancements in Non-Normative Wheel Layout award.
Why this MINI Countryman was hiding in sniper camouflage, we don't know. But, judging by the wacky-haired Chinese hipster kids nonchalantly hanging out around the hidden car, it's got a good chance at taking a few out.
Isn't this truck sexy as hell? This Genlvon Mynx was strutting its stuff in the heavy truck pavilion outside the Beijing Motor Show's main venue and the giant Victoria's Secret angel wings had everyone in attendance titillated.
Like most Chinese copies, the furries of the Beijing Motor Show — from Pandas to bus people — are both creepier and more hilarious than the originals. Here's western culture's strangest fetish viewed through a cheaply constructed Chinese knockoff prism.
The Great Wall of China's one of the seven wonders of the modern world. We checked it out after the Beijing Auto Show only to find the parking situation impressively awful. And the KFC outside the entrance? That's just depressing.
In the Chinese calendar 2010 is the year of the Tiger. That does little to explain why this Dodge Caliber has been tarted up with a fearsome Jaguar paint scheme. Paging Ricky Bobby...
It sounded kinda ridiculous at first. The pedestrian Saab 9-3 Convertible sitting next to the bonkers Spyker Aileron in the same stand. And yet, the two might as well be married now. Things are starting to get weird.
This FAW Limousine we spotted here in Beijing is Chinese President Hu Jintao's official car. It's part rip-off Rolls Royce Phantom, part copied Cadillac, and a healthy dollop of wacky retro-futurism. Hold onto your butts, this faux Cadillac One's strange.
With GM dumping ever-more cash into the Chevy Volt's hybrid system, you knew it'd seep into other products. Like this — the Chevy Volt MPV5 Electric Concept. It's a shrunken Orlando with Volt styling. In short, it's a Volt-U-Van. Eeew.
Chinese automaker SAIC will unveil a hilariously literal "green" car at the upcoming Beijing Motor Show. It's called the "Leaf Concept." It has in-wheel turbines and a leaf-shaped oxygen-emitting solar panel as a roof. Physics be damned!
"And so I said to the press, I said, 'I like the BMW 5-Series, and I think that, in this Swiss land, we should move away from all this 'neutrality' nonsense. I have an opinion! Here it is!"
