Each week, our German correspondent slices and dices the latest rumblings, news, and quick-hit driving impressions from the other side of the pond. His byline may say Jens Meiners, but we simply call him . . . the Continental.
German carmakers appear to still be on a crusade to get everyone to forget manual transmissions. Just the latest example? Audi’s claim that at the end of the first-generation R8‘s production run, just 3 percent of customers opted for the manual ‘box. No wonder Audi dropped the stick shift, right? But really, Audi dropped the transmission long ago. In Europe, the most interesting versions, like the R8 V10 plus, never came with the manual; and on the regular V-10, the option was long gone in virtually every market save for the U.S. The only way to get the fantastic open-gate shifter in Europe was by choosing the entry-level V-8. Was Audi surprised at the take rate?
Fake exhaust tips. Just the worst.
Don’t you have to laugh when you follow a cheap tuner car on a cold day, and despite four exhaust tips, the vapor is coming out on one side, betraying that the other exhaust pipe is fake? Now, this facepalm-worthy approach has migrated to German automakers like Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz. Diesel versions of the new GLC are fitted the same chrome exhaust tips left and right that grace the gasoline-powered versions. But alas, they are not functional. There is an SCR tank on the right, and the actual exhaust on the left doesn’t flow through the bumper-mounted exhaust tip, either.
I am not a great believer in design clinics, and Daimler’s claim that the fake feature has passed these gatherings of non-experts with flying colors doesn’t heighten my admiration for them. Following a suspicion, I went back to my photo files and confirmed that the European-market Passat is fitted with a similar kind of functionless decor, which at a first glance suggests awesome, supercar-worthy power. Just like those tuner cars . . .
“Super-Euro-Effekt,” courtesy of not being a Euro member state.
Cars and Politics
Cutting the Swiss Franc from the Euro is paying off handsomely for the Swiss consumer. When the central bank decided they couldn’t afford to keep their currency on a fixed exchange rate with the embattled Euro, it shot up in value. Now virtually every importer is advertising huge rebates as a “euro bonus” or “euro effect.” Customers are having a field day.
Meanwhile, Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel is sticking to her ambitious goal of one million EVs on the road by 2020, even though the cars’ population stands at a meager 25,000 units. At an “EV summit” in Berlin this month, the politician boldly reiterated her target and lectured the assembled CEOs: “Those who don’t develop E-mobility today and bring it to market will be following others in a few years. The world isn’t sleeping.”
Is plugging in really too much trouble for the Dutch?
The world might not be sleeping, but it would appear as though Dutch owners of ever-more-popular plug-in hybrids (thanks to government incentives) are sleeping on their chargers. My esteemed colleague Henny Hemmes, a long-time motor journalist who serves on a Dutch jury for the leading fleet cars, has shared with me an interesting survey conducted among drivers of the plug-in hybrids: It reveals that significantly more than ten percent of these vaunted vehicles are not charged at an electric outlet—ever. When the results were presented at an awards ceremony last September, the room, stuffed with corporate and automotive executives, broke into laughter.
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