Despite a significant sales spurt over the last year and a half that saw market share zoom from 3 to 4 1/2 percent, Korean manufacturer Hyundai feels it must do more to properly capture the attention of the buying public.

That’s why it is spending $160 million on the launch of the recently introduced 2011 Sonata, a dramatically restyled and re-engineered family sedan that it believes can change the company’s image from a follower of the competition to the leader.

“We want the Sonata to educate, and to change the perceptions that people have about Hyundai,” Michael Deitz, manager of product planning for Hyundai Motor America, told a group of automotive journalists at a Sonata introduction in Philadelphia.

By Vern Parker

One of the Silver Spurs manufactured in England by Rolls-Royce during the 1982 model year was loaded into a 40-foot-long container with another Rolls-Royce and shipped off to the United States.

It was early June, 1982 when the container with the luxury car was hoisted onto the Americana Legend that was to carry it across the Atlantic to Lindhurst, N.J.

That 5,040-pound Rolls-Royce Silver Spur was painted black with a double pinstripe of red highlighting both flanks. The Everflex material covering the top was also black but the carpet inside the car was cherry red. The leather upholstery matched the carpeting.

With more stringent fuel-efficiency and emissions regulations looming in the not-to-distant future, auto manufacturers are scrambling to produce passenger cars that will satisfy the government—and the buyers. 

By necessity (and the laws of physics), many of these new vehicles will have to be smaller, with less powerful engines and comfortable seating for no more than four passengers.

And that’s a tall order in a country where bigger has always been equated with better.

The good news is that there actually are a number of compact cars on the market right now that approach the upcoming requirements and provide comfortable, economical transportation for a family of four.

They were hardy, versatile, fun vehicles my station wagons. The first was a wallowing Chevrolet company car in one of my early failed careers. After becoming a homeowner and in need of a backup workhorse (the Rover 2000 wasn’t up to it), I snapped up a stripped down, slant six, stick shift 1964 Dodge for $125 at the Government Services Administration’s monthly car auction.

Bert, named after an old schoolmate who was also big, homely and simple but brave and loyal, did yeoman service for six years as we went about civilizing our 1929 bungalow. He succumbed to rust but was quickly replaced by Nubert, a nearly identical 1962 Plymouth wagon that had sat crippled in the Architect of the Capital garage for many years and whose crevasses were still filled with seeds, pods and wilted flowers. Nubert gave way to the Green Hornet, a plucky 1977 AMC wagon from – where else? – the GSA auction. I loved them all.

By Nick Yost

Remember these slogans?

“When Better Cars Are Built, Buick Will Build Them.”

“Wouldn’t You Really Rather Have a Buick?”

Throughout a long stretch of the 20th Century that has been the bulk of my life, these two advertising catch lines stood out whenever the subject turned to Buick.

Frankly, I can’t say they matched my perception of the brand when General Motors' crumbling financial position forced many shortcuts that toppled Buick’s standing as a near-Cadillac to just another badge-engineered version of automobiles that bore different GM nametags.

But, with the introduction of the Buick Enclave crossover vehicle a couple of years ago and, now, the 2010 Buick LaCrosse sedan, I’m beginning to think those slogans may be more timely today than they were when they originally appeared in the Buick ads.

The conventional wisdom says that I should be judging the LaCrosse against the Lexus ES 350, the target of engineers and designers in developing the new front/all-wheel-drive sedan. If that’s the case, I’d say Buick has hit the mark – and more.

By Vern Parker

Long before the Reagan name was added to Washington National, Nancy Windingland worked at the airport that serves Washington, D.C.

On her way to work one day 26 years ago she spotted a fellow commuter driving a new car she describes as "so cute."

She saw that the flanks of the white convertible that had arrested her attention were covered with "wood" trim.

Later she told her husband, "That's one of the cars I want to own before I die."  The object of her affection was a 1984 Chrysler Town and Country Mark Cross convertible.  An admitted "chick car," she says, "It looks cute."

When new the unusual convertible had a base price of $16,495 and under the hood was a 2.2-liter turbo-charged engine that developed 142 horsepower.  Windingland learned that only 1,105 such cars were manufactured by Chrysler during the 1984 model year.

By Nick Yost

It’s not the big-money cars that make the big money for most of the world’s prestigious auto manufacturers.

Ask the folks at Audi about the A4, for example, and they’ll tell you that their entry-level luxury/sports sedan is the key to the company‘s success in the United States, with nearly 40,000 sales annually.

I recently got to spend some time with a 2010 A4 sedan to see how it stacks up against its German archrivals, the Mercedes-Benz C Class and the BMW 3 series sedans.

In two words, the answer is “very well.”

It’s been said many times before, but it still bears repeating.

If you want to transport the maximum amount of stuff in the minimum amount of space the best container is a box, a tall box if possible. That’s why the minivan is the most sensible, most practical, most versatile vehicle available for family duty.

Over the past 20 years or so, millions of families have been seduced by the sport-utility vehicle, a large, manly conveyance that can go places where almost nobody ever takes it, gulp gasoline the way a skid-row alcoholic downs a bottle of cheap muscatel, and haul big boats and trailers that most SUV drivers don’t own.

First came Ford's baby birds, the two seat Thunderbirds built from 1955 to 1957. They were followed by the square birds from 1958 to 1960. Next were the bullet birds. 

For 1962 Ford created a sports roadster model by installing on the convertible model a fiberglass tonneau apparatus that covered the rear passenger compartment, effectively transforming the four-passenger car into a two-seater. The handsome roadster model attracted a lot of attention but it was much pricier than a more common convertible Thunderbird so it did not sell as well. 

Consequently, only 1,427 Sports Roadster model Thunderbirds were manufactured in 1962, each one with a base price of $5,439.