Lifestyle

We know about letting sleeping dogs lie, but we’d struggle to give such courtesy to the Jeep Gladiator Top Dog concept. Can you blame us? After all, this modified Jeep pickup looks ready for adventure, not naps. Besides, it’d need to sit still long enough to snooze in the first place, and parking this rig anywhere but out there seems like a crime. See all 27 photos Credit the truck’s numerous upgrades, the most notable of which are its K-9 Blue paint (either someone at Jeep loves Blue’s Clues or is very into hallucinogens—possibly both) and PCOR-sourced storage system that takes the place of the Gladiator’s standard pickup bed. The setup includes the likes of pull-out drawers and storage shelves on the passenger’s side and a battery-powered refriger...

The system will enable hands-free driving on prequalified sections of divided highways. These eligible zones consist of more than 100,000 miles of roads in North America. The feature combines active cruise control and lane centering to navigate the vehicle down the road. At the same time, Ford tracks the driver’s eye gaze and head position to make sure they’re still paying attention to the road ahead. See all 27 photos The 2021 Ford F-150 and Mustang Mach-E arrive this year, but they won’t get the hands-free capability right away. It’ll be available as an over-the-air update starting in the third quarter of 2021. Early vehicle buyers will start off by purchasing a hardware package, and then add the software update once it arrives. In the second half of 2021, new cus...

Cadillac has just announced that the eighth most abundant element in the earth’s crust—magnesium—will be used for wheels on the upcoming Blackwing versions of the  CT4-V and CT5-V, and Cadillac notes that “2022 CT4-V Blackwing and CT5-V Blackwing will be the only GM products to offer magnesium wheels in the near future.” Interesting. First, let’s focus on the magnesium alloy itself. Magnesium is both very strong and very light—it has the highest strength-to-weight ration of any commonly available metal—and that makes it an ideal candidate to reduce unsprung mass in cars without compromising the integrity of the wheels themselves. Porsche has used magnesium wheels on some of its cars in the past (the 918 Spyder and most recent 991 GT2 RS come to mind)....

Atlis CEO Mark Hanchett thinks big. When he set his mind on building the Atlis XT electric pickup truck, he wanted to solve the biggest problem first—namely getting 500 miles’ worth of electric charge into the truck at about the speed a diesel pump could do the job in a conventional vehicle. We got him on the phone to answer a few questions about how all this will work in advance of a November 11 virtual unveiling event for the Atlis XT truck. Fast Charge, Every Charge: 1.5 MW at 1,600V One key to cramming a lot of electrons into a battery quickly is managing thermal loads, and the flow rate of the current is key to that. The higher the voltage, the lower the current at any given power delivery rate. So while the state of the recharging art tight now is 400- or 800-volt DC curre...

Remember the doors Ford showed off when the wraps came off the new 2021 Ford Bronco? Not tube doors, although those will probably be available, but “donut doors” that looked like traditional doors with a quadrangular hole in the center. These doors originally appeared on a two-door Bronco loaded up with a bunch of accessory add-ons. Given that appearance, you’d be forgiven for thinking the cool looking pieces were already given the green light. See all 289 photos Not so, according to information that first surfaced at Bronco6G.com (and has since been partially confirmed by Ford). The buzz is that the “donut doors” fail to meet crash test standards and therefore will not be offered as an option. A set of tube doors, however, will be available. We reac...