The CC, which made its world premiere at the Los Angeles Auto Show last November, will first go on sale in Germany and Luxembourg in the beginning of February, followed by the rest of Europe at the end of the same month, and then globally, including America, Russia and Asia in spring 2012.
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On Friday, the German brand issued another press release revealing that it delivered 5.1 million vehicles worldwide, exceeding 5 million annual sales for the first time in its history and recording an impressive 13.1 percent increase over 2010 when it sold 4.5 million units.
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The company's December sales in the States totaled 32,502 vehicles, up 36.2 percent over the same month in 2010. VW noted that it was its best December since 1972.
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Starting with the new 2012 Toyota Camry, Consumer Reports tested three different models with a four-cylinder, a V6 and a Hybrid engine, all of which ranked amongst the best in their class.
As the magazines notes, compared to the model it replaces, the new Camry has a plusher interior, more responsive handling, improved ride and better fuel economy, with only the increased road noise and some cheap details tainting the overall picture.
In fact, while the 173HP 2.5-liter four-cylinder version ties with the Hyundai Sonata for best-in-class fuel consumption delivering 27 mpg (8.7 lt/100 km), the more powerful 268HP 3.5-liter V6 is just a smidgen more thirsty and, at 26 mpg (9.0 lt/100 km), beats most four-cylinder rivals.
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You'll have to wait until January to find the winners for the 2012 edition of the North American Car and Truck of the Year, but the three finalists for each category were announced on Thursday in Detroit.
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Now, Volkswagen has released the first-ever crossroad version of its Passat mid-size model, named the Passat Alltrack. It will receive its world premiere at the Tokyo Motor Show on December 3 and will go on sale in early 2012.
A successful recipe is not meddled with so the (European) Passat Estate-based Alltrack has all the goods one expects in the segment: raised suspension height, stainless steel-look front and rear underbody protection panels and plastic covered wheel arches that house 18-inch alloys.
However, Consumer Reports [CR], asks a rather intriguing question concerning this issue: are the press cars driven by motoring journalists the same as the ones bought by the public?
It's true that, despite quality control, two cars of the exact same make, model and specification that roll out of the same plant may differ in certain aspects such as fit and finish or actual engine output by a few ponies, but those differences are most of the times imperceptible to the human eye.
Earlier this summer, Volkswagen gave Consumer Reports a 2012 Passat from its press fleet for a first drive. CR's Jon Linkov noticed at the time that, unlike the Jetta, the U.S.-built 2012 Passat sedan's trunk hinges were dressed up in plastic.
It appears that VW also believes it's time to replace the old-school five-pot with a more modern turbocharged four. Citing two sources from within the German company, Car&Driver reports that the 2.5L unit will soon be dropped from Volkswagen's U.S. range with a new 1.8-liter TSI four-cylinder engine taking its place.
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Apparently, Volkswagen does not feel the same way. That is why when the time came to freshen up its four-year old Passat CC sports saloon, it chose to delete the “Passat” moniker from its name in order to signal its upmarket move and severe any ties with the mid-size family sedan.
To reinforce its point, VW has made some changes to the styling of the 2013 CC that made its world debut this week at the LA Motor Show.
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Set to make its world debut at the upcoming 2011 Los Angeles Auto Show later this month, the 2013 Volkswagen Passat packs some select visual scrub ups to bring it up to date with the German brand's more recent offerings.
You can spot the new model by the redesigned front that gets a new chrome-trimmed grille, reshaped headlamps that incorporate a ring of LEDs and a reworked bumper.
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In an attempt to sell more Zubehör (accessories) to its international customer base, Volkswagen’s German arm created a web campaign based around the concept of “Business class for all”.
The TV ad, which you can watch in full below, features a woman dressed in 1960s air hostess stewardess flight attendant attire and a host of accessories now available for the 2012 Volkswagen Passat.
TAP can assume control of the car using all its active safety systems without any intervention of the driver, who simply monitors the situation.
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And while we can’t confirm the rumormill, what we can do is show you a very well executed rendering of the VW Cross Passat made by a talented reader of Autoblog.nl.
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At the final presentation for the HAVEit (Highly Automated Vehicle for Intelligent Transport) project in the Swedish city of Boras, the German car company presented the “Temporary Auto Pilot”, or TAP, a system that allows the car to semi-automatically drive itself up to speeds of 130 km/h (80 mph) on motorways, with the driver simply monitoring the vehicle.
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