Top Gear USA Consulting Producer Crashes Camaro ZL1 at Presentation

When you're test driving a very powerful sports car like the new 580hp rear-wheel drive Chevrolet Camaro ZL1, there's always a chance something might go wrong. Unfortunately, for auto journalist Aaron Gold, something did go wrong, but at least he wasn't hurt.

As we found out from his Facebook page where he posted this picture, Aaron Gold hold several positions including the Vice President of the Los Angeles-based Motor Press Guild (MPG), a consulting producer on the History Channel series Top Gear USA and an editor at "About.com Cars".

As for the accident, Gold commented on the picture he uploaded: "Blame it on the rain". He also added: "Driver was me, I am fine, thank you. GM guys said the damage is cosmetic, but maybe they are trying to make me feel better..."

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18-wheeler Flips Over and Squashes Chevy Cruze, Driver Makes it Out Injured but Alive

A male driver of a rental Chevrolet Cruze was involved in what can only be described as a nightmare scenario for any road user when an 18-wheeler truck loaded with cardboard boxes flipped on its side and landed on top of the compact sedan.

The accident took place in the northbound lanes of the Dallas North Tollway in Texas in the late morning hours of Thursday.

The large rig also knocked over the concrete center barrier and hit another vehicle, a black Volkswagen Touareg, hurling it over the median and onto the other side of the road.

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How to Turn a Beaten up Chevrolet Chevelle into a Respectable Ride in Less than Six Hours

Granted, no one is expecting miracles in less than six hours when you're working on a beater 1972 Chevrolet Chevelle you just picked up from Craigslist, but Doug Glad and the Car Craft crew proved that that it is possible to turn it into what they describe as a "respectable street machine" in this new episode of Hot Road Unlimited.

You can watch the video for yourself right after the break.

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2012 Chevrolet Volt with Low Emissions Package Granted Access to California's HOV Lanes

In order to encourage carpooling and decrease traffic congestion, the State of California came up with the idea of creating the so-called High Occupancy Vehicle lanes or HOV for short, which could only be used by cars with two or more occupants.

Last July, however, the Golden State altered the regulations allowing single-passenger vehicles to use them as well, provided they were all-electric or powered by hydrogen fuel cells or natural gas.

Despite being a hybrid, the Volt was excluded from the list specifying the vehicles allowed to use the HOV lanes, which span more than 1,400 miles and reduce driving time by an average of 36 minutes each day, because of its emissions.

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GM Tells Carscoop No LED Tail Lamps for North American Camaro

After we posted the poll on whether you prefer the updated European market 2012 Chevrolet Camaro with its LED taillights to the original model, we sent an email over to General Motors asking if the company had any plans to apply some or all of the upgrades to the North American version.

A Chevrolet spokesperson replied in an email that the automaker has no such plans and that a number of these changes were made to the European Camaro in order to meet local regulations.

"There are some minor changes between North American Camaro and cars for export markets," a Chevrolet spokesman told Carscoop. "Often, there are even variations between markets, to meet regional requirements. And, no, these changes will not be integrated into the U.S. Camaro."

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Man Proves to Newt Gingrich that You Can Put a Gun Rack in a Chevy Volt

It's amazing how fast people react these days. While campaigning in Suwanee, Georgia, a couple of days ago, Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich attacked President Barack Obama on his plans to increase subsidies for alternative fuel-powered cars.

Gingrich started by making fun of the green car lobby. "How dare we go out and drive vehicles bigger than their bicycles!" said the former House Speaker before he aimed his guns on the Chevrolet Volt.

"You know the Volt is an interesting experimental car," said Gingrich. "The average family that buys it earns $170,000 a year. This is Obama's idea of populism. And in this new budget he wants to increase the amount given to every Volt buyer to $10,000. Which is an amount which a lot of people would by a decent second-hand car, but it wouldn't be an 'Obama' car."

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GM Relies on Euro Operations for the Development of North American Chevy Cruze's Diesel Engine

When it comes to diesel technology, Europe is king and all for good reason as diesel-powered models account for roughly half of all sales across the continent.

Therefore, it's no wonder that General Motors tapped its European operations for the development of the diesel engine to be offered on the North American market Chevrolet Cruze sedan.

The Detroit automaker tells us that the new diesel unit is being developed by the powertrain engineers at GM's diesel center of excellence in Torino, Italy, with the help of their counterparts in Pontiac, Michigan, while Opel's engineers in Russelsheim, Germany, are also supporting the program by developing the accessory drive, acoustic cover and other specialized components.

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Chevy wants to Make Sure you Know that the Camaro ZL1 was Honed on the Nürburgring

While we can understand General Motor's fixation with the Nürburgring, we're getting the slight impression that the Detroit automaker may be overdoing it when it comes to promoting its cars.

After a ton of Nürburgring-related films on the Cadillac ATS and following the official video of the 2012 Chevy Camaro ZL1 lapping the Nordschleife in 7 minutes and 41.27 seconds, GM has published the fifth installment of its ZL1 video series that gives us yet another insight on how its engineers developed the pony car on the German race track.

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Poll: What do You Think about the Euro 2012 Camaro's Redesigned LED Taillights?

If you hop over the break and take a close look at the 90 pictures of the European-specification 2012 Chevrolet Camaro Coupe and Convertible, you'll probably notice a few things that are different from the North American models - and no, we're not talking about the welcome presence of attractive women in some shots.

First and foremost, the Euro Camaro gets a redesigned pair of LED tail lamps. It's not only the addition of LED units that make them look different but also their shape, which kind of reminds us of sunglasses.

Those of you with flawless memory will remember seeing the revised tail lamps in our Nürburgring spy shots of the Camaro back in 2010.

Other differences include the diffuser-mounted reflectors at the back; the noticeably larger mirrors that look like someone pasted Dumbo's ears on the Camaro's doors (apparently, so you can detect those miniature ForTwos creeping up on you on the highway) and the more modern fonts on the instrument panel gauges that are placed outwards.

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Chevrolet Camaro Coupe and Convertible Come to the UK, Prices Start from £34,995

America's favorite modern muscle car, the Chevrolet Camaro, has made the trip across the Atlantic and has arrived on UK shores where it will go on sale this spring available exclusively with GM's 6.2-liter V8 and a choice of two body styles, coupe and convertible.

On-the-road prices for the Camaro SS Coupe start at £34,995 (US$55,100 or €42,300), which brings it in the same price range as the BMW 330i Coupe (£35,045) and fairly close to the Nissan 370Z coupe that costs £29,950 (US$47,200 or €36,200).

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Video: 2013 Nissan GT-R Versus 2012 Corvette Z06 Centennial Edition

Perhaps the greatest achievement for Nissan and its GT-R is that it has become a benchmark for all types of sports cars.

And there's no better proof for this than the fact that in February alone, we've seen at least three publications comparing the Godzilla against a variety of new sports cars including the 2012 M5 sedan, the 2012 Camaro ZL1 and now, the Corvette Z06 Centennial Edition from Insideline.

So, before you watch the video test, let's do a quick rundown on the numbers:

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This is it: The New Chevrolet Cruze Station Wagon

We've been hearing rumors about the possibility of GM adding a third body style to the range of its Chevrolet Cruze for quite some time now.

Well, there's no need to speculate any longer as this morning, the Detroit automaker officially revealed the all-new Chevrolet Cruze Station Wagon ahead of its global premiere at the 82nd International Geneva Motor Show early next month.

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MT Pits 2012 Porsche 911 Carrera S Aganist 2012 Corvette Grand Sport

Chevrolet's Corvette and Porsche's 911 are two of the most recognized and longest living sports car nameplates in history. Both models have evolved in many ways over the years but also remain true to their heritage.

The 2012 Porsche 911 was only just introduced into the market this year sporting an entirely new platform and a lighter body, while the sixth generation of Corvette has been with us since 2005 and has entered its final year of production as Chevrolet will present an all new model next year.

Nonetheless, since we live in the "today", Motor Trend's editor-at-large Angus MacKenzie took the 436-horsepower 2012 Corvette Grand Sport and compared it with the 400-horsepower 2012 Porsche 911 Carrera S.

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How Did This Happen? Chevy Impala Explodes During Oil Change

We know that there are certain dangers involved when you're servicing a car but an explosion happening after an oil change is something you don't often hear about.

The accident occurred during a regular oil change on a 2001 Chevrolet Impala sedan and was caught on film by a security camera.

The two workers are seen completing the service with one of them entering the Chevy and turning on the engine presumably to circulate the oil, at which point we see flames shoot out and then an explosion in the engine bay.

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China's JAC Does it Again with Ford F-150 Pickup Truck Clone

We've seen this play before and before that and before that, but it never gets old: Chinese automakers replicating vehicles from western automakers. One brand that keeps popping up on our cloning radar is Jianghuai Automobile, more commonly known as JAC Motors.

It's latest accomplishment is the JAC 4R3 pickup truck that makes no attempt to hide the fact that it's a styling copy of the Ford F-150. Of course, as with other Chinese doppelgangers, the similarities begin and end with the appearance as it's too costly for automakers to extend the cloning to the mechanical hardware.

The 4R3 will reportedly make its debut at the Beijing Motor Show in April and will then go on sale in China where it will be offered with a 2.8-liter four-cylinder diesel engine pushing out 108-horsepower and 240Nm (177 lb-ft) of peak torque.

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Chevy Takes a Stab at Ford with its New Super Bowl Ad for the Silverado

And the claws are out! Chevrolet makes no apologies for its new commercial on the Silverado pickup truck that will air during the first quarter of Super Bowl XLVI on Sunday.

Set in a post-apocalyptic world that draws on the Mayan predictions, the ad shows a group of friends that made it out alive and who all happen to be Silverado owners.

Once they assemble, they notice that one of their buddies didn’t make it to the meeting point – the missing friend happens to own a Ford…

You can take a look at Chevy's "2012" Super Bowl ad in the video after the break.

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Chevrolet Goes Big for Super Bowl with Five New Ads

GM's Chevrolet division will have a huge presence at this year's Super Bowl game as it plans to air no less than five commercials focusing on the Camaro, the Sonic and the Volt.

These include the "Needing Getting" music video for the Sonic from the band OK Go that will air during the pregame program, the "Aliens" spot showcasing the Volt, the "Chevy Happy Grand" with the Camaro Convertible, the "Sonic Anthem" that chronicles the sub-compact's stunts, and the "Joy", again with the Sonic.

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Road & Track Pits the 2013 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 against the 2013 Nissan GT-R

They may be different as night and day in most aspects, but we shouldn't forget that both the 2013 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 and the latest 2013 Nissan GT-R are aimed at the sports car enthusiast.

Nevertheless, we do find the pairing from Road & Track for its latest test a tad odd for one specific reason: pricing.

You see, Camaro ZL1 with its 580HP 6.2L supercharged V8 will retail for $54,995 (€41,800) when it arrives in dealerships this spring, whereas the 2013 edition of the 545HP Nissan GT-R starts from $96,820 (€73,500) not including destination and handling fees. This means there's more $40,000 difference between the two cars.

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GM wants to Make Opel Profitable Despite European Crisis and Sales Drop

Last September, during the Frankfurt Motor Show, General Motors executives were confident that their European operations were following the company’s restructuring plan to the letter and would break even.

Less than two months later, real-world results proved them wrong. In the first nine months of 2011, GM's European operations lost US$580 million before interest and taxes. Breaking even went down the drain.

In addition, restructuring, closing the Antwerp plant and cutting 5,800 jobs through September 2011, cost the company US$900 million. And that’s not all: its European division has cost GM more than US$2.34 billion since 2009, when it called off its plans for selling the company, and a staggering US$13 billion since 1999.

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California wants 1.4 Million Zero-Emission Vehicles by 2025; Manufacturers Agree, Dealers Object

The state of California has been at the forefront of the nation’s regulations when it comes to reducing emissions since the 1970s. And now it has taken another step in this direction by approving the Advanced Clean Car program.

It is a set of regulations that aims to reduce emissions and, among other things, requires 15.4 percent of all new vehicles that will be sold by 2025 to be all-electric, plug-in hybrids or powered by fuel cells.

By implementing this program, California regulators wish to reduce passenger vehicles emissions by 34 percent between 2014 and 2015, and overall smog-forming emissions by 75 percent. It’s a goal similar to the federal standards proposed by President Obama.

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