Monthly Archives June 2014

Previously, auto makers in Germany usually source the high-strength-steel from local suppliers. Since the smelting technology and quality in China’s steel industry has made significant progress in the recent years, some German factories started to consider the benefit of buying steel materials from China, and they took action in last month.

On 05/24/2014, the first batch of S500MC high yield strength steel made by the Tangshan Iron and Steel Group Company (aka. TangSteel), weights 500-ton in total, was shipped to Germany customers.

The S500MC steel is defined in the European’s EN10149 standard: “EN 10149 – 2 : 1996   Specification for hot-rolled flat products made of high...

BMW will also publish the official image soon. The redesigned X6 borrows a lot of style elements from the new X5, including the grille, headlight housing and also the tail lights.

At least three models will be offered in US: the 300hp turbo I6 X6 xDrive35i, the 445hp turbo V8 X6 xDrive50i and also the range topping X6M (engine output unknown yet).

Dear readers, we will be flooded with 2015 model year pricing of different models from different brands in this month, since right now it is the season that auto makers replacing their product line to a new manufacture year.

Today comes the news for the hot selling BMW 5 series.

Major changes are:

1. Sport leather steering wheel is standard on all models (previously you need to pay $2,000 – $3,150  to opt for luxury line/modern line/M Sport line to get it);

2. LED fog light is standard (you also need to shell out $2,000 – $3,150 to get the whole packages to get it too);

3. Comfort access (aka...

Toyota brought the FT-1 concept to the 2014 Detroit Auto Show earlier this year.

In the automotive industry, the purpose of a concept car is usually for testing the interest expressed from the public, which can assist the auto maker management to evaluate the business case for a proposed new model. If the public interest is high, then the developement will proceed to the direction of mass production.

Obviously, not all concept cars can gain enough public attention; actually statistically speaking, more than half of the concept car project will not be green lighted for production.

Summer is the season that auto maker rolling out next model year cars. Today not only Audi announced its 2015 A8 pricing, but also Nissan released its hot selling Altima’s 2015 model price.

Below is the detail numbers:

Altima Sedan 2.5 – $22,300
Altima Sedan 2.5 S – $22,560
Altima Sedan 2.5 SV – $24,720
Altima Sedan 2.5 SL – $28,150
Altima Sedan 3.5 S – $26,450
Altima Sedan 3.5 SV – $29,830
Altima Sedan 3.5 SL – $31,950
Destination and Handling: $810

Generally speaking the 2015 models has price increase compared to the 2014 one. The 2.5 4-cylinder models are having a $100 – $200 increase; while some 3.5L V6 models gets a price hike in the range of $1,000 (the 3...