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1. Thank you for watching.
2. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.
3. This is The Car Show, coming to you on KPFK 90.7 Los Angeles.
4. As Mark says, from the icy cold curves of Angeles Crest to the sunny shores of PCH,
5. we broadcast every Sunday from 1 to 2 p.m. for the last 53 years.
6. And Mark is on vacation this week.
7. So you have me, Michelle Spencer, as your host.
8. And alongside today with me is longtime auto industry veteran, current executive analyst at iccars.com,
9. and the co-host of the nationally syndicated The Drive radio show with Lauren and Carl.
10. Welcome again, Carl Brouwer, to The Car Show.
11. Hey, great to be on with you, Michelle.
12. I always enjoy talking cars in the car capital of the world where we get lots of listeners who can appreciate us.
13. Yes, and we are so blessed.
14. And by the way, happy 250th, America.
15. Today is 4th of July, if we don't get preempted, that is.
16. And so we are very happy to come to you on the holiday weekend and bring you all the car shows that are coming up in our area so that you can make a lot of fun plans.
17. And the first thing we wanted to mention was this parade that is called America on the Move.
18. And it's a Route 66 Centennial Parade.
19. And, of course, we all know now America is celebrating its 250th,
20. but we also have this year, coincidentally, the 100th anniversary of the opening of Route 66,
21. which opened up so many people to get from the Midwest to where we are today here in Southern California and all spots in between.
22. So the Peterson is going to host this America on the Move parade on July 12th from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.
23. And there's 50 vehicles that the Peterson has chosen to go in this parade.
24. And it'll start at the Peterson and end at the end of Route 66, of course.
25. All those trivia people out there know or people who've driven it.
26. And it's the Santa Monica Pier.
27. There will be a party there.
28. It's all free.
29. And you can watch on Wilshire Boulevard as the cars go down.
30. And you can also join at the end for free.
31. You just have to go to peterson.org.
32. And you do have to register, even though it's free of charge.
33. They just want to know who's going to be at the party.
34. So go to peterson.org to register.
35. That's a great, it's such a cool thing that they're doing this.
36. I mean, celebrating the 100th year.
37. And I do feel like there's this resurgence in interest in Route 66.
38. And I always feel like the movie Cars kind of helped that too.
39. You know, people started to realize that the fastest way from point A to point B isn't necessarily the most interesting.
40. Oh very well put I like that And I just went to Cars Land in June and they have a ton of 100th year anniversary Route 66 merch in the shops there Oh wow And also Cars has been you probably been seeing a lot of Cars in the media lately from Pixar because it the 30th anniversary of the first Cars movie which launched of course a huge franchise
41. So, yeah, this is a big year, 2026.
42. it can't be 30 years
43. it can't be 20 years
44. I was going to say
45. because I've barely been in the industry
46. for 30 years and I knew I'd been for a while
47. believe it or not I was really lucky
48. Michelle the Shelby
49. GT500 press launch
50. from like 2006
51. sorry from yeah from 2006
52. they flew us
53. up to
54. San Francisco, Oakland.
55. And then we went over to the headquarters of Pixar
56. and we got to see the movie like two months
57. before it was in the theater.
58. And John Lasseter came in and talked to us
59. about the movie before and afterwards.
60. It was a pretty amazing press launch
61. for that Shelby GT500 when Ford got us up there.
62. And I always remember the best story he had
63. was how he had been burned out.
64. He'd done all those Pixar movies
65. and he just wanted to get away.
66. And he had packed his family in an RV
67. to go for like a month or two.
68. And all his colleagues were like, you're getting crazy.
69. Like you're going to get like four days into that
70. and you're going to wish you could come back.
71. And he said it was the exact opposite.
72. He said he wished he'd had another,
73. like he didn't want to come back.
74. He just, he was having so much fun
75. discovering America with his family.
76. And that's what inspired the movie Cars.
77. Isn't that great?
78. I mean, as far as press trips go,
79. I bet that was one that you'll always remember too.
80. Yeah, no, it's just so cool.
81. I thought the movie was great seeing it
82. and knowing it was sitting out there for like two months.
83. before everyone else got to see it and having seen it, it was pretty awesome.
84. Very nice. Wow. All right.
85. And if you want something else to do on Sunday, July 12th,
86. and you're happy to be in the Long Beach area, there's a Cars and Coffee.
87. This is a new Cars and Coffee.
88. I had mentioned it probably a few months ago when it first kicked off.
89. And it's at a place that's called the Small Cafe, and it's on Naples.
90. So from 8 a.m. to noon, this small cafe will have a bunch of classic cars in front of their restaurant and you can get breakfast or lunch.
91. The address is 5656 Second Street.
92. And it's technically in Long Beach, but it's on Naples Island.
93. And the show is presented with Beach City Classics.
94. and they just opened this week a new market in conjunction with the cafe so you can get groceries
95. provisions and some merch probably car show merch i would imagine and that was you just show up and
96. you can have your breakfast or lunch and check out the cars you don't have to you know do anything
97. ahead of time just show up so that's sunday july 12th yeah and when then we have the dirt drags at
98. El Mirage that same weekend, July 11th and 12th.
99. SCTA and RPM Nationals at El Mirage Dry Lake.
100. Very fun.
101. So they say they're going to bring back drag racing side by side for the first time in 70 years.
102. Very fun.
103. So if you are interested in that, go to rpmnationals.com for all your info.
104. And something else going on in Torrance.
105. Yeah Cars and Bikes and Car Show right The American Honda Collection Hall in Torrance will be having their big event on Saturday July 18th And the theme will be Car and Bike Fun in the Sun
106. And it runs from 9 a.m. to noon.
107. And the gates, though, open at 7.30 a.m.
108. for people who want to secure the best display parking.
109. And it's at 1919 Torrance Boulevard,
110. basically the American Honda headquarters
111. out here in Southern California.
112. and um sounds like it's going to be pretty amazing big picnic area shade umbrellas a lot of games
113. uh things like cornhole and giant jenga and then there's going to be actually pretty cool vintage
114. accord ride-alongs you know probably already i'm sure i think we talked about this michelle i'm
115. sure you know but it's the 50th anniversary of the honda accord it first came out in 76
116. as a com as a compact hatch believe it or not it was kind of like a civic when it first showed up
117. and then it grew up and the Civic slid underneath to replace it.
118. But it's a 50th anniversary and all, so that's pretty awesome.
119. And you get to ride in one of the original ones.
120. That would be pretty awesome.
121. And then there's a Rides for Kids motorcycle charity
122. that raises money for the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation.
123. And you can register and donate at whatever amount you want to receive.
124. Free lunch, T-shirt, and an event patch.
125. So a lot of cool stuff going on.
126. They're going to have DJs, food trucks, vendors.
127. I've only been out there once, which is kind of a crime.
128. I should go more.
129. I've only gone to one of those cars and coffees since they started doing them,
130. but I really enjoyed it.
131. So I need to get back there.
132. Yeah.
133. I've been going to Torrance quite a bit because my mom's been in a rehab center up there.
134. But, you know, maybe one of these days I'll go visit mom and drop by.
135. Yeah.
136. Combine them.
137. Yes.
138. I should.
139. And then there's a new exhibit that we just found out about opening on July 18th at the Peterson.
140. This one has to do with fast cars called the World's Fastest.
141. And each vehicle in this exhibit represents an innovation in automotive engineering and the evolution of the modern automobile through aerodynamics and research on materials and powertrain design.
142. and the exhibit starts with cars in the post-war era.
143. It'll be on the second floor for over a year, which will be nice.
144. So it'll go through August of 2027.
145. I have checked with the assistant curator to find out exactly what cars will be on display
146. because their press announcement didn't say.
147. So your guess is as good as mine, Carl.
148. What will be in the world's fastest?
149. yeah and i'm trying to think you know because it's obviously they're talking about kind of
150. cars that broke new barriers as we went through time and it's post-war because i was going to say
151. it was like the 540k you know uh i think that was a mercedes in like the 30s it was supercharged and
152. it was for the time like stupid fast and the and like the fate the the the boat toilet the auburn
153. speedster boat tail speedster whatever you had some really you know relatively aerodynamic cars
154. for the time with powerful engines.
155. But if you're going post-war,
156. to me, the obvious one, I would assume,
157. is the 300SL Gullwing
158. because Mercedes just cleaned up
159. on the racing circuits with that thing,
160. the 19, and I remember it was fuel-injected
161. and it had a lot of tech
162. that was very cutting-edge at the time.
163. Of course, those crazy doors that opened up
164. and it made it very aerodynamic.
165. So I'm sure that's in there,
166. but I'm trying to think of what else
167. like went really fast.
168. I mean...
169. Ferraris, maybe.
170. Yeah there going to be some Ferraris and all I think the 275 GTB one of my favorite cars just on so many levels one of my favorite styled cars That was fast What about a Koenigsegg Well certainly in the modern era you know I actually did a list of like the 50 fastest car story like probably like 10 years ago now eight years ago
171. And it did really well on Forbes.
172. And yeah, and I looked at cars through the history and, you know, the Jaguar XJ220.
173. and of course the McLaren F1.
174. My favorite car of all times was the McLaren F1,
175. 240 miles an hour, which at the time was completely nuts.
176. That car held the record for the fastest production car
177. for I think like 10 or more years.
178. 240 miles an hour.
179. I mean, right now 240 is still very fast
180. and it was doing it like the mid to late 90s or whatever.
181. So what a great car.
182. But regardless, you're going to see a lot of cool cars
183. in that exhibit because all the cars
184. that were breaking these barriers from the 300 SL on
185. are very cool cars. Yeah. And as soon as I hear from the curator, I will put this in our radio
186. show announcements for whenever I get it. So we'll try to keep you updated on what will be in there
187. and see if Carl's predictions went right for the exhibit. All right. So Old World Loitering Show.
188. All right, this is a curated exhibition of post-war automobiles, but it's basically a car show.
189. So it's presented by Le Club in L.A.
190. It'll be Saturday, July 25th, 9 a.m. to noon at 1919 Bay Street in downtown L.A.
191. Mark put this in here, and he had found out about it on Instagram.
192. the poster that they had for to promo this event had some european coupes from the 50s and 60s
193. and i dug a little deeper and i found a bunch of alfa romeos his favorite lancias and fiats
194. air-cooled vehicles and a few french and german i did see some
195. Mercedes in there.
196. So if you would like to try to get in this and show your 50s and 60s coupe,
197. probably European would be best.
198. DM on Instagram this name right here, okay, if you have your pencil ready.
199. C-E underscore H-I-R-A-M.
200. And that is the guy in charge of that show.
201. or go to Le Club in LA on Instagram for their page
202. where you'll see that poster and the info about that show.
203. Oh, Le Club, huh? Le Club in LA.
204. Le Club. I've never heard of it, but somehow Mark has.
205. That's how connected he is. Yes.
206. And have you heard of the Bus Bros?
207. I feel like I have heard of them. Yeah.
208. I think we've had other shows that we've announced,
209. but these guys do VW buses.
210. That's right.
211. And they are taking over a pub in San Pedro for a really fun time.
212. On Saturday, July 25th, they are taking over Crafted, which is, I'll give you the full name,
213. but it's just a pub that everyone in San Pedro calls Crafted.
214. And the full name is Crafted at the Port of L.A., 112 East 22nd Street in San Pedro.
215. And this will be in the afternoon, 12 to 6.
216. And they're calling it the best VW bus show in San Pedro.
217. And they're going to have a DJ.
218. They're going to have raffles.
219. And they're going to have awards.
220. The top 10 buses will be recognized with award trophies.
221. So who knows?
222. Maybe Gabriel Fluffy will show up with some of his VWs.
223. You know, James Bell at Kia has the VW bus that his dad bought new originally.
224. He still has it, and it's even been restored.
225. So it pretty much looks brand new now.
226. It's red.
227. It's beautiful.
228. I wonder if he knows.
229. And he lives in Long Beach, so he's not too far from San Pedro.
230. So I would hope on the 25th of July, he makes it down there with his vehicle.
231. He certainly should be aware of this.
232. He probably is.
233. He probably is in the bus, bros.
234. Yes, he probably is.
235. And he'll probably have his car front and center, I'd hope.
236. Yeah, that would be great.
237. And I always love a red bus.
238. That's good.
239. Yes, it looks good.
240. We saw one of those at the air water reception, right?
241. They had a gigantic one.
242. That was so cool.
243. Fully restored.
244. When they're restored, they look crazy.
245. They look really like, you just, you forgot how kind of like space efficient they were.
246. These big, big, you know, boxy bus things.
247. Love them.
248. And I just love the sound.
249. There's a guy in my neighborhood who has one.
250. And of course, he only brings it out on the weekend.
251. And I know exactly when he's driving past.
252. Distinctive, distinctive noise.
253. Yeah, so true.
254. And for those of you who like the sound of Subarus and want to go to Subi Fest,
255. It's coming up in July, Saturday, July 25th.
256. And they're going to go with their afternoon to evening time slot again.
257. They tried this last year.
258. So it's from 3 to 10 p.m.
259. Excuse me on that.
260. And I guess it worked.
261. It'll be back at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia.
262. They're expecting 5,000 people to attend.
263. And so this classifies it as the largest West Coast gathering of Subaru fans.
264. crazy that's a lot of people
265. yeah so they'll have autocross
266. and they're going to have
267. Travis Pastrana there and he's going to be
268. doing on track demos
269. cool he's a great guy
270. I got to meet him
271. at a Subaru
272. rallycross up in
273. St.
274. where's it Glen Helen
275. yeah I think they turned it into a
276. racetrack up there at Glen Helen
277. And yeah, it was really fun, really fun time.
278. And Subaru is really into pet adoptions.
279. And if you've seen their exhibits, like at the LA Car Show, they always have dogs up for adoption with their cars on display.
280. So they're going to do that as well.
281. And then they're going to have some ride-alongs.
282. If you'd like to go, you can go to register for your tickets or to show your car at subifest.com.
283. It sounds like fun.
284. Yeah.
285. And what else is coming up at the Peterson?
286. Yeah, so we were talking about all the different things they do there,
287. both for displays but also for car events,
288. and fitting to be talking about today on the 250th birthday of the U.S.,
289. but the All-American Cruisin' will happen on Sunday, July 26,
290. from 9 a.m. to noon at the Peterson Automotive Museum.
291. Remember, it's at Wilshire and Fairfax there,
292. and kind of West LA Miracle Mile.
293. And it's going to be all about American cars and motorcycles.
294. And if you love classics, muscle cars, custom builds, performance cars,
295. all the things that, well, honestly, made Peterson, Robert Peterson,
296. Pete Peterson a lot of money because he had a lot of magazines that covered a lot of these vehicles And now they going to show up together at uh his museum and you can again uh check to see if you want to display your own vehicle if you go to peterson it was we said p and you can
297. spend 35 to register and it's also only 13 for museum members if you're already a member of
298. the Peterson Museum. So show your colors, show your support for the U.S. and enjoy all that
299. red, white, and blue excitement that's going to be happening at the Peterson Museum on July 26th.
300. I think this would be super cool if they line up the cars in red, white, and blue all over the
301. place and the motorcycle. Yeah, yeah. You need to do that. And don't forget too, if you go to this,
302. this admission to see the car show of the cruise in always includes museum
303. admission. So you can wander in and check,
304. check everything out inside.
305. Yeah. You really get two events out of these events.
306. You get to go to see the car show and then you get to go inside the museum and
307. see the museum.
308. Usually also they have some free food and coffee and they give you posters too.
309. So exactly. Yeah. They do all that stuff.
310. Should be fun. And I know there'll be more surprises.
311. I'm sure that they're going to have some kind of celebrity people there, too, who could sign your posters or whatever you want.
312. They always add-ons to those cruise-ins.
313. So, and we have time for one more item.
314. And just this is a planning ahead item.
315. In October, JCCS, which is Japanese Classic Car Show, is going to have their 21st annual event at Marina Green Park, same location in Long Beach.
316. and that's going to be October 11th from nine to three. Um, I've gone to this a lot. As you know,
317. I drive Japanese cars, uh, that you can see every year they'll have old Datsuns. Um, they'll have
318. old Toyotas. Uh, they always have the Mazda RX-7s, uh, Honda Civics, Acura NSX, and even Miatas. I
319. think last year was the first year they had a bunch of Miatas. It was crazy how many turned
320. out. It was a lot of fun to see them. And then the Mazda and Nissan usually bring race cars out too.
321. And they always have their own staffers available to answer questions. And they have famous people
322. who will talk to you, sign things, make a speech, all that fun stuff. And the reason why I wanted
323. to bring it up right now is because registration opens next Tuesday, July 7th. And you don't want
324. to miss this because last year the registration closed very early, August 10th, after all the
325. available spaces were filled. And this year they're going to keep registration open until
326. spaces are filled or on August 24th, whatever comes first. Registration early is $90 and standard
327. is 100 after July 31st.
328. So don't miss this.
329. Go to JapaneseClassicCarshow.com.
330. And if you want to get a spectator pass,
331. it's $20 advance.
332. And you will stand in line.
333. It's one thing I don't like about it
334. is there's a huge line to go through security
335. to get in there.
336. I go later and miss that whole thing.
337. Yeah.
338. Yeah.
339. Yeah, I'm standing in line for an hour.
340. No, thanks.
341. Well and that the reason A that we telling you about this so far ahead of when it happens because as you just said you got to be quick and on the uh on the spot johnny on the spot to get to your space because they go up quickly and it sounds like
342. you got to do a fairly early or late uh arrival with if you want to avoid the meat of the uh
343. entrance rush that results in i'm waiting for an hour which is not fun michelle no and there's
344. really no reason to get there and try to be in at nine o'clock because nothing's happening
345. that you're not going to do anything, no speeches or anything until like 11.
346. So.
347. Yeah.
348. So Michelle knows benefit from her experience.
349. Don't go early if you don't have to.
350. Yeah.
351. Don't unless you're showing or you have to be there.
352. So.
353. Yeah.
354. Yeah.
355. All right.
356. So we need to move on.
357. We need to, as we say, shift gears to the news.
358. We need to go to the news.
359. And we have to talk about a big problem with Tesla having another crash, not just an ordinary crash, a crash in which two people lost their lives.
360. Carl felt this was super important.
361. Go ahead, Carl.
362. Yeah, no, it just was really disturbing because it was not a Tesla Model S or Model 3 or Model Y or Model X.
363. It was a Tesla semi-truck, and apparently it was not far from their gigafactory in Nevada, right in the region where they're often testing these things.
364. And of course, you can assume that if they're doing testing of vehicles, that includes things like self-driving.
365. Well, apparently, early indications, we don't know for sure what happened,
366. so just as a disclaimer, but it appears, early indications,
367. that there could have been a sleeping problem,
368. as in falling asleep problem by the driver of this semi.
369. And, of course, that's a massive human error.
370. Some would argue, see why we need autonomous vehicles?
371. Humans are screw-ups.
372. Well, that may have been what caused this, it looks like.
373. But what's more disturbing to me is that would a Tesla truck not have the most advanced technology that includes something called automatic emergency braking?
374. AEB is the acronym you often hear because it's like on every modern car.
375. You can't buy like a, I don't even know, you can buy a post like 2020, 2021, but certainly you can't buy a 2025, 2026, 2027 vehicle that doesn't have some form of automatic emergency braking on it to keep exactly this kind of thing from happening.
376. Now, a lot of people say, well, yeah, but that's cars.
377. This is a truck.
378. Yeah, it's a Tesla truck.
379. So that technology may not be standardized yet.
380. And there's apparently legislation that's already been in discussion for a while of making it a requirement on semi trucks.
381. But Tesla is the cutting edge company.
382. They're always well ahead of the curve, ahead of the market.
383. So I was just surprised when I saw this.
384. I just don't know how that could happen.
385. and it's really unfortunate because, I mean, when you think about it,
386. if there's cars that need automatic emergency braking
387. or if there's vehicles that need automatic emergency braking more than cars,
388. I would say, you know, multi-ton, dozens of ton weighted vehicles
389. with a lot of kinetic energy as they move about
390. probably should have that technology,
391. probably should have made that standard and legally required on trucks before cars.
392. But, okay, the cars all have it.
393. let's get it on the trucks ASAP, especially and including the Tesla semis.
394. I totally agree Tesla already has a PR problem with pedestrian deaths and it has the highest rate of deaths from crashes caused by their vehicles So yeah it time for them to step up and figure out what went wrong here
395. And even if the driver did fall asleep, as you mentioned, which we don't know for sure, but if that is what happened, no, it's kind of unacceptable, isn't it, that Tesla didn't ensure there were some protections in place for a vehicle that weight.
396. And it's just actually kind of unconscionable.
397. Technology is there.
398. We know that.
399. It's on Toyotas.
400. It's on everything.
401. So kind of inexcusable and probably opening his real lawsuit, right?
402. Yeah.
403. It's going to be interesting to see what the fallout is from this, Michelle.
404. But just imagine you're doing what you're supposed to.
405. You're stopped at a stoplight waiting for it to change,
406. which is what both these passenger cars were doing when the Tesla truck ran into them.
407. And it's just like, okay, maybe I don't want to drive anymore
408. because if I can be sitting at a stoplight doing everything right
409. and be killed by somebody, you know, a large heavy vehicle that doesn't stop,
410. it's not inspirational to want to go out and drive your vehicle, is it?
411. No, it isn't, especially around where the Tesla Gigafactory might be.
412. Their vehicles.
413. no one no one wants to be a guinea pig yeah so really i do also hope concurrently that the
414. legislation catches up with this and makes sure that we are safer from large vehicles because
415. yeah and this ain't this isn't the first time i remember i don't know if you remember this
416. no i can't remember all the details and i'm going to say it's maybe like 20 plus years ago it was a
417. while ago but there was a truck coming down um angela's crest you know the famous uh freeway
418. that everyone likes to go drive their cars on.
419. And it's a big hill when you're coming down
420. out of those mountains and something happened.
421. This guy didn't fall asleep.
422. His brakes failed and he eventually couldn't stop.
423. And, you know, it eventually at T intersections,
424. you cross over the two freeway coming down Angeles Crest.
425. And then you're in like, God, what's that?
426. Is it Glendale?
427. Whatever, you're in that city and he couldn't stop.
428. And I know there were deaths involved with this truck.
429. Like he had to use other people's cars to stop his truck coming down that hill.
430. So this is not unprecedented.
431. And every time it happens, you're like, okay, we all need trucks to get stuff to us.
432. I'm not saying that, but maybe we need to make sure these vehicles with their weight involved have some additional safety elements.
433. Because they have certainly additional potential to cause terror and destruction if they aren't properly slowed down.
434. And what we call it is catastrophic consequences.
435. So, yeah, having done my share of catastrophic injury litigation, I can't think enough about every safety precaution that can be taken should be taken.
436. Otherwise, and it would be interesting to me, I used to talk about this when I did the show in San Diego when they first started with self-driving.
437. was are they going to just like try to cross-complain or tender the defense to the software people?
438. But Tesla can't do that if they're creating their own, if it's their own proprietary software that's in charge here
439. or supposed to be in charge here when the driver falls asleep.
440. So a nice try on that.
441. They could try to punt it.
442. But yeah, I'm always saying, you know, please, let's cut down on litigation.
443. make them safe so we don't have all these litigation things happening yeah yeah well
444. Well, all right.
445. Let's stop giving people a reason to sue big companies because the companies screw up.
446. You need them to hang around.
447. Yes.
448. All right.
449. So moving on to big companies.
450. Okay.
451. We have to talk about Ford.
452. Ford's been having some trouble.
453. Ford, there was a port that just came out from AutoWeek.
454. Oh, gee.
455. Who's the West Coast editor for AutoWeek?
456. Hmm.
457. I've never heard of that publication on this show before.
458. AutoWeek? What's that? I don't know. They came out with this report that Ford had a huge
459. callback, a recall of 741,196 vehicles due to rollaway risk. And this is from the transmissions.
460. There's a defect that could damage the parking system.
461. And in turn, that would prevent the vehicle from remaining in park, even when the gear selector indicates transmission is not engaged.
462. So we're talking about cars that are rolling away when the driver thinks that it should not be rolling away.
463. All right. Ford says that they will update the transmission control software.
464. Yeah. Inspect the transmission for damage.
465. Okay, great. And they're going to repair the damage free of charge, if there is any to the transmission.
466. And guess what? Expeditions 2018 through 2021 and Lincoln Navigators are in the mix.
467. And some Explorers and Lincoln Aviators from model year 2020 through 2021.
468. And last but not least, F-150s. Interestingly, only for one model year, 2021.
469. um and again as a litigation attorney i don't like hearing that owner notices have not gone out
470. even though they know about this yeah not good owner notices are going out this summer according
471. to the auto week story um all right it's summer um they know about this people are still using
472. those vehicles. And if it wasn't for this AutoWeek article, I don't think I would have been aware of
473. this recall. Most people don't really pay much attention to recall notices in the media. So
474. if you have one of these vehicles, and we usually don't even talk about this on our show,
475. but I felt like it was necessary because there are so many people who have these vehicles.
476. check to see if your particular vehicle is included in the recall by entering the VIN number
477. in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration recall website or in the
478. Ford recall lookup page on their website and in the meantime put on your parking brake
479. when the vehicle is parked, all right,
480. until you can get it into the dealer for the recall fix.
481. Yeah.
482. And by the way, interesting element to this,
483. I don't know if you also saw this,
484. I was talking to a reporter at the Detroit Free Press
485. earlier this week, like, well, not, yeah,
486. earlier this week, just a few days before this story broke,
487. about Ford's JD Power high initial quality things.
488. Like basically Ford has got this rather drastic and widespread reputation for having a lot of recalls because they had a lot of recalls Like they lead I think last year they had more recalls than all the other car
489. companies combined, Michelle. All the other car companies combined didn't have as many recalls
490. as just Ford had last year, if I'm not mistaken. It's like an order of magnitude higher, but they
491. are very much claiming that they are addressing their quality issues. And of course their attitude
492. is it's a lagging indicator.
493. You know, if they've made great cars for the last three years,
494. then the cars from, you know, five plus years old
495. could still be having problems pop up.
496. A lot of the cars you just mentioned, 2021,
497. that kind of era is five plus years old.
498. And so it looks like the company still has problems
499. even though they've addressed them
500. because they've addressed it in the last three or four years,
501. but all the cars before that
502. could still have these things pop up.
503. And that's a great story to tell.
504. And if they have new initial quality that's higher than,
505. that's moved up a lot and they're promoting it, that's great.
506. But just the irony that, and part of me wonders,
507. it seemed like terrible timing to like on Monday of this week be like,
508. hey, we're higher up on JD Power initial quality.
509. And then like middle of the week,
510. oh, we have to recall almost three quarter of a million vehicles
511. for a dangerous problem where the car can roll away.
512. It's like, okay, you guys, I'm not going to change your reputation
513. with that kind of back and forth.
514. You've got to have a bunch of long-term extended time
515. where you have great initial quality
516. and not counter it by having a bunch of reports of recall issues.
517. Yeah.
518. I really feel bad for whoever is in charge there of PR.
519. That's going to give them whiplash.
520. Just when you have things under control.
521. Oh, guess what?
522. Yeah.
523. And also, while we're talking about Ford, Ford just released its sales stats for May.
524. And again, their PR guy is not going to like that.
525. They had a really bad Q1 and it looks like they might have made up some ground in Q2.
526. But the stats that they just released are really interesting because it does show some
527. trends for the year because they released along with the May 2026 sales, they released their year
528. to date. And so Ford's truck sales are down 11% year over year, which means compared to 2025.
529. And that includes all their trucks. And then their Mach-E, oh, complete fall from grace,
530. 48.5% down in sales.
531. And their bestseller, another interesting thing when I looked at this breakdown,
532. the Mustang, just the regular Mustang, is up over last year, 28.6%.
533. Yeah.
534. And I would argue two things.
535. One, that's the only car, remember, that they make.
536. like beta ford doesn't make an any other car not an suv not a truck not a crossover just a pure
537. plain old you know four wheels and not a two box design trying to carry a bunch of stuff but a car
538. sedans are all gone convertibles are all gone except for the mustang which has coupe and
539. convertible form that's it that's the only car you can get from ford so that plus remember we
540. lost the challenger in the last like two years so if you want a two-door american coupe and the
541. Oh, I'm sorry.
542. And then the Camaro went away too.
543. So you want a two American coupe you get one choice and Ford got it Yeah So they kind of cornered that market And then the sales stats are showing that And maybe people are veering away from trucks and the flagship SUVs to go to a Mustang Why Well for one thing it cheaper You can get into it a lot cheaper And second of all it going to be better on gas because it a smaller vehicle And you drive it judiciously and you going to come out ahead
544. and then the Mach-E, that's easy to explain.
545. Yeah, I know.
546. We lost our electric incentive.
547. And as I like to say, Michelle, the first pony car is the last pony car.
548. Remember, the Mustang started the whole thing with pony cars,
549. and it's the only one still standing.
550. Yeah, there you go.
551. And then Lincoln, the Lincoln brand.
552. Okay, so Ford owns Lincoln, in case you didn't know.
553. They're losing a lot of money on Lincoln.
554. Just brand-wise, it's tanked.
555. And total sailors are down 10% from 2025 for all models.
556. And the only one that didn't decrease was the Aviator, which, you know, it is a cool SUV.
557. And sales of the Aviator were up 5.7% over last year.
558. So interesting from, I love studying stuff like this.
559. You know, it's really an interesting thing.
560. And if I haven't bored you completely with Ford, we're going to move on to gas prices.
561. more good news, right? But actually prices have gone down and we've seen a little bit of a dip.
562. I was in LA and prices, I'm buying my gas in LA. Okay. Quick tip, buying in LA, if you're up there,
563. it was about 20 cents a gallon cheaper up there than it was down here in Orange County.
564. So, wow. Now, I got a report that as of June 29th, the average price of gas fell 6.9 percent and is now three point three point three dollars and seventy eight cents per gallon.
565. OK, that's according to the Gas Buddy data. They studied more than 12 million individual price reports covering one hundred and fifty thousand gas stations all across the country, not just in California.
566. So the average nationwide is down 55.6%.
567. Oh my goodness, Carl.
568. 55.6 cents from a month ago.
569. Wow.
570. That's like well over 10%.
571. I mean, gas was around $4 for most of the country for a while there.
572. So down 55.6 is like 15%.
573. It's a big drop.
574. Yeah.
575. And even diesel went down.
576. So we're good.
577. And Patrick DeHaan, he's the head of the petroleum analysis there at GasBuddy, was quoted as saying that these declines came despite a turbulent week with the war in Iran.
578. And GasBuddy is anticipating that the national average will continue to drift lower this week.
579. and he's seeing that there will be an exception in California
580. because we have a cycle of where we put our summer blend
581. and he didn't mention this, but I'm adding it in there.
582. In California, we have a new raised tax on our gas.
583. So it went up two cents.
584. But in the non-cycling states, they are likely to see continued relief
585. depending on the fragile nature of this Iran situation.
586. So that means he was qualifying it and saying, yeah, it could shift.
587. But for now he predicting gas prices will continue to fall which is great And yeah so California does have the highest gas prices in the country
588. And most of it is due to our gas taxes.
589. And now our gas tax is 63 cents a gallon.
590. So yeah, awesome, huh?
591. 63 cents.
592. So think about that. Before you've paid for a drop of gas in your vehicle, you've paid 63.4 cents before the gas ever goes into your car, just because that's the cost of getting gas, according to the government in the state of California.
593. There you go. Yeah. Which brings me to, how can we save money on gas, Carl?
594. There's a long list, and people in California especially should be thinking about it.
595. Yeah. So get your tires checked. We don't want wear on tires and we don't want in under inflation
596. on your tires. That's the biggest way to save money on gas. That's conventional car people
597. wisdom, but we're just passing it along. And then my favorite avoiding jackrabbit starts.
598. Okay. No, I'm not going to do that. Um, I have a Miata. I have to,
599. combining errands into one trip yes i i've been doing these things for a long time actually
600. i definitely that's a time saver too by the way forget the gas you can save yourself some time
601. and you can do one trip and get three things done instead of three separate trips and to make it a
602. trifecta go when there's no traffic because you will not idle as much and then of course the
603. classic, which they told us in the 70s, drive slower. Remember that, Carl, in the 70s when
604. they told us if we went 55, we would save gas. That's right. That's right. Double nickel.
605. They launched the Honda Accord because crazy. But at that time, it was really bad. You couldn't
606. even get gas. And so you had to go where you could get the cheapest gas, but they also had gas
607. available. I remember seeing the lines. I remember that's why we had Volkswagens because they were
608. cheap, right? And you can fill them up for five bucks, but you have to be able to get the gas.
609. So there's that. And then GasBuddy also did a study to say that you should fill up your tank
610. on Sunday to save money on gas.
611. And they analyzed a whole bunch of daily statewide gasoline prices and found generally they were
612. lowest on Sundays and highest between Wednesday and Friday.
613. So, okay, Sunday's the best.
614. And then try to hit it on Monday or Tuesday.
615. So to save gas price money, you know?
616. Yeah.
617. So that could save you a little bit of money.
618. Thank you, gas buddy.
619. and if you want more info or want more tips go to gasbuddy.com and they did not sponsor us
620. nope and real quick there's also some notes in here about you can sometimes get grocery store
621. rewards you know michelle i was totally oblivious i'm like buying groceries one day in the past like
622. month and the very nice lady at the grocery store comes up and she's like going hey you know do you
623. like use your use this when you're putting gas in i'm like oh you know sometimes i see those things
624. pop up, you know, this member, that member. And I'm just like, Hey, I would ever know and all that.
625. And she's like, well, you are a member of this. And she told me, I can't remember how much
626. it was. Oh, I think it was like 10 cents for every like $50 in a given month that you spent.
627. And she immediately with my like account.
628. was able to come up and she's like, oh yeah, you'd be getting like 400 or like 40 cents off a gallon
629. and it's up to $75. Now it's only on one fill up. She's like, she's like, now depending on how much,
630. how much gas your car can handle and how empty it is, you might easily hit 75. She's like,
631. but it's one fill up, but it can be multiple cars because you don't start over. She's like,
632. so if you can't get enough, if you can't use $75 worth of gas in your car before it's overflowing,
633. have a family member come with you and finish off the 75 in their car so uh it was pretty
634. interesting as a guy who thinks he's supposed to be kind of the car guy to have the grocery store
635. lady telling me all these things i can do to save my money but i was grateful to uh to her and uh i
636. had i was totally oblivious michelle and now i'm like okay i have to buy groceries and now i'm
637. aware that i can be saving money on my gas based on if i'm buying groceries and i can and i connect
638. the two. I put in my kind of grocery store number when I go to get gas. Yes. Same with me. I go to
639. Chevron and I can use my Vons and Albertsons credits to get a couple cents off every gallon.
640. And as long as I plug in my phone number, it brings it right up. I get the discount.
641. And yeah. So there, and use your Costco gas and do whatever you can. It's worth it. Right.
642. At these prices, for sure.
643. Yeah.
644. So, P.S., Costco just opened its first standalone gas station in the whole country.
645. It is right here in Orange County at Mission Viejo in the old Pet Bath and Beyond store.
646. And it's off Oso Parkway exit off the I-5.
647. It's right near me.
648. I should go down there and use it.
649. But, yes, it's their first standalone gas station.
650. It's a couple miles from me.
651. Cool.
652. And there's 40 gas pumps there.
653. Crazy.
654. Yeah.
655. Okay.
656. So here's your hours, Carl.
657. Monday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.
658. Go first thing in the morning, right?
659. Saturday, 6 a.m. to 8.30.
660. Sunday, 6 a.m. to 7.30.
661. And you, of course, have to be a member.
662. There is no market or store or car wash.
663. Just gas.
664. All about the gas.
665. But it's cheap gas.
666. So I bet you they'll see all 40 of those pumps being used regularly.
667. Yeah.
668. Yeah, the one on, there's a Costco gas station on Tustin Ranch Road over there by the Tustin Marketplace.
669. And it's packed all the time, always.
670. You can see it over the bridge.
671. It's crazy.
672. There's one off of Technology Drive in Barranca or something where Kelly Blue Book offices are.
673. And that one was always jammed up too.
674. when I was working at Kelly and I'd drive by and I was like,
675. well, there's a big line there to save some gas money.
676. Yeah.
677. All right.
678. So we have a few more minutes to do a news item about Volkswagen.
679. Our friends at Automotive News put out a report that VW Group CEO Oliver Bloom
680. is going to ask its board of directors this month to approve plans
681. to restructure the entire company, eliminating 100,000 jobs worldwide, which is 15% of its
682. workforce, ouch, and to close completely four of its German factories due to the collapse
683. of China sales and breakdown of free trade model that gave rise to its export boom in
684. the last decade.
685. So thoughts, Carl?
686. China is going to destroy all of us.
687. If you want my expert analysis as effectively and efficiently delivered as possible I can deliver it in about five words But yeah it really Grab your ankles
688. Yeah, I mean, it's really...
689. And it's very, very frustrating because...
690. It's frustrating on two levels because China is producing these cars really inexpensively.
691. And as a result, they're eating at market share anywhere that they are on, anywhere they're allowed to sell.
692. Now, a lot of people might have noticed that they're not really allowed to sell in the U.S.
693. because we have such massive penalties between tariffs and they don't have any, for the most part,
694. they don't have any dealer franchise licenses, which, of course, are required to sell new cars here.
695. The exception, of course, being Polestar and Volvo, because they're both owned by Zhili,
696. which is a Chinese ginormous corporation.
697. But the cars are still built in either Sweden or even here.
698. There's a U.S. plant that Polestar invested in.
699. And that's another big piece of news you probably heard in the past week, Michelle, is that Polestar is not allowed to sell cars in the U.S. anymore.
700. Because the U.S. has decided that Chinese cars are all potentially rolling spy cameras and microphones to send information back to China.
701. And so if you have a software system that's in a Chinese car that's like a connected car, they see it as a security threat.
702. and they just took away Polestar's ability to sell cars here.
703. And Polestar theoretically could fight it.
704. And apparently they're like, fine, we're done.
705. And they're pulling out of the market.
706. They're not going to sell anything after the 2026 model year vehicles.
707. They've got dealerships here.
708. They've dropped that new plant in South Carolina they invested in and they're done.
709. And so that's kind of the first issue is the cars are cheap unless there's tariffs
710. and the tariffs are keeping most cars out.
711. And now there's a security thing keeping out Polestar in the US.
712. and then the next thing that everyone always wants to scream is well we should compete with china
713. tariffs are stupid and it very first very well frustrates me michelle because i feel like it's
714. like well you don't really know what you're saying when i hear you that because i'm betting if i said
715. to you fine we're going to compete with china no overtime no uh uh labor unions no automatic
716. yeah medical care no laws on what the age you know have some child labor laws there right uh
717. you know, no safety standards in the workplace.
718. No ability to sue for infractions.
719. Probably.
720. Right.
721. All this.
722. And you're told to go work in the factory and you'll go and like it and ask and say,
723. thank you, sir.
724. Can I can I work some more?
725. That's that's your option on working in the factory.
726. I mean, OK, if we do all that, we could compete with China.
727. Now, well, wait a second, Carla.
728. Yeah, that's what I thought.
729. You don't actually want to tell all the UW workers, hey, we're destroying your union.
730. We're going to reset your wages.
731. There's no overtime.
732. We'll see what we can do on medical benefits, but don't hold your breath.
733. And you'll like it, by the way.
734. We don't want to hear any feedback from you.
735. That's what China is doing with their automotive workers.
736. If we want to do that, and I don't work in an auto facility, so part of me is like, okay, I'd love to compete with China.
737. Let's do it.
738. But I'm pretty sure most people who work in automotive assembly facilities would say no thank you.
739. Yeah. And for whatever reason, they're able to get better deals on parts, probably because they're crappy parts, P.S., but they're able to just nickel and dime way better than we can. And their technology seems to be stuff that people really like. And I guess they are selling in Canada and people in Canada are, you know, snapping them up. And so it is a threat for sure.
740. They come in their pricing is half of what we charging for EVs summer EVs by the way It would decimate our market because people will snap them up So it is wise to keep them out you know but we have to
741. No, I mean, I hate the idea that we can't compete with China, but I also am realistic about why we can't compete with China and know that it's impossible.
742. And don't forget, there's a couple other things, too. The government and the industry is just totally aligned.
743. Like the industry is kind of another finger or arm of the government.
744. And so they can subsidize automotive production over there at a level that we, you know, a lot of people would be like, well, we've subsidized it.
745. Not at the levels that the automotor makers are subsidized, you know, because essentially they're, again, they're kind of puppets of the government.
746. So they do whatever the government says and the government helps pay the thing.
747. And then on the EV thing, they locked up all of the resources.
748. They locked up all those rare earth materials like 20 years ago where they talk about how a lot of the cultures on the other side of the planet have, you know, they think in quarter century and centuries.
749. And we think in, you know, quarters and years here.
750. So they saw this whole EV thing coming.
751. They locked up all the rare earth metals from Australia and a lot of the other sources and the zinc and all this kind of stuff, the lithium.
752. And so guess what?
753. They don't charge themselves the same
754. as they charge all the other markets for batteries
755. and for EV technology.
756. So they've got that advantage too.
757. And all you gotta do, Michelle,
758. is think about a monopoly.
759. What is a monopoly
760. and why do we outlaw them in this country?
761. A monopoly is the definition of something,
762. of a company that's so large,
763. it can control a market,
764. it can produce things so cheaply at a loss even
765. for an extended period
766. until it drives all the other competitors out,
767. and then it's the only one left.
768. And then, you know, guess what a company that's a monopoly does
769. once it's destroyed all of its competition?
770. It re-eats the prices.
771. I'll give you a hint.
772. It doesn't keep charging the low price that drove everyone out.
773. It goes, oh, good, and we can finally recoup our losses.
774. Yay.
775. Exactly, exactly.
776. So if everyone thinks that by buying these cheap Chinese cars
777. in the countries where they're sold, not ours,
778. but the ones where they're eating up market share
779. and destroying plants and employees like Volkswagen in Germany and Canada,
780. If they think that this is Chinese, just make better cars for cheaper.
781. It's like, no, they drive everyone out with all their monopolistic and government aligned incentives and crazy working conditions until they own the car industry, global car industry.
782. And then I'm pretty much can guarantee you, you won't be getting cheap Chinese cars anymore once they're the only ones left.
783. So please keep this in mind as a consumer and as someone who screams about not competing with China.
784. Please keep this in mind.
785. Exactly.
786. So, yeah, don't support that monopoly because it is.
787. It's what it is.
788. That's the pattern already.
789. There's a reason why we don't allow that in America because we like free competition.
790. And that's right.
791. Instantly.
792. It's over.
793. So we've always had laws on that since the 20s, I believe.
794. Yeah.
795. After the whole Carnegie and all those industrialists because they did have monopolies and it was like standard oil and all that.
796. It's like, OK, we got to put a stop to this.
797. Yeah, same with trust. So yeah, federal law is full of antitrust litigation and still. Yeah. So on that cheery note, really don't have a lot of time for reviews, but Carl has a preview of a couple of things that he's going to talk about next week on the car show.
798. Yeah, I know.
799. I just wanted to let people know that there's some interesting new vehicles coming.
800. The Lamborghini Urus Perfermonte SE, which is like the newest version of their SUV that's
801. really fast and does 0 to 60 in like three and a half or 3 seconds What Wow Yeah yeah It a big SUV Michelle and it does 0 in like the low threes And it sounds awesome
802. And it looks like a Lamborghini
803. and you can get them in crazy bright colors.
804. I remember they're electrifying their entire model line.
805. So they had the Urus,
806. then they had the Urus Performante,
807. then they had the Urus SE,
808. and well, then they had the Urus S,
809. then they had the Urus SE,
810. and the E adds the electric components.
811. That's when they started to hybridize them.
812. and now they've got the Urus Performante SE.
813. So it's basically the most performance-oriented one.
814. They've got the electric motor in there,
815. giving it a lot of torque at low speeds,
816. and then they've got internal combustion engine still
817. to keep it going once you're moving,
818. and it's the quickest one and all that.
819. So that thing was just released, all the information,
820. and we have an interview with one of the head executives
821. from Lamborghini that I talked to,
822. and next week I can give you more information
823. about what he said and also direct you to the other radio show that I do with Lauren.
824. And we have the interview there if you want to go see it.
825. So it's not there yet, but we'll have it next week.
826. And then there's a Ford F-150 Tremor down below my balcony right now.
827. I can almost see it where I'm sitting.
828. And I will be driving it and have more to say on the Tremor, F-150 Tremor next week.
829. And I will have, I've had the Mazda CX-50.
830. This is a crossover, five person, and it's just the right size.
831. for city people. It's not meant for off-roading, but it's a fun city suburban car. And I am going
832. to review that next week. And hopefully we'll have Mark back and he'll have something to review also.
833. And in the meantime, we'd like to thank our board ops. We always appreciate what they do for us
834. behind the scenes. And be sure to follow us on Facebook. Our Facebook page is The Car Show
835. on KPFK 90.7 FM.
836. Stay tuned on KPFK for Rhapsody in Black,
837. music that sounds great on your car stereo,
838. and we will see you next week on The Car Show.
839. Drive a seat.
840. I'm Estee Chandler.
841. Join Negwa Ibrahim and me Sundays from 1 to 2 p.m. for the news and views on Southwest Asia and North Africa you won't hear anywhere else.
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843. That's Middle East in Focus, Sundays at 1 p.m. only on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and online at kpfk.org.
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