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Ellesmere Port's bid to build Ampera hits snags

By Rob Golding Motor Industry 09 October 2009 15:02 Prime minister Gordon Brown’s personal crusade to get Vauxhall's version of the Chevrolet Volt petrol-electric plug-in hybrid – the Ampera – built in Britain's Ellesmere Port factory in 2012 is a dream delayed, CAR can disclose today.News that the UK Astra plant is the best in Europe, that the Astra's Delta platform will underpin the Ampera, and that Volt will be on US sale from 2010 had been taken to mean that Vauxhall would be churning out the cars in the north west within three years.But the prospect of an electric car industry growing up around the run-down Merseyside manufacturing site is not imminent, CAR has learned.'No Ampera to be built in Europe before 2015'Vauxhall insiders have made it clear that the car to be known as the Vauxhall/Opel Ampera in Europe will be an import from the US for at least five years. One senior planner told us: 'The US will be the sole source of Amperas until at least 2015.'Bob Lutz, GM's former product supremo who recently came out of retirement as a PR, said that the low value of the dollar made the US an ideal site for the manufacturing of export cars. And with forecast sticker prices of the range-extender electric car standing at a scary £35,000+, every price saving is vital to its marketability.The European market also needs time to get its electricity recharge infrastructure in place before it is worth making cars onshore in volume, GM high-ups point out.

Range Rover Evoque Convertible NOT going in to production. Thankfully.

It seems Land Rover is having second thoughts about making the Range Rover Evoque Convertible – shown at Geneva 2012 – in to a production model. But the one model we really couldn’t find a lot of positives in was the Range Rover Evoque Convertible – which arrived as a concept at the 2012 Geneva Motor Show – looking like the ultimate statement of Chav central for Tango’d ‘Ladies’ who lunch, from Brentwood via Surrey and up to Cheshire. We understood Land Rover’s impetus – they thought there’d be a market for a drop-top Evoque – but it really was a step too far for Land Rover to go.

Hyundai vows 50 mpg for U.S. lineup by 2025

Hyundai's entire U.S. vehicle lineup will achieve an average of 50 mpg by 2025, Hyundai Motor America CEO John Krafcik pledged on Wednesday. Speaking at the Management Briefing Seminars in Traverse City, Mich., Krafcik said Hyundai's U.S.