Cardone Industries 64-1301 Vacuum Pump on 2040-parts.com

Sacramento, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles top road frustration study

Weather, crashes, traffic and attitude--these are the things that make our commutes unbearable. Now, the RoadIntel.com Web site has ranked cities based on its "road frustration index." The index is based on how weather affects the roads, the amount of traffic, the number of crashes and driver sentiment, which is calculated by searching for keywords such as "traffic jam" and "stuck" on Twitter. On the site, you can look at cities ranked day by day and even hour by hour.

Fiat makes bid to buy Opel

The proposed partnership between Fiat and Chrysler has been thrown into a tailspin with revelations that the Italian carmaker has made a secret offer to purchase a majority stake in Opel. Klaus Franz, chairman of Opel's works council, on Thursday confirmed Fiat's interest in a takeover of General Motors' European subsidiary, suggesting that officials have cleared the way for the signing of a letter of intent as early as April 28. Opel has been in talks with parts supplier Magna International on a possible partnership over the past month.

Ford to triple production of EcoBoost engines by 2015

Ford EcoBoost Engine production to increase In another clear sign of engine downsizing by car makers Ford has announced it will triple production of its EcoBoost engines in Europe by 2015. The petrol engine is fighting back against hybrids and diesels with downsizing and forced induction creating petrol engines that work more pleasingly than  diesels – and with lower particulate emissions – whilst delivering proper performance and levels of economy that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. Ford is in the vanguard of this mainstream push to make petrol engines relevant even in a car world dictated by government CO2 targets (which aren’t really CO2 targets , they’re official economy targets) and they’re planning to triple production of their very good range of EcoBoost engines in Europe over the next three years.