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Toyota Hybrid Challenge: How Slow Can You Go?

Toyota Hybrid Challenge - Beware: Slow(er) moving Hybrid Ahead We’ll be the first to admit it: Toyota hybrids can achieve some pretty remarkable feats of economy. Trouble is, only if you’re happy to drive like you hate it with a passion. And that doesn’t mean thrashing the life out of your Toyota hybrid to get there as quickly as possible, because if you do you’ll probably get worse mpg than if you just had the Atkinson cycle lump without the hybrid gubbins.

Mazda hires VW alum Derek Jenkins to head U.S. design staff

Former Volkswagen designer Derek Jenkins has been hired to be the design chief for Mazda in America. Jenkins, 39, fills a position vacated last summer by Franz von Holzhausen, who left to take the top design post at electric-vehicle maker Tesla Motors. Jenkins had been chief of design for the Volkswagen Group in North America, which he joined in 2000.

Tesla Model S owners will receive upgraded charge adapters

After a garage fire in Irvine, Calif., in November of last year in which an overheated charging system for a Tesla Model S sedan was stated to possibly have been involved, Tesla will be sending out upgraded wall-charger adapters to all Tesla Model S owners. This upgrade comes on the heels of an over-the-air software update for the charging system in the Model S sedan. Software version 5.8.4 would enable the charging system to automatically reduce the charging current by 25 percent if the system detects unexpected fluctuations in the input power, essentially slowing the charging current and reducing the heat created in any high-resistance connections if the car senses that the current is unsteady.