Toyota, Honda, Nissan and Mazda recall 3.4 million cars over Airbag fault

As recalls go, 3.4 million cars around the globe is a big number, but it’s that big because a parts supplier - Takata Corp – supplied the same airbag part to Toyota, Honda, Nissan and Mazda, so the recall involves all four Japanese car makers. The part at fault could cause the airbag inflator to rupture and deploy the airbag abnormally, although there have been no reports of injuries due to the potentially faulty part and just five reports of the fault existing – three in the US and two in Japan. In the UK the number of cars affected – and do note the recall only affects cars sold between 2000 and 2004 – appears to be about 75,000 for Toyota, 60,000 for Nissan, 15,000 for Honda and 2.000 for Mazda, and all four car makers will be getting in touch with owners during the next month to book their cars in for free replacement of the part.

Nissan Leaf with advanced-driver assist to begin public road tests in Japan

Nissan is about to begin testing advanced driver-assist systems in the real world, and a new Nissan Leaf is serving as the test bed for these technologies. This is all a part of Nissan's development of Autonomous Drive, a goal to achieve virtually zero fatalities in accidents involving its vehicles by the year 2020. Autonomous Drive can be said to be a further development of Nissan's Safety Shield, a system that has a 360-degree view around the vehicle that scans for risks and provides warnings to the driver, intervening automatically if necessary.

Ford Mustang 50 Year Limited Edition premieres at New York auto show

Ford launched the Mustang 50 years ago this week at the New York World's Fair. To celebrate the iconic pony car's birthday, Ford will be revealing a 2015 Mustang 50 Year Limited Edition, just 1,964 examples of which will be built. The limited edition model premieres at New York auto show this week, and will go on sale this fall.