1996 Toyota Rav4 Owners Manual on 2040-parts.com

2013 Ford Mondeo debuts on Thursday – but is it time for a name change?

Ford will reveal the new Mondeo on Thursday at the ‘Go Further’ event in Amsterdam as well as news of major product acceleration. We saw the first photo of the new Ford Mondeo back in January, shortly after Ford revealed its North American sibling – the Ford Fusion – at the Detroit Motor Show. At that time, especially as the Fusion had already been properly revealed, we assumed the new Mondeo would debut at Geneva in the Spring, but it didn’t.

Ford Mondeo Vignale revealed – it’s back to the days of Ford Ghia

The Ford Mondeo Vignale (picture) has been revealed as Ford’s new range-topper Mainstream car makers have always tried to add some glitz and gloss to their models by tagging on a badge they thought made their cars more exclusive. Like Ford with endless ‘Ghia’ models sitting at the top of the Ford range after they bought Ghia of Turin in 1970. Ford continued to use the Ghia badge to mark out its best-equipped models until very recently (you could still buy a Fiesta Ghia as recently as 2008) but they finally dropped the badge and moved their top of the tree badge over to the ‘Titanium’ moniker.

Chrysler reportedly set to expand Toledo assembly plant

The Chrysler Group is planning to expand its Toledo, Ohio, assembly complex, adding a second shift and more than 1,100 jobs to the operation that currently builds the Jeep Liberty and Dodge Nitro SUVs, the Toledo Blade newspaper reported Thursday. The $365 million investment could be the first of several major expansions to Chrysler's Toledo operations, which also include production of the Jeep Wrangler at the nearby Toledo North Plant, the newspaper reported. The automaker disclosed the plans in documents filed in a city tax application that will be discussed by local officials at a meeting Thursday night, the report said.