K Source/fit System 66028m Door Mirror Driver Side on 2040-parts.com

Will the new Ford Mondeo (2014) end up a re-badged U.S. Ford Fusion?

With the 2013 Ford Mondeo now becoming the 2014 Mondeo with the closure of Ford’s Genk factory, will Europe now get a re-badged US Ford Fusion? The Genk Plant makes the Ford Mondeo and the Galaxy and S-Max (which are built on the Mondeo platform) and, at its peak, was building over 300,000 Mondeos and over 100,000 MPVs. But by last year the Mondeo production had dropped below 100,000 mark and MPV production had dropped to 80,000.

Grab a ‘VAT Free’ Skoda Octavia

In yet another ‘Sign of the times’ Skoda has announced that they are now offering ‘VAT Free Octavias’ until the end of the year. No, this is not a tie-up between Alistair Darling and VW, it’s just Skoda’s way of offering a headline price decrease of a bit over 13% (less expensive to Skoda than last week for the same headline, to be fair, and there is a new model due in January!). Grab a VAT free Skoda Octavia I’m pretty sure that there will be a raft of these ‘VAT Free’ offers floating around on everything from cars to washing machines, capitalising on the fact the VAT is in the headlines.

Honda CR-Z Hybrid by 2010

Honda are bringing the Honda CR-Z Hybrid to market next year, based on the CR-Z Concept from 2007 Honda’s first production Hybrid – the Honda Insight, recently called the worst car in the world – has not been a resounding success. True, it looks better than the Toyota Prius but – and we haven’t driven one yet so we can’t comment from our own experience – it’s not a great car. It has also been eclipsed – after a promising start – by the Toyota Prius, which has doubled its sales in Japan.