Lotus Cortina Elan Elite Gear Knob on 2040-parts.com

GM returning to leasing with luxury vehicles

General Motors will return to the leasing business focusing on luxury vehicles, but not on a broader basis, Vice Chairman Bob Lutz said. "We will get back into leasing, but we are not going to use massive subsidized leasing to drive volume because it's volume without profitability," Lutz said July 29 in an interview with Automotive News. "We'd rather sell less at higher profit than sell more at lower profit." Lutz said it still would make sense for GM to do more leasing on its luxury vehicles.

Spyker, Youngman agree on joint venture

Dutch supercar maker Spyker and the Chinese Youngman Group have agreed on a joint venture to build a new super sport utility vehicle and a group of sedans based on Saab's Phoenix platform. The SUV is scheduled to hit the market by the end of 2014, while no dates for the Phoenix-based sedan were announced. Youngman will invest 10 million euros in Spyker, 7 million of which will be for stock shares constituting 29.9 percent of the supercar company.

1970 Firebird gets prepped for Stone Soup Project raffle

Detroit classic-rock station 94.7 WCSX started this year's Stone Soup Project for charity last month, and things with the 1970 Pontiac Firebird are going swimmingly. When finished, the car will be raffled off for HolyCross Children's Services, a charity dedicated to providing social services to kids in Michigan. Last year, the Stone Soup Project took on a classic 1969 Mustang Boss.