Merkur XR4Ti
The Merkur XR4Ti is a performance-oriented 3-door hatchback sold in North America from 1985 to 1989. A product of the Ford Motor Company, the car was a version of the European Ford Sierra adapted to U.S. regulations. The XR4Ti project was championed by Ford vice president Bob Lutz. History The Sierra was the successor to Ford of Europe's Cortina/Taunus and was developed while Lutz was chairman of Ford's European operations. Due to financial restrictions the decision was made to keep the front-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout of its predecessor and pursue improved fuel economy through advanced aerodynamics. The Probe III design study unveiled at the 1981 Frankfurt Motor Show indicated the direction Ford would take with the Sierra. Responsibility for the Sierra design was handled by vice president for design Uwe Bahnsen and chief stylist Patrick le Quément. The Sierra was released in Europe in September 1982, and the performance-oriented XR4i appeared in 1983, slotted into ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ford Of Europe
Ford of Europe GmbH is a subsidiary company of Ford Motor Company founded in 1967 in Cork, Ireland, with headquarters in Cologne, Germany. History Ford of Europe was founded in 1967 by the merger of Ford of Britain, Ford Germany, and Irish Henry Ford & Son Ltd divisions of the Ford Motor Company. The front-engined Ford Transit range of panel vans launched in 1965, was the first formal co-operation between the two entities, simultaneously developed to replace the German Ford Taunus Transit and the British Ford Thames 400E. Prior to this, the two companies avoided marketing their vehicles in one another's domestic markets, and in much of the rest of western Europe were direct competitors, with totally separate product lines, despite being owned by the same American parent, in a similar manner to General Motors’ Opel and Vauxhall subsidiaries at the same time - indeed GM followed Ford's precedent in the 1970s by merging the operations of Opel and Vauxhall into General Mo ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bob Lutz (businessman)
Robert Anthony Lutz (born February 12, 1932) is a Swiss American automotive executive. He served as a top leader of all of the United States Big Three automobile manufacturers, having been in succession executive vice president (and board member) of Ford Motor Company, president and then vice chairman (and board member) of Chrysler Corporation, and vice chairman of General Motors. Early life Lutz was born in Zürich, Switzerland, the son of Margaret and Robert Harry Lutz. His father was a vice chairman of Credit Suisse. Lutz left Switzerland at the age of seven and spent time in Scarsdale, New York, becoming a U.S. citizen in 1943, and returned to Switzerland in 1947 to attend school in Lausanne. He is fluent in English, Swiss German, German, French and has a modest fluency in Italian. Lutz received a bachelor's degree in production management in 1961, followed by an MBA with a concentration in marketing with highest honors in 1962, both from the University of California, B ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Notchback
A notchback is a design of a car with the rearmost section that is distinct from the passenger compartment and where the back of the passenger compartment is at an angle to the top of what is typically the rear baggage compartment. Notchback cars have "a trunk whose lid forms a distinct deck." In profile view, the body has a step down from the roof with a downward inclined passenger compartment's rear window to meet an almost horizontal trunk lid extending to the rear of the car. The category may be characterized as having a three-box design where the trunk volume is less pronounced than the engine and passenger compartments. Many models of sedans, coupés, or hatchbacks could be classified as notchbacks. However, the category has limited salience outside of American car manufacturers distinguishing the three-box models from other body styles in the same model range. For example, the Chevrolet Vega range included both a notchback coupe and a fastback coupe. North America One ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ford Focus (third Generation)
The Ford Focus (third generation), also known as the Focus Mk III, (Code name: C346) debuted at the 2010 North American International Auto Show as a 2012 model. The cars shown were a 4-door sedan and 5-door hatchback, also debuting a new 2.0-litre direct injection I4 engine. A 5-door estate (wagon) was previewed at the Geneva auto show a month later. This generation of Focus would be the first Ford vehicle designed under the tenure of CEO Alan Mulally and his "One Ford" plan, which aimed to leverage Ford's global resources into creating more competitive vehicles that could be sold globally in each segment with minimal changes. The "One Ford" plan would reunite the North American and global Focus line. The previous North American version was thus discontinued, and the new model was launched simultaneously in North America and Europe on March 2, 2011, both having started production near the end of 2010. Production in Asia, Africa, and South America followed later. Ford debut ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated between the Baltic and North seas to the north, and the Alps to the south; it covers an area of , with a population of almost 84 million within its 16 constituent states. Germany borders Denmark to the north, Poland and the Czech Republic to the east, Austria and Switzerland to the south, and France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands to the west. The nation's capital and most populous city is Berlin and its financial centre is Frankfurt; the largest urban area is the Ruhr. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity. A region named Germania was documented before AD 100. In 962, the Kingdom of Germany formed the bulk of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th ce ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Genk Body & Assembly
''Genk Body & Assembly'' was a Ford Motor Company automobile factory in Genk, Belgium, just over an hour to the west of the company's European head office in Cologne, Germany. The site spanned . The plant employed approx 4,300 workers in 2014. The plant opened in the early 1960s. The first mainstream car built there was Ford's first front wheel drive volume model, the Ford Taunus P4. Later on the plant focused on producing mid-sized family cars including the company's Sierra and Mondeo models. Models built Closure Ford announced in October 2012 that it was planning to close its Genk plant at the end of 2014 in response to longstanding over-capacity problems in Europe, as part of a larger closure plan that will see the manufacturer's European capacity slashed by 20%, with further capacity cuts penciled in should the company not succeed in returning to higher European sales volumes. The next generation of Ford Mondeo will be assembled, for the European market, at the manufa ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera
The Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera is a mid-size car that was manufactured and marketed from the 1982 through 1996 model years by the Oldsmobile Division of General Motors. It shared the front-wheel drive A platform with the Buick Century, Pontiac 6000 and Chevrolet Celebrity. Available body styles included a 2-door coupe, 4-door sedan, and the 4-door Cutlass (Ciera) Cruiser station wagon. Background The Cutlass Ciera and its A-Body platform twins, featured MacPherson strut front suspension, body-color urethane bumpers, flush-mounted glass, front-wheel drive, and on many models, fuel injection. The Cutlass Ciera shared the Cutlass nameplate with the smaller Cutlass Calais and the upscale Cutlass Supreme. Oldsmobile had previously used the Celebrity brand in the 1960s, but GM chose to give that name to Chevrolet. With the Ciera, Oldsmobile established Cutlass as sub-brand for its line of mainstream sedans and coupes. Initially, the Cutlass Ciera and its platform mates were mark ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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GMC C/K
C, or c, is the third letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''cee'' (pronounced ), plural ''cees''. History "C" comes from the same letter as "G". The Semites named it gimel. The sign is possibly adapted from an Egyptian hieroglyph for a staff sling, which may have been the meaning of the name ''gimel''. Another possibility is that it depicted a camel, the Semitic name for which was ''gamal''. Barry B. Powell, a specialist in the history of writing, states "It is hard to imagine how gimel = "camel" can be derived from the picture of a camel (it may show his hump, or his head and neck!)". In the Etruscan language, plosive consonants had no contrastive voicing, so the Greek ' Γ' (Gamma) was adopted into the Etruscan alphabet to represent . Already in the Western Greek alphabet, Gamma first took a '' form in Early Etruscan, then '' in Classical Et ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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General Motors
The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and was the largest in the world for 77 years before losing the top spot to Toyota in 2008. General Motors operates manufacturing plants in eight countries. Its four core automobile brands are Chevrolet, Buick, GMC (automobile), GMC, and Cadillac. It also holds interests in Chinese brands Wuling Motors and Baojun as well as DMAX (engines), DMAX via joint ventures. Additionally, GM also owns the BrightDrop delivery vehicle manufacturer, GM Defense, a namesake Defense vehicles division which produces military vehicles for the United States government and military; the vehicle safety, security, and information services provider OnStar; the auto parts company ACDelco, a GM Financial, namesake financial lending service; and majority ownership in t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Frankfurt Motor Show
The International Motor Show Germany or International Mobility Show Germany, in German known as the ''Internationale Automobil-Ausstellung'' (''IAA'' – International Automobile Exhibition), is one of the world's largest mobility shows. It consists of two separate fairs, that subdivided in 1991. While the ''IAA MOBILITY'' displays passenger vehicles, motorcycles and bikes, the ''IAA TRANSPORTATION'' specializes in commercial vehicles. Before the separation, the show was held solely at the Messe Frankfurt. The IAA is organized by the ''Verband der Automobilindustrie'' (VDA – Association of the German Automotive Industry) and is scheduled by the Organisation Internationale des Constructeurs d'Automobiles (OICA), who recognize the IAA as one of the "big five" (most prestigious auto shows worldwide). History In 1897 the first IAA was held at the Hotel Bristol in Berlin, with a total of eight motor vehicles on display. As the automobile became more known and accepted, the IAA be ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Front-engine, Rear-wheel-drive Layout
In automotive design, a FR, or front-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout is one where the engine is located at the front of the vehicle and driven wheels are located at the rear via a drive shaft. This was the traditional automobile layout for most of the 20th century. Modern designs commonly use the front-engine, front-wheel-drive layout (FF). It is also used in high-floor buses and school buses. Front mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout In automotive design, a front mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout (FMR) is one that places the engine in the front, with the rear wheels of vehicle being driven. In contrast to the front-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout (FR), the engine is pushed back far enough that its center of mass is to the rear of the front axle. This aids in weight distribution and reduces the moment of inertia, improving the vehicle's handling. The mechanical layout of an FMR is substantially the same as an FR car. Some models of the same vehicle can be classified as ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ford Taunus
The Ford Taunus is a family car that was sold by Ford Germany throughout Europe. Models from 1970 onward were built on the same basic construction as the Ford Cortina MkIII in the United Kingdom, and later on, the two car models were essentially the same, differing almost only in the placement of the steering wheel. The model line was named after the Taunus mountain range in Germany, and was first made in 1939, and continued through several versions until 1994. Taunus G93A (1939–1942) / G73A (1948–1952) The Ford Taunus G93A was a development of the Ford Eifel, and used the same 1172-cc four cylinder engine, but in a longer chassis and a streamlined body. It was the first German Ford to have hydraulic brakes. Due to the war, production was interrupted from 1942 to 1948; 7,128 were made, including estate cars and light vans. Taunus M-series (1952–1968) From 1952 to 1968, all German Fords were called the Taunus, using the model names 12M, 15M, 17M, 20M, and 26M (on some ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |