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The Opel GT is the concept General Motors should build for the US

Now is the time. General Motors should double-down on performance cars and build the Opel GT concept that's set to debut next week at the Geneva Motor Show. Better yet, sell it in the United States as the Chevy GT. Consumers are showing a thirst for performance cars not seen in decades. Ford has them coming in waves, with everything from the F-150 Raptor to a hotted-up Fusion. FCA US is unrepentantly building loads of Hellcats. GM should respond. The General's cupboard is hardly bare. With the Corvette, Camaro, and Cadillac's V-Series, GM has more than enough to compete with its crosstown rivals and anything Europe or Japan can throw at it. But there's also an opportunity. There's not many front-mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive, two-seat sports cars out there like the Opel GT concept. A Chevy GT that used that layout and captured some of the concept car's proportions and curves would ignite a different kind of passion in enthusiasts. It would be Miata-like. With Chevy branding, this sports car would be the everyday exotic. The concept has a turbocharged 1.0-liter three-cylinder engine, which makes about 143 horsepower to motivate a structure that weighs less than 2,200 pounds. It can hit 60 miles per hour in less than eight seconds. All of those numbers are within the front-engined Miata's territory. This new Opel is inspired by two great mid-1960s concepts that helped put its design studio, and that of its sister brand, the British Vauxhall, on the map. (The GT concept is also technically a Vauxhall, as the brands are linked in GM's European strategy.) One of them, the '66 Vauxhall XVR remained a concept. The '65 Opel Experimental GT was on the road by 1968. That shows this is doable. There's precedent. The Saturn Sky and Pontiac Solstice shared a chassis with a modern GT during that trio's brief run. If GM ever makes this concept, Opel and Vauxhall should get their versions. But Chevy is the one that could make this car a global icon. Chevrolet GT. Make it happen. News & Analysis News: The potential return of the Ford Bronco is generating a ton of attention. Analysis: That's not news, per se. But when the Bronco6G.com fan site did a rendering of a next-generation Bronco, it almost broke the Internet. Everyone from Automotive News to Jalopnik picked up the illustrations. Our own post has drawn a lot of traffic and passionate responses. People are clamoring for the Bronco's return.

Cruze Diesel Road Trip reveals the good and bad, but no ugly

Most of us have strong opinions on diesel-powered cars based on our perceptions of and experience with them. I used to thoroughly dislike oil burners for their noise, smoke and lackluster performance, and the fact that they ran on greasy, smelly stuff that was more expensive than gasoline, could be hard to find and was nasty to get on your hands when refueling. Those negatives, for me, trumped diesel's major positives of big torque for strong acceleration and better fuel economy. Are any of those knocks on diesel still valid today? I'm not talking semis, which continue to annoy me when their operators for some reason almost never shut them down. At any busy truck stop, the air seems always filled with the sound – and sometimes smell – of dozens of big-rig diesels idling endlessly and mindlessly. Or diesel heavy-duty pickups. Those muscular workhorses are far more refined than they once were and burn much less fuel than their gasoline counterparts. But good luck arriving home late at night, or departing early morning, without waking your housemates and neighbors with their clattery racket. No, I'm talking diesel-powered passenger cars, which account for more than half the market in Europe (diesel fuel is cheaper there) yet still barely bump the sales charts in North America. Diesel fuel remains more expensive here, too few stations carry it, and too many Americans remember when diesel cars were noisy, smelly slugs. Also, US emissions requirements make them substantially more expensive to certify, and therefore to buy. But put aside (if you can) higher vehicle purchase and fuel prices, and today's diesel cars can be delightful to drive while delivering much better fuel efficiency than gas-powered versions. So far in the US, all except Chevrolet's compact Cruze Diesel come from German brands, and all are amazingly quiet, visually clean (no smoke) and can be torquey-fun to drive. When a GM Powertrain engineering team set out to modify a tried-and-true GM of Europe turbodiesel four for North American Chevy Cruze compacts, says assistant chief engineer Mike Siegrist, it had a clear target in mind: the Volkswagen Jetta TDI 2.0-liter diesel. And they'll tell you that they beat it in nearly every way. "I believe we have a superior product," he says. "It's powerful, efficient and clean, and it will change perceptions of what a diesel car can be." The 2.0L Cruze turbodiesel pumps out 151 SAE certified horses and 264 pound-feet of torque (at just 2,000 rpm) vs.

Chevy Cruze CNG available from Crazy Diamond Performance

Anyone out there who can somehow find a second way to link Pink Floyd to natural gas vehicles gets a prize. Because so far, we have one Michigan-based company called Crazy Diamond Performance (Shine On You Crazy Diamond being a longtime Floyd fave) that's setting out to convert Chevrolet Cruze vehicles to run on compressed natural gas (CNG). All in the name of cheaper fuel and domestic security, of course. Crazy Diamond says it can offer a converted CNG-powered Chevy Cruze for a price as low as $26,000. That four-cylinder version has 130 horsepower and an 8.5-gasoline-gallon-equivalent capacity that provides a full-tank range of as many as 250 miles. Pony up another $2,000 or so and the peppier, turbocharged CNG Cruze can be yours. The company says it will provide a 100,000-mile powertrain warranty and is trying to get EPA certification for its conversions. The selling points are cheaper fuel (CNG is about half the cost of regular gasoline in some parts of the country) and homeland security (CNG reduces dependence on foreign oil). The only production passenger vehicle CNG in the US is the Honda Civic CNG, which sells in very limited numbers. Check out Crazy Diamond's flyer here. Featured Gallery 2015 Chevrolet Cruze LTZ: New York 2014 View 13 Photos News Source: Crazy Diamond Performance via Hybrid Cars, Green Fleet Magazine Green Chevrolet Natural Gas Vehicles CNG