2003 Chevrolet Monte Carlo Ss #24 Jeff Gordon Edition Collectors Item No Reserve on 2040-cars

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Car Club USA: Louisiana Mudfest

There's nothing quite like mudding. Big tires, huge power, and crazy-wild gearheads that like to throw down on a mud pit almost as much as a thirty rack of Coors. In the latest, and some might argue greatest yet episode of Car Club USA, we head to Louisiana to throw some dirt at Mudfest. As Louisiana's one and only Mouth of the South puts it, "If you don't mud ride... go to Texas I guess." Joining The Mouth and friendly rivals The Most Hated Mud Sluts, we dive in. Beyond the obvious V8 blasting and tractor-tire spinning, those who know best describe Mudfest as, "Good cooking, good friends, good fun, and a lot of partying." It's a motorsport spectacle unlike any you're likely to find up North or out West, though no less impressive to behold. Follow along with the fun, the impromptu drag racing, the trash talking, and the mechanical madness. And find out why, at Mudfest, "if we don't tear it up, we ain't done it right." Each Car Club USA episode features a different car club or event from across the US, where passionate owner communities gather to share automotive experiences and embark on incredible adventures. From Main Street cruises to off-road trails, catch all the latest car club activity on Autoblog. Chevrolet Ford Jeep RAM Truck Off-Road Vehicles Car Club USA Videos autoblog black

This map reveals the cleanest vehicles based on location

Naysayers love to point out how dirty the electricity grid mix is when it comes to charging electric vehicles. Curmudgeons are eager to jump into any conversation about EVs to enlighten the lucky listeners about how plug-in cars contribute to pollution, sometimes even throwing in a dash of climate-change denial for good measure. (Thanks, buddy. Pray, tell me more about the plight of oppressed SUV owners.) Unless someone buys an EV just because they think they're cool (which, yeah, they often are), they probably have at least a passable understanding of their environmental pros and cons. As many EV owners are already aware, location has a lot to do with any particular plug-in car's carbon footprint. Still, there's always more to know, and knowledge is not a bad thing, especially if one uses it to do the right thing. That's why this handy-dandy map from Carnegie Mellon University is so interesting. CMU researchers have compiled information about the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions of various EVs based on where they're charged, as compared to gasoline-powered vehicles. The researchers looked at the Nissan Leaf, Chevrolet Volt, and Prius Plug-In Hybrid versus the gasoline-dependent Toyota Prius hybrid and the stop-start-equipped Mazda3 with i-ELOOP and compared grams of CO2 emitted per mile. CMU takes into account the grid mix, ambient temperature, and driving patterns. CMU takes into account the grid mix based on county, as well as ambient temperature and driving patterns in terms of miles traveled on the highway or in the city. For instance, if you drive a Nissan Leaf in urban areas of California, Texas, or Florida, your carbon footprint is lower than it would be if you were driving a standard Toyota Prius. However, if you charge your Leaf in the Midwest or the South, for the most part, you've got a larger carbon footprint than the Prius. If you live in the rural Midwest, you'd probably even be better off driving a Mazda3. Throughout the country, the Chevrolet Volt has a larger carbon footprint than the Toyota Prius, but a smaller one than the Mazda3 in a lot of urban counties in the US. The Prius and Prius Plug-In are relatively equal across the US. Having trouble keeping it straight? That's not surprising. The comparisons between plug-in and gasoline vehicles are much more nuanced than the loudest voices usually let on.

Cadillac XT4 crossover to be built in Kansas City

Cadillac's upcoming XT4, a crossover we've previously known as the XT3 in a long series of spy shots of heavily camouflaged mules, will be built at General Motors' assembly plant in Kansas City on the same platform as the Chevrolet Malibu, Bloomberg reports, citing people familiar with the plan. That will give Cadillac another entry in the red-hot luxury crossover segment and, GM hopes, help to reverse a sales slump in the U.S. It'll also breath life into the Kansas City plant that makes the slow-selling Malibu, where GM cut a third shift last year, by sharing the assembly line between the crossover and sedan and defraying costs for each vehicle. The XT4 was known most recently as the XT3, with styling cues based on the Escala concept sedan from 2016. It's slightly smaller than the XT5, Cadillac's top-selling vehicle, and will also augment the full-size Escalade in Cadillac's stable of SUVs when it makes its expected debut later this year. Cadillac last week reported its second-highest-ever sales mark with 356,467 vehicles, an increase of 15.5 percent over 2016. But that mark papers over an 8 percent sales decline in the U.S. to 156,440 vehicles. The luxury brand is on a hot streak in China, where sales jumped 50.8 percent last year to 175,489 units.Related Video: Image Credit: Brian Williams Plants/Manufacturing Cadillac Chevrolet GM Crossover sales cadillac xt5 cadillac xt4 cadillac xt3