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Who sold the most heavy-duty pickups in 2012? PickupTrucks.com investigates

Domestic manufacturers enjoyed a good year for heavy-duty pickup sales in 2012. PickupTrucks.com has taken a close look at exactly how those sales broke down between each manufacturer and between three-quarter and one-ton pickups. Ford sold some 67,786 F-250 Super Duty models last year with the Chevrolet Silverado 2500 HD falling just behind at 56,359 units. The Ram 2500 HD came in third at 41,918, while the GMC Sierra 2500 HD earned itself fourth place with 27,616 deliveries. While Ford held onto the top spot in the one-ton market, Ram easily nailed down second place by selling more 3500 HD models last year than General Motors sold Silverado 3500 HD and Sierra 3500 HD trucks combined.
So, did GM manage to sell more trucks than Ford with its two brands? Very nearly. Ford sold a total of 119,338 heavy-duty pickups to GM's 111,555. Ram, meanwhile, moved a distant 77,583. But perhaps more interesting is the diesel take rate in this segment. PickupTrucks.com says 80 percent of all domestic one-ton trucks roll from the dealer lot with a turbo-diesel under the hood. Head over to the site for a closer look at the breakdown.

Subaru Legacy pitted against Roadkill project cars

There's an evergreen debate among auto enthusiasts about whether they would prefer to have the latest and greatest car of today or a certified classic from yesteryear. What if you had to further define that, though, and the choice was between a brand new 2015 Subaru Legacy or a turbocharged Datsun 240Z with a hatch that wouldn't close? Roadkill aimed to find out that and more in one of its best videos to date.
According to the hosts, Subaru came to them, handed over some money and challenged Roadkill's project cars against its latest Legacy. The result is every bit as good (or better) than any automotive-themed show you could find on television.
Things start simple with a figure-eight race in a rodeo arena with the Subaru taking on Roadkill's 1968 Ford Ranchero, originally built for ice racing. From there the Legacy races a 1968 Dodge Charger with no windows around and off-road rally stage. Finally, the Subie goes head-to-head against the Rotsun, the aforementioned turbocharged 240Z, through an abandoned neighborhood. Plus, there's a bonus drag race challenging them all.

The 1965 Ford Mustang could have looked a lot different

The 1965 Ford Mustang is unquestionably an automotive design icon, and nearly every generation of Mustang has some connection to that original car. Because it's such a universally-known vehicle, we were amazed to see all the different designs that were being considered. Head of Ford's archives Ted Ryan recently shared photos of design proposals for the original Mustang on Twitter that he and Jamie Myler found, and we reached out to them to find out more. As Ryan initially noted, the photos were taken on August 19, 1962, and they are proposals for the Ford Mustang. Apparently Ford had committed to doing a Falcon-based youth-oriented car at this point, and it did have plans to launch the car in 1964 for the 1965 model year. But after having little success with early design proposals, the company asked all of its design studios — the Advanced Studio, Lincoln-Mercury Studio and Ford Studio — to submit proposals. With only about two years before the planned launch, Ford was understandably short on time, and it's believed that the studios only had a month to create and present these designs. Lincoln-Mercury design proposal View 8 Photos The majority of the designs, a total of five, came from the Advanced Studio, and part of this was because they already had a couple of concept designs in reserve it could present. Two other models representing three design possibilities came from Lincoln-Mercury, and just one model with two options came from Ford. The Advanced Studio proposals are shown in the gallery at the very top of this article, and the Lincoln-Mercury and Ford proposals are in the gallery directly above this paragraph. The Advanced Studio's most radical design is the one that was clearly related to the Mustang I concept that would be shown later that year with huge wraparound rear glass, turbine-inspired bumpers and enormous side scoops. The other proposals from the studio were more conservative, featuring simple lines, grilles reminiscent of the Falcon, and one even borrowing the jet-thruster-style taillights made famous on the Thunderbird. Lincoln-Mercury had some impressively bold designs, particularly its fastback that had buttresses to extend the shape all the way to the tail. This car had two different side trim possibilities. The other Lincoln-Mercury design was toned down a bit, but had two interesting possibilities for side detailing, as well as some crisp, low-profile tail fins.