79 Trans Am Black(smokey And The Bandit) Beautiful Car on 2040-cars

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GM expands headlight recall to 180k Buicks and Pontiacs

General Motors is issuing an expanded headlight module recall to include 180,504 examples in North America of the 2005 Buick LaCrosse (2008 model year pictured above) and 2007 Pontiac Grand Prix. Specifically, the campaign affects 159,584 of them in the US and 20,920 in Canada. When the part fails, the vehicles' low beams can stop working either intermittently or permanently. "GM is unable to confirm any crashes, injuries or fatalities related to this condition," the company said in a statement, and there's currently no permanent repair for the problem. For now, dealers will replace the headlamp module with a new example of the same part. The automaker first announced this campaign in November 2014 when it affected 316,357 examples globally of the 2006-09 Buick LaCrosse; 2006-2007 Chevy TrailBlazer and TrailBlazer EXT; 2006-2007 GMC Envoy and 2006 GMC Envoy XL; 2006-2007 Buick Rainier; 2006-2008 Saab 9-7X; and 2006-08 Isuzu Ascender. Related Video:

Autoblog Classifieds finds: 1987 Pontiac Fiero GT

Autoblog's free Readers' Used Car Classifieds section is a great place to list your car for sale, and because these are readers, they often list really interesting cars. Occasionally we find interesting listings, and tell you what's special about them. This 1987 Pontiac Fiero was listed for sale at the time of this writing, but if the listing expires by the time you read this, feel free to browse for other great finds. Thirty years after General Motors stopped building it, the Pontiac Fiero might have finally emerged from the darkness. First, it was a humble commuter car that just happened to be a mid-engined coupe, then it was a re-skinnable basis for Fierorraris or other slightly strange kit cars, and then it made some Worst Cars of All Time lists due to its econobox ingredients, including its Chevy Citation suspension parts. But after a few decades, even the most mediocre car will become interesting as most of the examples built have been run into the ground; why not then the Fiero? The story of the Fiero is paralleled by a number of GM products, as it improved constantly the longer it was built, and by the time of the last model years it was quite decent indeed. And then the plug was pulled. The Fiero might not be a Toyota MR2 or even a Fiat X1/9, but it was made in two body styles, the notchback and the fastback, the latter of which looks especially good now. The Fiero also remains quite affordable, and the plastic body panels do not rust, unlike with the two aforementioned cars. This 1987 car advertised for sale at Autoblog Classifieds does not yet benefit from the 1988 cars' improved suspension, but thanks to its low, low 47,000-mile odometer reading, it looks to be in tip-top shape. The automatic transmission is just the three-speed affair, though, rendering the V6 car here more of a cruiser than a fiery hot canyon carver. Perhaps that has contributed to its good condition, along with the lack of possibly leaky T-tops. Could the Fiero have aged better than your Hall & Oates tapes? Related Video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

German prosecutors have recorded calls between VW bigwigs talking dieselgate

It's barely possible to believe how poorly Volkswagen continues to handle dieselgate. Depending on which day you catch the news, the German carmaker embodies the corporate venality of "Michael Clayton," the comic blundering of the Coen Brothers' "Burn After Reading," and the every-man-for-himself vengeance of "Reservoir Dogs." Today is Tarantino day, with news that German prosecutors have recordings of phone calls between former Audi and Porsche development boss Wolfgang Hatz, ex-Volkswagen Group executive Matthias Muller, and current Porsche executives Oliver Blume and Michael Steiner. Hatz made the calls to the trio in November 2015, two months after Volkswagen admitted its diesel-particulate sins to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Hatz was still employed at the time, and in his company car. Who recorded the calls? His wife. Hatz and his missus apparently saw the storm coming and started stacking defenses early. Hatz's wife, who can be heard encouraging Hatz during at least one call, sent the recordings to Hatz's attorney from her mobile phone. According to a Google translation of the German newspaper Handelsblatt's report, she included the note, "Here is a very long, but quite informative conversation on the current situation with useful formulations." The report in Handelsblatt said that in Germany it is generally "not allowed" to record a conversation and pass it on to a third party. We don't know how the authorities will handle this matter, since prosecutors found the recordings in e-mail attachments on Mrs. Hatz's mobile phone. Remember, when the diesel scandal broke, VW spent months saying that only a small number of low-level personnel were behind it, and all of the higher-ups had been blindsided. Ex-CEO Martin Winterkorn claimed to be "stunned that misconduct on such a scale was possible in the Volkswagen Group." Winterkorn successor Matthias Muller said, "according to current information, a few developers interfered in the engine management." Former VW USA honcho Michael Horn told a congressional committee that "a couple of software engineers" programmed the software for reasons no one could understand. In the recorded conversations, Hatz apparently called Muller to find out how VW planned to treat him.