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Ram, Jeep redesigns on hold, Alfa Romeo models may come sooner

Last summer, FCA outlined an ambitious five-year plan that sketched out the company's product intentions for each of its brands through the end of 2018. However, even the best strategies sometimes need tweaking. According to Reuters after speaking with unnamed people at auto suppliers, FCA is now possibly delaying at least a dozen projects in North America for a variety of reasons. From vehicle to vehicle, these postponements allegedly last anywhere from just a few months to over a year. The sources from the suppliers claim that in some cases these tweaks are for engineering and design changes. The next-gen Ram 1500 reportedly has among the shorter delays and is being pushed from mid-2017 to November 2017, according to Reuters. Also, the much-discussed future Jeep Wrangler is allegedly moving a little later to July 2017. Among the vehicles purportedly seeing longer delays, the next-gen Grand Cherokee could get pushed back about a year to 2018. That then forces the launch of the three-row, luxury Grand Wagoneer to be even further away. Jeep's upcoming C-segment CUV and the all-new Chrysler 300, Dodge Charger, and Challenger might also see postponements. The one brand allegedly seeing an accelerated plan is Alfa Romeo. Without going into detail, the sources from these suppliers claim that the Italian automaker is getting even more vehicles for its lineup and could get them even faster than planned. "Those plans need to be flexible and fluid, with the potential to add some vehicles, pull some forward and extend the life cycle of others," FCA said to Reuters about all of these allegations. "We look at these programs on a vehicle-by-vehicle basis." Investment in the auto industry has been a major topic for FCA CEO Sergio Marchionne as of late. He believes consolidation is necessary so that companies aren't burning money on the same projects. Related Video: News Source: ReutersImage Credit: Bill Pugliano / Getty Images Plants/Manufacturing Alfa Romeo Chrysler Dodge Fiat Jeep RAM Sergio Marchionne FCA fca us

Autoblog Podcast #392

Episode #392 of the Autoblog Podcast is here, and this week, Dan Roth, Steven Ewing, and Chris Paukert talk about recent confessions by Autoblog Editors, the unconfirmed rumors that the 2015 Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat will show up at the Woodward Dream Cruise, and the release of the North American Car and Truck of the Year long list. We start with what's in the garage and finish up with some of your questions, and for those of you who hung with us live on our UStream channel, thanks for taking the time. Check out the new rundown below with times for topics, and you can follow along down below with our Q&A. Thanks for listening! Autoblog Podcast #392: The video meant to be presented here is no longer available. Sorry for the inconvenience. Topics: Autoblog editors come clean Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat to debut at Woodward Dream Cruise NACTOY long list released In The Autoblog Garage: 2015 Jaguar F-Type Coupe 2015 Subaru Legacy Limited 2015 Audi S8 2015 Alfa Romeo 4C Hosts: Dan Roth, Steven Ewing, Chris Paukert Runtime: 01:48:05 Rundown: Intro and Garage - 00:00 Editor Confessions - 34:48 Hellcat Charger Unveil - 59:56 NACTOY Long List - 01:09:51 Q&A - 01:25:43 Get the podcast: [UStream] Listen live on Mondays at 10 PM Eastern at UStream [iTunes] Subscribe to the Autoblog Podcast in iTunes [RSS] Add the Autoblog Podcast feed to your RSS aggregator [MP3] Download the MP3 directly Feedback: Email: Podcast at Autoblog dot com Review the show in iTunes

2014 Dodge Journey Crossroad

Watchers of the auto industry will notice a theme among the formerly bankrupted American automakers, General Motors and Chrysler. There are the post-bankruptcy vehicles, and the pre-bankruptcy vehicles. The former, in the case of Chrysler, include the Jeep Grand Cherokee, as well as the 200 and 300. For GM, there's the Cadillac ATS, Chevrolet Impala and Buick Encore, among others. These vehicles have the freshest styling, with sharp exteriors and well-crafted interiors, as well as advanced powertrains and well-sorted chassis.
As for the pre-bankruptcy vehicles, they tend to be easy to spot. Most suffer from inferior driving dynamics, cheaper interiors, poorer fuel economy and often homely looks (we know, there were some decent cars before the bankruptcy, but they were pretty heavily outweighed by the bad ones). Think late, last-generation Chevrolet Impala or Chrysler 200. Increasingly, though, we're seeing vehicles that split the balance between pre- and post-bankruptcy. Vehicles like the Dodge Journey.
The Journey debuted in 2007 as a 2008 model year vehicle, meaning it should fall into the latter category. But heavily breathed upon in 2011, it now enjoys a new, 3.6-liter Pentastar V6, a big, critically acclaimed touchscreen display and in the case of today's tester, a new-for-2014 Crossroad spec.