2005 Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor on 2040-cars

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2014 Ford Fusion to get 1.5L EcoBoost three-cylinder?

Just one year after launching the all-new 2013 Fusion, Ford is reportedly set to alter the sedan's powertrain lineup with the addition of a new 1.5-liter turbocharged three-cylinder EcoBoost engine. A member of Blue Oval Forums apparently got their hands on the ordering guide for the 2014 model year Fusion, and this 1.5-liter mill is set to be introduced with late availability.
This lines up with other news about the Chinese-market Mondeo being offered with a new 1.5-liter EcoBoost - a derivative of the 1.0-liter triple that will come to North America under the hood of the Fiesta (note: the 1.0 is also offered in the current Euro-spec Mondeo). In the Chinese application, the larger three-pot engine produces 177 horsepower and 177 pound-feet of torque, which is very close to the current 1.6-liter inline-four's output numbers of 178 hp and 184 lb-ft.
What's interesting, however, is that the 1.6-liter engine will reportedly still be offered in the Fusion, but only with the six-speed manual transmission. The smaller 1.5-liter EcoBoost will only be mated to a six-speed SelectShift automatic, and will feature start/stop. This means that while the 1.5 is slightly down on power compared to the 1.6, it could easily improve fuel economy numbers, allowing the Fusion to regain the title of having the best mileage in the segment, likely besting the 38 miles per gallon of the Nissan Altima. Currently, the Fusion 1.6 is rated at 23 mpg city and 36 mpg highway.

Unrestored 1969 Shelby GT500 one of many classic barn finds going to auction

We love a good barn find here at Autoblog. We like that there's a palpable excitement and sense of mystery surrounding barn finds. Each case has its own uniqueness to it, and this latest discovery is no different: an unrestored, one-owner 1969 Shelby GT500 with just 8,531 miles on it.
In the case of this particular barn find, many of the typical questions have already been answered. For example, we know who owned it - his name was Larry Brown. He recently passed away, and as he had no wife or children to inherit the estate, the car he purchased at Pennsylvania Ford dealer in May of 1969, will be auctioned off by Ron Gilligan Auctioneers.
The car was fastidiously maintained, having never been driven in the rain. In fact, Brown never even washed it, out of fear of it rusting. According to the auction website, the last time this car saw water was probably when it was detailed ahead of being delivered to Brown. If that doesn't sound like a fanatical sense of maintenance on the part of this GT500's owner, this next part will. The interior has been treated to a similarly painstaking attempt at preservation, with garbage bags covering the seats and two layers of floor mats over the carpets. The result is a car that, aesthetically, is in remarkable shape considering it's spent so long in a barn.

Bill Ford op-ed argues we can't just build and sell more of the same cars

It's hardly a secret that the auto industry is undergoing an enormous, tectonic shift in the way it thinks, builds cars and does business. Between alternative forms of energy, a renewed focus on low curb weights and aerodynamic bodies, the advent of driverless and autonomous cars and the need to reduce the our impact on the environment, it's very likely that the car that's built 10 years down the line will be scarcely recognizable when parked next to the car from 10 years ago.
Few people are as able to explain the industry's many upcoming changes and challenges as clearly as William Clay Ford, Jr., better known as Bill Ford. The 57-year-old currently sits as the executive chairman of the company his great-grandfather, Henry Ford, founded over 110 years ago.
In an op-ed piece in The Wall Street Journal (subscription required), Ford explains that the role of automakers is, necessarily, going to change to suit the needs of the future world. That means changing the view of not just the automobile, but the automaker. As Ford explains it, automakers will "move from being just car and truck manufacturers to become personal-mobility companies."