2012 Toyota Tundra Base Extended Crew Cab Pickup 4-door 5.7l on 2040-cars

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Chip maker Nvidia adds Volvo to list of self-driving partners

Chipmaker Nvidia Corp announced on Monday it was partnering with Volvo Cars and Swedish auto supplier Autoliv to develop self-driving car technology for vehicles due to hit the market by 2021. Volvo is owned by China's Geely Automobile Holdings. Silicon Valley-based Nvidia also announced a non-exclusive partnership with German automotive suppliers ZF and Hella for artificial intelligence technology for autonomous driving. Nvidia came to prominence in the gaming industry for designing graphics processing chips, but in recent years has been a key player in the automotive sector for providing the so-called "brain" of the autonomous vehicle. The company, whose many partners already include Tesla, Toyota, Ford, Audi, BMW, and tier one supplier Robert Bosch, announced its latest deals at an automotive electronics show in Ludwigsburg, Germany. Nvidia's Drive PX artificial intelligence platform is used by Tesla in its Models S and X and upcoming Model 3 electric vehicles. Volkswagen AG's Audi is also using the system to reach full autonomous driving by 2020. In a call with reporters, Nvidia's senior automotive director Danny Shapiro said carmakers and their main suppliers are now moving away from the research and development phase of autonomous vehicles and into concrete production plans. The system developed jointly by ZF and Hella, and using Nvidia's Drive PX platform, will combine front cameras with radar and software to create technology meeting the Euro NCAP safety certification for so-called "Level 3" driving, in which some, but not all, driving is performed by the car. Volvo is already using the Drive PX for the self-driving cars in its "Drive Me" autonomous pilot program. Volvo's production vehicles built on Nvidia's platform, as announced on Monday, are planned for sale by 2021.Reporting By Alexandria SageRelated Video: Auto News Green Tesla Toyota Volvo Technology Emerging Technologies Autonomous Vehicles nvidia autoliv

Toyota bids farewell to FJ Cruiser with Ultimate Edition at SEMA

Happy trails, to you... As we reported back in August, the FJ Cruiser is headed to the great automotive graveyard in the sky, and Toyota is offering a fitting eulogy in the form of the 2014 Trail Teams Ultimate Edition, which was just unveiled here at the 2013 SEMA Show.
Unlike many special edition models, the Ultimate FJ Cruiser earns its name with a host of parts from Toyota Racing Development, starting with TRD Bilstein race shocks that Toyota says improve damping, articulation and high-speed stability. The front shocks measure 66 millimeters and feature TRD race coil springs, with geometry that improves the approach angle; the 50mm rear units are equipped with remote reservoirs to diminish damping fade.
A new one-quarter-inch thick aluminum TRD front skid plate offers protection for the underbody bits, and the outfit is completed with a BF Goodrich A/T KO tires on 16-inch bead lock wheels, rock rails and a roof rack. Check out the high-res image gallery above and the press release below for all the rest of the details.

2015 Toyota Camry set to circle NASCAR track near you

Toyota recently introduced the all-new 2015 Camry for the street, so it follows that it should want to promote its new bread-and-butter sedan by putting it out on the racetrack as well. And that's just what it's done here with the release of the new Toyota Camry for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.
The new Camry represents the first reskin of the standard stock car chassis since the Gen-6 model was introduced in 2012. Toyota's Calty Design studio worked closely with series organizers to determine which parts could be redesigned to more closely resemble the new production model, and what you see here is the result. Since it is based on the same control chassis as all the others, the Camry's skin is applied over a steel tube frame and powered by an old-school 5.86-liter pushrod V8 mated to a four-speed manual gearbox.
Although the idea of a Japanese automaker in American stock car racing didn't initially get the warmest reception from some of the good ol' boys when it first entered the series back in 2007, it has by now become a staple of the NASCAR circuit. After all, it's hard for even the most patriotic of racing fans to argue with the US-built Camry's ranking as one of the most American cars by content on the market.