fortwo

New rent-by-mobile-phone car-sharing company to launch in Austin

It's impulse shopping meets car rental. Car2go, a car-sharing concept from Daimler, will launch in Austin, Texas, in fall 2009. The service will enable members to use their mobile phones to locate and rent one of a fleet of 200 cars near them without advance reservation.

The business model is similar to other car-sharing programs (such as Zipcar) in the U.S. with a few exceptions. The company's entire fleet of rental vehicles consists of Daimler's fuel-sipping, two-seater smart Fortwos. Registered members can rent the cars via their mobile phones and unlock the car with their membership … Read more

America's cheap car wars heat up

The cheap car price wars are heating up with Hyundai's announcement that it is dropping the price of its Accent GS three door to $9,970, knocking the $9,990 Nissan Versa 1.6 from its short-lived position as the least-expensive car in America. With a single $20 separating the two vehicles, let's take a look at the specs and see how cheapskate champions compare.

Starting under the hood, both vehicles are equipped with 1.6-liter four-bangers. Nissan's 107-horsepower engine is just edged out by the Hyundai's 110-horsepower mill. Both qualify as Ultra-Low Emissions Vehicles (ULEV) … Read more

Smart announces fortwo Brabus

Smart has revealed a new version of its fortwo at the 2008 LA Auto Show, the fortwo Brabus. Brabus being the German tuning house most famous for their close ties with Mercedes-Benz. If the idea of a performance variant of the superthrifty fortwo seems a bit odd, you're not alone. We're looking at with a bit of skepticism as well.

Particularly because the fortwo Brabus features no more power than the standard 71 horsepower fortwo, choosing to boost performance in the suspension and aesthetic departments instead.

The fortwo Brabus will be released in limited quantities and made available … Read more

Five finalists for LA Auto Show Green Car of the Year

Five finalists were announced for the 2008 LA Auto Show's Green Car of the Year award. Only one of them can be crowned king, but which will it be?

There are a broad range of green technologies represented in this year's field: clean diesels, gasoline-electric hybrids, and a tiny, thrifty gasoline engine.

Will the winner be the Volkswagen Jetta TDI, which we've heard so much about over the past few months? Perhaps it will be the newly announced BMW 335d, with its 50-state-compliant clean diesel? Representing gas-electric hybrids are the Saturn Vue 2 Mode Hybrid and the … Read more

Daimler launches car2go vehicle sharing service

Daimler, maker of the Smart fortwo, has just launched a new car sharing service called car2go in Ulm, Germany. The service is similar to the Zipcar or City CarShare services where users sign up for the service and are given use to a distributed fleet of vehicles for a fee. In this case, we're talking about a fleet of 50 Smart fortwos. What did you expect, Maybachs?

To start, users sign up on the car2go Web site, as of yet unpublished, or meet with a representative. Once in the system, an electronic tag is applied to the user's … Read more

Smart ForTwo gets five-star IIHS crash ratings

Forget the death-trap jokes: The pint-sized Smart ForTwo, has earned a full five-star crash rating from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) for frontal and side impacts. More than 3 feet shorter and almost 700 pounds lighter than a Mini Cooper--and only a third as heavy as a BMW X5--the ForTwo is the smallest car the IIHS has ever tested. Nevertheless, it scored a maximum safety rating from the IIHS in the standard frontal and side impact crash testing, which involves both a 40 mph frontal offset crash and a 31 mph barrier impact. The IIHS findings follow last … Read more

Photos: Smart Fortwo

This week, Daimler's long-awaited Smart Fortwo goes on sale at 70 dealerships across the country. The two-seater microcar is already a smash hit in European cities, where it combines urban-chic styling with practical parkability. We just got back from Rome--dubbed the "Smart Car capital of the world"--where we had plenty of opportunity to see the Fortwo up close. Check out our holiday snaps and the details of the next small big thing to hit the U.S. automotive market.

Video: Smart ForTwo Preview

Brian Cooley takes a drive in the Smart ForTwo, anticipating its arrival in the U.S. next year. The ForTwo darts through traffic, includes a six CD changer, and, most importantly, offers enough headroom for the 6 foot 3 inch Mr. Cooley.

Smart gets smarter

On October 15, Smart starts production of its new Micro-Hybrid. This very mild hybrid car is based on the ForTwo city car. The hybrid system merely stops the gas engine when the car is stopped in traffic, then starts it up again when the driver releases the brake. Smart estimates it will get 13 percent better fuel economy than the standard ForTwo, which works out to about five additional miles per gallon. Very heavy traffic will increase the savings. While the ForTwo is slated to be sold in the U.S. early next year, Smart hasn't said whether it … Read more