Thumbs Up: May be the perfect American muscle sedan.

Thumbs Down: Thirsty when driven hard (as you’d expect).

Buy This Car If: Your idea of a weekend get away involves multiple time zones.

There are very few perfect things in life. Take enough pictures, and maybe you’ll eventually snag the perfect shot (hey, it worked for Ansel Adams). Try hard enough and you may concoct the perfect breakfast sandwich, to unseat McDonald’s Egg McMuffin (although we doubt that very much). Drive a particular track long enough in the same car, and you may eventually find the perfect line.

That’s why I’m trying so hard to wrap my head around the Chrysler 300 SRT8, because perfection in anything is so rarely encountered. To be clear, the 300 SRT8 isn’t the perfect car. It won’t beat a Prius in fuel economy and it won’t go around a racetrack faster than a new Nissan GT-R; in fact, it isn’t even close on either point. No, the Chrysler 300 SRT8 isn’t the perfect car, but it may very well be the perfect interpretation of the American muscle sedan.

Is it big and heavy? Yes, it is. Does it suck down gas? Sure, if you keep your foot in it. But it will also haul four people in supreme comfort from one end of the country to the other, at speeds that would make the average man curl into the fetal position and whimper for mercy. It will also lay down a righteous burnout, emitting clouds of smoke so dense they can be seen from the International Space Station. Or so I’m told, because I’d never actually do a burnout in a press fleet car.

I didn’t expect to be this impressed with the new Chrysler 300 SRT8, but the fact of the matter is that I was blown away by it. Forget everything you know about the old Chrysler, because the fit and finish of the 300 SRT8 was on par with import luxury sedans, and noticeably better than recent luxury sedans from other American manufacturers. Maybe it’s Chrysler’s way of apologizing for cars like the Dodge Caliber, but whatever the reason, the new 300 SRT8 is the most impressive sedan I’ve driven in a long time.

Chrysler updated the looks of the 300 for the 2011 model year, but it was an evolutionary restyle, not a revolutionary one. The front of the car is now more aerodynamic, with a less pronounced grille and more contemporary headlights. The car retains it slab-sided styling and low greenhouse, but that’s not criticism. The original Chrysler 300 won a significant amount of attention for the brand, and Chrysler knows not to mess with a good thing. While the exterior styling won’t appeal to everyone, it probably won’t offend anyone, either.

Inside, any remnants of the old Chrysler have been erased. Gone are the acres of cheap black plastic, replaced by coarse-grained, soft-touch vinyl trimmed in genuine carbon-fiber. Yes, the dash bottom is still plastic, but it’s solid plastic, and my 300 SRT8 press fleet tester didn’t emit a single squeak or groan during my time behind the wheel. Even the infotainment system has been seriously reworked; while Chrysler used to produce the least user-friendly systems on the market, its new ones are among the best and most intuitive. Even the steering wheel (sized to fit my extra-large paws) was above average in feel and comfort.

Since the 300 gives a nod towards luxury, the instrumentation was a bit flashy for my tastes. The tach and speedometer sit in tunnels bathed in ambient blue light, and numbers for both gauges are on the small side. They’re still functional, but I’d have preferred something a bit easier to acquire, perhaps with a little less glitz. I’m a fan of Chrysler’s driver information display (located between tach and speedo), which provides some entertaining performance data (like lateral acceleration, 0-60 time, 1/8 mile time) on the SRT8 version of the 300.

Front seats are road-trip worthy, and SRT8 models get both heat and ventilation. There’s enough bolstering to keep front seat passengers in place during spirited cornering, aided by the suede center panels of the seats. I’m not a huge fan of the red seats, but they aren’t mandatory since the SRT8 can be ordered with a black interior, too.

Rear seats lack serious bolstering, but you probably won’t be going as fast through the twisties with three (or four) passengers. As you’d expect from a car of the 300’s size, there’s a reasonable amount of rear seat legroom, though those much taller than six feet will need to watch their heads entering or exiting the rear accommodations. The rear passenger headrests aren’t adjustable, either, which may or may not be an issue depending upon how often you haul three passengers of varying sizes around.

The heart of the 300 SRT8 is its 6.4-liter Hemi V-8 engine, rated at 470 horsepower and 470 pound-feet of torque and mated to a six-speed AutoStick transmission equipped with wheel-mounted paddle shifters. While it’s likely that an eight-speed will be stuffed into next year’s car, the six-speed provides crisp and quick shifts, regardless of whether you leave it in auto or shift it yourself. The combination of engine, transmission and gearing is good enough to produce a 0 to 60 time of 4.7 seconds, which is even more impressive given the car’s 4,400 pound curb weight.

Despite being saddled with a gas guzzler tax of $1,000, the 300 SRT8 returned semi-reasonable fuel economy, thanks to Chrysler’s cylinder deactivation system that turns the car into a 3.2-liter V-4 under steady-state driving. The EPA says to expect 14 mpg in the city, 23 mpg on the highway and 17 mpg combined, but a reasonable blend of city and highway driving returned an indicated 18.8 mpg. I wouldn’t call that “fuel efficient,” but it’s a whole lot better than a car with 300 SRT8 mass and power would suggest.

SRT head Ralph Giles once described the new Dodge Challenger SRT8 as “driving a thousand pounds lighter than it really is,” and I’d apply the same logic to the 300 SRT8. Yes, it’s a big car, but it doesn’t drive like a big car. Turn-in is immediate, especially with the suspension in sport mode, and the car is capable of carrying a surprising amount of speed into corners without complaint. When ordinary sedans (and even a few sport sedans I can think of) would be plowing into the weeds, the 300 SRT8 just keeps sticking to the pavement. That said, you won’t be winning any SCCA Solo championships in the car, because you just can’t re-write the laws of physics. Quick left-right transitions are a weak point, simply because the car weighs in at over two tons.

While lapping a short, technical track at speed isn’t the 300 SRT8’s forte, gobbling up highway miles at whatever speed you care to drive is. I can’t think of a better platform to take cross-country, especially if your plans call for the occasional winding-road side trip. The great American road trip, where families packed their kids into giant sedans or station wagons and set off to find the real America, is quickly going the way of the dinosaur. Cars like the 300 SRT8 may not be around much longer, so here’s my suggestion to you: do whatever you have to buy one (or its Charger SRT8 cousin), pack your family into it and set off on an adventure you can call your own. In a not-too-distant future, you’ll be glad you did it while you still had the chance.

Chrysler provided the 2012 300 SRT8 for my evaluation. Base price of the SRT8 model is $48,995, including a destination charge of $870 and a gass-guzzler tax of $1,000. Options on my press fleet tester included the $1,995 Customer Preferred Package 21X (power folding mirrors, adaptive cruise control, forward collision warning, blind spot and cross path detection, rear fog lamps, side mirror signals and side mirror courtesy lamps), the $1,995 Premium Speaker Group (18 premium speakers, subwoofer, 900-watt amplifier), the $1,295 Dual-Pane Sunroof and the $150 summer performance tire upgrade for a total sticker price of $54,430.

For comparison, a similarly equipped Dodge Charger SRT8 would list for $50,405, while a comparable Infiniti M56 would sticker for $73,065.

I’m not a Mercedes-Benz guy, and I never have been. Sure, its cars can be nice to look at and comfortable to be driven in, but very few of the tri-pointed star’s automobiles make my hormones sit up and beg. The exception to this rule has always been the Mercedes-Benz Black Series.

The latest Black Series car, the C63 AMG Coupe, is no exception. With 510 horsepower and 457 lb-ft of torque on tap, the sprint from 0 – 60 should take no more than four seconds, on your way to a governed top speed of 155 miles per hour. Only a handful will be imported into the U.S. when the car goes on sale here next March. As for the price, if you have to ask, then you’re not really a customer, are you?

Since the C63 AMG Black Series is well above my pay grade, we unwashed masses will have to make do with the video below.

If someone asked me to describe the difference between Audi’s TT and the TT-RS, I’d do my best to explain that one is a sporty luxury car, while the other is a sports car that happens to have luxury appointments. Stephan Reil, Audi’s head of development at quattro GmbH, can tell you the difference between the two cars down to the slightest detail, which he does in the video below.

Here’s all you need to know: the Audi TT-RS is impressively fast, and at a base price of $57,725, is expensive but attainable. That money buys you an all-wheel-drive coupe with a turbocharged, 2.5-liter five-cylinder engine that puts out 360 horsepower and 343 lb.-ft. of torque. It’ll run from zero to sixty in 4.6 seconds, and to ensure that only true enthusiasts need apply, comes only with a six-speed manual gearbox.

The TT-RS pushes all the right buttons for me, and could quite possibly top my list of “if I win the lottery” cars. For now, at least.

It’s taken me a while to realize it, but deep down inside I’m an Audi guy. No other brand does it for me the way Audi does, and (generally speaking) I’d grab the keys to an Audi over most other luxury brands. While Audi doesn’t compete in all segments (they really don’t have a Porsche 911 competitor, for example), they do what they do very well.

When it comes to product, the Audi A4 is the brand’s mainstay, and the product line that’s largely responsible for paying the bills. When you make changes to a product line like that, you do so carefully (as with BMW’s recent changes to its 3-Series line).

The good news on the horizon for U.S. customers is this: for 2013, Audi is expanding the number of A4 variants that will be offered in the U.S. market, so we’ll get a new S4 as well as seeing the (likely) return of the Audi A4 Avant. We’ll also get a new version of the Audi allroad, based on the A4 platform instead of the former model’s A6 starting point.

The videos below give you an idea of what’s inbound from Ingolstadt. Details like engines and pricing haven’t been announced yet, but we’ll update you as soon as they are. Look for the 2013 Audi A4 models to begin hitting dealer showrooms in mid-2012.

The Mark VI Volkswagen GTI was released in 2010, and the car upped the ante for Volkswagen’s entry into the hot hatchback class. Sure, cars like the Subaru WRX and the Mazdaspeed 3 were “faster,” but the GTI brought a level of sophistication with it that the others lacked. If going fast is your only concern, then either the Subie or the Mazda are better choices; if you live in the real world, where occasional track days are punctuated with daily commuting, then the GTI really starts to shine.

Sure, I’m biased because I now own one, but it was the car’s refinement that really made me pay attention. The interior, even on base models, feels more Audi than VW, and even bone stock the car’s performance is better than what you may expect. Sure, there are weak points, like the craptastic all-season tires or heavier-than-the-center-of-the-earth stock Detroit wheels, but there are plenty of aftermarket suppliers who can solve those problems.

With an APR Stage 1 tune, my car now puts out around 254 horsepower and just over 300 lb-ft of torque. The biggest problem I have is traction, especially in first and second gear. On wet roads, you’ll get wheelspin in third gear, too, but better tires will solve that issue. I could be more relaxed on the throttle, too, but that’s just crazy talk.

Matt was impressed with the GTI, and you will be, too, if you drive one. As for that “Mazdaspeed3 is faster” argument, Matt turned a slightly better lap time (2/10 of a second) in the GTI than in the Mazdaspeed. I wouldn’t call the GTI faster, but I would say it’s more of a horse race than specs on paper would lead you to believe.

Source: You Tube

The 2012 Honda Ridgeline Sport. Image: Honda

In a recent statement to the automotive press, Honda seems to be channeling Mark Twain. In regards to the Ridgeline pickup, Honda’s release essentially translates to “rumors of my demise are greatly exaggerated.” In fact, Honda wants the world to know that the Ridgeline will soldier on well beyond the current 2012 refresh.

For the coming year, a Ridgeline Sport joins the product line, and the Ridgeline gets a boost in fuel economy. That’s a good thing, since the current Ridgeline’s 15 mpg city and 20 mpg highway aren’t exactly “class leading.” In fact, Honda has struggled to move Ridgeline pickups in 2011, selling just 6,476 units year-to-date through September. To put that in perspective, Ford sold 7,154 Ranger pickups in September alone (and 49,788 YTD), and the current Ranger model really hasn’t been updated since 1998.

It may be the demise of the Ford Ranger, which goes away at the end of this year, that has Honda planning for the Ridgeline’s future. In the compact to mid-size pickup truck segment, the Dodge Dakota, Ford Ranger and Chevy S10 have all been put out to pasture, leaving the market to Toyota and Nissan. If Honda can make the Ridgeline a bit more competitive in terms of price and fuel economy, it can carve out a decent enough niche to make a business case for the Ridgeline.

I’d call that good news, since I’ve always been a fan of the Ridgeline. It may not be as off-road capable as other compact pickups, but it’s probably the best choice for a daily driver that doubles as a truck on weekends. If you’re in the market, don’t pass the Ridgeline by without taking a test drive.

Ford's Mustang Customizer website. Image: Ford Motor Company

If you’re a Mustang fan, don’t click on Ford’s absurdly addicting Mustang Customizer Website unless you have some serious time to kill. The site lets you build your own Mustang, in V6, GT, Boss 302 or Shelby GT500 trims, changing a surprising number of external appearance items. Want a custom color, not in the Ford catalog? No problem, just mix your own. Want a Mustang GT with a Boss 302 grill and Shelby wheels? it’s just a click of the mouse away.

When you’ve built up your unique and one-of-a-kind Mustang, complete the graphics and striping, you can upload it to Facebook and compete against other Mustang fans who’ve done the same thing. You won’t win any actual prizes (and I seriously doubt Chip Foose or Jack Roush will be calling with a job offer), but you’ll get to earn bragging rights on the coolest virtual Mustang. For what that’s worth.

If you’re serious about building a one-of-a-kind Mustang, and have a really big budget to work with, Ford will even provide you with a PDF listing part numbers and vendors. All the parts shown in the customizer are available for Ford or aftermarket vendors, so you really can build a one-of-a-kind Mustang, just like the one you’ve created online.

Source: Ford

The 2012 Ford Mustang Boss 302. Image: Ford Motor Company

If you missed out on your chance to buy a Boss 302 in 2011 (although rumor has it that there are still some base models in the pipeline), we’ve got good news for you: Mustangs Daily is reporting that the Boss 302 will return for 2013, and will deliver more content for the same money. First up is Ford’s Sync infotainment system, which will allegedly be an available option for 2013 Boss 302 Mustangs. Don’t expect a giant 8-inch display, since the Boss is about going fast, not watching DVDs while parked. Opt for the Sync system and it comes with a 4.2 inch touchscreen LCD display.

If you don’t want the Sync system in your Boss (and you don’t, since it doesn’t make the car go any faster), the price for a 2013 version is said to be less than the car cost in 2012, but we’re still waiting on final prices to be published. There are a few new colors to choose from, including Grabber Blue and Gotta-Have-It-Green. HID headlights are said to be available in 2013, but there’s no word on whether they’ll be included or optional. Likewise, there’s no confirmation that the sold-out Laguna Seca package will be returning for a second year in 2013.

Source: Mustangs Daily, via Autoblog

If you want to buy a Mustang to use on track days, the 2012 Mustang Boss 302 won’t disappoint. In fact, if you can get your hands on a (sold out) Laguna Seca edition of the Boss 302, even better: the car’s stiffer suspension generates a surprising amount of grip in the corners, but hanging the back end out is as simple as mashing the gas and turning the wheel. Not only is the Boss 302 Mustang entertaining to drive, it’s also surprisingly capable on the race track.

The video below is part of Motor Trend’s “Hot Lap!” series, meant to help determine the best driver’s car in America. The results won’t be out until September 12, but SCCA World Challenge pro Randy Pobst was impressed by the Boss 302 Laguna Seca. Some of his comments included, “handled better than a Porsche Cayman” and “clearly better than any other Mustang I’ve driven.”

The Boss 302 Laguna Seca’s lap time around the Laguna Seca circuit was 1:41.06. That’s not even close to the 1:36.39 that Randy got out of the Lexus LFA, but considering the spread in price and technology between the two cars, it makes the Boss 302’s performance that much more impressive.

Source: YouTube

The 2012 Porsche 911 Carrera S. Image: Porsche AG

Porsche’s 2012 911 Carrera and 911 Carrera S make their official world debut at the upcoming Frankfurt Motor Show, but you can see the 911 Carrera S on the road in the video below. At first glance, the 2012 Porsche 911 looks a lot like the 2011 version, until you view them side by side. The new car is longer, wider, and just a bit shorter, which gives it a lower center of gravity and allows for slightly better weight distribution. It’s shed some 100 pounds since last year, and both versions get more powerful engines for 2012.

The 3.4-liter flat six in the base 911 Carrera now puts out 350 horsepower, which is five more than last year, while the Carrera S makes an even 400 horsepower, or 15 more than last year. To put that in perspective, the 2012 Porsche Carrera S is now faster than the higher-strung 2011 Porsche 911 Carrera GTS. In fact, if you equip the base Carrera with the PDK transmission and the Sport Chrono kit, it will match the 0-60 time of last year’s Carrera GTS. Both engines are more fuel efficient, too, but no one buys a new Porsche 911 if they’re concerned about fuel economy. More power and more fuel economy? Now that’s what we call progress.

Both cars will hit Porsche dealer showrooms in February of 2012, with the Carrera model starting at $82,100 and the Carrera S model starting at $96,400.