EPA Rips New Oshkosh Mail Truck Over Horrible Fuel Economy

kia carnival Full OverviewWe decided to assign our long-term 2022 Kia Carnival minivan to the Detroit office after it was delivered to our SoCal HQ. So, a cross-country road-trip/familiarization drive was hastily organized to relocate our Carnival from Los Angeles to its new home in Michigan. On a Saturday in May we flew out, picked up the yearlong test van, and decamped to a family outpost in Vista, California, where we spent the afternoon customizing settings, registering with Kia Connect (formerly UVO) telematics, and purchasing and stashing all our road-trip essential maps, snacks, and cooler. The Kia's nav system estimated the direct 2,316-mile route would take 33 hours, 17 minutes, but our route would be less direct and way more entertaining. Here's what we learned about the Carnival as a road-trip machine.Day 1: Calico Ghost TownOur first stop was at the Calico Ghost Town, a former silver and borate mining boomtown near Barstow, California. It was restored in the '50s by Knott's Berry Farm founder Walter Knott, who worked in Calico as a carpenter before becoming a berry/jam/pie magnate. It's here we noticed the Carnival EX gets standard sunshades for all the rear side windows—fancy stuff in a $39,055 van. This and the standard solar reflective glass (a step up from the LX's mere tinting) helped keep the cabin cool in desert sun.World's Tallest ThermometerI-15 from L.A. to Vegas passes a 134-foot-tall digital temperature gauge in Baker, built to commemorate a record 134-degree reading from 1913. As we passed this unofficial gateway to Death Valley and the giant 392-MW Ivanpah solar-generating mirror farm, we started to miss the SX trim's ventilated front seats just a little, but my copilot registered his relief at finding visors that slide to cover the entire front side glass width—a small thing, the lack of which excludes a vehicle from his purchase consideration.Neon Sign MuseumOur first gas stop was just across the Nevada line. We should have gassed up in Baker, but the Carnival is so shy about begging for fuel (there's a brief low-fuel warning on the info screen, then there's just the tiny orange low-fuel lamp) that we pressed on until the needle was fully on E. When we only squeezed 16-plus gallons into the 19-gallon tank, we reckoned the gauge is conservative. Passing Las Vegas, we avoided the hackneyed Welcome sign in favor of the less well known Googielicious Neon Sign Museum. Its lobby once welcomed guests to the LaConcha Motel, a fabulous sign for which is included in the collection.Arizona & UtahPressing on, we marveled at the gradual change of scenery from desert, to dry hills, to increasingly verdant mountains viewing a geology lesson in heaved sedimentary formations. We exited the interstate at Cedar City on State Route 14, which climbs to 9,900 feet crossing the scenic Markagunt Plateau, and stopped at Navajo Lake, which is fed by springs through lava tubes and feeds several rivers we'd soon be crossing, including the Virgin. By now we were disappointed in the Carnival's door pockets, which are basically only good for maps (remember those?). They feature a cupholder indentation, but it only fits 12-ounce cans (remember those?) Our taller water bottles and even motel coffee cups don't fit. A midcycle refresh needs to relocate the speakers to the upper door panel to accommodate larger water bottles.Red Canyon, Utah in JulyA little way up Utah's Scenic Byway 12 en route to Bryce Canyon is Red Canyon, which features miniature "hoodoos" that preview the epic eroded stalagmite-like formations that define Bryce Canyon. Jumping back in after this photo op, CarPlay acted up, requiring multiple unplug-plug operations (wireless CarPlay is not yet available) to resume, thus interrupting our streaming performance of The Book of Mormon musical. We eventually prevailed and proceeded to the Bryce Canyon Pines motel and restaurant for a feast of local trout and berry pie.Day 2: Bryce Canyon National ParkScotsman Ebenezer Bryce, for whom this striking park is named, was a Mormon convert and "serial pioneer" who settled a half-dozen towns or villages in the region to help spread the Mormon gospel. We spent 90 minutes in the park in 39-degree overcast weather searching unsuccessfully for a location where the van could pose with the spectacular canyon, then headed back down to rejoin the interstate following a stop at…Butch Cassidy BirthplaceThe notorious horse and cattle thief/bank and train robber grew up in this quaint log structure near Circleville, Utah. Just before arriving here, a speeding dove Kamikaze-dive-bombed the Carnival's nose, releasing feathers that penetrated the joint between the fascia and front fender. Descending the steeper hills in this area, we found the eight-speed automatic's manual shifting gate an intuitive and swift way to moderate downhill speeds without traumatizing the brakes.Giant Soda CansOur Roadtrippers app suggested several fun roadside "attractions" like these tanks adorning the parking lot of a Carl's Jr. They originally wore PepsiCo liveries (7Up, Dr. Pepper, Diet Pepsi, and Pepsi labels). A Carl's corporate conversion to Coke products presumably prompted the current labels. Here CarPlay went completely black-screen on us. Other native Kia screens worked, but CarPlay entered a deep and persistent snit that resisted even a "cold reboot" (park, ignition off, open and close door, lock, unlock, open and close, restart). Later, after a longer lunch stop, full CarPlay functionality mysteriously resumed.Serpentine Freeway CurvesAs part of the Carnival's Highway Driving Assist system, there's a feature that uses map and GPS data to slow down in tighter curves. Some curves on I-70 through Utah and Colorado prompted the system to decelerate way more than necessary—sometimes by 10 or 15 mph. Puke-prone preschoolers in car seats may warrant such caution, but with two adults looking out the windows, not at a screen, we overrode this feature and eventually disabled it.Snowy PassesAs we crested Vail Pass and other I-70 passes, we were met with lots of snow and dropping temperatures that dipped into the 30s. Yet, the Carnival's climate-control system managed to keep a constant temperature despite the day's wild swings in sun load and exterior temperature. As eastbound transcontinental travelers, we were saddened to see the Johnson Tunnel on I-70, which marks the beginning of the end of the journey's most epic scenery.Day 3: Pony Express & ObsolescenceThe welcome center at Julesburg, Colorado, honors the Pony Express National Historic Trail—a 1,900-mile run from St. Joseph, Missouri to San Francisco that originally took 10 days. It was rendered largely obsolete just 18 months after it was established by the advent of the telegraph. Speaking of obsolete, how is it that this brand-new minivan lacks modern conveniences like a capless fuel filler, wireless CarPlay, and USB-C jacks? This might be a long year.Rain Stays Mainly in the PlainsHard rains driven by strong headwinds torpedo our fuel economy all day, from an indicated 25 or 26 mpg through the mountains, down to 20. We skipped a visit to the Archway Museum, which pays tribute to pioneer adventurers who plied the Great Platte River Road. Crossing the plains, whoever is in the passenger seat turns to email and work, whereupon we miss the SX's 115-volt plug and our van's built-in Wi-Fi (we initiated setup back in California, but the system takes 10 days to activate). Our portable inverter and MiFi kept us connected and productive.Pioneer VillageJust east of Kearney, Nebraska, we detoured 13 miles south to Minden to see the Harold Warp Pioneer Village, a cluster of 28 buildings housing 50,000 historical artifacts including loads of cars, planes, tractors, trains, etc. We spent an afternoon and evening here during a cross-country trek in 2001 and were saddened to see the decline it's suffered in the years since. Leaving, we approached the locked Carnival with the key sharing a pocket with an iPhone in the driving rain and struggled to get in. Turns out the phone interferes with the key—a fact we'd struggle to remember in the coming days. Other cars occasionally suffer this problem; here it's always.Drizzly Des MoinesWe streamed the musical Hamilton on our way into Des Moines (later learning the Broadway touring company is in town!) and decided the non-branded audio system sounds decent but lacks any sense of spatial imaging. We found ourselves fiddling with tone settings more than we might with the SX Prestige model's 12-speaker Bose setup to mitigate this. We closed out the night with whiskeys at The Library, where nearly two decades earlier, MotorTrend digital director Erik Johnson and I met and drank with the Drake University women's basketball team during a peculiar Subaru press trip.Day 4: Detroit or BustRoad-tripping offers very few compelling roadside attractions to tempt us on the anchor leg of this journey, but the birthplace of Michael Jackson, the King of Pop, at 2300 Jackson Street in Gary, Indiana, lures us off the freeway (and lest you presume the road has been renamed, this neighborhood's north-south streets are all named for presidents). We both found ourselves fidgeting, readjusting the seat, and moving our legs around to stay comfortable after a few hours at the Carnival's helm. A little reverse engineering and/or patent-licensing of Nissan Zero Gravity seats might be another midcycle upgrade worth doing.Home at LastAfter four 8-9-hour driving days, we rolled into 's Detroit outpost having covered 2,470 miles and consumed 102.726 gallons of gas at a cost of $483.85. That works out to an average of 23.7 mpg—that's about 7 percent above the EPA combined rating of 22 mpg and a reasonable 7 percent below the trip computer's calculated 25.3-mpg average for the trip. Stay tuned; this rig is bound for many more adventures.Looks good! More details?2022 Kia Carnival (EX) Specifications BASE PRICE $39,055 PRICE AS TESTED $39,940 VEHICLE LAYOUT Front-engine, FWD, 8-pass, 4-door van ENGINE 3.5L direct-injected DOHC 24-valve 60-degree V-6 POWER (SAE NET) 290 hp @ 6,400 rpm TORQUE (SAE NET) 262 lb-ft @ 5,000 rpm TRANSMISSION 8-speed automatic CURB WEIGHT (F/R DIST) 4,609 lb (56/44%) WHEELBASE 121.7 in LENGTH x WIDTH x HEIGHT 203.0 x 78.5 x 68.5 in 0-60 MPH 7.7 sec QUARTER MILE 15.8 sec @ 90.4 mph BRAKING, 60-0 MPH 129 ft LATERAL ACCELERATION 0.78 g (avg) MT FIGURE EIGHT 28.4 sec @ 0.58 g (avg) EPA CITY/HWY/COMB FUEL ECON 19/26/22 mpg EPA RANGE, COMB 418 miles ON SALE Now TOTAL MILEAGE 3,621 mi AVERAGE FUEL ECON 22.8 mpg UNRESOLVED PROBLEM AREAS Intermittent CarPlay failure Show All

The world is full of undiscovered treasures. Some people use metal detectors to dig up lost wonders, and others hunt garage sales for that pot of gold at the end of the proverbial rainbow. Gearheads, however, search the classifieds for their automotive lost treasure. This is that story, but this time around it wasn't the high-tech interwebs, it was a printed ad in a small-time newspaper. Yep, those still exist.As Todd Evans explained, "I was browsing a little-known local newspaper that serves the High Desert areas of California and the Lake Havasu, Arizona, area on a Sunday evening when I ran across the ad. 'CAR COLLECTION FOR SALE: 1963 Corvette cpe, 4 sp, SCCA race car w/spares.' That was it, a small text ad with no pictures in a little newspaper. The ad had a few other cars listed, a trailer, and two motorhomes that I didn't even pay attention to. However, it did have a phone number, which, in today's online advertising world, where people refuse to even talk to you unless it is via text or email, was like gold to me. Unfortunately, the ad said not to call after 9 p.m. It was 9:30, but there was no chance I could wait until morning. I would have gone clinically insane."Evans continued: "I called, and a great old guy named John Lloyd answered, laughing after I apologized at least five times for calling past his 9 p.m. deadline. John began to tell me the story of his Corvette that he had purchased as a stock split-window back in 1968, before turning it into his dream racecar in the early 1970s. Honestly, I'm not even entirely sure I heard what he said during most of the conversation. My mind was racing so fast it kind of reminded me of having a chat with Charlie Brown's teacher. He said it had big flares, big turbine wheels, big-block hood, side pipes, and a 'cage. He knew a lot of people wouldn't like all of those things, but I assured him, in the calmest voice that I could muster, that I loved all of them. He's telling me all of this and I still haven't even seen a picture of it yet! I was crushed when he proceeded to tell me he already had a deposit on the car!""John had raced it extensively throughout California in the '70s, and Riverside Raceway was his home track. He owned Rialto Wheel & Tire at the time and was a weekend warrior, as opposed to being a big-dollar, sponsored racer. He had some success, won some races, and had a blast with all of his buddies, racing every chance that he got. He finally retired the car in 1978 and switched to a much lighter tube-chassis Camaro, along with taking care of his now growing family. He parked the car in his friend's yard outside his garage after the last race that day and it never moved again for 44 years," recalled Evans."Back to the phone conversation—it was now about 10:30 at night and I offered to come out immediately. I would bring cash and a trailer, but it would have put me in Riverside around midnight. I didn't care. I wanted it. After much convincing (also known as begging), John said I could come out first thing in the morning to look at the car in case the guy that had put a deposit on the car backed out. No problem. I'll be there. Remember waiting on Christmas morning as a kid before you got to open your presents? That's what the rest of my Sunday night and Monday morning turned out to be.""My good buddy Ken from Moreland Choppers and Hot Rods and I loaded up the trailer while it was still dark the next morning and met John at a coffee shop in Temecula. He wanted to sit down and find out who I was before we would even go see the car, which I completely understood. After shooting the breeze for about an hour, my Christmas came even earlier than I expected. John said the guy that supposedly had given him a deposit was a friend of a friend of an acquaintance, who knew about the car from years ago. Turns out, he had been saying he would send a deposit for over a month and hadn't done anything. John was ready to move on and I was even more ready!"Evans recalled to HOT ROD, "We arrived to see the car out in Riverside, and the Corvette was so much cooler than we ever could have imagined. Aside from fading on some of the paint, it was just as it had been that day when he parked it almost 50 years ago. The interior, while obviously dirty, was like a time capsule, right down to the melt-in-the-sun, annoyingly sticky early-'70s SS steering wheel. I didn't want to negotiate. I didn't want to haggle. I had already told John numerous times that I would pay more than his asking price if he just let me buy the Corvette. John isn't that guy, and said if I wanted the car, I could have it for the original asking price.After digging the Corvette out from its resting place and finding, surprisingly, that the Firestones all held air, we winched it up onto the trailer with huge smiles on our faces. I think the common phrases on the drive home consisted of a lot of 'I can't believe that just happened.' We were given a bunch of old pictures of the car back in its heyday, even some in its former red-white-and-blue paint scheme. John being the guy that he is, he even threw in the rat poop, mice nests, and raccoon skulls for free!"So, what's next for this rescued vintage racer? Well, cleaning will be kept to a minimum, but Evans will be removing the critters, rat droppings, and bones from the interior and engine bay. As for the rest Evans told us, "I've never done much road course racing, so I would leave it just like it sits and make a nasty street car out of it. It still has the original VIN and title so it could be registered. We have a Hilborn-injected small-block sitting here in the shop begging to be put in something anyhow. It would be impossible to not love a streetcar that looks like it belongs in one of the best movies of all time, The Gumball Rally." Sounds like a solid plan to us, and we asked him to let us know when the vintage Corvette racer is back on the road! -Photos By Todd Evans 

gmc sierra-1500 Full OverviewWorking as an automotive journalist is a surefire way to get to know all your neighbors. With a weekly (and sometimes daily) rotation of new metal circulating through your driveway, it's rare not to be asked about the vehicles when you dare poke your head outside. In my neighborhood, pickup trucks have been especially popular lately. The questions are usually the same, but a recent conversation involving the 2022 GMC Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate threw me for a loop."Hey, what do you think of that Chevy?" came the inquiry. "The Chevy? Oh, no, that's a Ram TRX," I replied, pointing to our long-term test truck. "No, not that one. It was the boxy-looking truck," he said. "Oh!" I replied, "You mean the electric F-150? Yeah, it was pretty great!" "Yeah … maybe. I could have sworn it said 'Denali' on it," he said.After an embarrassingly long pause, it came to me: "The 2022 GMC Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate! I forgot I recently had that one." "Yes! What'd you think?" I paused for a second before replying, "Well, I forgot about it, didn't I?"This admittedly unfair personal anecdote is a sign of a larger problem for the new luxe Sierra Denali Ultimate: With a high-horsepower electric Ford and an ascendent, stylish Ram across the way, the GMC (and its Chevrolet Silverado sibling) is a bit lost in the shuffle until the next-gen electric trucks arrive. However, the only ones suffering for this are potential buyers; the new Sierra Denali Ultimate is the most convincing Denali product in years. But is it enough as we enter the electric pickup truck revolution?Why It's ImportantIt's easy to forget, but back when it first launched, people held GMC's Denali brand in the same esteem as its Cadillac siblings and Lincoln rivals. In fact, MTV's TRL (for the younger crowd, it was a show where you called Carson Daly and asked him to play your favorite music videos) was just as likely to feature a Denali-branded GMC on spinners as it was a Cadillac or Lincoln.Somewhere along the way, the Denali brand began to lose some luster as rivals stepped up from simply premium to truly luxurious. The new 2022 Sierra Denali Ultimate aims to fix that.Designed to slot above the already spendy Sierra 1500 Denali, as well as the Sierra 1500 Denali Limited, which is the pre-refresh truck, albeit also a 2022-model-year offering that is confusingly sold alongside the new one, the Ultimate ups the ante by adding double-finished embossed leather, open-pore engineered-wood trim, aluminum accents, and a synthetic suede headliner. GMC finishes off the interior with a smart-looking black and tan color scheme, hand-stitched massaging seats, topographic maps of its namesake mountain etched into the wood, and much less plastic than is typically found in a GMC product.The 2022 Sierra Denali Ultimate also steps things up on the tech front. Like the new Sierra 1500 AT4X, the Ultimate gets a massive 12.3-inch digital instrument cluster, a Google-capable 13.4-inch infotainment screen, and a 15.0-inch head-up display. Provided it has enough semiconductors handy, GMC also fits the Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate with its Super Cruise advanced driver assistance system as standard equipment.Outside, the Denali Ultimate gets the freshened face GMC fit to the Sierra 1500 for 2022, with the addition of black badges and accents, and black-trimmed 22-inch wheels. The Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate is available exclusively in the ever-popular crew-cab, short-bed (in this case a 5.8-foot carbon-fiber job) configuration. A 3.0-liter turbodiesel I-6 making 277 hp and 460 lb-ft of torque is standard, but our test truck was fitted with the more popular gas-swilling 6.2-liter V-8, which makes 420 hp and 460 lb-ft. All 2022 GMC Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimates come standard with 10-speed automatic transmissions and four-wheel drive.Pricing for the 2022 Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate begins at $83,695, and this loaded test truck stickered for $84,190.Pros: What We LikeAlthough there's a fair bit of Spinal Tap-esque "but these go to 11!" nonsense in the Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate's naming and positioning (why not simply make the standard Denali more luxurious, as there's clearly room for improvement there?), there's no denying that by turning up the luxury dial, GMC has finally built a compelling Denali product again. The seats, though a bit hard and short, are swathed in thick, rich-feeling leather, and the aluminum brightwork and convincingly real faux-wood trim do much to make the Sierra's cabin feel special. Some of the materials below the belt feel of lesser quality, but the opulent touches that benefit the front of the cabin thankfully also carry through to the back seats.The Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate's new tech touches are a welcome addition, too. Super Cruise continues to be the most confidence-inspiring driver's aid on the market, clearly communicating to the driver when it can take control, when it's going to automatically change lanes for you, and when it needs you to resume control. The integrated Google Maps is also done well. We especially appreciated the fact that when you enter a destination into the system, it tells you how many minutes of your route Super Cruise will be available for. This is a really thoughtful touch.Whether or not Denali Ultimate buyers will ever put the Sierra 1500's bed to good use, the carbon-fiber cargo hold is impressively deep and wide. It features three tie-downs in every corner—an incredibly useful feature.Cons: What We Don't LikeIf the interior is so great, why had I forgotten about the Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate when my neighbor queried me? Probably because it's a bit unremarkable to drive.Surprisingly, the 6.2-liter V-8-powered pickup truck feels a bit poky compared to its crosstown rivals. The Sierra's V-8 feels big and lazy, and the 10-speed auto feels as if it's tuned for smooth, purposeful shifts, not quick up or down blats like you get in conventionally powered Ram 1500s, even if the GMC is ultimately quicker than all Rams without a dinosaur graphic under the hood. With a 0-60-mph run of 5.7 seconds and a quarter-mile time of 14.2 seconds at 98.5 mph, the Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate isn't exactly slow. However, the performance of the rival F-150 Lightning Platinum, which will hit 60 mph in 4.0 seconds and can run through the quarter mile in 12.7 seconds at 105.9 mph, makes the GMC feel stately in comparison.Despite the Sierra's standard magnetic dampers, there's room for improvements to ride quality, too. You pay for how good the Denali Ultimate's 22-inch wheels look with a firm, almost flinty ride. The GMC would likely be a far more luxe truck with a smaller wheel package.Lastly, those big new screens could use a bit more work, too. The graphics are clear and crisp, and the layout is generally intuitive, but the screen responds slowly at times. There were also a handful of instances when menus and features—such as the fancy 16-way massaging front seats, activated by a physical control on your seat but adjusted via the screen—wouldn't load.The Bottom LineAlthough the fancy new interior does much to finally drag the Sierra Denali brand forward, it does so at a time when all of its competitors are redefining what a luxury truck is.Looks good! More details?2022 GMC Sierra 1500 Denali Ultimate Specifications BASE PRICE $83,695 PRICE AS TESTED $84,190 VEHICLE LAYOUT Front-engine, 4WD, 5-pass, 4-door truck ENGINE 6.2L direct-injected OHV 16-valve 90-degree V-8 POWER (SAE NET) 420 hp @ 5,600 rpm TORQUE (SAE NET) 460 lb-ft @ 4,100 rpm TRANSMISSION 10-speed automatic CURB WEIGHT (F/R DIST) 5,582 lb (58/42%) WHEELBASE 147.9 in LENGTH x WIDTH x HEIGHT 231.9 x 81.2 x 75.5 in 0-60 MPH 5.7 sec QUARTER MILE 14.2 sec @ 98.5 mph BRAKING, 60-0 MPH 132 ft LATERAL ACCELERATION 0.76 g (avg) MT FIGURE EIGHT 27.6 sec @ 0.61 g (avg) EPA CITY/HWY/COMB FUEL ECON 15/20/17 mpg EPA RANGE, COMB 408 (est) miles ON SALE Now Show All