Articles by John Law

Hyundai has detailed its largest combustion SUV, the Palisade, before it goes on-sale in Korea. Expected to arrive in Australia some time in 2025, the three-row SUV ditches its diesel powerplants for an all-petrol based offering, including a new powerful hybrid model with the Toyota Kluger, Kia Sorento and Nissan Pathfinder in its sights. The new-generation Palisade is bigger than its predecessor: 65mm longer (5060mm), 5mm taller and wider, riding on a 70mm longer 2970mm wheelbase. The Palisade rejoins a busy seven-seat segment with the brand also offering the Ioniq 9 electric car and smaller Santa Fe in Australia.In Korea, the Palisade is available in a nine seat configuration with a three-wide front bench. Normally, that would be unlikely for Australia but Hyundai has engineered a twin centre airbag for safety, so it may get in. It is otherwise a seven seater with two front, two middle ‘captain’s chairs’ and a three-wide rear bench.The interior has been completely overhauled in the style of the smaller Santa Fe, with upmarket trims such as Calligraphy getting twin curved 12.3-inch displays, with the centre working as the multimedia touchscreen. Upholstery comes in a variety of colours with top-spec variants getting the choice of black or brown leather in Korea. Huge 21-inch alloy wheels are available optionally. Helping keep the ride plush are the first adaptive dampers ever fitted to a non-N Hyundai SUV. The technology is borrowed from Genesis models. Under the bonnet you’ll find a 2.5-litre turbo-petrol four-cylinder in place of the old 3.8-litre V6, while the more efficient diesel is effectively replaced by the new hybrid system. Petrol alone, the Palisade develops 210kW. The hybrid’s 1.65kWh lithium-ion battery and electric motor bumps this to 249kW with combined driving range in excess of 1000km. Electric car-like features include vehicle-to-load (V2L) along with ‘Stay Mode’ that allows the car to idle for long periods of time without compromising on air-con effectiveness. Australian pricing is yet to be confirmed but in Korea, Palisade prices have jumped by up to 15 per cent. If we apply that same increase to the flagship Calligraphy model ($81,719) today, it’s possible a new AWD hybrid could be pushing $95,000 before on-road costs.

Renault importer Ateco has confirmed Australia is getting the giant slaying Renault 5 Turbo 3E electric hatchback.With two rear-mounted motors delivering 375kW, the Renault 5 Turbo 3E’s targeted 0-100km/h time of 3.5 seconds would make it as almost as rapid as the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N (3.4 seconds), though still over a second shy of the wild Porsche Taycan Turbo S (2.4 seconds). Australian details of the '80s-inspired hyper hatch, including arrival timing, pricing and allocation size, are yet to be confirmed. Expect an ultra-limited run with a price tag beyond A$200,000. Expressions of interest are now open ahead of a 2026 production start. The Turbo 3E is the new electric Renault 5 flagship, sitting above the cooking hatch and its 160kW Alpine-fettled version. It has a carbon fibre body wrapped around a bespoke carbon fibre ‘super structure’, though, sharing little with the regular 5. There are massive side intakes to cool the e-Motors, one of which houses the charging port. Regarding the huge wide-body kit, rear diffuser, wings and bespoke front bumper, Renault CEO Luca De Meo’s design brief was “Make me a little beast”.The Turbo 3E is expected to have all sorts of driver-centric features, including drift modes, doughnut settings and a physical handbrake — though whether it’s a cable pull or more like the Ford Mustang’s electro-hydraulic ‘Drift Brake’ is unclear.Renault has promised an “outstanding driving sensation, something completely unexpected” with agility “like nothing else”.The Turbo 3E is a nod to the Renault 5 dynasty. The hatch started with the regular range, with the 5 GT Turbo added as the mass-production hot model — akin to today’s Alpine A290 — with the mid-engined Renault 5 Turbo 2 as the limited-run flagship. The recipe was repeated in the early 2000s on the second-generation Renault Clio. Cooking regular hatch, big-engined attainable hot hatch (Renault Sport 172 and 182) and super-limited, borderline insane mid-engined rear-drive Clio V6 at the top of the tree. It also seems, strangely, as though the Turbo 3E will be a Renault product, rather than Alpine. Suppose that is the difference between outright punch and Alpine’s bent for low weight and overall balance. Further details such as driving range, battery size and recharging times remain a mystery for now. “Renault head office in France has been very supportive of Australia. The fact we’ve been able to secure the Renault 5 Turbo 3E for our customers so soon after it was confirmed for production in Europe, shows how committed Renault is to the Australian market – with this and other exciting models around the corner,” said General Manager of Renault Australia Glen Sealey. Those other ‘exciting models’ are yet to be detailed. Renault has expressed interest in both the regular 5 electric hatchback and its R4 small SUV sibling. Neither model is confirmed for Australia yet. 

We're lucky, us car journalists. We get to drive oodles of exciting new cars throughout the year — sometimes so many you start to forget your favourites — so making this list was a nice walk down medium-term memory loss lane.

Chinese electric car specialist Nio was one of the first to try its hand at launching premium models into European and Scandinavian markets in 2021. 

If you really don’t like Tesla boss Elon Musk, where are you supposed to get a good electric car?It’s a question on many people’s lips because, right now, the Model 3 sedan and Model Y siblings offer the best balance of affordability, performance, technology and cabin space of any mainstream electric car on the market. As a new challenger, a brand like Xpeng — along with the likes of BYD, Leapmotor, Aion, Deepal and plenty more — will be looking to scoop potential Tesla customers. But do Elon’s political movements bode well for new brands looking for fresh buyers?The answer, according to Jason Clarke, the CEO of Xpeng importer TrueEV, is more complex than a simple ‘yes’.“Tesla is an incredible brand. You can have thoughts on Elon Musk — positive or negative or neutral — but it was groundbreaking, what they did,” said Clarke, who is an admirer of the way Tesla disrupted the market with the Model S that landed in Australia 10 years ago. “They weren't cheap, and there was no real charging infrastructure and people worked it out, sorted it out. Range anxiety? Forget it. It was desirable, aspirational, all of that. And it was groundbreaking. “Now you've got a Model Y and 3 and it's kind of pedestrian; they're just EVs now, so where does Tesla go?” He said. Clarke, however, sees the value in Xpeng not being so involved in Australia’s early phase of electric vehicles. There’s less pressure and expectation of a new nameplate — it’s a clean slate. Plus, there’s the benefit of surfing some of the education and awareness about electric car ownership and charging that carmakers like Tesla, Nissan, Renault and others had to invest in. “If a brand, Tesla, is in market really fiercely protecting or spruiking what they have — its importance to the environment, economy and so on — that is good for us. A strong Tesla is good for Xpeng, I really believe that.“It’s like two cafes in the street rather than one, it brings more customers,” said Clarke. Clarke appreciates Elon’s willingness to say things and be seen in this business, something others may find jarring. It’s good for business. “I think if you flipped it and Tesla was problematic and had a low market cap and some problems and Elon Musk was demure, that whole category suffers, I believe. You don't necessarily love it on the political side of it. You can loathe it. But is still, front and centre, an electric vehicle technology company,” Clarke said. Xpeng has entered the Australian market with its first offering, the G6 mid-size SUV. With a sharp sub-$60K price, 800-volt electrics for sub-20-minute fast charge and driving range up to 570km, it will be a real headache for the Tesla Model Y, Australia's favourite EV. The brand will expand its range next year with a twin-motor G6 Performance model, along with the X9 people mover. Also likely are the G9 large SUV and the P7+ large sedan, which is Xpeng’s most performance-oriented model. Xpeng has opened its first location in Mascot, inside the Sydney Airport precinct. It is part of a network that will expand beyond 12 locations by the end of 2025 leveraging ‘experience centre’ type stores along with traditional dealer franchises. The goal for Xpeng, which sees itself as a rival for Tesla, BYD, Volkswagen, Kia and Hyundai, is to become a top-five electric car seller, on the way to the target of 25,000 annual sales in Australia. Battery electric vehicles are the main focus for now but Clarke didn't rule out hybrids in the future. The bosses back in China are keen for any product that works in Oz, but Clarke likes the idea of consistency.Xpeng is developing more than just passenger cars, too. Artificial intelligence, humanoid robots and flying machines are all in Xpeng’s future. Flying cars are not ruled out, either.

The EPU concept Toyota showed at the 2023 Japan Mobility Show is heading to production.

It seems the worm has turned on electric pick-up trucks.

Ford has rolled out massive discounts across its vehicle range, including on Australia’s best-selling vehicle.  Variants of everything from the low-volume E-Transit to market-leading Ford Ranger ute are on special, with the family-favourite Everest SUV also on offer. 

A Czech dealer has revealed a special edition Mitsubishi Colt small car that channels Ralliart vibes. In other markets, Mitsubishi isn’t scared to trot out the Ralliart name, with South East Asia markets getting stickered-up versions of the Pajero Sport, Triton and other models. Like those, don’t expect this Colt for Australia.  Known as the Performance edition, the Clio-based Mitsubishi Colt isn’t exactly the hottest hatch on the block, with a dyno verified 96kW and 222Nm at the wheels. Phwoah.That’s the sort of grunt that would’ve had a 199X Suzuki Swift GTi sweating, but not the current hot hatch establishment. The similar-size Hyundai i20 N and Volkswagen Polo GTI pack at least 50 per cent more punch. There are some good aspects to the hot Colt, such as a six-speed manual transmission and light 1097kg kerb weight. It features high-end 18-inch OZ Racing Superturismo GT wheels, too. Further details, such as price and run-size, have not been revealed. Compared to the last Colt Ralliart, sold in Australia between 2006 and 2010, the stats are pretty promising, that vehicle putting out 113kW and 210Nm from its turbo-petrol four-banger and weighing 1130kg. It was good for a 0-100km/h sprint in 8.0 seconds. There are no suspension changes for this Mitsubishi Czech special, though, not even lowering springs. It’s more of an appearance pack than a full transformation and that means there’s absolutely zero likelihood of coming to Australia. The new Clio on which the Colt is based isn’t sold in Oz and the Colt certainly isn’t. Additionally, Mitsubishi Australia has previously turned down similar performance versions as it wants “to do heritage justice.”"We are asking for a Ralliart," Mitsubishi Australia CEO Shaun Westcott told CarsGuide at the Triton ute’s launch in March, also suggesting a vehicle like that would be popular in other markets such as South Africa. "So the fact that we are there, and that we are in Ralliart and that we are racing the vehicle I think does open up an opportunity for us to look at performance enhancement in the future potentially around the vehicle." Ralliart’s reboot is in the works. Don’t expect it to be half-baked but hopefully it’s here soon.

The Xpeng G6 has entered the rapidly expanding and extremely competitive electric medium SUV segment. Priced to compete with the Tesla Model Y at $54,800, before on-road costs, the 2025 Xpeng G6 boasts stats impressive enough to make the Tesla’s $55,900 best-seller sit up and pay attention. Under the skin, the G6 uses 800-volt architecture and boasts up to 570km driving range, comparable — if not better — than $20,000 dearer rivals like the Kia EV6 GT-Line RWD ($79,590), Hyundai Ioniq 5 Epiq ($84,300), Ford Mustang Mach-E Premium ($79,990) and Polestar 4 ($78,500, all before on-road costs). The significance of Xpeng’s 800-volt electric system is charge time, with owners able to recuperate the larger 87.5kWh lithium-ion (NMC) battery from 10-80 per cent in less than 20 minutes, just as Hyundai-Kia’s E-GMP platform allows. You’ll also find this in luxury vehicles like the Porsche Taycan and its Audi e-tron GT relation.The question is, how has Xpeng saved the money? Imported by TrueEV in Australia, Xpeng says it is all to do with streamlined production steps — and it’s pleasingly nerdy. Like Tesla’s ‘Gigacasting’, Xpeng is moving to simpler vehicle construction, with the SEPA 2.0 platform's one-piece castings integrating 300 individual parts into one element. But there are less visible advancements, too. Technical Advisor at TrueEV Andrew Morcos told CarsGuide about the lessons learned from stripping down a G6 to understand its structure and parts make-up. “I pulled Mercs apart for years. You've got so many different modules, and they go half copper, half CAN Bus. The way you undo these things, make it very complicated”, explained Morcos. Typically, the different modules used by OEMs for various purposes — adaptive cruise control, lighting, in-car entertainment, for example — will communicate in their own ‘languages’. The signals are then translated into universal CAN protocol for the main onboard computer, which communicates information to the occupants or other elements of the vehicle. “When we undid the , everything was so easy to undo with clips … instead of having 10 modules, they’ll have one module that does all of the left-hand side, one module does all the right-hand side and they’re in easy positions to get to.“Because the whole car runs on CAN Bus system, it can communicate in micro seconds. That's why the whole thing is dedicated to autonomous driving, to have reaction times,” said Morcos.  “They've designed this whole system — I reckon they spent more time designing this part of the system than the actual body — they pieced it all together and you can see how delicately they put it for diagnosis, and how everything reacts to each other module and it's very simple to diagnose what the problem is, that's what we found out.”With CAN Bus, instead of a ‘rats nest’ of different, heavy cables, the bulk of the wiring harness can be simplified into two wires — one there, one back. It’s lighter, simpler and should be faster. “This whole car, from 4G to the blinker system, no matter what it is in the car, it all works on their CAN Bus system, and it's and it's very responsive,” added Morcos. Tesla is also pushing forward with elegant solutions for in-car electronics, with boss Elon Musk allegedly sending a ‘how-to design a 48-volt architecture’ pamphlet to major manufacturers, including Ford. Its Cybertruck uses 48-volt electronics everywhere, allowing its steer-by-wire system. The G6 promises rapid processing speeds with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8155 chip powering the 15-inch touchscreen and, while the phrase ‘software defined vehicle’ makes everyone in the CarsGuide office groan, it is the future of electric cars. It drives more than the multimedia system too, in theory making the whole experience more seamless. “I've had Tesla technicians come into our car in Melbourne — to spy on us — and they came in and said, ‘man, the refresh rate, processing speed and the quality, it's far superior than ours’,” said Morcos, showing signs of promise for the new G6. Of course, this all comes with one big caveat: We’re yet to drive the G6, or any of Xpeng’s products, in Australia. They could have annoying driver aids, a poor ride, or clunky multimedia systems. Or not. Either way, we’ll have an answer early next year. Unlike Polestar and some European marques, such as Renault, Xpeng does not openly discuss its battery pack’s constituents. The brand does sell vehicles in the EU, which requires battery passports for all vehicles from 2027. Speaking to TrueEV CEO Jason Clarke, it is clear that Xpeng’s target is fixed on the back of Tesla. The importer aims to make Xpeng one of the top-five electric vehicle brands in Australia. The first model to launch is the Xpeng G6, which is on-sale now in two trim levels with a Performance grade to join next year, followed by the X9 people mover. In the near future, expect a larger G9 SUV and a sporty sedan, known as the P7. Prices listed are before on-road costs