2011 Chrysler 300 priced from $27,995*

The most recent debut in Chrysler’s 2011 model year refresh onslaught, the 300 flagship sedan, will make its official public debut at the Detroit Auto Show next week. It won’t be long before the new 300 hits dealerships, and Chrysler has just revealed that its redesigned sedan will be priced from $27,995 (*including $825 in destination charges).

Four trim levels will be available from the get-go. The 300 and 300 Limited use the automaker’s 3.6-liter Pentastar V6, rated at 292 horsepower and 260 pound-feet of torque, mated to a five-speed automatic transmission and routed to the pavement through the rear wheels. Base 300s come standard with things like cloth seats, 17-inch aluminum wheels and new LED headlamps and taillamps; Limited models add leather trimmed seats, heated from seats, Uconnect voice command, a rear backup camera, premium audio system and 18-inch chrome wheels. Opting for the 300 Limited will set you back $31,995.

The higher-end 300C, priced from $38,995, uses Chrysler’s well-liked 5.7-liter Hemi V8, and comes standard with amenities like a heated steering wheel, power-adjustable pedals, LED interior lighting, power folding mirrors and a host of more luxurious interior options. Adding all-wheel drive to that equation nets you 19-inch wheels wrapped in wider 235/55-series tires and pricing starts at $41,145. Available on 300 Limited, 300C and 300C AWD models is a new SafetyTec Group option ($2,795) that includes HID headlamps, forward collision warning, adaptive cruise control, blind-spot monitoring and a slate of beeping park aids.

The full details are available in Chrysler’s press release after the jump, and keep your eyes peeled for the 2011 Chrysler 300 to debut at the Detroit Auto Show in just a few days.

WSJ: Chrysler to back away from Hemi in favor of more refined, green image

Chrysler has introduced musclebound V8 engines carrying the Hemi moniker twice over the last fifty years, and the company is reportedly preparing to once again back away from the Hemi. As we discovered during our First Drive of the 2011 Jeep Grand Cherokee, the burly, modern engine with a throwback name won’t be going away so much as it will be re-framed when the marketing-speak starts to flow. Dodge vehicles andRam trucks will unbashedly carry the Hemi, and it will continue to be available in some Jeeps and theChrysler 300, though it will be downplayed as merely a “5.7-liter V8″ in those brands.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the Hemi’s Multi-Displacement System will also be given more prominence to point up the engine’s fuel-saving abilities. With the Pentastar V6 finally putting a fully competitive V6 in the Chrysler engine stable, and a desire by management to cultivate a more refine and efficient image, it seems that the iconic powerplant will move to the back seat for now. The Hemi is one of the best V8s out there, just like the original, and for now, it’s still available.

Chrysler name gone from Europe, cars will remain as rebadged Lancias

Without any small-car offerings, Chrysler has an incomplete product lineup. Ditto for Lancia. But Fiat’s other offspring lacks larger vehicles. Since Fiat controls both brands, it looks like a match made in heaven, right? Maybe, but not just for North America. 

Fiat has announced that it will drop the Chrysler lineup in Europe and instead re-badge the Pentastar lineup as Lancias. The combination of Lancia and Chrysler leaves Fiat with too many European dealerships, so the Italian automaker also announced the cancellation of 350 Chrysler and Lancia dealer contracts beginning May, 2011. Chrysler and Lancia CEO Olivier Francois tells Automotive Newsthat the plan is to create an “integrated network comprising about 800 dealers and over 1,000 dealerships.” The only country in Europe that will continue to sell Chrysler products is the UK, where Lancias haven’t been sold since 1991.

The next big challenge for the dealerships that make the cut is to increase floor space to make room for a new, larger model lineup. And if everything goes as plan (does it ever?) Chrysler/Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne is looking to increase Chrysler/Lancia sales in Europe from 132,500 vehicles in 2009 to over 300,000 units in 2014.

Review: 2010 Chrysler 300C SRT8 remains a guilty pleasure

If the economic downfall of 2008 had happened just a few years earlier, the Chrysler 300C SRT8 probably wouldn’t exist. Think about it: when the nation was on the verge of $4.00/gallon gasoline and people were doing everything possible to get out of their fuel-sucking SUVs and into smaller, more efficient vehicles, a 425-horsepower flagship sedan with a free-breathing 6.1-liter Hemi V8 doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. But then again, did it ever?

The 300C SRT8 is the product of a pre-castrated Chrysler. This was a time of Viper-powered Rams, Hemi-powered Jeeps and SRT-badged Neons. “You want it, you got it.” Chrysler wanted the 300C SRT8 to start a new trend of muscle sedans – a land where quarter-mile times reigned supreme, and booming exhaust notes were all that mattered. This trend never really caught on (save the Cadillac CTS-V, which has been honed to be one hell of a machine), and at the end of the day, Chrysler was left with a big, heavy, powerful sedan that didn’t offer much in the way of refinement and carried a near-$50,000 price tag.

But despite its flaws – and there are quite a few – we still think of the 300C SRT8 as a guilty pleasure. It has all the ingredients of an American muscle car wrapped in a four-door, luxury(ish) package. We’d probably never buy one or recommend buying a new one to a friend, but if we’re totally honest, there’s still something about the SRT8 that gets us all giddy when one comes through the Autoblog Garage. Make the jump to find out why.

New York 2010: Chrysler shows off new SafetyTec package for Town & Country

Although the Chrysler Group still has a rather large amount of floor space here at the 2010 New York Auto Show, the company didn’t have a lot to offer this year…at least not just-baked stuff for the assembled media. Instead of showing off a new 300 or maybe even a 200C hybrid, they merely gathered up a bunch of older concepts and special editions and dropped them off at Javits. Chrysler at least had the good sense not to have a press conference. To be fair, the Pentastar is struggling and we don’t mean to kick them when they’re down so we’ll focus on the positive instead.

One new vehicle we found amidst the recently unveiled specials was a 2010 Chrysler Town & Country with seemingly every one of Chrysler’s latest safety and security features. The press release, which you’ll find after the jump, says the package includes the company’s Rear Cross Path (RCP) and Blind-spot Monitoring systems (BSM) to help drivers in making “safe lane changes and backing out of high-traffic parking situations.” Both features are apparently firsts in this segment.

This new “SafetyTec” package, as it’s known, is an option on the 2010 Chrysler Town & Country Touring and new Touring “Plus” models, and will be standard on the Town & Country Limited. The grouping includes standard and optional safety and security features like multi-stage airbags, seatbelt pretensioning, constant-force seat-belt retractors (CFR), active head restraints and supplemental side-curtain air bags. There are also accident-avoidance features like Smart Brake and Electronic Stability Control (ESC), plus security features like an anti-theft alarm and the Sentry Key engine immobilizer among other things. If Chrysler knows anything, it’s minivans and the importance of safety to minivan buyers.

The new SafetyTec package will be available late spring at an undisclosed price. Follow the jump to read the long laundry list of included features and take a look at our gallery below.

Chrysler Groozer: Customized PT-Cruiser with Suicide Doors and Split Rear Window

Over the years we’ve seen all sorts of customized Chrysler PT-Cruisers but admittedly, this ‘old school’ ride managed to capture our attention. The owner of the PT-Cruiser has put a serious amount of (body) work into the car that has been renamed to ‘Groozer’.

Among many other mods, the owner fitted a pair of suicide rear doors, a custom made rear end with split rear window and unique LED tail lamps, and reworked fascia, hood and C-column.

The PT-Cruiser also features an air suspension system and a sliding canvas ragtop while it rides on 18-inch front and 20-inch rear ‘wire’ wheels.

As you can see in the photo gallery below, the project is still in the works with the owner of the car saying that in the next phase he’ll concentrate on the Groozer’s interior.

Via: Cardomain

MY Chrysler 300C: New Model Line-up goes on Sale in the UK

If Chrysler keeps on schedule, then we’ll be seeing the redesigned 300 sedan making its market debut in the U.S. and other countries sometime in the second half of the year. But for now, Chrysler’s UK division has announced a new model-line up of its mid-size sedan for Britain. The new 2010 300C range will now offer four derivatives, the 300C SE, SR and SRT that are powered by 215HP 3.0-litre V6 diesel engine, and the SRT-8 fitted with a 425HP 6.1-litre V8 HEMI petrol engine.

The new entry-level 300C, the diesel-powered SE, is priced from £23,995 (approx. US$38,900) on the road.

Standard features include leather seats, ESP, ABS, front, rear and side-curtain airbags, heated front seats, dual zone climate control, LED ambient lighting, front fog lamps, parking sensors (front and rear), Xenon headlamps and rain-sensing windscreen wipers,18-inch alloys and an in-car entertainment system with CD player and MP3 capability and a six speaker Boston Acoustics sound system.

The 300C SR is priced at £24,995. In addition to the SE grade, SR models feature auto-dimming rear view mirror, upgraded Boston Acoustics sound system including subwoofer and uconnect GPS, uconnect phone with voice recognition, a hands-free communication system using Bluetooth technology.

Priced at £27,995, the 300C SRT offers in addition to the SR models a mesh grille with chrome surround, body coloured door mirrors and door handles, wheel arch extensions, 20 inch alloys, leather and suede trimmed sports seats and carbon fibre interior details.

The diesel-powered 300Cs are offered with a standard automatic transmission and can complete the 0-62mph (100km/h) sprint in 8.7 seconds while reaching a top speed of 143mph 0r 230km/h.

At the top-of-the-range is the 300C SRT-8 that costs £41,795 (about US$67,800 – in the States, the 300C SRT8 carries a sticker price of $47,315 not including taxes, but you may get a better price if you haggle the dealer).

The 300C SRT-8 with its 425HP and 420 lb-ft HEMI V8 goes from 0-62mph in 5.0 seconds, hits the quarter mile in the high 13-second range and has a top of speed of 165 mph or 265km/h.

Chrysler Said to Show All-Electric Fiat 500 as well at Detroit Auto Show

Following yesterday’s rumors about a new Chrysler model based on a Lancia vehicle, a news report today claims that the Chrysler Group will also reveal an all-electric version of the Fiat 500 at the Detroit auto show in January, without however giving out any specific details. In addition to the 500 EV, it is said that Chrysler will also display the entire Fiat 500 lineup at its Detroit booth, including the standard model, the 500C Moon Roof err.. Convertible and the sporty 500 Abarth.

The North American version of the Fiat 500 will be built at Chrysler’s Toluca plant in Mexico, with sales set to begin in fall 2010. The base version of the city car will be powered by Fiat’s new 1.4-liter Multiair 4-cylinder gasoline engine.

The tin-top model will be followed in 2011 by the 500C Convertible which gets an electronically retractable canvas roof as opposed to a full convertible top, while Fiat will complete the range in 2012 with the presentation of the sporty 500 Abarth powered by a turbocharged four-cylinder engine.

In North America, the Fiat 500 will be sold at select Chrysler dealerships.

Via: Autonews

PS: All photos are of the Fiat 500 Aria

Fiat Group "Revitalizes" Chrysler's Lineup with Special Edition 2010MY 300 S6 and S8

To be completely fair, we weren’t expecting the Fiat Group’s tie up with Chrysler to produce immediate results in such a short period of time, but we doubt that this is of any concern to consumers that want to see new products rolling into in the Detroit automaker’s showrooms.

We’re still waiting to see if the rumors about a Lancia Delta-badged / based Chrysler turn out to be true, but for the time being, Chrysler’s Detroit Show offerings will include the new 2010MY 300 S6 with a 250HP 3.5-liter V6 and the S8 with a 360HP HEMI V8.

Both models benefit from a series of exterior and interior improvements as well as equipment upgrades.

The 300 S6 and S8 are distinguished on the outside by their blacked-out grilles with chromed surround, body-color fascia accents, darkened headlamp bezels, chromed door handles, “shaved” doors with body-color mirrors and large 20-inch polished face wheels with painted pockets.

Interior highlights include a unique leather steering wheel with carbon weave accented, red stitching and brushed silver spokes, seats upholstered in a combination of dark gray leather and suede brushed aluminum accents on the instrument panel center stack, center console side trim and upper-door trim. The carbon-weave door-pull handles with red accent stitching round off the interior upgrades.

The 300 S6 and S8 models also feature a 13-speaker Kicker audio system with a 322-watt amplifier and 100-watt subwoofer, Uconnect Phone, iPod Control and SIRIUS Satellite Radio.

The new Chrysler 300 S6 and 300 S8 will go on sale at Chrysler dealerships in the spring of 2010.

Shhh…. Chrysler-Badged Lancia Delta Appears at the Detroit Motor Show [Updated]

Talk about a crappy representation of a thinning yet still major player in the States like Chrysler and its Dodge and Jeep brands. Not only did Fiat Group’s bosses decide to skip a press conference at the 2010 NAIAS in Detroit but they didn’t even bother -at least until the time that this post was written- to issue a press release on the Chrysler-badged Lancia Delta that was displayed at the firm’s booth…

Not to pat ourselves in back, but our photoshop of the “Chrysler Delta” that we showed back in December was spot on as we correctly predicted the shape and more importantly, the styling of the chrome grille.

We did however overestimate the Fiat Group’s rebadging capabilities as the unnamed Detroit Show car retained the Italian model’s alloy wheels – we’ll keep that in mind for next time.

There’s no official word on the group’s North American plans for the 4,522mm-long (177.9-inches or about the same size as the VW Jetta) hatchback, but we would like to hear your thoughts on the matter and in particular, if the Delta’s styling would appeal to American consumers. Have your say in the comment section below.

New Study Says that Every GM Vehicle Sold in the States Costs Taxpayers $12,200 – In Theory…

It’s ‘bailout talk’ time again as a new study that was conducted by Thomas D. Hopkins, a Professor of Economics at Rochester Institute of Technology, for the 362,000-member strong National Taxpayers Union (NTU), finds that the American taxpayer will have put up $12,200 for every GM vehicle, and $7,600 for every Chrysler, sold from the beginning of 2009 to the end of 2010. Together, the taxpayer subsidy for Chrysler and GM, will theoretically exceed $10,700 per vehicle sold.

But that’s only if, and we repeat if, the two companies fail before 2011 and don’t repay their government loans. That’s a big ‘IF’, if you ask us, but anyway.

Hopkins came out with these figures by making guesstimates on the 2009 and 2010 combined yearly sales of GM (5.06 million vehicles total) and Chrysler (2.3 million units total) and then dividing the numbers with the loans received by the two automakers, including GMAC’s bailout money as the company now provides financing services to both GM and Chrysler.

The professor says that the result is a GM/GMAC bailout of $61.5 billion ($52.9+$8.6), and $17.4 billion ($13.5+$3.9) for Chrysler/GMAC, which amounts to $12,200 for GM and $7,600 for Chrysler on a per vehicle basis.

Hopkins does note however that for each year of survival beyond 2010 and as long as no additional government loans are provided, the taxpayer burden per vehicle would decline.

“Of course one could adopt a more optimistic set of assumptions, developing a scenario in which this rescue turns out so successfully that most (but certainly not all) of the taxpayers’ investment ultimately is returned, perhaps indeed with some profit,” says Hopkins. “In that event, most of the taxpayer burden would disappear.”

“But the plausibility of such rosy assumptions is not easy to defend. For starters, some $6.4 billion of the bailout funds, in the form of loans to the former (now bankrupt) GM and Chrysler, are not legal obligations of the newly-structured GM and Chrysler,” Hopkins added.

Pete Sepp, NTU Vice President for Policy and Communications, was even more aggressive in his commentary about the report:

“Every time someone in your neighborhood drives home in a shiny new Chevy Silverado, remember that it cost American taxpayers more than $12,000,” said Pete Sepp.

“Between this and GM’s plan to payback their bailout debt with other taxpayer funds, I wonder if all those Americans without work right now could think of any better ways to spend that money. This is a play out of the Bernie Madoff ponzi scheme playbook, and would be the equivalent of paying your Master Card bill with your Visa.”

Leaving aside the fact that the ‘taxpayer burden’ per vehicle is based on the assumption that neither company will pay back any loans and that they will both fail by 2011, the report also does not take into consideration any other factors whatsoever including the cost for taxpayers if both companies went bankrupt leaving tens of thousands of workers directly and indirectly employed by GM and Chrysler without a job.

Link: NTU