Buick Leaves China, Kia K4 Hatchback, A Conversation with Steve Saleen

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great guests.

This is the Consumer Guide Car Stuff podcast.

All right, this is the Consumer Guide Car Stuff podcast.

I am Tom Appel.

Thank you for joining us today.

When you have a chance, check us out at ConsumerGuide.com.

You know the drill.

Our 2026 Best Buy picks are there if you were shopping for a new car.

All sorts of fun stuff, including reviews, classic car stuff.

I just did a piece about something called the Cadillac Civil Opera Coupe, which is a

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You're going to love checking out that ad.

It's frightening, really.

That laugh was Jill Siminello.

She is a contributing editor here at ConsumerGuide.com.

North American Car of the Year, Jurr and Freelancer.

How are you?

I am doing well.

How are you?

I'm good.

I think all of America knows that all of America is under some sort of nightmarish weather

condition right now.

But it is freaking cold.

And yet you hear you are in shorts.

Yeah, well, that's part of the deal.

I can't just suddenly wear long pants.

It's funny, though, and we'll talk about this later in the showtime permitting,

but we've driven cars that were deeply affected by the weather and handled it to some

degree or not.

I had driven the Cadillac Lyric recently, and for most of the week, everything was

great.

And then when things started to get cold, the batteries started to shrink a little bit.

But it was at pretty extreme temperatures, not like 15, 20, zero.

Yeah.

It's been cold and snowy and icky.

Yeah.

So we'll get back to that.

And there's a whole lot of the country that had it worse than us.

It seems like whenever they showed how bad the weather was going to be, like Chicago

just sort of peeked its eye out from underneath the ugly zone.

All right.

Just I haven't done this in a while, so I wouldn't check.

Last episode, we had downloads in Melbourne, England, Bonn, Germany, Nairobi,

Kenya, Kathmandu, Nepal, and Gdansk, Poland.

OK.

Thank you all, you English speakers in non-English speaking nations, for checking us out.

Yeah.

Or there are non-English speakers who are listening us to maybe learn English.

I'm sorry if that's your case.

Yeah, this isn't that place.

So I've got a story here I've been meaning to get to for like three weeks and I've

talked to you about it offline, but we finally have time today.

Mercedes-Benz has been selling a level three, a true level three hands-free driving system

in the U.S.

Yes.

In like one market.

And it was Northern California and parts of Nevada.

OK.

And it was called DrivePilot.

It's been around since 2001 in Germany, 2023 or 20.

You think I would have written this down.

2023 in the U.S.

OK.

But it was a hands-off, eyes-off system and it seemed to work pretty well, but it had

so many limitations and it was so expensive that it was pointless.

And Mercedes has finally admitted it was pointless.

OK.

So it was on the new S-Class and the EQS, which is ostensibly the electric S-Class.

That's their big sedan.

It only worked at speeds below 60 miles an hour.

It was 2,500 bucks a year for the subscription and it didn't work very many places and you

had to be on major highways.

So extremely limited.

That would be a nope.

And it's funny too.

If you think about the history of the S-Class, 60 miles an hour is not the history of the

S-Class.

No.

And by the way, most speed limits these days are not 60 miles an hour.

No.

On highways.

And in Germany before things got congested, we used to talk about the Autobahn.

And in the 80s it was like this dream thing where Americans would want to go there

and rent a Mercedes and go 130 miles an hour.

Or 200.

Or something.

The Autobahn's not really like that anymore.

It's just congested and busy and they limit the speeds during certain times of the day.

It's not what it was.

But the S-Class was always part of this legacy of very fast, very sleek and efficient

big sedans.

And going 60 miles an hour, not really in keeping with the S-Class.

My sound effects.

Yeah.

So that system is going away.

And it's like a strong level two system for the next generation of these vehicles as they

work on level four.

Got it.

So goodbye, drive pilot.

We hardly knew you.

Yeah.

And I think until this morning I didn't know that was the name of the system.

Right.

So they never got one to us to test.

Interesting General Motors news, I'm sure you heard this.

About Buick.

Yes.

The Buick Envision is coming home.

There are people who don't know, a few vehicles sold in the U.S. were actually built in China.

One of them is the Lincoln Nautilus and there have been some stray volvos over the years

and I think there might still be one or two.

But the Buick Envision, extremely popular in China, that's one of Buick's most popular

models there.

It's built in China and they've been importing that to the U.S. and until this

tariff situation, it was a fine situation for General Motors but that's obviously

not going to work moving forward.

So starting sometime soonish, the story gets complicated.

Maybe around 2007 and a half or for the 2028 model year.

So 2027 and a half.

2027 and a half.

I was going to say throwback.

What were you doing in 2007?

They will move production of the Envision to the U.S.

Okay.

Now what's interesting about this plant, this is the Fairfax Assembly Plant in Kansas.

This is where they're going to start building or have started building the Chevrolet

Bolt.

Okay.

So the reason that the Bolt is only going to be around for a little while, this is why.

They're going to use that factory to build the Envision plus they're going to move the

equinox there.

Okay.

And those vehicles will be very closely related.

Okay.

So basically we're waiting for the Envision to need to be redesigned, gets moved to

the U.S.

Mm-hmm.

That's that story.

Okay.

Oh yeah.

And then there are some question marks about whether or not the Bolt is actually

temporary.

Okay.

I hope not.

Yeah, you know, I mean, I hope not too.

I drove the Bolt previous iteration, loved it.

Yeah.

It was one of my favorite electric cars for a long time and it was so affordable.

Well, and the fact that like it, you know, it was inexpensive but had like all the cool

things like it had supercruise on it.

What it did not have was fast charging.

Right.

It was, it tapped out at 50 kilowatts, right, which is technically fast charging.

But not ultra fast.

But it's the slowest of the fast charge options.

But it was a pretty small battery, 65 kilowatts.

So it didn't take that long to charge anyway.

But the new one's coming in with faster charging.

I think it's 100 kilowatts.

Okay.

So twice as fast.

That would be lovely.

I think the only problem there is the price squeeze, though it is a good deal, the cheapest

version of the Equinox EV is not a bunch more money.

Right.

So we'll see if there's market confusion there or not.

Okay.

All right.

That's that story.

Wow.

I'm running out of stuff here quick.

All right.

I ran this poll on, I do this all the time on X and I don't know if people usually respond

to my silly polls.

Well, they are silly.

But this one was good.

Which comma culturally is the most American vehicle?

Was it which culturally comma?

No, which is comma culturally, the most American vehicle, yes.

Okay.

Two commas.

Hashtag patriotic, hashtag American.

Okay.

All right.

I think now we've got the full.

Got it.

Punctuation sorted.

Yeah.

Okay.

So here's the Chevrolet Corvette, the Ford Mustang or the Jeep Wrangler?

Oh, that's a good question.

I'm going to go with Corvette.

It was a three-way tie.

Wow.

Yeah, exactly.

Wow.

And I could see it.

Corvette goes all the way back to the 50s.

Mustang of course, the first pony car sold like crazy first year out and the Wrangler,

one World War II.

Yeah.

So there you go.

All right.

So you recently drove, I'm interested in this for a bunch of reasons, but you recently drove

the Kia K4 hatchback.

Correct.

So the K4 is a replacement for the Kia Forte, a civic-sized compact sedan, a very likable

car.

But it was redubbed K4 as part of their international naming nomenclature and just to piss off

Americans.

Yes, because we love alphanumeric nomenclature.

So the sedan came out last year and the hatchback came out this year.

And they're clearly anticipating selling fewer hatchbacks than sedans we know is for a bunch

of reasons like they're limiting the trim level count and stuff like that.

But still here it is.

Here it is.

Tell me about it.

And is the hatch, does the hatch make it a better vehicle?

Yes.

All right.

I think it does.

All right.

Let's go to a break.

Yeah, and we're done.

No.

Yeah, show's over.

No, I really, really liked the sedan.

I thought the sedan was well done.

I thought the materials were great.

You know, the technology, the engines, like I thought everything about that was pretty well

done.

And I agree.

Yeah, it's a very nice choice.

So and I mean, this is coming from a former GTI owner, you add the hatchback, which creates

a little more utility, more space.

And to me, it just makes everything better.

And what I thought was really fascinating about this vehicle is even though it has

more cargo space, the passenger space stays the same.

And the overall footprint of the vehicle is 11 inches shorter.

It's shorter.

Shorter.

So they're bob tailing a little bit because there's no trunk.

Correct.

So that space all comes from the hatch bubble.

Yes.

Basically that area that would be above the trunk that is now under the hatch glass.

Interesting.

But I mean, it is oddly fun to drive and kind of sporty.

And we were in the top tier GT line turbo trim.

So the 1.6 liter engine, I think it's 190 horsepower.

That sounds right.

And it was fun and fast and peppy.

My drive partner was Aaron Gold, who works for Motor Trend.

And he took the portion of the drive on Angeles Crest and managed to handle that

vehicle beautifully such that it is like a curvy path up a mountain outside of Los

Angeles that a lot of people will take performance cars to test.

It is a favorite of the Buff Books.

So he's very familiar with it.

He lives in LA.

And he was driving and managed to keep up with Camaros.

Well.

I mean, it's all about the cornering and the curves.

Camaros let you keep up.

Yeah.

No.

There were like three of them in a row.

Yeah.

And we had them in our sights the entire time.

So to me, that was impressive.

But I mean, overall, very quiet, very smooth.

And the materials, again, really good.

The technology is very good.

The vehicle we were testing was probably about $32,000 and that's all in.

And it had the blind view monitor.

It had the 30-inch screen that has the 12.3-inch gauge cluster and the 12.3-inch infotainment

screen.

And you know, all of the special safety technology.

And I don't know.

It just, I mean, it was kind of this odd yellow color that is exclusive to the Hatchback.

I don't know what that color is.

I don't know either.

It was, and you know, I mean.

Your review of that vehicle is up at ConsumerGuide.com and I did look up the color.

And so it is in there.

Yeah.

And I knew it at one point and I don't have it in my head at the moment.

But I don't know.

It's an interesting color.

The Hatchback exclusive, you know, Kia thinks that the buyer for this vehicle is going to

be younger but more tech-savvy, therefore, you know, that is why they did away with

the lower trims is because they think that somebody buying this car is going to start

at the X anyway.

So you know, where the stand starts at about $22,000, this is going to start

at about $25,000.

Let me be cynical.

There's also going to be fewer hatch buyers.

You have to limit build permutations just so there's space and dealer lots.

And so ordering doesn't get too complicated.

But yeah, I could see that.

I also, I would think someone who's tech-savvy now might be a little bit more

practical.

Yeah.

So they might be drawn to the Hatchback.

Yeah.

And I mean, it has the what the AI assistant and the real time traffic

available and all of the, you know, wireless Apple CarPlay and Android

Auto and it just, it has anything you could possibly want in a car.

I think it has it.

The vehicle we were in was heated and cooled seats.

It had heated steering wheel.

It had dual automatic climate controls.

I often call that a marriage saving feature.

We are in a really weird place with what has become entry level cars.

Yeah.

And Compad cars now are the entry level cars.

So a Civic, a Corolla, a K4, a Mazda 3.

These are all really nice cars with good powertrains.

And these are now the new entry level.

Yeah.

And for whatever reason, the new entry level, not for whatever reason, this is

what consumers want, can be loaded up to near luxury levels of content.

And my daughter bought, I've talked about this, a CX30 with a bunch of stuff.

And I don't know, retail, we ended up buying a certified Priome.

But it would have been 36K for a Compad car.

Right.

So they're not cheap anymore, but they are the entry level.

But everything's coming on them.

And it's so funny because I think we're just moving every other car upstream.

Prices are getting higher slightly because we're pushing other cars up market.

Yeah.

Well, and I mean, we're removing the bottom tier.

Yeah.

You know, you don't have a Kia Rio anymore or, you know, whatever the like

what the Chevy Aveo or, you know, those really small, ultra affordable cars.

For a little while, Chevy was actually selling in volume, the spark and the

Sonic, really affordable car.

I mean, the spark was available around 16K, not that long ago.

And the Sonic was a much more substantial vehicle.

Actually, if it's a nice car, but that's gone.

I mean, you mentioned the Kia Rios gone and the Hyundai Accent is gone.

But a lot of this, when we talk about affordability, a lot of this is

still coming out of COVID.

Yeah.

When manufacturers couldn't couldn't get chips, couldn't build cars.

Right.

So they just stopped building the ones they made the least money on.

And they haven't gone back to building them.

Well, because people are buying them, the average

transaction price of a new vehicle in 2026 now is over $50,000.

Yeah, I did see something about that.

And that number is a bit misleading.

Well, because it includes pickup trucks and pickup trucks.

If you extract pickup trucks, the number is closer to 38,000.

OK.

It's still a lot of money.

But that is, but for apples to apples, that is the number we used to use.

So 50 K is 50 K.

It's a bunch of money.

And yeah, people are paying that stuff.

But sales last year, interestingly, and this actually comes up on the quiz.

Well, but sales are up slightly last year from about 15, 8 to 16, 2.

OK. Not a bunch up.

Right.

So and actually, it's interesting that sales were up last year at all

because of how confusing things were with rebates and tariffs and taxes

and yes, oh my.

So but anyway, back to the key of K4.

Just ignore my little segue that's segue side, a little side trip.

You're side trip.

I'm like, wait, what were we talking about?

Yeah, no, I thoroughly enjoyed the K4 hatchback.

I've got a lot of little micro videos available on my TikTok and YouTube,

the shorts and I've got a full length video review as well.

And then as you mentioned, I've got the written review on consumer guide

website and I, you know, there was very little that I did not like about it.

There's a panel, like a screen in the top tier models that controls

your HVAC that is hidden kind of behind your steering wheel.

And that's a little bit awkward to the left of the wheel.

Is it to the right?

OK. And it's literally it's blocked by the right side of the steering wheel.

And I mean, the good news is there are some hard redundant controls.

But if you need to adjust like where the airflow is to your feet,

to your face, whatever, like that is the panel that's hidden.

And it's funny because I posted that on TikTok and one of my followers was

like, I own a K4 and that's not actually a problem.

And I was like, OK, sorry.

Calling it out doesn't necessarily mean it's a problem,

but people should know about it.

Yeah, yeah.

But I mean, that was probably the one of the biggest things

that I didn't like.

I mean, otherwise, there's just so much to like about this car.

Well, that's good.

Did Kia mention in any way what percentage of buyers

if they think we'll go hatchback?

They did not, at least not in our way, if they did not.

I'd be interested to know.

It's kind of thing they don't always share. Yeah.

But it is available.

So it starts at 26 085, goes up to 29 985.

Is there a package on the GT?

What did you drive turbo?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And so there's like, I want to say it's a technology package.

And that is what adds the blind view monitor

and some of the other tech features.

And then that's another thing we see now

with all these vehicles, not Honda,

but there's often a top trim level

like over the top luxury package.

Yeah. And I want to say that.

And it's expensive.

That package is only, quote unquote, $2,300.

And then they have.

That's a lot relative to the price of this car.

Relative to the price of the vehicle.

And then they have another package.

If you don't get the yellow vehicle

in some of the other colors,

you can get red seats, red and black

instead of the white and black.

And that's I want to say like $500.

So I mean, you could probably max out at about 33,000

if you did both of those packages.

There you go.

But but yeah, I just I think it's a great vehicle.

Like I said, there's very little

that I didn't like about it.

It's great for tall and small drivers.

And it is it's heading to dealers now.

Cool.

Well, that was my question.

So coming to dealers now, the sedan returns.

Hatchback is new this year.

Yes.

Check them both out.

Yeah.

All right.

We're going to take a break when we come back.

We talked to industry legend Steve Seline.

That is cool.

Yeah, stick around.

Questions or comments?

Drop us a line at carstuffatconsumerguide.com.

That's carstuffatconsumerguide.com.

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Welcome back to the CarStuff Podcast.

And we're back.

This is the Consumer Guide CarStuff Podcast.

I'm Tom.

She is Jill.

Yes.

We're going to be talking performance cars in a moment.

A very favorite topic of mine.

Yeah, this is very cool.

As you know, Consumer Guide once owned by Publications

International Limited, where we published lots

of classic car books.

Mm-hmm.

And Celine Mustangs.

Heavily featured in most of the books that we put together.

Mm-hmm.

So talking to Steve today is a big deal.

Real quick, throw me a bone.

Hey, Tom.

Are you on social media?

I am.

Check me out on Twitter, X, and I'm Blue Sky.

I'm CarGuy Tom.

Awesome.

All right.

On the phone with us is a driver, an engineer,

a builder, and an up-fitter.

He's generally an automotive Renaissance man.

Welcome to the CarStuff Podcast.

Steve Celine.

Steve, how are you today?

Good.

Can you hear me okay?

We can hear you well.

Thank you.

Thank you for making the time for us today.

Good.

Glad to join you.

Steve, your resume is so detailed and so cool.

I don't know where to begin.

What would you like our audience to know about what

you've been doing?

Well, we race cars.

That's a loaded question.

And I actually don't know where we're going.

I don't know where we're going.

And I actually don't know where to begin.

Other than, we've been at this for over 40 years.

As I heard your promo into it, a lot of people

may not know this back.

With the exception of the Ford Mustang itself nameplate

and the Chevrolet Corvette nameplate,

the Celine Mustang nameplate is the third longest

continuing nameplate sold in North America.

Wow.

I didn't know it was continuous.

So it's been unbroken since the 80s.

Yeah.

So we started the company in 83.

And the first was the 1984 Celine Mustang

and it's been the Celine Mustang ever since.

Yeah.

So you're a driver too, but let's talk about this

Mustang relationship for just a moment.

You guys, the folks at Celine, your company,

you've been modifying Mustangs for a long time.

How did you decide on the Mustang?

And maybe that's a really obvious question.

But talk about what it is you do the Mustangs

and what opportunities you saw there

when you saw a stock Mustang.

Well, I was actually driving racing for Pontiac

at the time in the early 80s.

We were racing the Pontiac Trans Am professionally

and we were, Ford Motor Company was just coming out

of the hiatus of no racing and they were starting racing.

And we were beating Ford on the track

and I was helping, in addition to racing,

I was helping on the proving grounds

and design on special edition Pontiacs.

And I got to know the guys so at Ford

that were just now getting back into it

and they were going to build a special edition Mustang.

And I asked them what model and they said

it's going to be a four cylinder turbo.

And I went, ooh.

I said, I think the American public

would rather have a V8.

And they said, well, we're committed to the four cylinder

turbo called an SVL Mustang.

I remember it well.

But we might support you on doing a V8 version

if you had interest.

So at the end of the racing season in 1983

I left my position with Pontiac

and started doing the Mustangs.

And that was really just to do a number of them

fairly quickly so that it would support our racing endeavors.

But once I got involved in redesigning,

re-engineering and having to go through the certification

to be able to sell the cars,

that took us into a whole different level of business

and we've been doing it ever since.

So when you did that first Mustang,

did you think, OK, this is just going to be a one-off thing.

It's going to help me win races?

Or were you thinking this is going to be a lifelong brand

and it's going to have some meat to it?

No, it was going to be a short run.

I thought, well, I could actually just do a thousand

of these sell them and that would support our racing

for quite a while.

And we would race the cars.

We took, though, the Celine Mustang

and started racing at the end of 1985

and won our first race in the category in 1986

and then started winning our championships in 1987.

And that has just escalated all the way through that period of time,

really from the mid-80s all the way through 2000.

We were pretty much a dominant sports car racing team,

but always doing a good volume of the Celine Mustangs

that were sold through Ford dealerships throughout the country.

And then at the turn of the century, the opportunity came

because of our work.

Again, a lot of people don't realize that our changes on the Mustang

mean we need to re-certify the car.

That was a skill set that we developed in the 80s

and have carried on.

So that skill set allowed us to actually build our own ground-up car

which at the turn of the century,

we decided that we would endeavor to do that

and that was the Celine S7 Supercar.

Which is gorgeous.

And we had one race this past weekend at the Daytona Historic.

It's over 25 years now, so it's eligible for historic racing,

which is amazing.

It is because it's so contemporarily fast.

Zero to 60 times are about three seconds for that bad boy.

Talk about the S7 a little bit.

Because that was only around for about a model year?

Two model years?

No, no.

We came out with it in 2000 and we built the first batch

all the way through 2007.

Oh, really?

Okay.

My bad.

We built just a little bit under 100.

And then I have done a few more that we up the specs.

When I came out with the S7,

normally aspirated 550 horsepower,

that was the fastest car really on the planet at the time.

But we engineered at the same time to knowing that Ferrari

probably would not stand still to add an extra turbo or two.

And then in 2005, when Ferrari came out with the Enzo Ferrari,

all I did was we just added a couple turbos

and boost the horsepower up to 750.

That's all you did.

And then at the end of the initial run,

we were at 1,000.

The ones I'm doing today are 1,500 horsepower on the E85

on the car that only weighs 2,800 pounds.

Wow.

And its aerodynamics really are still second to none

in the way that we designed it.

Its racing pedigree on this is also second to none

but the S7 has won at every major racetrack in the world

with no exception.

Congrats.

That's cool.

Shanghai, China, to Mount Fuji, Japan, Laguna Seca, Daytona,

Sebring, Florida, Silverstone, England, Barcelona,

Spain, Imola, Italy, Nürburgring, Germany,

Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Bahrain, and we finally won

a number of years ago the 24 hours of Le Mans.

And we actually have more race wins

than Ferrari, Lamborghini, and McLaren

combined all by five-year teams.

I had no idea.

Now Steve, I was checking today auction values on the S7

and I hope you have a few in the closet

because these are now hyper-collectible.

Yes, and I think as we age here,

it probably should continue to rise in collectability.

Yeah, and as I mentioned before, the good-looking cars,

we'll have to post a picture on our Facebook page.

Definitely.

We should talk about what Celine is doing today

if you don't mind.

Go to Celine.com and you guys can see your current lineup

of vehicles, all of which are interesting.

Obviously, there's still a Mustang,

but you're also doing stuff with the F-150 and the Bronco.

Tell us about that.

Yeah, so as we've moved away or haven't really moved away,

but as we've expanded on this,

we have gone heavily into the pickup trucks.

Again, a lot of people don't know that my racing background

is we were the Ford factory race truck team

back in the 80s, early 90s.

I actually have more race wins than anybody

that competed at that time driving pickup trucks.

So we certainly feel we know our way around that element.

And what we're offering now is we have two versions

of our Celine trucks.

One is called a sport truck where it has a lower sense

and lower center of gravity with our revised

total different suspension.

It has totally different aerodynamics and ground effects.

Its interior has been revamped and much more performance oriented.

And then, of course, we add a twin-screw supercharger to it

and you can get anywhere from 700 to 775 horsepower

out of your sport truck.

And then the off-road version, we raise it

in a more of a daily utility type of vehicle

or that you can take off-road for rock climbing or what have you.

And Porsche Power is the same offering.

It's just a different application of the F-150.

So I have to talk about something here real quick

that's slightly off topic.

But the ST, I'm looking at the website today.

Short bed, regular cab.

That's literally what I was just going to ask about.

It looks so badass.

That is a great looking car and I love the mods you make to it.

We've had a lot of fun and we've nicknamed it

Thunder in the respect that when Ford,

they are discontinuing now the Lightning F-150

and that was all electric.

So that made no sound.

Ours actually makes sound so that's why we nicknamed it

with Thunder.

Let's talk about the Mustang lineup a bit too.

I'm surprised by what I would call affordability.

Your 302 series of modified Mustangs,

the white label, yellow label and black label,

they don't seem expensive for what they are.

Yeah, I need to probably raise our price for that

by a couple hundred thousand dollars on each vehicle.

But it is true.

Earlier, you guys were talking about the price of car.

The average price, including the trucks,

that you pointed out is over $50,000.

I think over the last month and a half,

I think it's gone from $50,000 to $52,000

and changed to be specific on this,

which is incredible.

So when you're looking at the Selene Mustang,

our white label on this,

at a price of about $71,000,

and you get almost 500 horsepower,

a totally different suspension,

a different aerodynamic and a totally different interior,

you realize, well, the value proposition of that

is unbeatable.

And it's actually, we've had a number of people now

and some of the other influencers now have realized

that we are, with our white label,

it's about $10,000 less expensive

than the Ford Dark Horse Mustang with more horsepower.

And then we have our yellow label,

which we boosted up to $770 horsepower.

And then, which again is actually will be

in current price and configuration,

there's a lot more content and it's less expensive

than what Ford just introduced last week

with the Dark Horse SC.

So we have more horsepower with that

and then our top of the line black label is 850 horsepower

and everybody panel on that has been changed

in the interior at $125,000

and that becomes probably the best bargain

in the performance category in today's market.

People do want to go to Selene.com

just because these are great looking vehicles

and you want to check this out.

Also, there's a bunch of history, Selene history there.

And I was wondering if you could talk a little bit

about how your relationship with Ford works.

Like do they just, do you buy like a thousand vehicles

and then modify them?

Do they work with you on the number of vehicles

that you want?

Like how does that work?

Over the years, it has gone in a lot of different phases.

When I started, I was really more in a relationship

with the dealer ordering the cars for us.

And then in 1986, I talked Ford

in actually building a special version

for us as the Mustang.

They were willing to actually do a stripped down

put one seat in it, skinny wheels on it,

no rear wing, no pinstriping,

a number of other stuff that we were taking off.

And I was, I was very happy with that.

The one thing I didn't ask at the time though

was what kind of a discount.

And when the car started showing up,

I realized, wow, it's only like a hundred dollars

left to buy in a full,

and the parts we take off,

I could find wholesale for more.

So I realized that probably wasn't the best way

to work within the Ford system.

And over the years, we've had everything

what they call from a bill system into today.

It really is kind of a hybrid.

We have our own code in the Ford system.

So the dealer orders it.

We're able to get as best we can

some priority on the bill through that,

through the dealer network,

and then monitor it as it comes into our facility

where we revamp it and send it back to the ordering dealer.

Interesting.

So Steve, how do people go about obtaining

a Selene Mustang or a Selene F-150?

Do they work with an affiliate dealer

or do they go directly through you guys?

They can do it either way.

It depends on where they live.

It is more than likely we have a local dealer

in the United States that they would have.

We tend not to have a lot of dealers.

Over the years, I've realized that we actually have dealers

that have bigger territories.

For example, we have, in the center of the country,

we have Ames Ford has the whole state of Iowa.

And so throughout that element in North Carolina,

we have the Crossroads Ford

has the whole state of North Carolina.

And so we tend to work with fewer dealers,

but we give them a much bigger territory

as we said in some cases, it's the entire state.

But they can either go there

or they can actually inquire us

and either through our website or phone call for us

and we will get back to them in a short order

and then we will help direct them

or we can help assist them in ordering our products.

That's very cool, Steve.

Before we go, and we're running out of time here,

but you were part of a museum exhibition,

the birth of the American supercar.

You curated the show?

I've had the pleasure

working with the Lou May Automotive Museum

up in Seattle area, specifically Tacoma.

And it's actually, it's the largest car museum in the U.S.

both in physical size and in car number.

So a lot of people I don't think realize

how big of a museum it is

and how well established it has been.

But we were asked, I was asked last year

to look at curating a new exhibition.

And we came up with what is called

the birth of the American supercar.

It's the past, present, and future.

And in doing that, we've put together

a very unique, never done before, display

and diorama, so to speak,

as a journey that starts in 1900s

with the students' Bearcat

and the Mercer Raceabout.

And we go from 1900s into the 1920s,

the 30s, the 40s.

Then we get into the 50s with hot rods

and Chevrolet Corvette kind of tracing

the roots of American supercars.

We have the Briggs Cunningham on display.

I was scared of later this year.

We cover all of the Shelby Cobras

into the GT40s.

And then you get into the 70s with the Panterras

and the Vipers and the Vector

and all unique American.

And then we get into, you go through a portal.

You actually transform from the past

into present day, where we have

all of the present day supercars.

I have the Ford GT on display.

The fact that a lot of people don't know,

the 2005, 2006 Ford GT,

we did the engineering and development

as well as build and assembly

of all of that as private label

for Ford Motor Company.

So a lot of people don't probably know that.

We didn't really broadcast that much,

but we have one of those in place.

We have some prototypes from Ford

and coming in from Chrysler and Chevrolet on this.

We have a new GTD Mustang

as well as the latest Corvette

in that category.

And we had a Zinger.

And later this year we will have

a Tennessee as well as the SSC Tatara.

And then we move into the S7.

We have our new S1.

And that kind of takes you into the present.

And then you go through another portal

and that's where we're taking you into the future.

And we have a very unique display

is that we unveiled

our latest supercar, the Selene S11.

And that is in clay form.

And while we're inviting everyone

to go online at the LaMaine Museum website

and vote because we're letting

the American public do the final design

as we sculpture it in the clay

over this whole coming year.

And so you guys can go and vote.

You want to see this headlight or tail light,

what the interior look like.

Very cool.

Rear end and all of this.

And then we've also have coming here

from the Art Center in Pasadena

and Creative Art Services out of Detroit.

Future designs in the future.

So really for anything American in the supercar

this is one stop to see it all

from the beginning all the way into the future.

So we're very excited about that.

Steve, how long does the show run?

It goes actually all the way through.

The attendance has been overwhelming

and they've decided to extend it

all the way through March 31st of 2027.

Oh, okay, good.

But we have, I will say it's not a static display.

There's a lot of new cars

and different cars that are coming in

almost on a monthly basis here

that are really different.

So if you've seen it once,

you may want to go back

to the second time as well.

And very unique American made supercars.

Steve, I wish we had more time

but we thank you for spending this time with us.

No, I appreciate that

and feel free to call anytime

and visit our website

and let's make sure we keep our foot to the floor.

Sounds good.

Absolutely.

Thank you, Steve.

We're going to take a break

and when we come back...

Quiz time.

Questions or comments?

Drop us a line at CarStuff at ConsumerGuide.com.

That's CarStuff at ConsumerGuide.com.

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Welcome back to the Car Stuff Podcast.

And we're back.

This is the Consumer Guide Car Stuff podcast.

I'm Tom.

She is Jill.

We could have talked to Steve Lunger, had we had time.

He was so interesting.

Yeah.

His career is fascinating because he was a race car driver, he's an engineer, a designer.

And that S7 truly is a piece of American history.

I didn't know they were working on a new supercar.

That's cool.

That is cool.

Yeah.

We'll see what they do with that.

The original one, kind of a fun thing.

It was a seven-liter engine, but it's kind of a historic Ford displacement.

It was a 427.

So this huge V8 that they were just pumping a lot of air through, very cool.

I didn't realize it was so racing competitive.

So that's cool.

Social media, you got...

I got some things.

So TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, all the things.

But you can find me at Jill Siminello.

And I use the hashtag cardigior, like soup digior, because I'm always driving different

cars.

So that's what I'm driving today.

I was pronouncing it cardigir, is that right?

Cardigir?

Yeah.

That would be incorrect.

Cardigior.

But yeah, because I drive different cars pretty much every day.

So there you go.

It's what I'm driving today.

Alrighty.

It is quiz time.

This is quiz 311.

Okay.

Not really.

Show 311, but quiz something.

Yeah.

Today's topic, 2025 sales.

Great.

The numbers came in.

15.9 million cars in the U.S. last year, 16.2...

I'm sorry, year before last, 2024, 16.3 last year, up slightly, surprising all things

considered.

Especially because we seem to be hitting this affordability wall.

And we'll talk about that.

Actually, that might be a question for Sam, our good friend, Sam Fiorani, who hasn't been

on yet this year.

But there are different things that manufacturers are starting to think about doing, like

bringing back lower trim level products, which I wish they would do.

All right.

I'm going to give you two cars.

You just have to tell me which one sold better in 2025.

Oh, yeah, because I'm always so good at this.

Okay.

Super easy.

You're going to like the bonus question too.

The bonus question always related to the topic of the day.

Is it about the Hallmark Channel?

No, it's about janitorial deodorizers.

I'm not even going to comment on that.

Okay.

So what's your first question?

The Hyundai Ioniq 5.

Mm-hmm.

Hyundai's very likable, compact crossover EV, or the Kia EV6.

Same description.

I'm going to say Ioniq 5.

Quite a lot.

$44,400, the EV6, $21,715, I cannot explain the discrepancy.

You would think they would sell about equal.

I think the Ioniq 5 just looks cooler.

I guess so.

I would probably say yes.

I might pick it.

Well, and it has, sorry, I'm eating a sugar donut today.

It has ...

That sounded whiny.

Mm-hmm.

Oh, okay.

It's a puffy dough-like substance with sugar on it, and I'm happy about it.

I know that you're donut grateful.

I don't know.

I'm being donut grateful today.

All right.

But no, plus the EV6 is a single variant, whereas the Ioniq has the N, and then it has the XRT

version, so it has some different options that the EV6 does not have.

All righty, there you go.

Mm-hmm.

They're both good vehicles.

Mm-hmm.

The Land Rover Defender, available in 90, 110, or 130 variants.

Okay.

Or the Toyota Land Cruiser.

Mm-hmm.

Kind of same mission vehicles.

I'm going to say Land Cruiser.

No, but it's super, super close.

Land Rover Defender, 29,650.

Mm-hmm.

The ... I'm drinking Pepsi from a bottle today, and it's making me burpy.

I was going to say your burpin.

I'm usually through a straw, and I don't have this issue.

Do I need to come pat you on the back?

Maybe.

Toyota Land Cruiser, 29,113.

Okay.

They're only off by a few hundred.

Kind of similar mission things.

I'm impressed by how much I love the Land Cruiser Defender.

It is ...

The Land Cruiser Defender?

Land Rover Defender.

It just ... it has that kind of paramilitary look that I don't always love.

Mm-hmm.

But it's a really good vehicle.

Yeah.

It's roomy.

Mm-hmm.

It's refined.

The power is good.

If you get the six-cylinder engine, which I recommend.

Mm-hmm.

The fuel economy is decent.

Mm-hmm.

It's a mild hybrid.

Lots of there to like, oh, did you get that one right or wrong?

Wrong.

You said Land Cruiser.

Little zero here.

Whatever.

I have one point.

Yeah.

Okay.

The Chevrolet Chevrolet.

That's very southern to not pronounce the R. The Chevrolet Equinox or Subaru Forester.

Ooh.

And you're talking about the Equinox gas version.

Just gas.

Yes.

Just gas.

Ooh.

Because Subaru Forester now also has a hybrid.

Good one.

Yeah.

A really good one.

But I just think Subaru is a little bit lower volume.

I'm going to say Equinox.

By a lot.

Mm-hmm.

236,604 versus 175,521 for the Subaru.

You have two points.

All right.

Chrysler Pacifica or Honda Odyssey.

Hmm.

Pacifica no longer available in hybrid trim.

Still, it just ditches all its plug-in hybrids.

Unfortunate.

I'm going to say the Honda Odyssey.

No.

It's the Pacifica.

By a fair number.

119,389 Pacificas, 80,293 Odyssey.

The Odyssey dragging its feet on any sort of serious update.

Okay.

So is the Pacifica.

They are the two oldest minivans in the segment.

It always gets like little tweaks.

Hmm.

Something.

Hmm.

Also, is the Voyager not available anymore?

I don't know.

I can't even follow that.

For people who don't know, the Voyager is an on-again, off-again, fleet version of the

Pacifica, specifically for rental fleets and for commercial fleets because Pacifica

kind of got expensive.

Yeah.

When we talk about price inflation.

Yep.

Okay.

You're in a little trouble now.

Uh-oh.

You've got two questions left to score your last point.

The BMW 7 Series or the Mercedes-Benz S-Class.

Ooh.

Legendary, historic, large sedans that no longer sell very well.

Correct.

Um, do that, do either of those numbers include the electric versions or is it just the

gas versions?

I believe not.

Okay.

Um.

And there are electric versions of both.

There are.

Uh, I'm going to, I'm going to say the BMW.

Yes.

By Smidge.

Uh, 10,714 versus 10,049.

Wow.

That is a Smidge.

You got your win.

Interesting thing.

And this is just the little note about how poorly large sedans, large luxury sedans

now sell.

So those two broke five digits.

Um, next on the list in sales volume, the Lexus LS, 2,153.

That's a good vehicle.

And compared to these others, it's priced right.

The Genesis G90, 1,503 and the Audi A8, just 1,628.

Wow.

Yeah.

That's it.

I mean, this whole segment, you combine them all and you have one-third the sales of

an Equinox.

Wow.

I mean, they're profitable, but.

Dying.

Alrighty.

Um, according to Amazon.com today.

This morning.

These are the best selling janitorial deodorizers.

Okay.

You need to tell me which one's fake.

Okay.

Are you ready?

Zero odor pro.

Okay.

Smells be gone.

Dumpster defender.

And stink stalker.

And all of, all except for one are real.

Three of these are real.

According to Amazon.com today, these are the best sellers.

One of them is fake.

What was the last one?

Stink stalker.

Not to be confused with the night stalker.

No.

Which was a great TV show.

Read through them one more time.

I would love to.

Zero odor pro.

Smells be gone.

Dumpster defender and stink stalker.

Okay.

So the first one just sounds really boring.

Yep.

I'm going with that.

That's the fake.

Because it's boring.

That one's real.

Yeah.

That one's real.

Smells be gone.

Real.

Dumpster defender.

Real.

Stink stalker I made up.

Stink stalker was going to be my other one.

All right.

We've only got about four minutes here, but you wanted to talk a little bit about the vehicle

you're driving.

You were driving the Lucid Air, which you drove through some awful, awful weather.

Do tell.

Yeah.

No, I drove from Indianapolis to Chicago yesterday during the snowmageddon.

I wasn't even paying attention.

So there was some serious snowfall.

They got at least a foot of snow in the Indianapolis area.

And we left in the heaviest bit of the snow.

And I want to say the Lucid Air was flipping amazing.

Like it felt planted and solid.

I did not feel any slipping or anything.

And like in one of my stories right now on Instagram and on Facebook, I showed the roads

we were driving on.

And it was not good.

And I was so impressed with how it handled and like how I was able to maneuver the

vehicle in the snow.

I was very, very impressed.

And I mean, there were a couple of downers in that cold and snow and, you know, all of

that is going to affect your range.

That's not a shocker.

It's not a surprise.

But you got the 200-mile stone easy.

Yes.

Okay.

Yes.

From Chicago to Indianapolis.

Yeah.

So on the way back, we did stop to take a little bit of a break because it was a bit

of a white knuckler.

And so we just stopped and charged.

But we didn't need to.

And the only thing that is really a problem on this vehicle in terms of winter

weather and cold is the windshield wipers.

And the fluid is in the wiper itself and freezes.

Which is a wonderful thing in the summer.

When it doesn't freeze.

Yeah.

It's such a great, complete coverage.

And quick.

You actually save fluid because it's so effective.

But it freezes.

And then the windshield wiper turn on point is in the screen to the left of the

wheel.

So when you're driving in white out conditions, the last thing you want to

do is take your eyes off the road.

But you have to do that in order to turn your windshield wipers on.

And that was slightly problematic.

I drove the Hyundai Sonata Hybrid, Limited Hybrid during the extreme cold.

And the cold definitely affected the mileage.

And it's because the battery just doesn't want to charge when you're

braking.

So I saw about 30 miles per gallon.

This vehicle is capable of so much more.

Like 50 something.

But in the sub zero weather, literally below zero weather, really didn't

want to warm up.

Yeah.

And the heated steering wheel took forever to kick in.

I mean, these are, you know, first world problems.

But the seat heaters did work pretty quickly.

It's a fine vehicle.

But the cold had, it took its impact on the hybrid functionality.

And I will say I did have access to the app on the Lucid Air.

And that made my life so much happier.

Because when we would get ready to go downstairs before I would unplug

the vehicle.

So we were staying at a hotel in Fisher's, Indiana that has a

charger.

Yay.

Shout out to the Courtyard Marriott and Fishers.

And so I, as we were getting ready to go downstairs, I would just

turn on the climate control for the car, turn on the heated

seat, turn on the heated steering wheel.

And like at one point, the cabin itself was zero degrees.

And by the time we got down there, like, you know, because I

started it five minutes early, it was like 60 degrees in the

cabin.

It was amazing.

Next week I want to talk a little bit about what I'm driving

right now.

I asked for and got a Corolla.

Like I just haven't driven a Corolla forever.

But I didn't get any old Corolla.

I got a Corolla SE that is hybrid all-wheel drive.

Ooh.

And it's still under 32 grand.

Amazing, yes.

It just feels like a lot of stuff.

Okay.

So I'm excited to drive this.

I only drove it a couple of minutes here so I don't have

any impressions yet.

Okay.

Except that I fit just fine.

Okay.

That's a good impression.

Yeah.

Yeah, it is.

That was a great conversation.

Thank you, Jill.

Thanks to producer Randy and the good folks here at

TalkZone.

Let's talk more about cars again.

Next week.

Remember to check us out at ConsumerGuide.com.

The Car Stuff podcast is produced by J-Turn Media.

To advertise on the show, please drop us a line

at CarStuff at ConsumerGuide.com.

Thank you.

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