The Car Curious Weekly is a look at what the automotive podcast world is talking about, who's saying it, and what patterns emerge when you listen to all of them at once.
July 05 - July 11, 2026 · 240 episodes across 158 podcasts.
This week's podcasts debated whether a simulated manual still counts as a manual as Ferrari rolled out a clutch-by-wire DCT for the 12Cilindri, sparking independent debates on Everyday Driver and evo about whether the gimmick qualifies.
Here are the five biggest storylines and where they showed up across the feed.
Ferrari's 12Cilindri 'Manual' Is a Clutch-by-Wire DCT, and Five Shows Are Debating Whether That Counts
Ferrari's new gated option for the 12Cilindri uses an eight-speed dual-clutch transmission with a clutch pedal and shift lever that have no mechanical connection to the gearbox, a point Everyday Driver Car Debate and The evo podcast both made independently.
Bloomberg Hot Pursuit described it as a software solution layered onto an automatic gearbox, and noted the option carries a price tag of roughly $200,000 on top of the car's base cost.
Manual Ferrari 12Cilindri, New BMW X5, What’s After Subaru? | Episode 1,053
"This is an eight-speed F1 dual clutch transmission with a clutch by wire pedal and a six-speed manual by wire control lever. No mechanical linkage for either."
The Collector Car Podcast and THIS CAR POD with Doug DeMuro flagged that Ferrari programmed the system to allow stalling and bucking, replicating manual behavior without the underlying hardware. Whether simulated engagement satisfies the authenticity demand that justifies the price is the question none of the five shows resolved the same way.
427: Why Australia Punches Above Its Weight in Car Culture | Allan Whiting Explains It All
"What's interesting that even programmed it, it does have a clutch pedal, that even programmed it so that you could stall the car."
The Global Market Splits: Australia's BEV Share Hits 23.5% as Affordable Used Cars Disappear in the U.S.
Australian battery electric vehicles reached 23.5% of new car sales in June 2026, up from 8.4% in January, a nearly three-fold increase in six months, per Ludicrous Feed.
The Australian Capital Territory posted 43% BEV share for the month, and BYD finished 243 sales behind Toyota nationally.
"There is record low inventory. Now, look at this, more than 150,000 vehicles under $10,000 sold per month. You might think to yourself, that's a huge number. That's a big number. There's way more than 150,000 people who are trying to buy $10,000 or less used cars every month. We'll start here. These vehicles are turning on average 33 days."
In the U.S., CarEdge Live reported the opposite pressure point: used vehicles priced under $10,000 are turning in an average of 33 days against wholesale supply sitting at under 27 days, meaning demand for affordable used cars is outrunning available inventory. Taken together, the two segments show how quickly the entry-level market is splitting by country: EVs are gaining share in Australia while cheap used cars are getting harder to find in the U.S.
Australia EV Sales Update: June 2026 | July Market Trends and Analysis
"If you look at January 2026, 8.4% of all new car sales in Australia were BEVs. Contrasting that with June, which was 23.4%, so that's a three-fold increase in new car sales."
Toyota Bets $3.6 Billion on Texas as USMCA Becomes an Annual Negotiation
Toyota's board has approved a $3.6 billion expansion of its San Antonio plant that will move 150,000 Tacomas from Mexico to Texas by 2030, adding 2,000 jobs and reducing what Automotive News Daily Drive calculated as an $8.6 billion annual tariff bill.
The shift stems from both tariff concerns and capacity constraints, as Toyota has exhausted its North American and global manufacturing capacity.
July 9, 2026 | Borton Volvo's Kjell Bergh reacts to Polestar ban; USMCA limbo
"What this appears to mean is we're going to go through this song and dance every single year for a decade."
The broader structural challenge, according to the same program, is that President Trump's preference for annual USMCA reviews over a long-term renewal forces trade planning into a yearly cycle for every North American plant. In practical terms, Toyota may have to reconsider where it builds vehicles every year instead of planning around a stable decade-long trade agreement.
2027 BMW X5 Launches With Five Drivetrain Options and a Grille That Finally Shrank
BMW launched the 2027 X5 in Spartanburg, South Carolina, offering five powertrain configurations: a B58 gasoline engine with a 48-volt mild hybrid system, a plug-in hybrid, a full EV rated at 435 miles of range and 570 horsepower, a diesel, and hydrogen.
TFL Car Chat and CarCast also covered the reveal and landed in roughly the same place on styling: the oversized kidney grilles that defined recent BMW criticism have been scaled back, but the high beltline, slab sides, and reduced glass area left reviewers divided on whether the Neue Klasse design language, meaning new class, solved the problem.
"The EV is 435 miles of range… it's got 570 horsepower, 593 pound feet of torque. And 460 kilowatts of fast charging."
CarCast's panel offered a partial defense, arguing the high beltline and flat fender edges give the X5 something distinctive in a segment where many silhouettes blur together.
"This thing starts at over 70 grand in the US."
Two Fights Over Who Controls the Customer: Repair Data and Direct Sales
A mid-May draft of the Repair Act included telematics access, Federal Trade Commission enforcement, and a provision allowing parts manufacturers to serve as data designees, but the version that advanced stripped all three, adding a four-year FTC study in their place.
Bill Hanvey of the Auto Care Association told Ratchet+Wrench Radio that a survey of 700 shop owners identified data access as their top concern, and that the association generated roughly 50,000 constituent letters in a single week.
Right to Repair's Next Chapter
"And that watered down version eliminated telematics from the bill, it eliminated part manufacturers from the bill, it added a four year study for the FTC to conduct on the effect of data in our industry."
On the sales-channel side, CarEdge Live reported that a dealer trade group in Washington state has sued Scout Motors, the Volkswagen-backed brand, to block its direct-to-consumer model, arguing it undercuts the franchise system. Similar lawsuits are already active in California, Florida, and Virginia, expanding the fight over whether automakers or dealers control how customers buy and maintain their vehicles.
Also covered by: Automotive News Daily Drive, CarEdge Live.
Hidden Gems
Episodes worth checking out that you might have missed:
- 
Blowing Up Watches & Driving Porsches with Ian Elliot (9WERKS Radio), A watch engineer connects rugged product design to real Porsche ownership.
- 
The Good The Bad and The Ugly - Parts of Yesteryear (I Speak Jeep), A practical look at why vintage Jeep parts knowledge is getting harder to preserve.
- 
The Real Reason Porsche IMS Bearings Fail, And How to Stop It (Eleven After Nine), LN Engineering's founder explains the failure mode without the usual internet mythology.
Recommendations
A Personal Pick From Us
Driven Radio Show
Ryan joined Driven Radio this week, so this is not a neutral recommendation. The conversation explains the problem Car Curious is built around: podcasts are full of useful references, model codes, and stories, but listeners need a better way to understand them while they listen.
More Episodes Worth Hearing
Bloomberg Hot Pursuit!
John Temerian's origin story, grandfather at a Springfield gas station in 1957, eventually building a vintage supercar business in Miami, grounds what could be a dry tech debate in something human. The episode's centerpiece is Ferrari's new 'manual' option: a third pedal bolted onto a dual-clutch that software makes stall-able but prevents engine damage. The hosts don't let that slide easily.
To All The Cars I've Loved Before
Doug's conversation with Tony Funk fits the same listener-first car storytelling that made the show an early friend of Car Curious. The episode moves from a 1980 Dodge Mirada and a reliable 1983 Ford Escort into the lost Mustang and Mopar restoration lessons, keeping the focus on what owners remember, not just what the spec sheet says.
CAR KEYS
Jay de Marcken drove the Rivian R2 at a mall demo and found the speed limiter while trying to keep pace with a C8 Corvette. That says more than another polished press drive.
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Also from our team: Suspension News is a daily automotive briefing that turns industry news, filings, Reddit, and YouTube into one useful email.
By the Numbers
Most-Discussed Cars
| Car | Mentions |
|---|---|
| Ford Mustang | 28 |
| Chevrolet Corvette | 25 |
| Dodge Ram | 20 |
| Honda Civic | 18 |
| Ford Bronco | 18 |
| Ford F-150 Lightning | 17 |
| Porsche 911 | 17 |
| Ford Maverick | 16 |
| Ford F-150 | 16 |
| Ford Ranger | 15 |
| Jeep Wrangler | 15 |
| Toyota RAV4 | 15 |
| Porsche Cayenne | 15 |
| Chevrolet Camaro | 15 |
Trending Terminology
| Term | Mentions |
|---|---|
| torque | 26 |
| EV | 25 |
| downforce | 16 |
| V8 | 16 |
| horsepower | 14 |
| clutch | 14 |
| manual transmission | 13 |
| MSRP | 13 |
| mileage | 11 |
| battery | 11 |
| all wheel drive | 11 |
| warranty | 11 |
Publishing Pattern
| Day | Episodes |
|---|---|
| Sunday Jul 05 | 16 |
| Monday Jul 06 | 42 |
| Tuesday Jul 07 | 42 |
| Wednesday Jul 08 | 38 |
| Thursday Jul 09 | 48 |
| Friday Jul 10 | 34 |
| Saturday Jul 11 | 20 |
240 episodes. 3055 car mentions. 13573 terms explained. Browse every episode with searchable annotations and plain-language term definitions in the Car Curious app.