AutoComplete: FCA and the PSA Group are gettin' hitched

Welcome to road shows autocomplete your weekly roundup of the biggest news in the automotive world. This week we have news on Lamborghinis trip into space, Mazda Miata restoration parts programme and Ford Flex getting canned. The first let's start with that FCA and PSA merger. It seems like Fiat Chrysler's been in one of those always the bridesmaid never the bride type situations for years now, as it's been casting about looking for a company to merge with. Most recently, it was in talks with Renault, but not only did the French government a major stakeholder in that company, PNFCA sweeties, so to did Nissan and Mitsubishi both companies with which Renault is alive. But while that didn't work, FCA clearly couldn't get the French out of its mind. And now it's announced its intent to merge with PSA groupe that owns Peugeot, Citroen, Opel and Vauxhall, among others. Both companies confirm their intent and will likely become a $50 billion Voltron of Franco Italo American automotive manufacturing. Lamborghin is going to space Well kind of, it's working with a research hospital in Texas to send some samples of carbon fiber up to the International Space Station for six months of testing to see how temperature extremes and cosmic radiation can affect the super material. At the end of its six months test period, the data game will be used to create better types of carbon fiber for cars and for things like medical prosthetics Pretty cool? Tesla raffled a lot [UNKNOWN] where it decided to forego the whole dealer franchise model of sales for its cars focusing on online sales instead. But since then, its proven to be pretty successful for the brand so much so that now Porsche is trying to get on the fun with a new pilot program offering online sales from 25 dealers across the US. Porsche didn't call it specifically which dealers were participating in the program, but it did state that they spanned the entire country. So odds are terrible for you being able to snag your next Porsche while sitting at home and your sweatpants. It's been a long time coming, but. But the commercial version of Tesla's solar roof is here and available for purchase by the general public. This newest version is Tesla's third and according to CEO, Elon Musk, it's going to be competitive in cost with a new roof plus the cost of traditional solar panels. But, you know, it's gonna look cooler and stuff. The Big T plans to offer the system through normal roofing contractors who go through some kind of special Tesla training and expect the system on an average size roof to take about eight hours or less to install. The LA Auto show's just around the corner and that means it's time to start getting excited for lots of new models and concepts from companies like Volkswagen. In fact, VW has already announced its plans to unveil it's next ID electric concept at LA's Petersen Automotive Museum as a standalone event. We don't know much about the concept that's getting its debut but we can bet that its name will be ID and a word with two Zs in it. Danville is scheduled for November 9th, and Roadshow will be there as the sheet comes off. Ford Flex was always a car that didn��t make a ton of sense, but that we always secretly kinda liked. It��s minivan meets truck, meet suv styling, was just oddball enough that it didn��t necessarily find the kind of popularity that Ford hoped for during the last decade of suv insanity Did manage to find a bit of a cult following, and a surprisingly dedicated fan base with the ability to seat seven and carry a ton of cargo, it was practical and thanks to its low stance and more car like driving characteristics, it was well suited to family duty to. And when equipped with the awesome eco boost V6 engine it became a bit of a secret hot rod. We're always sad when weird cars go the way of the dodo so we'll definitely be pouring one out for the Ford Flex tonight. [MUSIC] Ford's sync in-car infotainment system has had a fairly rough history. The first couple versions were pretty crappy and sink three, well, much better than the other two is still only pretty okay. Ford is planning on changing that with a comprehensive update to the system that it's calling rather on surprisingly Sink for updates include wireless Apple Car Play and massive new 15 inch touch screens as well as over the air updates and more. We're pretty interested in getting our greasy myths all over that big touchscreen and seeing how it all works but looks like we'll have to wait until next year to do so. People love Miatas. And we're not only talking about automotive journalists, either, because the cars are so fun, light, affordable and unintimidating, that you kind of have to love them. The first generation on Miata, also know as the NA, is not only the first one to go into production, it's also first in most people's hearts. The problem is that the earliest ones are now around 30 years old and they've been used and abused and tracked within an inch of their life. Finding a nice one at this point is really hard and that's a shame. To help fix that problem Mazda has instituted a restoration parts program where it's consulted with Miata clubs and Miata specialist shops to find the best parts to remanufacture with modern techniques and materials. The list of parts is long. There are around 1,100 part numbers on it, and we're hoping that the program is successful so other Japanese makes take a hint and start their own heritage parts programs. Pretty much anything that's unintentional that happens when you're driving a car is gonna be a bad thing. For example, remember a bunch of years ago when Toyota had problems with unintentional acceleration? Yeah, not great. Now looks like General Motors is having the exact opposite problem where approximately 600,000 Silverado Sierra Suburban a new cons are breaking unintentionally. Also not great. Anyway the problem stems from some faulty software and the electronic braking control system not playing nice with wheel speed sensors while the vehicle is in four wheel drive. So the fix will probably be pretty simple. Until then though, GM says that as long as you don't put the vehicle into four wheel drive, there won't be any problems, which is, you know, good to know with winter approaching and most of us. That's it for to complete this week. Don't forget to subscribe and hit the bell icon to stay notified of all new videos on road show and we will see you again next week.