Kiwis buy up big – record new vehicle numbers in first quarter of 2017

April 4, 2017 by Alastair Sloane

Screen Shot 2017-04-04 at 1.13.50 pm — Top 15 passenger vehicles in first quarter

New Zealanders wrapped up the 2016-17 financial year by buying up big, this time setting record numbers for new vehicles for the month of March.

Motor Industry Association (MIA) figures show 13,869 new vehicles were registered last month, a number that puts March 2017 among the five strongest months since records began in 1975.

The record sales month in the past 41 years was October last year, when 14,709 new vehicles were logged by the NZ Transport Agency. The next best monthly tally was July 1984, with 13,983.

Registrations have gone beyond 13,000 three or four times over the past couple of years. “Growth in the new vehicle sector continues to surpass expectations,” said David Crawford, CEO of the MIA.

Screen Shot 2017-04-04 at 1.14.19 pm — Top 15 commercials in first quarter

Figures on the NZTA books at the end of the first quarter of 2017 showed 39,477 new vehicles, compared with 34,316 for the same period last year. That’s growth of 15 per cent.

Registrations last year totaled 146,939 units, an average of 12,244 a month. After three months of 2017, they have averaged 13,159 a month.

A continuation of that would pan out to around 158,000 registrations in 2017, or 12,000 up on 2016.

March registrations were made up of 9230 passenger cars and 4639 commercials. The Ford Ranger ute was the best-seller for the month, with 810 units, followed by the Toyota Hilux (740), Toyota Corolla (396), Holden Colorado (380), Mitsubishi Triton (365), Kia Sportage (349), Toyota Hiace (336).

If you are in a position to shell out upwards of NZ$600,000 for the 60^thanniversary Porsche 911 S/T or optional Porsche 911 S/T Heritage, you’ll no doubt want the signature titanium watch that goes with it. That’s how Porsche figures it anyway. Or, if you want the watch you’ll need to get the car. Both the car and the watch are limited to 1963 units, the year the original 911 model broke cover. The watch – Chronograph 1 911 S/T and Chronograph 1 911 S/T Heritage – and the car carry matching edition numbers. The watch is priced at $US13,500, or around $NZ22,200. The car, says Porsche NZ, starts at $NZ608,000. A “strictly limited number” will go into production for NZ early next year.

Eight European Union countries are pushing to weaken new EU emissions limits for cars, saying they are overly ambitious and unrealistic for carmakers to hit. The eight countries – France, Italy, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia – said in a joint paper that parts of the proposed Euro 7 regulation, including curbs on exhaust pipe emissions, should be scrapped entirely. They said the limits would force carmakers to invest in improving exhaust emissions performance, money which would be better spent on developing zero-emission vehicles. Taken together, the countries would have enough votes to block the proposal.

A go-anywhere EV concept for the US military uses an onboard 12kW diesel generator to top up the batteries on the move. The all-wheel-drive has 800-volt technology and a 200kWh battery pack to power three electric motors, two in the rear and one up front. Claimed output is 745kW/15,590Nm, or 1000hp and 11,500 ft-lb of torque. The four-seater was developed by the defence division of General Motors and is based on the platform of the Hummer SUV. It rides on Fox performance shock absorbers and 37-inch tyres and comes with “exceptional” approach and departure angles for off-road mobility. Maximum range using the generator to keep things ticking over is said to be around 500km.

The outside temperature in Midland, Texas, was 40.5C when staff at the local office of the US National Weather Service set out to show the cabin of a closed car can literally get baking hot in summer. They mixed up a batch of chocolate chip cookies and laid them on the car’s dashboard – the surface of which showed a temperature of 87.7C. A little over four hours later the cookies were ready to eat. “Even though ours weren’t golden brown, we can confirm that they are done and delicious,” the staff wrote on Facebook.