The good oil: General Motors offers full refund

In its first big marketing campaign since emerging from bankruptcy, General Motors is offering to give customers a full refund within 60 days if they don't like their new car or truck. It's part of a plan to change an image as a financially struggling company with substandard products. "It's really all about getting people to consider our brands and our vehicles," said Fritz Henderson, GM's chief executive. Company sales in the US have fallen 35 per cent this year, and its market share has dropped to a record low of about 19 per cent.

* * *

The lads will be back in February. After a successful debut here last year, the Top Gear presenters with their carefully cultivated image for larking about in a noisy and potentially destructive fashion, will be in Auckland with an expanded Top Gear Live show, February 18-21. Racing driver Greg Murphy will return in an expanded role.

* * *

Good Oil may have found a motoring equivalent of Britain's most famous hapless skier, Eddie The Eagle Edwards, who bumbled his way to fame in the 1988 Winter Olympics. Nathan Millward, a 29-year-old Yorkshireman, is riding from Australia to England on a Honda moped called Dorothy because he "fancied something of an adventure". He picked up the moped, a five-year-old CT110 retired from Australia Post as too worn out, saying that he couldn't afford anything better. "Was I out of my depth and ill-prepared? Of course I was," he says. How far has he gone? "Don't ask me because I haven't got a clue."

* * *

For an automotive coals-to-Newcastle story, how about Nissan's Tennessee factory starting to export engines to Japan? It's supplying 5.6-litre V8 motors for the next-generation Infiniti QX56 luxury full-size SUV. Nissan's decision to export the engine was based largely on the American factory's competitive ability to produce the engine for the world market. Not long ago that was the reason why the world went to Japanese manufacturers.

* * *

After years of rising sales, the diesel engine's days of dominance in western Europe may be ending. In the last six months, 45.9 per cent of the 6,979,342 new cars sold in western Europe were powered by a diesel engine, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association, a big drop from the 52.7 per cent share at the end of 2008. Instead, there has been a huge increase in petrol minicars and subcompacts. And unlike diesels, cars with alternative powertrains are benefiting from government incentives. In Italy, for example, incentives of up to $7250 are given to people who buy vehicles that run on LPG.

* * *

Volkswagen will take a stake in Suzuki by the end of the year, according to reports from Europe. This would give Suzuki access to a variety of VW technology, while Volkswagen would have a solid supporting leg in India and Southeast Asia. Both companies are keeping quiet, but VW CEO Martin Winterkorn allowed that the product portfolio of Suzuki would fit well with that of VW.

* * *

Honda plans to develop an electric for the US by around 2015 as tighter environmental regulations increase demand for zero-emission vehicles. The Nikkei newspaper says a prototype would be unveiled at the Tokyo Motor Show next month. It's expected to be about the size of a minicar. Other manufacturers including Toyota and Volkswagen have also announced plans to launch electrics in the next few years but they say it could take decades for their use to spread due to high cost, limited driving range and long charging times.