1992 Ford Ranger Custom Extended Cab Pickup 2-door 4.0l on 2040-cars

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Ford F-100 'Snakebit' shown off by Gene Simmons and Shannon Tweed at SEMA

Ford, along with KISS bassist Gene Simmons and his wife, Shannon Tweed, used SEMA as a backdrop to pull the covers off Snakebit, a 1956 Ford F-100 pickup truck that's been updated with Shelby Mustang-derived styling bits and a 5.4-liter supercharged V8 engine. All 550 horsepower are funneled through a six-speed manual gearbox to the rear wheels.
Underneath the custom bodywork sits a chassis that's been stretched five inches and a bed widened and bedecked with billet machined pieces that are supposed to look like wood. The 20-inch rear and 18-inch front wheels ape those of past Shelby Mustang models. The interior is swathed in two-tone leather with a bench seat designed to look - try to act surprised - like a Shelby Mustang.
Like what you see? Bidding for the truck will take place in 2014 at an unspecified Barrett-Jackson event (we'd assume Scottsdale). Proceeds will be used to help build a children's hospital in Saskatoon, in the province of Saskatchewan, where Ms. Tweed grew up. See the high-res gallery above and the press release down below for more.

Ford Mustang returning to Australia in 2016

Australia's Herald Sun newspaper has reported that the next-generation Ford Mustang is heading Down Under in 2016, just as Ford is hanging the "Closed for Good" sign on its Australian manufacturing operations and sending the Falcon to its grave. Ford hasn't offered any official word on the matter, but the paper says that Ford's global VP of sales and marketing, Jim Farley, is flying to Australia to make the announcement himself.
While Ford converted Mustangs in the early 2000s from left-hand to right-hand drive for the Australian market and then sold them at high prices, it's been almost five decades since Ford imported a dedicated right-hand-drive Mustang to Oz. The arrival of the global model specifically made for places like Australia and the UK means Ford will also be able to offer them at better prices than the converted models; the Herald Sun says the price is expected to be "close to $50,000."
And that's for one of the "V8 performance models," which are the only ones Australia will get; Ford apparently won't send the turbocharged four cylinder or the V6. The Aussies could find out in a month from now whether this rumor is true. We will all find out what this Mustang fuss is about when the car debuts at next year's New York Auto Show.

Court puts kibosh on apartheid lawsuit against Ford, Daimler

Ford and Daimler have scored a major victory in a long-running lawsuit filed in US federal court by unnamed South African nationals. The suit alleges that both manufacturers and their subsidiaries sold their vehicles to the South African military, despite knowing that they'd be involved in violently putting down anti-apartheid protesters.
According to Reuters, South African plaintiffs filed the case under the 223-year-old Alien Torts Statute, a law which allows foreign nationals to file charges in US courts for perceived breaches of what was originally international law, but now more closely relates to violations of human rights.
And while the case - which also involves computer manufacturer IBM - has been tied up in federal courts for years, a recent case from the Supreme Court struck down a similar suit against Royal Dutch Petroleum (Shell), arguing that the ATS doesn't apply to corporations or to conduct if it occurred outside the US. In short, the law applies to individuals, but not corporations like Ford or Daimler. A US appeals court ruled that the conditions apply in this case, potentially drawing this long-running saga to a close, as the defendants will now be allowed to request that the case be dismissed in district court.