Toyota may soon be forced to significantly slow the company’s vehicle production in Japan, a result of an explosion at one of its steel suppliers’ factories.

The explosion took place at an Aichi Steel plant in central Japan January 8. Since then, steel supplying Toyota’s Japanese factories has been slowly dwindling. Currently, there is only enough to keep the lines running until February 6, a spokesman told Automotive News. Beyond that, decisions to run the plants will occur on a “day to day basis.”

Toyota currently produces 14,000 cars a day in Japan, about 40 percent of its global output. It had been on track to build 10.2 million cars and trucks this year, a bump of 50 million from 2015′s tally of 10.15 million.

The setback could put a significant dent in these numbers, which gave Toyota the title of world’s largest automaker last year (surpassing VW in the wake of its diesel engine cheating scandal). The Aichi Steel plant is scheduled to resume normal operations sometime in March. Toyota declined to say which models would be affected by the shortage.

The electric 9-3 sedans circulating in the news recently will not be Saabs. They’ll look like Saabs, be largely constructed out of Saab parts, and built in the Saab factory in Trollhattan, but they will not be badged Saabs.

Saab parent company NEVS (National Electric Vehicle Sweden) recently signed two deals worth nearly $13 billion, in which would sell 170,000 all-electric cars based on the 9-3 sedan to Chinese companies as part of the nation’s efforts to promote EVs. However, none of them will be allowed to use the Saab name or griffin logo officially. “We have revoked their right to use the brand name,” Saab spokesman Sebastian Carlsson affirmed to Automotive News.

The rights to the name and logo were taken back two years ago when NEVS, which bought the bankrupt automaker in 2012, during a period of stalled fundraising. Even though NEVS is back on track, the rights were never re-activated. Enforcement of the usage has been murky until this week, as prototypes of the electric 9-3 were shown wearing a prominent “Saab” logo in the grille.

Instead, NEVS will now use a different name for the electric 9-3s it assembles, owner Kai Johan Jiang told Swedish radio. What that name will be has not been determined yet.

The opening day of the Geneva Auto Show is over a month away, but General Motors’ Germany-based Opel division has already ruled out turning the sleek GT concept (pictured) that will debut there into a production model.

“[The GT is] purely a concept study to show off innovations that may one day be found in an Opel production car,” explained a company spokesman in an interview with industry trade journal Automotive News.

German magazine Auto Bild was the first to report that Opel would leverage the benefits of economies of scale by building the production GT on the same front-wheel drive platform as the Astra, a popular Golf-fighting hatchback. The spokesman pointed out that a production version would compete in a niche segment that’s regularly shrinking in size, so the odds are against it even if it can be brought to the market in a relatively cost-efficient manner. A two-door version of the Astra has been categorically ruled out for the same reasons, and many of Opel’s competitors — including Renault and Peugeot — have recently come to the same conclusion.

Furthermore, the magazine claimed the GT would be introduced in 2018 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the original model. Opel’s spokesman told Automotive News that even if the GT was given the green light for production there’s no way it could be ready to hit showrooms in a year or two.

Confirming a recent rumor, BMW has introduced an entry-level version of the 7 Series powered by a four-cylinder engine in China and in Turkey.

Called 730i, the sedan is fitted with a 2.0-liter turbo four that’s also found under the hood of the 225i and the MINI John Cooper Works. It has been tuned to generate 258 horsepower and 295 lb-ft. of torque, and it’s bolted to an eight-speed automatic transmission.

The four-cylinder sends the short-wheelbase 730i from zero to 60 mph in 6.2 seconds when it spins the rear wheels. Selecting all-wheel drive and a long-wheelbase body lowers the zero-to-62 time to 6.3 seconds, which is a fairly respectable statistic when the sedan’s size and weight are taken into account. Top speed is electronically limited to 155 mph. Fuel economy checks in at over 40 mpg.

The 730i is evidently not as well equipped as a range-topping 7, but that doesn’t mean it’s a stripped-down, bare-bones machine; don’t look for steel wheels and black bumpers. BMW is mainly bringing it to the market so that private buyers and fleet operators can circumvent the stiff tariffs that authorities in China and in Turkey slap on passenger cars powered by large-displacement engines.

It’s not too far-fetched to speculate the downsized 7 won’t be offered in Europe and in the United States, where demand for a large sedan powered by a small engine is low at best.

Note: BMW 750i pictured. Photos by Drew Johnson.

Chicago Police officers have allegedly schemed to intentionally sabotage cruiser dashcams, adding fuel to the controversy surrounding police accountability.

The pattern has been exposed by a DNAinfo investigation prompted by the city’s release of a dashcam video showing an officer shooting and killing 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. The footage was withheld for more than a year and finally went public late last year, under court order but lacking audio to provide additional context.

Chicago Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi initially dismissed the significance of the missing audio, claiming it was likely a simple technical fault.

“As with any technology, at times software issues or operator error may keep the cameras from operating as they normally should,” he said.

The department later admitted that “intentional destruction” may have played a role in some cases. The latest investigation, based on nearly 2,000 maintenance records, suggests sabotage may not be an anomaly.

Exemplifying the trend, only two of five vehicles present at McDonald’s shooting captured any video footage and four vehicles did not record audio. For the vehicle occupied by the first responding officers, including shooter Jason Van Dyke, a wiring issue had been fixed in June 2014, three months after the malfunction was first logged. Just one day later the system was broken again, due to “intentional damage,” according to the maintenance records.

The issues appear to have gone unnoticed or ignored by Police Department leadership until questions were raised in the wake of McDonald’s death. Guglielmi now claims the department “will not tolerate officers maliciously destructing equipment.” Union officials, meanwhile, claim the city is to blame for failing to maintain the equipment.

Some police departments have implemented a zero-tolerance policy for intentional destruction or misuse of recording devices.

Toyota has fully acquired subsidiary Daihatsu, setting the stage for deeper collaboration between both companies.

Claimed to be Japan’s oldest automaker, Daihatsu is already majority owned by Toyota. The latter company will acquire the remaining minority stake in a share exchange, expected to be worth around $3 billion USD.

“The purpose of the agreement is to develop ever-better cars by adopting a unified strategy for the small car segment, under which both companies will be free to focus on their core competencies,” Toyota said in a statement. “Ultimately, this will help Daihatsu and Toyota to attain their joint goal of achieving sustainable growth.”

The brands will continue to engage in ‘friendly competition’ and maintain separate management structures, but with a shared strategy that could benefit from co-development and global growth.

Best known for its minicars, Daihatsu currently sells its own models in Japan and builds Toyota-badged adaptations. The subsidiary is said to have struggled in a price war against rival Suzuki last year, according to Bloomberg. Interestingly, a Nikkei report claims Suzuki and Toyota are involved in talks to form a potential global alliance.

Pornography has been cited in the distracted-driving death of a Michigan resident involved in a single-car crash.

The 58-year-old was allegedly watching an adult film on his cellphone while attempting to simultaneously drive and masturbate, Michigan State Police told local news outlet Fox2.

Wearing neither pants nor seatbelt, the man reportedly lost control of his 1996 Toyota on I-75 in Detroit. The car consequently rolled, partially ejecting and killing the driver.

Michigan State Police Lieutenant Mike Shaw claims the accident tops his list of strangest encounters on the road, according to a CBS Detroit report.

The incident is not the first traffic fatality to involve lustful distractions. In another case last year, a truck driver was accused being distracted by nude pictures on his cellphone before his rig smashed into the back of an SUV in Georgia and killed five Georgia Southern University students.

Tesla Motors has denied rumors that a second vehicle will make its debut alongside the Model 3 in March.

The company is widely expected to launch a crossover based on the Model 3. A deleted Twitter post suggests it will be labeled the Model Y, apparently completing a S-3-X-Y lineup without fighting over the trademark for Model E.

Citing leaked presentation images with two veiled cars displayed side-by-side, Electrek speculated that Tesla’s March event would simultaneously introduce two different models.

Tesla now claims the report was simply “wrong,” though the denial is said to have included confirmation that another model is under development on the same platform as the Model 3.

The fledgling automaker may attempt to narrow the gap between the Model 3 and its higher-riding stablemate. The crossover segment is still experiencing particularly strong growth — much higher than sedans — and quick arrival of a second affordable model could further improve economies of scale as the company ramps up Gigafactory battery production.

The first Model 3 sedans are expected to arrive on the market sometime late next year.