In two different locations, half of the two-lane country road was blocked off for a few hundred yards. Within the coned-off area, technicians from an unknown Japanese car company were using sophisticated instruments to measure the road surface so they could build a duplicate section of that pavement at their home proving grounds.

We’ve always known that these roads, with their combination of heavy crowns and less-than-glassy-smooth pavement arranged in variegated twists and turns, provide a challenging test of any vehicle’s road manners and control responses, but it’s nice to see others have independently come to the same conclusion.

Having such demanding roads is tremendously helpful to us because the task of winnowing the 10Best Cars from the dozens of terrific new models remains as tough as ever.

For 2006, we were presented with a brace of affordable roadsters in the form of an all-new Mazda MX-5 and the eagerly awaited Pontiac Solstice. The new Ford Fusion and the comprehensively redesigned Hyundai Sonata and Volkswagen Passat took on the returning 19-time 10Best-winning Honda Accord, which came reinforced with a fresh face lift.

It was also a big year for V-8 sedans from Detroit, with the new Buick Lucerne, the Cadillac DTS, the Dodge Charger, which is already available with the high-output Hemi in SRT8 guise, and the Chevy Impala SS and Pontiac Grand Prix GXP, which are now available with the latest iteration of the venerable small-block Chevy V-8, complete with cylinder-shutdown systems.

Our rules for inclusion in the 2006 10Best competition are essentially unchanged from last year’s. We automatically invite the

back and sift through our automotive database to identify other cars that are all-new or significantly upgraded for 2006. Cars we’ve considered in previous years don’t get invited back until they meet our redesign threshold.

Otherwise, all nominees must also have a base price no higher than $71,000. This is 2.5 times the average new-vehicle transaction price as of August 2005. Eligible cars must also be promised for sale no later than January 2006, and the manufacturer must deliver an example to us for our evaluations. Vaporware, in other words, need not apply.

As usual, we assembled every available

C/D editor to take full advantage of our collective experience. This year that comprised 318 years devoted to scribbling about cars on the part of 14 editors spanning several generations and coming from different parts of the country, as well as from Britain and Germany. Consequently, we all have different automotive priorities and hot buttons. But for this competition, we agree to judge the cars in three general areas.

First, how well does the car perform the functions that we expect from it? We expect Corvettes to be fast and exciting, whereas we look for practical utility in family sedans. Second, we show a marked preference for the more engaging cars in each category. This could be exhibited in fine road manners, or a striking look, or a powerful engine, but in every category we seek some form of automotive satisfaction. Finally, we are suckers for value. Everyone wants to get the most car for the buck, and we’re no exception.

10Best Nominees *These cars met our eligibility requirements, but test examples were not available for evaluation.

10Best Performers, 2005*

Acceleration, 0 to 60 mph:

Chevrolet Corvette Z06, 3.4 sec

Street start, 5 to 60 mph:

Chevrolet Corvette Z06, Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren, 3.8 sec

Quarter-mile: Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren, 11.6 sec @ 125 mph

Top-gear acceleration†: Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren, 4.1 sec

Braking, 70 to 0 mph:

Chevrolet Corvette Z06, 144 feet

Roadholding, 300-foot-dia skidpad:

Chevrolet Corvette Z06, Dodge Viper SRT10 coupe, 1.01 g

Interior sound level @ 70 mph: Lexus GS430, 63 dBA

EPA city fuel economy: Lexus RX400h, 31 mpg

C/D -observed fuel economy: Chevrolet Cobalt LS, 27 mpg

10Worst Performers, 2005*

Acceleration, 0 to 60 mph:

GMC TopKick C4500 by Monroe Truck, 14.4 sec

Street start, 5 to 60 mph:

GMC TopKick C4500 by Monroe Truck, 15.5 sec

Quarter-mile: GMC TopKick C4500 by Monroe Truck, 19.8 sec @ 68 mph

Top-gear acceleration†: Nissan Xterra Off-Road 4WD, 32.4 sec

Braking, 70 to 0 mph:

Dodge Dakota SLT, 229 feet

Roadholding, 300-foot-dia skidpad:

GMC TopKick C4500 by Monroe Truck, 0.61 g

Interior sound level @ 70 mph: Porsche 911 Turbo S cabriolet, 82 dBA

EPA city fuel economy: Dodge Ram SRT10 Quad Cab, 9 mpg

C/D -observed fuel economy: GMC TopKick C4500 by Monroe Truck, 8 mpg

*Based on test results for U.S.-specification production vehicles appearing in C/D during 2005. †Sum of 30-to-50-mph and 50-to-70-mph acceleration times.

Speaking of Spokes When steering wheels were first created, they needed multiple spokes for support, often four of them. But with the advent of rigid plastics, why do we need so many today? To accommodate redundant radio controls? Hell, millions of Citron drivers made do with one steering-wheel spoke for years. I counted the number of spokes on 67 of our 10Best candidates. Twenty-five offered four spokes, 40 offered three, and only two—the Honda Civic EX and Civic hybrid—offered two. Those wheels, whose spokes are at 3 and 9 o’clock and include a comfy spot to hang your thumbs, were the best in the field. So how come the Civic Si, the sporty model, offered that same, perfect wheel except with a gratuitous third spoke? Best guess: Manufacturers think you think more spokes are better. That’s just dumb.—

John Phillips Slap-Happy Transmissions Now that manumatic functions have appeared on so many automatic-transmissioned cars (the majority of our 10Best nominees had them), many are sprouting "paddles" on their steering wheels. It’s too bad there’s little uniformity on how these work. Audi’s A4 tranny ignores the driver’s wishes, upshifting and downshifting at its own intervals. The Lexus IS350′s behaves autocratically, with downshifts only. GM and Acura give the driver complete authority and hold his or her gear commands obediently. With the exception of GM, all vehicles with paddle shifters also have manumatic gates (having missed the manumatic boat, GM leaped straight to paddles on the Corvette and Grand Prix GXP). GM also combines upshifts and downshifts on one paddle; all others split up the work (left paddle for downshifts, right for upshifts). Interestingly, all seven steering-wheel-mounted shifters in our competition were connected to an automatic gearbox-so essentially, these controls are relocated and glorified manumatics. —

Dave VanderWerp Into the Woods Wood is used purely as a flavoring in today’s cars. Pontiac should try garlic instead. The G6 GTP has broad panels of tobacco-hued plastic on each door, angled for a full-frontal look at the "burl." Big mistake. Buick makes it, too, in the Lucerne. Trailer-park Formica looks worse as the acreage goes up. Pretend-a-plank in polished plum is no more promising, but Hyundai makes it work in the under-$30,000 Azera by keeping the expanses small and curving them away from the eye. When you don’t see the grain, you won’t be offended. Above $40,000, you expect real wood and impeccable taste. Yet BMW overdoses its traditional burl with coffee tint. Lexus drowns the delicate bird’s-eye pattern of the GS in cranberry juice. Only Ford, scheming to sell a Fusion at Lincoln prices, does it right: The tiger-striped maple in the Zephyr glows with mystery beyond man’s simulation.—

Patrick Bedard Don’t Spend More Than 30k on Your Next Car More than half the cars in this year’s field cost more than 30 grand, but I don’t see why you’d ever spend more than that amount on a car. I counted almost a dozen perfectly satisfying cars for less than 30K that offer nearly the same level of refinement and comfort as cars costing far more. Here’s a sampling of my favorite under-30K cars: the Honda Accord LX, the Audi A3, the VW Jetta GLI, the Acura TSX, and the Toyota Avalon. All of them are quiet and refined, and in particular, the Jetta GLI, the A3, and the TSX are extremely fun to drive. Every time I drove one of those cars, I kept trying to quantify what another $20,000—nearly the price of a new MX-5—would get me, but I never came up with a good answer. I may be a cheapskate, but do yourself a favor and drive one of the cars I mentioned before spending the big bucks.—

Larry Webster The Return of the Tuning Knob In an age of touch screens and toggling pushbuttons, it’s comforting to see the return of tuning knobs on car radios. With the recent trend toward burying radio functions under three menu levels in some impassive electronic Cyclops, how refreshing to just reach over and twirl a knob for a station change—particularly in vehicles with someone else’s station presets. Even among cars with screen displays, tuning knobs were so common among the 10Best-nominated cars that they stuck out like sore thumbs. Seek and scan functions are all very well, but they sometimes scoot past the frequency you want. A knob is a simple and familiar way to get the job done.—

Barry Winfield  

Article source: http://www.caranddriver.com/features/06q1/2006_10best_cars-10best_cars