This 1962 Ford Thunderbird Roadster will be among the featured offerings at the Mecum Houston sale. Get all the latest auto industry news in the Executive Briefing.
Today’s headlines:
+ Three U.S. senators are urging President Trump to bar Chinese automakers from building vehicles in the USA or from importing their vehicles from Mexico and Canada. More at U.S. News & World Report.
+ Hyundai reports that exports to Europe and North Africa, which typically transit through the Middle East, are being disrupted by the military conflict between the USA and Iran. More at Reuters.
+ In an AAA survey, six out of 10 drivers reported that glare from more powerful headlamps is a problem when driving at night, and 73 percent say it’s getting worse. More at The Drive.
+ Disgruntled with the 2026 hybrid Formula 1 car package, which he calls “Mario Kart,” four-time World Champion Max Verstappen is threatening to leave for another series. More at ESPN.
+ The Trump administration has once again revised its tariffs on steel, aluminum, and copper imports, shifting the rate calculation to the consumer price of the finished goods. More at CBT News.
+ General Motors is investing more than $150 million in its Saginaw Metal Casting Operations (SMCO) in Michigan to produce sixth-gen V8 cylinder blocks and heads. More at Automotive World.
+ Stellantis is currently discussing the possibility of building Leapmotor electric vehicles in Canada with its Chinese joint venture partner, Zhejiang Leapmotor Technology. More at The Detroit News.
+ Ponz Pandikuthira of Nissan North America says a next-generation R36 GT-R is not a question of if but when, and reportedly there will be both twin-turbo V6 and EV versions. More at Car and Driver.
+ A rare 1962 Ford Thunderbird Sports Roadster in Raven Black with a matching-numbers M-code 390 V8 will be offered at the Mecum Houston auction on April 11. More at Old Cars
+ Chris Rice, president of Kaulig Racing, with entries in both the NASCAR Cup and Truck series, says the rising price of diesel fuel for its transporters is impacting team budgets. More at Racer.
Photo courtesy of Mecum Auctions.
Review the previous MCG Executive Briefing from April 3 here.
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Four of 10 drivers surveyed by AAA are either liars or work for GE/Wagner/Bosche (joke). Blinding oncoming drivers or tailgaters is absolutely not safer, even if the headlights technically meets FMVSS 108. This is the big contradiction in modern lighting: a headlamp can be 100% legal and still extremely dangerous in real‑world use. Modern lamps can legally hit 75,000 candela at the hot spot. Aftermarket unlimited. That’s orders of magnitude brighter than 1970 era standardized sealed beams we loved and kept everyone sane.
Beleive it or not, the brightest FMVSS 108 headlights do NOT violate any OSHA visible radiation rules like welding arcs or lasers. OSHA does NOT regulate visible light exposure the way it regulates UV/IR/ionizing radiation. Any American worker could theoretically stare at the brightest FMVSS 108 headlights all day and still be “in compliance” with OSHA’s visible radiation regs. But OSHA should still cite the employer under General Duty Clause because it’s obviously damn unsafe…
Worst‑Case Scenario:
Total loss of vision when an oncoming vehicle’s headlights overwhelm your eyes. You lose ALL usable forward vision for 1–2 seconds. That doesn’t sound like much, but at 55 mph you travel 161.4 feet- half a football field- completely blind.
FMVSS 108 hasn’t been updated since the mid ’80’s for halogens but manufacturers, suppliers and special interests are much better at exploiting lighting standards (loopholes) and evidently a long standing undocumented NHTSA “zero enforcement” policy.
Along with the Federals looking at headlight brightness, they need to establish rules for maximum headlight height for vehicles under 7,500 pounds.
Right now, there is no publicly available evidence that NHTSA has any open, active defect or compliance investigations specifically targeting “too‑bright” headlamps. NHTSA has not opened a new brightness/glare‑related headlamp investigation since 2003. The absence of investigations doesn’t mean the problem isn’t real—only that NHTSA has not initiated any defect or compliance probes in response to immense safety complaints. Instead, the agency simply relies on decades‑old lighting standards that do not regulate modern LED brightness, peak luminance, glare intensity nor quantify any relevent safety risk assesment at all.
According to Google AI, 14-16 states have mandatory safety inspections some of which include headlight aiming. Seems like NHTSA could mine that data to get an indication of how much jacked up pickups contribute to the headlight blinding problem.
Nine years ago I installed new sealed beam headlights and asked around for someone to aim them. I tried 15 shops and no one had the equipment to do so. Only the independent BMW-Mercedes shop knew how to do it against a wall and they wanted $85. To the best of my knowledge, my state’s safety inspection doesn’t include headlight aim.
Sealed beams had nubs on the lens to accommodate aiming equipment but today’s lights presumably can only be done against a marked wall. My guess is that the inspectors ignore everything except lights that point at the ceiling. And I’m sure they don’t bother with auxiliary ‘off-road only’ lamps.