Toyota moving U.S. headquarters to Texas:
Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. announced that it will pack up and move its headquarters from sunny Southern California to Texas, after 57-years in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The move will take place over the next three years and will affect about 4000 marketing, management, and communications jobs. Expected to move to Toyota's new campus in Plano, Texas, right outside of Dallas, are approximately 2000 employees from Torrance, Calif., 1000 employees from Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America in Erlanger, Ky., and a number of employees located in New York, NY. Toyota will break ground on its new campus this year, with construction expected to finish by late 2016 or early 2017.
A number of the automaker’s operations will be unaffected including its current distribution centers, other regional offices, Toyota Racing Development, AirFlite Inc, Toyota Info Technology Center, and its Calty Design Research campuses in Southern California and Ann Arbor.
The reasons for Toyota's exodus from the Southland are many, reports the Los Angeles Times. When Toyota launched its North American operations in 1957, the Japanese automaker picked L.A. as its U.S. headquarters because of easy port access in Long Beach and San Pedro, and easy airline access to Tokyo. Now with about three-quarters of its production located in the South Eastern United States, a move to Texas puts Toyota big wigs closer to the company's factories. The other reason for Toyota's move is expenses. The Los Angeles metro area is reportedly the ninth-most expensive in the U.S., while the Dallas metro area is 19th. Toyota would also pay less business and real estate taxes in Texas than it does in California.(Motor Trend)(4-29-2014)
Mama was talking with one of Her “inside” sources on JR’s Team and they were having brake overheating to the point of boiling the fluid till it turned black. This was due to all the debris from the tyres clogging up the cooling ducts.
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Several teams have tire issues at Richmond:
Several Sprint Cup drivers battled tire issues Saturday night at Richmond International Raceway, causing some cars to catch fire from the burning rubber. Among the drivers who had problems were #48-Jimmie Johnson, #99-Carl Edwards, #15-Clint Bowyer, #41- Busch, #17-Ricky Stenhouse Jr and #36-Reed Sorenson. Goodyear brought a new tire combination to Richmond, with its new multi-zone tire on the right side. The outward 10 inches of the right-side tire had the same compound as last year but the inside two inches of tread surface was designed for more endurance, with a tougher, more heat-resistant compound. It appeared the inside few inches of the tires were unraveling, causing the areas around the brakes and wheels to catch fire when rubber became entangled with wheel and suspension parts.
“There are a number of cars that don’t have any issues at all and they have got a good balanced car and everything is fine,” Goodyear Racing executive Stu Grant told Motor Racing Network during its race broadcast. “But what we’re seeing is the inside shoulder of the right front is wearing through the tread and through the overlay. It’s important to have a good balanced car, it’s important to not have a lot of camber, and it’s important to try to stay off that right front. But having said that, it looks like the operating window is pretty narrow for these guys. If they miss it by a little bit, you’re going to get into that right front and we’re going to have to work on that.” Goodyear most likely will conduct a tire test and bring a new tire for the Richmond race next September, a pivotal event as the final race before the Chase for the Sprint Cup field is set.
“The tire was adjusted properly on many of the cars, and I think some of them took it overboard,” NASCAR Vice President of Competition Robin Pemberton said. “Goodyear being a good partner, they’ll get together and if it’s something we need to re-do before we get back in here in the fall, I’m sure Goodyear is more than happy to test and build another tire.”(Sporting News)(4-27-2014)