Sorry, going to take longer than I expected - I’ll try to get it done as soon as I can.
Rats, it turns out my car file no longer works properly, especially since I keep switching to the closed beta patch to test new changes 
Let’s just say my car had a higher profile tyre, and about 100 LESS hp, slightly less downforce, but a more aggressive suspension setup. The basic principle, however, was almost exactly the same!
Oh, okay. Thanks for the attempt.
I think my car was at maximum Driveability/Sportiness camber - I’m guessing higher profile tires allow more camber?
I’m not entirely sure what the Automation reason is, but there are a few thresholds for contact surface grip and driveability, and so far the only way I’ve found to really discover what they are is to test the track times with each profile. I’ve also found that smaller wheels are generally potentially faster, to a certain degree.
Ah, okay. Well, if it was easy, where would the fun be?
(I think I have a reasonably good idea for a challenge, but I’m out of the house at the moment and there’s more research I need to do to come up with the performance metrics.)
One day, you’re called into the office by the product manager. Your heart sinks when you see her reading a glossy (yet somehow cheap-looking) magazine. Before you can warn her not to take the writers too seriously, she spots you and hops out of her chair.
“Ah, you’re here!” she exclaims. “Check out this review!”
“…is this for real?”
“Yes! We have a clear opportunity here to strike a underserved market! We’ll have these - what do they call themselves, ‘survivalists’? - all to ourselves! And it all comes down to you!”
“Are there really that many people worried about nuclear bombardment? The USSR is gone.”
“Any publicity is good publicity - and according to this, our '93 model was the last major pickup truck that doesn’t use any electronics. We won them once, and we can win them again. Make it happen!”
…and at that moment you are hustled out of the office.
[size=150]Rules[/size]
General
Year must be 1995
Body must be standard two-door pickup truck (no utes)
No Lips or Wings
Engine requirements:
No VVL
No EFI
Regular fuel (91 RON, 87 AKI)
Engine specs:
Engine reliability no lower than 60
Loudness no higher than 45
Emissions no higher than than 900
Engine must be “torque-y” - max torque RPMs must be at or below 2/3rds max power RPMs
Vehicle requirements:
No Electric Differential (as if you could afford one…)
Hard or Medium Road tires
No Active Cooling
Edit: Entertainment is permitted (after all, a non-functioning tape deck doesn’t do any harm…)
No Driver Assists besides Power Steering
No more than Basic 80s Safety (i.e. no airbags)
Total cost no more than $9500
Vehicle specs:
Economy no more than 15 lt/100 km (i.e. no less than 15.68 mpg)
Utility no less than 130
Offroad no less than 45
Environmental Resistance no less than 90
Avg. Reliability no less than 75
Driveability no less than 45
Comfort no less than 25
Safety no less than 40
Stuck. Safety is killing me. Even with steel body and paneling and a V8, I can’t make it heavy enough… and I can only afford so much quality on the Basic 80’s safety. Will continue work on it tomorrow, but this one is a lot harder than it looks.
The big cost-saving trick I did was using Galvanized Steel for the chassis instead of Corrosion-Resistant Steel. (I still needed Corrosion-Resistant for the body panels to make 90 Environmental Resistance.)
Also: Body quality, Chassis quality, and Interior type and quality all affect the final safety total - if you haven’t already, you can probably save some money by reducing the Safety quality slider and boosting these others. (Interior also benefits you by letting you reduce Entertainment quality.)
(Also: I really hope I haven’t made this too hard. The requirements were intended to make a vehicle competitive with the 1995 Ford F-150, but even when I was making the challenge I couldn’t come up with the 45 Safety that my F150 recreation had.)
(Edit: Especially because the inspiration for the idea was your Battle of the Half-Tons.)
I can’t get the safety up above 38, no matter what I do. Body sliders, safety sliders, it doesn’t matter. I run out of money LONG before I get to the safety requirement. Even at 37.6, my total costs exceed $12000. There’s no way I can trim that much in other places without the rest of the stats falling below minimum
I’m going to have to throw in the towel on this one. But because of how insanely difficult this is, I’m requesting your finished LUAs showing the challenge is actually possible. You must provide them in 48 hours or the challenge is invalidated.
Damnit. That definitely wasn’t my goal with this challenge. (And now I’m wondering if stretching out the pickup bed to the max had some huge effect I didn’t know about.)
Proof of feasibility attached. I think you might have to page through all the screens to get the settings to settle out correctly - and for some reason between saving and loading Driveability dropped to 44.9 and I had to stiffen the dampers to fix that - but in the version of Automation I’m running that has a safety of 40.0 and total cost of just under $9400. Let me know if it slipped below the threshold in any of the other requirements and I’ll tweak to fix.
Cold Peace Pickup Proof.zip (17 KB)
I’ll take a peek later tonight, as well as come up with a challenge for chipskate.
[size=150]Chipskate’s Challenge[/size]
Once upon the not so distant past…
… you were heading up the design division, and your bosses called upon you to bring back an old flagship 3/4 ton SUV nameplate that died in 2009 thanks to the economy. Not entirely sure about the wisdom of this, you brought up many questions. Most were deflected. Some were answered. You knew that you were going to have to do this, no matter you reservations.
Your company has also been embarrassed recently by its extensive use of airbags from a certain company that had a major recall… and hundreds upon thousands of your vehicles were included in the numbers. So safety is of paramount importance.
Oh, and to top things off, they don’t want you to spend a bunch of R&D money developing new systems. After all, your company has a “grand heritage” to upkeep. Fortunately there are at least a couple projects you can “borrow” from, but your engine is going to be somewhat lacking in sparkle… yet has to be able to tow your boss’s boat.
THE CHALLENGE RULES:
Year: 2013
MUST use the large SUV body, 8 seat interior
MUST use MOHV (Modern OHV) head.
Cannot use Direct or Mechanical injection.
Regular Unleaded only
Drivability >40
Sportiness >10
Comfort >63
Prestige >35
Safety >70
Reliabilty >69
Utility >175
Offroad >25
Practicality > 125
Emissions < 150
Service Cost <2000
Total Cost <20000
Production Units <175
Good luck, my friend!
That’s funny, I always thought that Galvanised steel was relatively cost ineffective compared to Corrosion Resistant 
Galvanized Steel has way higher tooling costs, I think.
Alright, I’ll get on it! It might take a while since I’m a bit busy, but I should have the challenge comoeted within reasonable time.
Okay, so I’ve been working on the challenge for a while, and it seems like I’ve hit a snag. I’ve managed to meet every requirement except for utility, which seems to be impossible to get above 120. I’m not
ready to throw in the towel just yet, but I need some help on what to do. I also forgot to change the platform year before I started working on the car, so getting some help with fixing that would be great.
SUV challenge.zip (19.2 KB)
Utility is easy. One change in the Model tab (specifically, the chassis tab) will get you double what you have. That will drop your safety a bit, but that should be easier to compensate for.
Well, that was easier than expected; thanks a lot! Now all I need to do is to figure out a way to change the platform and engine year, maybe tweak some things and I’ll be set.
Okay, I got it figured out 
I’m gonna start working on my challenge for the next victi- I mean contestant, so that it’ll be ready on time.
SUV challenge.zip (19.1 KB)
Well, since Vic hasn’t said whether I’ve completed his challenge or not, I’m going to post my challenge for Urbanliner in the meantime.
[size=150]Ferrari tofu[/size]
[size=125]D[/size]uring the 1960’s and -70’s the car fleet in Europe was changing quickly. The highways and cities, which previously were populated by various British, French, Italian and German cars, were now filled with various japanese cars. Being far more reliable and better equipped than their counterparts from the continent, they soon held the European car industry in a stranglehold. The import bans legislated by various countries in order to save companies from bankruptcy only worsened the situation, as this prompted the japanese manufactuers to build their car factories overseas. It seemed like the winner of this war would be the land of the rising sun.
The year is now 1975. You are the CEO of a Japanese car manufactuer, and just like your countrymen you too want a piece of the new European car market. However, unlike your colleagues you are not satisfied with just selling soulless tin cans; after a business visit to Italy you find yourself in love with the low-slung Ferrari, Maserati and Lamborghini GT coupés, and you dream of building their likenesses. You set your engineers up to the task of creating a 2-seater sports coupé that’s not only as fast and luxurious as the Italian thoroughbred, but also as reliable as a Japanese family car. Will you be able to fight yourself to a spot among the sports car elite, or will you be forever condemned to build refrigerators on wheels?
[size=125]Restrictions[/size]
Platform and engine year: 1975
Must use the not-Datsun Z (any variant) or not-DB5 body shell
Must be RWD
No canards (front mounted wings)
No race intake
No race exhaust manifold
No semi-slick tires
Max tire quality of +2
Cooling airflow must satisfy engine requirements
[size=125]Requirements[/size]
[ul]]Top speed higher than 250 km/h (155.3 mph)/:m]
]0 - 100 km/h (62 mph) in less than 7 seconds/:m]
]Drivability of 30 or better/:m]
]Sportiness of 35 or better/:m]
]Comfort of 35 or better/:m]
]Prestige of 30 or better/:m]
]Safety of 35 or better/:m]
]Fuel economy better than 10 l/100km (23.52 mpg)/:m]
]Engine reliability of 45 or better/:m]
]Overall reliability of 60 or better/:m]
]Production costs lower than $11,000/:m][/ul]
Good luck!