Three essential features your truck needs before towing

Is your truck equipped with the must-have features it takes to haul a trailer?  If these three items aren’t standard on your truck, it might be time to trade up.

-Trailer Sway Control
-Hill-Hold Assist
-Integrated Trailer Brake

5 Chevrolet cars expected to find new roads in design

Spark: Expect a new 1.0-liter, three-cylinder engine and possibly a continuously variable transmission.

Sonic: Late 2015 will bring a freshening for the ’16 model year, and we can expect a total redesign for the 2018 model year.

Cruze: It will be the first car built on a new, lighter global compact platform, code-named D2XX. You’ll see evolutionary design change, with a more-rounded front end with a deeper grille, steeply raked windshield and fastback roofline.

Malibu: After a fast-tracked re-engineering for the ’14 model year, the mid-sized sedan is in line for a redesign in mid-2016 as a ’17 model.

Corvette: The racetrack-oriented Z06 goes on sale in early 2015.

2015 Sonic Packs a Big Punch

Spend any amount of time in a Chevrolet Sonic and you’ll see quite a bit of thought went into creating this small car. The Sonic might be cute, but it’s serious too. From its stellar performance in NHTSA’s crash testing (five stars overall) to its wealth of standard features (including Bluetooth and blind spot mirrors), as cute as it is, the Sonic is also a rational choice.

Power comes from a choice of two engines, a normally aspirated 1.8-liter inline four with 138 horsepower and 125 ft-lbs of torque, or a 1.4-liter turbocharged four with 138 horsepower and 148 ft-lbs of torque. The turbo engine can be had with a choice of a six-speed manual or a six-speed automatic, while the normal engine gets a five-speed manual or a six-speed automatic. Fuel economy ranges from a low of 26 in the city to a high of 40 on the highway—depending upon the engine and transmission combination.