Auto Unleashed |
| Premier4509 tuning program for the Aston Martin Vantage Posted: 30 Jul 2008 08:06 AM CDT  Only 300 kits for the Aston Martin Vantage will be available, each kit will come with a numbered serial plate plus framed certificate of ownership and the first ones will be ready by the end of this year. Check out more photos after the jump.
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| Posted: 30 Jul 2008 07:44 AM CDT  I’m pretty sure there isn’t anyone on this planet that watches Top Gear and wouldn’t like the know who The Stig is. The current one, the White Stig, because we know that the Black Stig was former F1 race driver Perry McCarthy. There have been countless speculations about the Stig’s real identity, but none of them was confirmed so far. And the guys keep playing with us, for example, in the last episode, when talking with Jay Kay about The Stig, Jeremy says “Well, he’s quicker than Lewis Hamilton or Nigel Mansell or Mark Webber”. Oh, c’mon! What does that mean, is he one of these three or he’s another guy? Anyways, we came across this YouTube video that shows an interview with The Stig, and comparing the voices, it looks like he’s Ben Collins, a 33 year old driver from Bristol, England which competed in Formula 3, Le Mans Sportscars, GT and NASCAR. His experience might place him as The Stig, but to be honest, I don’t really dig this video. I mean, we haven’t heard Stig saying anything for 8 seasons and now have him interviewed? Something’s not right. But, who knows, maybe Collins really is the Stig. How about you? Would you like to know his identity or you’d like to keep the mistery?  | ||||
| Volkswagen Passat CC tuning by Abt Posted: 30 Jul 2008 07:18 AM CDT  The body kit is one of the coolest things in a tuning package, however, unfortunately, Abt didn’t release any photos of the car’s new aerodynamic kit, instead we got these ‘teasers’, showing us the car fitted with Abt’s AR and BR alloy wheels which will be available in sizes 18 to 20 inch. More details will come when Abt decides to let us know, meanwhile check out more photos.
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| Video: The new Chevrolet Camaro Posted: 30 Jul 2008 06:49 AM CDT The new production-ready Chevrolet Camaro was officially introduced last week and now here are two videos in which we can see the car in action. Available in three trim-levels (LS, LT and an SS), the new Camaro will come with two engine choices, a 296 hp 3.6 liter V6 and a 416 hp 6.2 liter V8, both able to run on fewer cylinders when necessary, to improve mileage. Check out the other video after the jump. Via Carscoop  | ||||
| Michael Schumacher crashes Ferrari F430 Scuderia prototype Posted: 29 Jul 2008 12:37 PM CDT  We all know that Michael Schumacher (one the best F1 pilots ever) helped Ferrari several times develop new cars. His experience was very useful to the Ferrari engineers, that made better cars from the Enzo, 599 GTB or the recent California. Last week Ferrari had exclusively reserved the Nürburgring for testing of a Ferrari 430 Scuderia prototype, and our spy photographer on the scene noticed it was Michael Schumacher driving. However, the Ferrari-Schumi cooperation didn’t go well every time. For example, last week, he was testing a Ferrari F430 Scuderia on the Nurburgring track (exclusively reserved for Ferrari for these tests), when Michael lost control of the car at about 250 km/h (155 mph) and the car struck a guardrail causing pretty important damage. Apparently, his co-driver was his son, Mick. Schumacher’s spokeswoman Sabine Kehm said: “Michael called me and said ‘We have crashed the car but are going to continue with another one”. Source: WorldCarFans  | ||||
| Let’s play with the Mercedes Benz CLC Posted: 29 Jul 2008 11:13 AM CDT  Have you got a lot of spare time, or nothing to do at work? Mercedes has found the solution: a virtual race on the streets of London on board the Mercedes CLC. "CLC Dream Test Drive" can be downloaded for free from CLCdreamtestdrive and all you have to do is enter an email address and then you can download the game. To accomplish the best time on the streets of London, in a Mercedes CLC, you have to review a few details such as engine power and torque, and also how many seconds you need for 0 to 100 km/h acceleration.
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| FortuneSport: Supercar ‘to go’ Posted: 29 Jul 2008 11:06 AM CDT  What if you will be able to place an order for your future car, just like you order for your happy meal? It would be nice, isn't it? The new FortuneSport car, developed in cooperation with Panoz, will soon make its debut on the market. The new exclusive car (its production will be limited to only 60 units) will be offered in two versions: Rt.R racing version and Rt.S street version. The Rt.R will weight only 750kg and will be powered by a 6.0 liter V8 developing 510HP and it is expected to reach a top speed of 280 km/h (173 mph) and will speed up to 100km/h (62 mph) in about 3 seconds. All these will cost $300,000, of which $200,000 represents the advance payment order. After you place your order, the car will be built according to the size and customer preferences and will be assembled in 3 weeks. Rt.S version, which will debut in 2010, will be less radical, the engine will develop only 360 HP and the speeding from 0 to 100km/h will be done in 3.7 seconds. Rt.S will be cheaper, customers having to pay only $85,000 for the exclusive model with two seats and the chassis made from composite material and aluminum.  | ||||
| First photo of the new Ford KA Posted: 29 Jul 2008 10:24 AM CDT  We’ve got the first photo of the upcoming Ford KA, which leaked this morning on the internet, published by a British magazine that breached Ford’s embargo. Scheduled to debut at the Paris Motor Show in October, the new Ford KA looks like a smaller version of the Fiesta, which I’m not sure if it’s good or bad. Honestly, I don’t really like it, but I’ll wait for the Paris show to see it and decide whether I like it or not. No official info from Ford so far, but we expect a press release any time now. What we already know is that the car will share its platform with the Fiat Panda and the Fiat 500 and will be built in Tychy, Poland. Rumors say that, under the hood, the car will get 1.4 and 1.6-litre petrol engines and a 1.6 TDCi diesel engine.  | ||||
| Posted: 29 Jul 2008 10:12 AM CDT  The concept car we see in these photos is the Datsun XLink Concept, created by Pforzheim University student Benjamin Nawka at Nissan Yulon Design Center. The concept is Benjamin’s final thesis project and was meant to interpret a possible re-introduction of the Datsun brand (discontinued in 1986), with the first C-segment four-door coupé. First showcased at the Pforzheim Graduate Show 2008, the XLink concept is defined by Banjamin as “the first product of the new lifestyle brand DATSUN, whose re-introduction is based on the excellent image of the 240Z and other cars which were mainly affordable, reliable and easy-to-use. [..] The scribbles are early exploratoty drawings to get the four-door coupe feeling and to play around with the winglet topic” The car’s design was inspired by aircraft and architecture and it features winglets loaded with functions (DLR lights, LEDs for mood lighting, integration of dead angle and rear mirror cameras). The car also has a 380 liter trunk, is powered by a Two-Mode Diesel Hybrid and features the XLink Experience communication system, which allows different XLink drivers to connect with each other in order to share a vehicle or a ride. We really like these design studies that show up once in a while, because even though they’ll never make it into production, it’s like a breath of fresh air and we always like to feast our eyes and imagination on these. So, great job done there by Benjamin, congrats! More photos after the jump.
Via CarBodyDesign  | ||||
| Super efficient Loremo car gets restyled Posted: 29 Jul 2008 09:27 AM CDT  Last year, at the Frankfurt Motor Show, Loremo presented their super efficient concept car. And now it seems that the car gets closer and closer to production, because Loremo announced the car got a new design, which includes a restyled front and rear and larger tail-lights). The new Loremo significantly grew in height in width, offering a more spacious interiour for its passengers. However, despite the larger front surface, engineers at Loremo managed to keep the low air resistance level, very important for the fuel economy. Weighing 450 kg, the Loremo is powered by a two-cylinder generating 20 bhp for LS (0-100 km/h in 20 seconds and 160 km/h top speed) and a three-cylinder producing 49 bhp for GT (0-100 km/h in 9 seconds and 220 km/h top speed), both turbodiesels. But really impressive are the fuel economy figures: the LS reaches 1.5 liters/100km (156 mpg), while the GT reaches 2.7 liters/100 km (8.7 mpg). The Loremo is expected to go on sale in 2009 and it will cost 11,000 Euros (LS) and 15,000 Euros (GT). More photos after the jump.
Source: Loremo  |
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