It was a day of many firsts for me, the day Proton corporate communications invited some of us to test drive a prototype of the new Proton Exora MPV. Yup, we got to drive a pair of Exoras, both the same colour but taped up in the typical black disguise that you’ve seen countless of times on the spyshots featured on this site.
We drove 2 prototype units, one with a manual transmission and one with an automatic transmission, from Proton’s plant in Shah Alam along the KESAS highway, then onto the MRR2, Karak Highway, and then the East Coast Expressway, where we made a U-turn at the Lanchang exit and on back to the Proton plant (we stopped at Karak town for awhile). The first half of my journey was in the manual model while the 2nd half was in the automatic model.
Look after the jump for my experiencing with the Proton Exora, as well as some other information gathered from our session with the engineers.
[Read more...]
Here’s another shot of the Great Wall Wingle being tested in Malaysia, this time snapped in Genting by reader Mior. This time there’s a very clear front shot of the car, featuring a design that was clearly “inspired” from the Volkswagen Magellan Concept (shown left). I have no idea when this is scheduled to launch, but from what I am aware of, it uses a Bosch-developed 2.8 litre turbodiesel engine putting out 95 horsepower and 225Nm from 1,600rpm. Having it appear so often doesn’t really mean anything especially with a Chinese marque as there is a precedent somewhat set by the ChangAn CM8, which was also spotted over a year before it was actually launched. In case you’re wondering what’s with the odd name, Wingle is actually said to be a combination of Wind and Eagle.
We now have more details regarding the Jaguar XE sports car courtesy of Motor Trend, which is set to take on the 