The Porsche Club Malaysia will be organizing an event called the “SUPERCAR FOR CHARITY” event in aid of Malaysian floods Victims together with the Ferrari Owner’s Club, Force of Nature Aid Foundation and the Sepang International Circuit.

The event will be held on the 24th of February 2008 from 2pm until 7pm. By paying between RM300, RM500 or RM1,000 you will get a taxi ride in a supercar driven by experienced drivers for a full three laps around the Sepang circuit. These supercars include a fleet of Porsches, Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Lotus Esprit V8s, Aston Martins, and also a Mercedes Benz SL55 AMG and new BMW M6 (picture shown above).

There will also be an exhibition of supercars like the Pagani Zonda, the Maserati MC12, the Bugatti EB110, the Ferrari F50 and the McLaren SLR .

All proceeds from the event would go to the flood victims, and FON being the charity arm would monitor and disburse the money raised to local non-governmental organisations and foundations to aid the recent flood victims.

Fiat Group Automobiles has announced that they will unveil its first dual-clutch gearbox in September 2009. The gearbox will be designed and built by Fiat Powertrain Technologies at an investment of 500 million euros. The new gearbox called the DDC will be able to handle up to 343Nm of torque. The dual clutch transmission is one of three transmission variants in the C635 family. The other two will be a manual and a single clutch automated manual.

The new dual clutch Fiat Powertrain Technologies C635 gearbox will use two dry clutches (DDC means Dual Dry Clutch) which are lighter and require less cooling than wet clutches, but there is no indication at the moment how many speeds the gearbox would have, though 6-speed is the most likely since the C635 family will feature a manual as well, and I don’t think a 7-speed manual is very common,

Source

General Motors is planning a new series of small turbocharged Ecotec engines, similiar to Volkswagen’s TSI and Fiat’s T-JET series. First in the line up will be a 1.4 liter turbocharged gasoline engine. This engine could be tuned to produce power outputs ranging from equivalent to a normally aspirated 1.6 or even up to a normally aspirated 2.0 liter unit, just like Volkswagen has its 1.4 liter TSI in three stages of tune with two different types of forced induction systems. The 1.4 liter turbocharged GM engine is currently destined for American small cars, but it could slowly find its way into the engine bays of GM’s other cars too, like the Chevrolet Aveo and the Chevrolet Optra sold in Malaysia.

Source

The new Toyota Rush has been launched in Malaysia and UMW Toyota showrooms will start taking bookings from today onwards. Read more about the new 7-seater fully imported 4X2 Toyota Rush 1.5 liter SUV after the jump.

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Mitsubishi has revealed some details of the new 5-door hatchback that will be displayed at the 2008 Geneva Motor Show in March this year.

The car is called the Mitsubishi Prototype-S and is naturally based on the new Lancer family. Mechanical specifications include a 2.0 liter inline-4 DOHC MIVEC turbocharged engine putting out 240 PS and 343Nm of torque. This is mated to a Twin Clutch SST automated manual transmission that puts power to all four wheels via a full-time 4WD driveline which features Mitsubishi Motors’ Active Center Differential (ACD).

Active Center Differential (ACD) uses an electronically controlled multi-plate hydraulic clutch to optimally vary the front-rear torque split to different driving conditions and deliver the best balance between steering response and traction.

Related Posts:
Mitsubishi Lancer Sportback Sketch

The latest car spotted at JPJ Putrajaya is the Volkswagen Eos, essentially a two-door convertible version of the Volkswagen Golf Mk5.

No indicative launch date so far, but it’s interesting to note that the Volkswagen Eos was so popular in Canada that Volkswagen Canada decided to cancel its introductory campaign because it did not make any financial sense to go ahead with it anymore.

Even before any form of advertising was put up, the Volkswagen Eos had begun to disappear from dealer lots around the country. All of the 2007s stock had nearly sold out from pure word of mouth alone.

Related Posts:
Volkswagen Canada experiences the power of word of mouth
Volkswagen Eos Cabriolet - Details, Photos

Click here to read the rest of Volkswagen Eos spotted in Putrajaya

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The 2008 What Car? Car of the Year award goes to the sexy new Jaguar XF, which also clinched the Best Executive Car title, beating its competitors the 5-Series and the CLS-Class. It is with a choice of engines – 3.0 litre V6; 2.7 litre twin-turbocharged V6 diesel; 4.2 litre V8; and finally a 4.2 litre supercharged V8.

“For us, the XF goes straight in there with the very best cars from Jaguars past. And given that the car market today is more competitive than its ever been, its fair to say the XF is the best car Jaguar has ever built. The XF really does have it all – a sensational exterior and dramatic interior combined with a drive that will delight and pamper in equal measure. On top of that, it stacks up as a sensible buying and owning proposition, too,” said Steve Fowler, group editor of What Car.

The new XF indeed marks a new milestone in the history of Jaguar. Will SISMA Auto bring it in sometime soon to join the Lexus GS in giving the 5-Series and the E-Class a run for their money?

UPDATE: SISMA Auto is already taking bookings for the XF, and although no booking numbers were given, it is expectedly “selling like hotcakes”. No confirmed prices as there is the issue of duties and etc that are not finalised yet, but the price will be below RM500,000 for the 3.0 V6 model. The 4.2L V8 will also be offered but pricing is unknown for that one at the moment. Delivery is on a first come first serve basis and the first batch will arrive in March 2008. Once the first batch arrives, 3 will go to SISMA Auto’s showrooms - one to each showroom. Then customers will be able to test drive it.

Related Posts:
Jaguar XF wins 2007 Autocar Design Award
New Jaguar XF Details and Photos

The UK’s Automobile Association is calling for the introduction of speed cameras that detect average speeds in residential areas to replace speed bumps.

“Humps are a crude, uncomfortable and noisy way of slowing people down and this research has shown they are also environmentally damaging. We accept that traffic speed needs to be controlled in residential areas where there is a problem with accidents and children are playing. We think motorists are more likely to accept average speed cameras than humps,” says Edmung King, the AA’s president.

According to the AA, a car that achieves 20.58km per liter travelling at a steady 48km/h will deliver only 11km per liter when going over humps. An independent engineer who used a fuel flow meter to test the fuel consumption of a small car and a medium-sized car at the Millbrook Proving Ground in Bedfordshire.

My housing area has an insane amount of illegal speed bumps and they do nothing more than damage vehicles and give drivers nasty jolts. The roads in Cheras remain some of the worse I’ve seen and they wear out car suspensions prematurely.

Source, Source 2 (read Source 2 for more interesting facts)

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The new facelifted Lexus GS300 is already on sale in Malaysia, right after the facelift was unveiled at the 2008 Detroit Motor Show just earlier this month.

What’s obvious is the exterior changes and the minor interior change (button relocations, etc) as previously highlighted in the facelift announcement blog post, so I will highlight some other technical enhancements in this blog.

• Increase in steering rigidity for improved direct road feel.
• Improved front suspension bushings for comfort and road holding.
• Underbody reinforcement for increased body response to steering input.
• Underbody aerodynamics improved for more stabler highs peed driving.
• 330W 14-speaker Mark Levinson Premium Surround System with in-dash 6-CD DVD player now has aux input for your iPod and other music players.
• Vehicle Dynamics Integrated Management which uses input from various sensors to anticipate an impending vehicle instability such as a skid, and uses a combination of brakes, throttle and steering control to avoid a mishap.

Another interesting change is that the dashboard fonts have been changed to a new standard Lexus font. This is for branding and a “family feel”, which is important as Lexus establishes its identity in a market filled with luxury automakers that have very long histories and heritage.

Lexus has sold a total of 83 units of the Lexus GS300 last year. The new 2008 facelifted Lexus GS300 costs RM408,800.00, OTR without insurance.

More photos after the jump.

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The 2008 Cadillac BLS Wagon is the first ever Cadillac Wagon, and its on sale in UK now priced from £21,495.

“Launching the first-ever Wagon in Cadillacs history gave us the opportunity to revise the 2008 BLS Saloon model line-up to enhance our presence in the premium UK market. We looked again at what the current UK market and consumers would expect from a Cadillac and then added all the equipment to match those expectations – as standard. This enabled us to rationalise the specification levels from three down to just one. We wanted to make the BLS line-up simple for us to communicate and for customers to understand,” said Jonathan Nash, Direct in Charge of Cadillac UK.

There are six engine choices which range between 150 PS to 255 PS, including a new 180 PS turbodiesel engine and a 200 PS Flexpower bio-ethanol engine.

Two more photos after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2008 Cadillac BLS Wagon