Archive for Cars

This is some interesting news, but I think it sparks up even more questions about the reliability and longevity of CVT transmissions compared to conventional slushbox automatics. Nissan USA have decided to extend its CVT transmission warranty from the existing 5 years or 60,000 miles to a total of 10 years or 120,000 miles, whichever comes first. That’s effectively doubling the length of the warranty.

The best part is for those who have already had problems with their CVT transmission and incurred some costly repairs after their initial 5 years warranty period expired, Nissan will be reimbursing the repair money paid. They will even reimburse you if you have sold your CVT-equipped Nissan car but have paid money for CVT transmission repairs in the past! You do not need to do anything to have your warranty extended but if you have a claim to make, you must do so before 31 July 2010.

Of course this is only for Nissan USA customers. I’ve shot an email to Edaran Tan Chong Motor to find out exactly what their warranty coverage for their CVT transmission is. ETCM currently sells two models with CVT transmissions – the Murano and the Sylphy.

The Honda Jazz and the Honda City used to be available with CVT but not anymore. Another common car with a CVT here in Malaysia is the Mitsubishi Lancer. The Audi A4’s 1.8 liter TFSI and the Mercedes-Benz A-Class and B-Class engines are also mated to CVT transmissions.

READ: Full announcement on CVT warranty program by Nissan

Singapore will be the first country in the world to get its very own BMW M showroom. I believe this is something necessary in Singapore as there a high interest in high-performance cars there. Just look at the amount of Audi R8 and Maserati Granturismos going up and down Orchard road.

A dedicated M showroom is probably necessary to pull the rich dude that has a Granturismo kind of price tag in his car buying consideration and doesn’t want to rub shoulders with ‘lowly’ 320i and 520i buyers.

The BMW M showroom will be located at the Teban Gardens Crescent in Jurong East New Town. Alfa Romeo also has a showroom there. The showroom will be set up by Munich Automobiles Pte Ltd, a JV between Prestige Cars and Sime Darby. Sime Darby also owns Performance Motors Ltd, the company which distributes BMW cars and motorcycles in Singapore. Interestingly MINI is not distributed by PML, but falls under Trans-Eurokars who distributes Saab, Opel and Rolls-Royce.

The M showroom will sell the full range of M cars including the BMW M3, BMW M5, BMW M6, BMW X5M, and BMW X6M. It will also sell M accessories.

Volkswagen has announced that its South African plant will be a global production center of the new Volkswagen Polo. The plant near Port Elizabeth will be exporting the Polo to various countries including UK, Ireland, Australia, Singapore and even Malaysia. Although Volkswagen Malaysia hasn’t said anything about the introduction of the new Polo yet, this announcement means we will be getting the new Polo in early 2010. Three versions of the previous generation Polo were sold in Malaysia – the regular Polo, the CrossPolo and the turbocharged Polo GTI.

The Porsche 911 GT3 Cup S has been replaced by this new model – the Porsche 911 GT3 R, adding yet another variant to the neverending list of different 911 GT3 models. No matter what kind of 911-beating laptimes Nissan posts with its GT-R, the choice of plenty of small racing teams most of the time is the 911 GT3.

The GT3 R’s 6 cylinder boxer engine has a displacement of 4.0 liters, up from the 3.8 liters you get with the road cars or the Cup model. This same engine size is also found in the 2009 GT3 RSR. The 0.2 liters of extra displacement has been achieved by increasing the cylinder stroke to 80.4mm instead of 76.4mm.

The engine is mated to a 6-speed sequential dog-teeth gearbox. Dog-boxes use gears that are straight-cut instead of the helical-cut gears that we have in our normal road car manual transmissions. Because of the different way the gears engage, a dog-teeth gearbox is much more noisy (that whirring sound that we get when we travel in reverse gear – they have it all the time!), and they also don’t have synchro rings so you basically just slam it with greater force into engagement instead of having to clutch at changes. A dog box has less transmission losses compared to a helical gearbox and is more durable.

Porsche’s focus with this new model is better drivability and easier handling. The GT3 and its race-going variants have always been hardcore cars but this car has ABS, traction control and a throttle blip function built into its e-gas throttle body. These features make it more suitable for an ambitious amateur racer (with deep pockets – the car is 279,000 Euros) to drive the car.

When I first read Honda’s most recent press release for the 2009 Los Angeles Autoshow, I thought they were pulling off a very belated April Fool’s joke, judging from the car’s funny name. They’re going to show a car called the Honda P-NUT.

P-NUT stands for Personal-Neo Urban Transport and it is supposed to be a design concept for a futuristic ultra-compact and aggressive-looking coupe. That is what they describe it as, but we’ll have to see what the car actually looks like to see what the boys at LA-based Honda R&D Americas Advanced Design Studio have cooked up.

Last year’s LA show concept was the Honda FC Sport design study, which also so happened to be a two-door coupe of sorts, and as hinted by its name was powered by a fuel cell stack.

The new Hyundai-Kia Motor Group Theta II GDI engine you saw earlier this week will be making its way into Kias as early as the first half of 2010 in South Korea. It will then make its way into UK models in 2011 and probably then the rest of the world.

We don’t get many normally aspirated gasoline direct injection engines here in Malaysia. So far only a handful of cars have featured non-turbo FSI engines here in Malaysia, such as the 2.2 liter JTS engines in the Alfa Romeo range here including the 159, and the Volkswagen Jetta 2.0 FSI.

BMW has stayed away from bringing in the new direct injection N53 engines and have stuck to the sweeter-sounding port injection N52 engines. Even for the 4-pots, it is the reason why our 320i still puts out only 156hp instead of the 170hp+ available overseas. Even the Lexus GS uses a conventional port injection engine instead of the D4 engine available overseas, however the LS has direct injection.

Most companies quote the issue of fuel quality when asked on why normally aspirated direct injection engines are not available here. The NAP Review says there will be a timeline formulated for the introduction of better petrol (and diesel) here in Malaysia so hopefully by that time it will be just right for GDI Hyundais and Kias to be introduced here in Malaysia.

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Trailerloads of the Perodua D46T MPV are on their way somewhere, and from the looks of the livery on the side of one of the exposed vehicles, it looks like they are promotional units, probably to be used as display units or test drive units. These shots are thanks to long-time reader KK Chen.

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The Perodua D46T MPV is based on the Toyota Passo Sette so if you absolutely need to know more about this new model to hit our local roads you can refer to my story on the Passo Sette, but for a more accurate picture of what we’ll get in our Perodua version you’ll have to wait for the full story after the launch next week on the 23rd of November 2009 at 5pm.

The UK government will be spending 30 million pounds (RM170 million) in a program called Plugged-In Places to add thousands of new electric vehicle and plug-in hybrid vehicle charging points around the country. On the overall, UK is spending 400 million pounds to encourage development and manufacturing of ultra-low carbon cars.

Local authorities, businesses, electricity distributors, suppliers and other organisations in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will be able to apply for the 30 million pounds in two phases. The applicants will need to show how their plans fit into objectives like improving air quality and encouraging the uptake of electric vehicles.

“The UK can be a world leader in electric and low carbon cars. Our aim is for electric and low carbon cars to be an everyday feature on UK roads in less than five years. There is still a lot of work to be done, however Plugged-In Places is one very significant step to a low carbon future,” said Transport Secretary Andrew Adonis.

The new Proton Exora Basic (also known as the B-Line) is Proton’s cheapest Exora variant, priced at only RM57,548.00 for the manual transmission solid white model for the Peninsular Malaysia. The following is the full price list:

It is available at all Edar and EON branches nationwide and the booking fee is RM500. Here’s a list of what has changed compared to the M-Line and H-Line:

• Manual transmission only
• Driver airbag only
• Seatbelt pretensioner for driver only
• Passenger airbag replaced with tissue box holder
• No front seat back pockets
• No grocery hook at the front passenger seat
• No aircond outlet for 2nd row, but 3rd row outlets remain
• Fabric flat knitting for the seats (M-Line uses fabric flat woven)
• Only 2 headrests for the second row
• No third row headrests
• No door trim inserts
• No assist grip for the third row
• No inner carpet deck box
• No luggage lamp
• No rear power socket
• Matte black finishing for gear knob, panel shift lever, door inner handle, center panel finishing, side mirror hosing finishing, exterior door handle, rear garnish
• No front grille garnish
• No front fog lamp
• 15 inch steel wheel with cover
• No reverse sensors
• No ABS and EBD

On another note, if you’ve ran out of ideas of a family activity this weekend, you can check out the “Proton 4 You” customer appreciation event held at all Proton Edar and EON outlets throughout Malaysia.

They’ve planned a variety of family-oriented programs at all outlets such as coloring contests, family quizzes and games wih prizes to be won. Proton will also throw in free personal assurance worth RM10,000 for all customers who book a Proton car on that weekend. There will also be Proton iCare teams at almost every outlet to perform free 20-point car inspections.

Hmm, it looks like Hyundai’s new ‘angry crab’ look on the Santa Fe does not apply to all markets. This shot of a UK market Santa Fe from the UK press kit shows a much simpler-looking front grille that shares the same look with the Hyundai i series of cars. It’s basically a similiar grille but the three bars have been painted black, and a chrome edge has been added on top. Under the hood is the new ‘R’ diesel engine which is a 2.2 liter all-aluminium block. It makes a very good 194 horsepower with 436Nm of torque when mated to an automatic transmission (slightly less torque with a manual).

Click here to read the rest of UK market Hyundai Santa Fe facelift announced