Archive for 2006 Paris Motor Show

Volvo exhibited the Volvo C30 SportsCoupe at the 2006 Paris Motor Show. The Volvo C30 will be available in 5 trim levels – the S, SE, SE Sport and SE Lux. This set of photos show the Volvo C30 in SE Sport trim level, which includes 18 inch alloy wheels and a full bodykit with the body painted in a two tone finish.

More photos after the jump, courtesy of Volvo Media. Click here for more details and specifications related to the Volvo C30 SportsCoupe.

Click here to read the rest of 2006 Paris Motor Show Gallery: Volvo C30 SE Sport

This little oddball spotted at the 2006 Paris Motor Show is the Tang Hua Xiao Ya, looking quite sesat in the middle of all the other displays. It’s booth doesn’t even have any banners of any form, only a little oriental-style umbrella next to it, and a small dalmation toy in the car.

The little Tang Hua Xiao Ya is actually an electric car made in China, and features a 7 hour charge time, a 45 km/h top speed in normal mode which can be boosted to 64km/h in performance mode. It’s cheap though, at around US$5,000.

This must be what the old woman who lives in a shoe drives – a yellow shoe-mobile. One more photo after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2006 Paris Motor Show Gallery: Shoemobile

Here are more photos of the Audi R8, straight from the 2006 Paris Motor Show, thanks to paultan.org correspondent Ben Corley. As with the previous post with details of the 2007 Audi R8, click each photo for an enlarged version. For all the photos, check out the full post after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2006 Paris Motor Show Gallery: Audi R8

Toyota has revaled the new flagship Toyota Yaris model called the Toyota Yaris TS at the 2006 Paris Motor Show. The new Toyota Yaris TS is powered by Toyota’s new flagship Dual VVT-i 1.8 liter engine which makes 130bhp at 6,000rpm and max torque of 173Nm at 4,400rpm, compared to the Yaris 1.5 liter’s 109hp at 6,000rpm and 142Nm of torque at 4,200rpm. With the new Dual VVT-i engine, Valve timing is adjusted on both intake and exhaust valves. This engine is mated to a 5-speed manual gearbox. The little hatch goes from 0-100km/h in 9.3 seconds.

Other enhancements to the Toyota Yaris TS over the base model include suspension improvements – the front suspension has been reinforced, gains a thicker anti-roll bar and a linking rod has been introduced between the rear suspension members. The ride is also lowered by 8mm.

Other than ride height, further external differences include a new black mesh grille with a TS badge, darkened headlamps, a deeper bumper with integrated foglights, a new rear bumper with integrated exhaust tailpipes and fog lights, as well as new LED rear lamp clusters. Look from the side and you will see nice 17 inch alloy wheels that fill up the wheel arches as well as deep side skirts. There is also a roof spoiler for the rear.

Both three-door and five-door versions of the Toyota Yaris TS will be on sale from February 2007. More photos after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2007 Toyota Yaris TS 1.8 Dual VVT-i

After a few artist’s impressions mostly from Japanese auto magazines, Toyota has revealed to the world the Toyota Auris space concept, which will be the base design for the future Toyota Auris hatchback, the replacement for the Toyota Corolla hatchback in the European market.

“The Auris space concept is tall and spacious. The high waistline, short overhangs and forward balance of the cabin architecture ensure it retains a sense of dynamism and agility, a quality we call perfect imbalance,” says Wahei Hirai, Toyota Global Design Managing Officer, explaining the rationale behind Toyota’s latest interpretation of it’s Vibrant Clarity design philosophy.

The Toyota Auris space concept is equipped with a panoramic glass roof, which helps increase the overall feel of interior space and lighting. The Latin word for gold is Aurum, which is similiar to the Auris name, hence the new Toyota Auris space concept is painted in gold.

More photos after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of Toyota Auris Space Concept

Audi launched three new engines at the 2006 Paris Motor Show – one being a new 2.8 liter V6 FSI engine with Audi’s new valvelift system, a new 1.8 liter Turbo FSI engine and a new more powerful variant of the venerable 2.0 liter Turbo FSI engine that will find it’s way into the new Audi S3 hot hatch.

The new 2.8 liter V6 FSI engine which will debut in the Audi A6 makes 210hp at 5,500rpm as well as a constant peak torque wave of 280Nm between 3,000rpm and 5,000rpm. The new engine is a shorter stroke version of it’s 3.2 liter big brother, 82.4mm instead of 92.8mm, and retains the same bore of 84.5mm, making it a slightly oversquare configuration. The engine uses an alloy crankcase which gives it a weight of only 165kg. Precise 100 bar pressure FSI direct injection allows a high compression ratio of 12.0:1.

New to the engine is Audi’s valvelift system which gives the engine two valve lift profiles on the intake cam. The higher cam profile opens valve through 11mm, while the other cam opens the intake valves at two different lifts – one at 5.7mm and the other at 2mm. This is deliberately done for a swirl and tumble flow effect for intake air. The transition between the two cam profiles is smoothened out via a combination of tricks like temporary retardation of ignition, adjustment of camshafts and closing of throttle valves.

A slightly different style of how an engine is built is shown in the form of the new 1.8 Turbo FSI engine. The new 1.8 TFSI engine has higher pressure six-hole injectors – up to 150 bar. A watercooled Borg Warner K03 turbocharger gives the 1.8 TFSI engine a good torque figure of 165Nm at just 1,000rpm, and this peaks at 250Nm slightly further up in the rev range at 1,500rpm – this figure stretches all the way up to 4,200rpm. Peak horsepower is 160hp from 5,000rpm to 6,200rpm. Compression ratio is lower than the 2.0 TFSI though, at only 9.6:1 compression.

The final engine is the new motor that goes into the Audi S3 hot hatch, an updated 2.0 TFSI with a higher power of 265bhp at 6,000rpm and a stronger peak torque of 320Nm constant up to 5,000rpm. To keep up with the stronger boost, the engine features pistons with stronger pins, stronger conrods and a reinforced cylinder block made of a new highly heat-resistant alloy.

Click here to read the rest of Audi debuts new 2.8 FSI V6, 1.8 TFSI and 2.0 TFSI

This is the third in the line of the new Kia cee’d based C-segment vehicles that Kia has in store for the European market. Following the 5-door hatch and the 3-door hatch variants, Kia will also introduce the 5-door Kia cee’d Sport Wagon at the 2006 Paris Motor Show later this month.

The Kia cee’d Sport Wagon is a station wagon that measures 4470 mm long, 1490 mm high, and has the same 650 mm wheelbase as it’s other two siblings, the Kia cee’d 5-door hatch and the Kia pro-cee’d sporty 3-door hatch.

Production is expected to start in mid-2007, and full sales across Europe is expected to begin in September 2007, following the 5-door hatch’s introduction in December 2006.

This is the Å koda Joyster Concept, Å koda’s vision for a new B-segment compact car that might make it into production as the new Å koda Fabia hatchback in the year 2007. The current Å koda Fabia is based on the Volkswagen Polo platform – watch out for a test drive report soon on the Fabia 1.4 hatch.

Skoda is a company that has pretty much filled up the market segment where Volkswagen used to be – as Volkswagen has moved up a notch in the market, no longer concentrating on making cheap basic cars that everyone can afford.

The Skoda Joyster Concept design study will be presented alongside other innovations from Å koda Auto at the Paris Motor Show on Thursday 28th September, 2006.

We’ve seen the Kia cee’d five-door hatchback, Kia’s C-segment competitor for the European market. Kia announced that soon after the 5-door hatch is launched, a station wagon version as well as a sporty 3-door version will be launched. This is the Kia pro_cee’d hatchback, to be shown at the Paris Motor Show later this month alongside it’s production 5-door cee’d brother.

The Kia pro_cee’d concept was developed by Kia’s team in Russelsheim under it’s design chief Gegory Guillaume. The concept comes in a colour Kia called Cashew – which is somewhat like a flat brown but with a small percentage of metal flakes to give it a little sparkle. The pro_cee’d has a roofline 25mm lower compared to the production 5-door cee’d, to give it a sportier image. Further enhancing it’s sporty image is the huge 19 inch wheels that fill up the wheel arches, wrapped with 265/30/R19 tyres.

More images after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of Kia pro_cee’d Concept at Paris

The Audi Q7 is built on a stretched version of the Touareg platform and has a new model in it’s line-up – the Audi Q7 6.0 liter V12 turbodiesel.

This massive oil burner is based on the Audi R10 Le Mans turbodiesel engine and makes a nice 500 horses and ONE THOUSAND newton meters of torque at a low 1,750rpm. Can you imagine that? 1000Nm at 1,750rpm? The Audi A4’s 280Nm at 1,800rpm was already impressive to me, I cannot possibly imagine how much push this engine has, and I would love to try it out one day. Simply COLOSSAL!

0 to 100km/h takes only 5.5 seconds, and top speed is electronically limited at 250km/h. The engine uses an advanced common rail direct injection system – a Bosch 29,000 psi pressure system which is a first in the world! Power delivery is channeled through a 6-speed slushbox that drives all four wheels – Audi’s trademark quattro system.

Click here to read the rest of Audi Q7 6.0 V12 TDI at Paris Motor Show