Archive for China

MidAmerican Energy Holdings, a unit of investor Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway announced it will be paying US$230 million for a 10% stake in Chinese automaker BYD Auto. BYD Auto (Build Your Dreams Auto) is said to be developing hybrid-electric cars set to be launched in China end-2008, and in Europe by 2010.

BYD Auto also plans to enter the US market. Its first two US-market cars are said to be the F3DM and the F6DM, both of which are going to support plug-in recharging. There will also be a fully electric F6e. Not sure how they’ll get past the copyright office though, as the F3 looks like a mash-up of the Toyota Corolla Altis, the Honda City and the Nissan Sentra (click to see the similiarities!)

Guangzhou Automobile will be developing a new large sedan using the platform of the Alfa Romeo 166, fully licensed and paid for of course.

The 166 has just been discontinued in spring last year, and rumours are that its replacement could return to a rear wheel drive format.

The 166 was a front engined front wheel drive car with double wishbones at the front and a multi-link setup at the rear. The Guangzhou Automobile car to be based on its platform will be styled by Bertone.

Honda in China is sold by two companies – Dongfeng Honda and Guangzhou Honda. In the C-segment market, the Honda Civic is sold by Dongfeng Honda, leaving Guangzhou Honda with no car to pitch against Dongfeng’s Civic and other C-segment competitors such as FAW Toyota’s Corolla.

The C-Segment market must be quite important as it warrants Guangzhou Honda taking this problem into its own hands, with the support from Honda Japan of course. Guangzhou Honda will be putting a 1.8 liter motor in the new Honda City and will be stretching it to more Civic-like proportions to pitch it against Honda’s own Honda Civic.

As with all other 1.8 liter latest generation Hondas, the 1.8 liter motor is likely to be from the new R-series SOHC i-VTEC family of engines. As it is based on the City, the new car will probably carry over its rear torsion beam design and other technical features such as the positioning of the fuel tank underneath the passenger cabin.

Chinese publications are currently calling it the CC (City+Civic), and according to a Guangzhou Honda engineer, it will not be called the City and will get a new name. The new car will be priced at roughly the same level as the Civic, currently sold in China for about 150,000 yuan (about RM75,150). It may even be marketed under Guangzhou Honda’s separate “Li Nian” marque.

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Chery’s B240 MPV has been relaunched in Malaysia as a locally assembled car and it is now called the Chery Eastar. The locally assembled Chery Eastar MPVs will roll out of Oriental Assembler Sdn Bhd’s plant in Johor, but a new CKD plant will be up and running in Pekan, Pahang by the end of 2009.

The Pekan plant will include an investment of over RM50 million in equipment and will begin assembly of up to 100,000 Chery vehicles a year, including 10 models such as hybrids, SUVs, MPVs and executive cars.

According to Chery Alado Sdn Bhd’s chairman Tan Sri Cam Soh Thiam Hong, more details on the plant will be announced in the next two months together with its joint venture partners which may include a GLC. “Malaysia is the largest passenger car market in ASEAN and also the important link for Chery to other ASEAN countries’ market. We currently have 7 other overseas factories in countries like Russia, Iran, Egypt and Argentina and are planning to accelerate more overseas factories in the coming 2 years,” said Chinese automaker Chery Automobile Co Ltd’s president Yin Tongyao.

Chery currently exports 120,000 vehicles yearly and plans to hit 400,000 vehicles by 2010. As it is, the Malaysian plant will export 30% of its Chery Eastar production to countries such as Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore and Australia. Local sales of the MPV is expected to be between 120 to 200 units monthly.

Under the hood of the 7-seater Chery Eastar MPV is a 2.4 liter SOHC Mitsubishi long-stroke engine producing a rather sedate 127 horsepower at 5,500rpm and 198Nm of torque at 3,000rpm. This is quite a conservatively-tuned basic engine (SOHC, 9:1 compression) which does not produce much power for its displacement but should be relatively easy on maintenance. It is mated to a 4-speed automatic transmission with manual shifting. The MPV measures 4662mm long, 1820mm wide and 1590mm tall with a long 2800mm wheelbase.

The new Chery Eastar is priced at RM79,888 for the standard version and RM86,888 for the high-spec version. The standard version includes LED rear lamps, side turn indicators on the wing mirrors, all-round disc brakes, a radio cassette player with 6 speakers, manual windows and 16 inch steel wheels while the premium version adds a CD player with MP3 support, steering wheel audio controls, ABS brakes, traction control, power windows for all four doors, dual SRS airbags for the front, and 16 inch alloy wheels. Further options include 18 inch alloy wheels and an NGV kit.

The high-spec version adds It comes with 1 year free service (for the first 1,000 units sold) and a 3+2 year warranty.

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Chinese automaker Chery and automotive components supplier Ricardo developed these hybrid versions of the Chery A5 as part of transportation arrangements for the Beijing Olympics. The 50-unit fleet comprise of two different types of A5s. One is a start-stop “hybrid” which is basically a regular 1.6 liter petrol engine with a 5-speed manual equipped with start-stop system called the Belt Starter-Generator (BSG).

The other is what we would normally consider a hybrid vehicle. A 1.3 liter petrol engine is combined with a crank-mounted 12kW 151 volt motor. The system was fully developed by Ricardo, using an integrated hybrid control unit comprising of motor drive electronics, DC to DC converter and a high-voltage battery pack positioned behind the rear seats with minimal intrusion into the luggage area.

Ricardo claims the 1.3 liter hybrid system provides similiar peak power and torque to a 1.6 liter benchmark engine, with a 15% improvement in fuel consumption over the benchmark. In addition, the start-stop system can restart the engine within 200ms.

More images after the jump.

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Only one photo of the Nice Ze-O has been released by electric car manufacturer Nice (No Internal Combustion Engine) so far, but we are able to have a preview of how it will look like by looking at the car it is based on, the Changhe Ideal II, a joint venture development between China’s Jiang Xi Changhe Automobile and Suzuki, Changhe’s partner in China.

The Changhe Ideal was designed by design firm Bertone and launched in 2003, and it received its current looks when it got a minor facelift in 2006. It comes with a choice of a 45hp 1.0, a 64hp 1.1, a 78hp 1.3 or a 90hp 1.4 liter engine but naturally these will be missing in the Nice engineered version as the Ze-O will be powered by an electric motor. The Ideal is sold outside China under various badges like Suzuki and Effa.

More photos of the car found after the jump, including of the interior.

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The first batch of 270 Chinese-made Brilliance BS6 sedans by Brilliance China Automotive Holdings have been shipped to Germany. The BS6 has undergone Euro NCAP crash tests and managed a score of 3 stars. The BS6 is the size of big D-segment cars like the 5-Series and the E-Class but will go head to head against cheaper rivals like the Hyundai Sonata. Under the hood is an ancient 2.4 liter inline-4 from Mitsubishi with only 130hp.

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A television ad that Lancia produced for its new Delta hatchback has angered China as it touched on the sensitive issue on Tibet’s attempts to gain independence from China.

The commercial shows actor Richard Gere driving the Lancia Delta in a Tibetan village where he makes a hand print in the snow with a young Tibetan monk. Richard Gere has been well known to speak out publicly against China’s Tibet policies. The ad ends with the message “The power to be different”… a hidden (or not so hidden) message about Tibet not wanting to be a part of China? Delta is also the symbol of “difference” in maths.

Fiat has issued an apology to the People’s Republic of China over an misinterpretations of its position of neutrality and said that the use of Richard Gere in the ad does not mean Fiat endorsed his political views, however a top Fiat official said the ad was “politically advanced” and since Lancia did not sell cars in China, it was free to comment on the whole Tibet-China issue.

Unfortunately Fiat does sells cars in China, albeit that is another hairy situation as it does not actually have any cars to sell now, still being in a transition period from its partnership with Nanjing to its new partnership with Chery.

View the “offending” ad after the jump.

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There is apparently a beauty pagent-like title in China for Miss Car Saleswoman of the year, and this year’s winner is a 21 year old young lady named Vivi, who works in a Dongfeng Citroen dealership. I think we may have found the key to increasing Proton sales in export markets… view more photos of Vivi after the jump.

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See rest of upcoming Chery MPV spyshots

Ever since initial sketches of the Proton MPV was revealed by Buletin Utama TV3, there have been readers who have noticed similarities with a disguised next generation Chery MPV that has been spotted and captured on camera in Europe. It’s only natural to start speculating. Let’s take it beyond speculation for abit shall we?

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