It all started when BMW decided to congratulate Audi when their Audi A3 won the South African Car of the Year 2006 back in May this year. As you can see from the ad image above, very cheeky. This makes Ford’s “thanks to our competitors for making us the best” advertisements here in Malaysia alot more tame. Audi decides to respond, have a look at their reply advertisement after the jump. Can anyone say “pwned?”
Apple Computer has teamed up with Ford Motor Co, General Motors and Mazda Motor Corp to offer easy iPod integration with their cars. While some manufacturers have begun offering AUX input so you can plug in external MP3 players and feed music into the audio system, this is not a complete solution as you cannot control the iPod from car controls such as buttons on the steering wheel.
Optimally, a complete integration solution will allow you to browse tracks from an LCD screen and skip tracks from steering wheel buttons. Recently, our local boys Race Rally Research have jumped onto the iPod bandwagon by offering an iPod Nano 1GB integrated with the car audio system with their new limited edition Proton Waja MME and Proton GEN.2 MME.
Subaru will be changing the all too familiar sedan shape of it’s rally-inspired Subaru Impreza car to a hatchback form when it’s next incarnation is introduced in 2008. We’ve kind of known this was going to happen when Subaru showed us the Subaru B5-TPH Concept at the 2005 Tokyo Motor Show.
Shown above is an artist’s impression from Road & Track on how the Impreza hatch could possibly look like. This move is in line with Subaru’s plan to position the new Impreza hatch against hot hatches like the Golf GTI, Golf R32/R36 and the Ford Focus. A preview of the final production vehicle will be shown next year at the 2007 Tokyo Motor Show. The car will come in both 3-door and 5-door models.
Engine options are expected to be a naturally aspirated 2.0 liter four-pot boxer producing 170 horsepower for the baseline model, and the WRX versions will have a turbocharged version under the hood. STi versions will have a higher performance turbocharged four-pot boxer producing over 300 horsepower.
There will also be four-pot boxer turbodiesel options, developed together with Toyota. Of course, the car will retain it’s trademark AWD drivetrain.
Toyota intends to drop the name Corolla when the next generation of the hatchback version of the car is unveiled in the UK. Toyota says the new model will be a radical change, so much that a name change is needed to reflect that. Toyota says it is hoping to repeat what Ford managed to achieve when it dropped the Escort badge for the new Focus name.
Honda had actually considered putting a new name on it’s European Honda Civic because of it’s radically different nature and having moved slightly more upmarket, but in the end they decided to stick with the Civic moniker.
We have some comments from Proton now regarding the Perdana Replacement Model project. Unfortunately, as expected we have to source this from foreign papers. This piece of news comes from the Australian paper the Herald Sun, reported by Bernama. Proton’s head for product planning and programme engineering Bob Hall commented to Australian journalists regarding the possible import of the Australian market Mitsubishi 380 as Proton’s flagship replacement for the aging Proton Perdana.
“The Perdana is so far past its use-by date. It’s (the Mitsubishi 380 Perdana Replacement Model study project) still alive. It’s a heavily-studied project.”
While the original plan was to bring the cars in fully imported as CBU models, this would push the prices of the Perdana Replacement Model far too high to be competitive. Proton now plans to import CKD kits and assemble it locally to save on non-ASEAN CBU import duties.
The report says Proton hopes to get the car with a 2.4 liter motor, which was also a concern of Mitsubishi’s due to rising petrol prices in Australia which are currently approaching A$1.50 (RM4.20) a litre. A 3.8 liter engine would be unfeasible for our local market, and a likely 2.4 liter candidate would be the 4G64 2.4 liter engine or the 4G69 (160hp, 212Nm) which is a derivative of the 4G64 with MIVEC variable valve timing as well as other enhancements found in the USDM Mitsubishi Galant.
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Proton Holdings Bhd is setting up a special unit to fully capitalise on it’s UK subsidiary Group Lotus, part of Group Lotus’ five-year turnaround plan. The unit, to be comprised of people from both Lotus and Proton is in it’s final planning stages.
Part of Group Lotus’ plan to turn around in 5 years include producing it’s own sports cars like the Elise and Exige, producing Lotus-branded versions of third party production cars like what they did with the Lotus Carlton as well as engineering consultancy. It needs all of these revenue streams to turn around. Lotus already has engine and chassis engineering deals with 4 Chinese car markers including Nanjing Automobile Corp which owns MG Rover. Lotus also has a deal to manufacture the Tesla Roadster, an electric sports car by American company Tesla Motors.
Lotus’ deal with Nanjing will help modernise MG’s range of cars, with the first fruit of the collaboration to be a new MG TF, with a MG ZT following up later in 2008. Besides that, MG Rover’s K-series motor will be upgraded to meet the latest European Union emission standards.
Geely will be introducing it’s Geely BL sports car into the European market soon, with a targetted launch date set sometime in 2008. It will be banking on low cost as one of the attraction points - anyone looking for a cheap sporty ride to buy the car but does not mind the fact that it only comes with either a 1.3 liter or a 1.5 liter engine. Transmission options are a 5-speed manual and a slushbox likely to be a 4-speed with overdrive. The car has discs at the front and drums at the rear, and the 1.3 and 1.5 liter 16-valve engines make 84 horsepower and 92 horsepower respectively, both at 6,000rpm. Torque output is 110Nm at 5,200rpm for the 1.3 and 128Nm at a lower 3,400rpm for the 1.5 liter. These engines push a 980kg car. Mostly all show and no go, but it doesn’t look terribly underpowered. Notice the classic Chinese design element - tiny wheels which barely fill up the wheel arches.
Geely has caused some amusement with it’s Geely Merie, a sedan that mimics the Mercedes Benz C-class. They are China’s largest privately-owned car manufacturer. The Geely Beauty Leopard (yes, that’s what BL means) sells for as low as US$7,500 (RM27,600) in China. The car will probably be rechristened for the European market as a car called something that sounds that silly probably will be a sales turnoff. This car falls into the tiny spoarts car segment, and I’m reminded of the old school Mazda Eunos and Toyota Sera. No confirmed prices yet, but we’ll know sometime closer to 2008.
The 2006 Kia Rio/Rio5 clinched the top position for the US market J.D. Power and Associates 2006 Initial Quality Study SM (IQS) in the sub-compact category. The Rio/Rio5 tied together with the Suzuki Aerio for the top position of the survey which measures 217 vehicle attributes over 8 categories including driving experience, engine and transmission as well as QC problems reported by buyers. The Kia Rio/Rio5 scored 137 problems per 100 vehicles, the same as the Suzuki Aerio.
Other winners of the award include the Lexus LS430 in the large premium car category, the Toyota Corolla in the compact car category, the Lexus SC430 for premium sporty car, the Mazda MX-5 Miata for compact sporty car, the Toyota Solara for midsize sporty car, the Porsche Cayman for compact premium sporty car, the Toyota Camry for midsize car, the Lexus IS250/350 for entry premium car, the Pontiac Grand prix for large car and the Lexus ES330 for midsize premium car. Looks like Toyota and it’s luxury brand Lexus managed to clinch top position in 7 out of the 11 categories in the car segment. Click here to read the rest of Kia Rio tops US compact car J.D. Power IQS
Italian marque Alfa Romeo is making a comeback to the US, starting with the limited edition Alfa Romeo 8c Competizione, a carbon fibre-built sports car based on a shortened version of the Maserati Coupe platform. Alfa Romeo has been missing from the USDM market since 1995, more than 10 years ago.
The Alfa Romeo 8c Competizione will be powered by a Maserati 4.2-liter V-8 engine producing over 400 horses. Joining the 8c Competizione coupe in 2009 will be a soft top version known as the 8C Spider. 250 of the cars will make their way to the US market, which is about half of the total limited edition production planned worldwide.
These cars will carry price tags of around US$200,000, and it is hoped that the cars will create a halo effect to reintroduce Alfa Romeo as a sporty marque in the US market, paving way for more volume production models in 2010. The volume production models are expected to be the Spider, Brera coupe and a lengthened 159 sedan to suit US market conditions. Alfa Romeo will leverage on the Maserati dealership network already established in the US - about 47 of them.
Porsche has filed patents indicate the company is developing a new seven-speed DSG gearbox for use in it’s sports cars range. The Volkswagen Group’s Direct Shift Gearbox or DSG is a manual gearbox with dual computer controlled clutches. And it shifts fast, real fast. This could either be a Porsche design or an adaptation of Volkswagen’s BorgWarner DSG, considering Porsche’s close connection with the Volkswagen Group. Also, it’s not known yet whether Porsche will be calling their system DSG or something else. Audi uses Volkswagen’s DSG but calls it S-Tronic. The DSG is also expected to end up in Lamborghinis soon.
Porsche currently has manual and Tiptronic automatic transmissions for it’s cars. The original plan was to introduce the new DSG in time for the latest 2007 Porsche 911 Turbo (model 997) launch but it didn’t happen. BTW, stay tuned for an article on the new 997 Porsche 911 Turbo which was launched in Malaysia by Auto Eurokars last Friday.
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