Archive for Cars

Of all the GEMA manufacturers, the Hyundai-Kia Group has been setting the best track record in terms of extracting the most power and torque out of their engines. The current generation Sonata and Optima’s 2.0 liter GEMA engine (Hyundai calls them Theta, Mitsubishi calls them 4B11, etc) currently makes around 158 PS to 163 PS, which is probably one of the best in class when you’re talking about a regular engine with only variable valve timing and conventional port injection. The new “Passat CC-ish” Hyundai Sonata’s 2.0 liter Theta II engine makes even more power, now rated at 165 PS at 6,200rpm and 198Nm of torque at 4,600rpm.

Hyundai is now taking the bar higher with the 2.4 liter engine option for the new Sonata. The 2.4 liter Theta II with variable valve timing on both the intake and exhaust now gains GDI gasoline direct injection and as a result, can produce 201 PS at 6,300rpm and 250Nm of torque at 4,250rpm. That’s some very good torque figures for a 2.4 liter engine.

Thanks to the lean burn precision that direct injection affords, compression ratio has been increased to 11.3:1. The engine also comes with a three-stake variable induction system. The variable valve timing system has also been improved, with a new drive system designed for silent operation and better durability. The block has also been reinforced, with improvements to the crank and piston design as well. For example, the piston now has a cooling jet under the piston crowd to get more oil onto the piston walls, helping reduce friction and improve economy/power.

Hyundai says conventional port fuel injection is limited in the sense that as the engine spins faster in terms of RPM, valve opening and closing times get shorter and shorter, reducing the time available for the injectors to injet fuel. A DI injector positioned inside the combustion chamber can inject fuel at pressures at up to 150 bar faster. The fuel travel path is also shorter and more direct, thus more control is available over the combustion process.

The Hyundai GDI system does injection in two phases. The first phase is called the pilot injection and ignition, which triggers the piston’s downward stroke. Then during the piston’s descent more fuel is injected and ignited. Hyundai claims this split-injection technique reduces load on the catalytic converter and helps reduce emissions. Optimal operating temperature for the cat is also achieve faster, which means better cold start emissions, a figure which Hyundai claims have improved by 25 percent.

The new 2.4 liter Theta II GDI engine will be available in the new Hyundai Sonata along with the high-powered 2.0 liter engine. No news yet when Sime Darby is bringing the new Sonata into Malaysia, but perhaps it might change people’s perception of Korean D-segment vehicles. Hyundai has also unveiled a 2.0 liter GDI Turbo engine before this.

Geely already has some grand plans for Volvo when it finally takes over the Swedish brand known for safety. It’s a twist of irony for many as Chinese car companies are rather infamous for their iffy crash safety, thanks to the widespread publicity of how badly their dirty cheap models perform in crashes.

A new Volvo factory in China built by Geely will churn out about 300,000 cars per year for the Chinese market, while other Volvo factories around the world will help bring up the total annual output to a whopping 1 million cars! Yes, you can produce all you want but will you be able to sell all the cars you produce? Apparently this is their aim, to sell a million cars a year by 2013, up from 458,323 they recorded in 2008. That’s an increase of about double.

Our very own Volvo assembly plant in Malaysia produces the S40, V50 and the 2.5T variant of the S80 for the local market. The Malaysian plant exports the S40 and the V50 for sale in Thailand. Hopefully Volvo is being rewarded in terms of various incentives appropriately by our government, otherwise there’s just no point for manufacturers to come in and do anything here if the case studies all go wrong.

The other thing that’s bugging people is of course the possibility of Volvo just going down the drain after Chinese ownership. That seems to be what happened to Ssangyong, look where it is now post-SAIC ownership? On the verge of bankruptcy, recovery plan rejected by creditors, and there is even a lawsuit going on now involving Ssangyong hybrid technology being leaked and transferred illegally to SAIC.

Despite Ssangyong being owned by SAIC, as the Ssangyong hybrid tech was developed using some Korean state grants, the tech is registered as state-owned in Korea and cannot be shared without government approval.

Will something similiar happen to Volvo? Will it be siphoned dry and then left to rot, or does Geely have an actual plan to bring Volvo to new heights? A Geely spokesperson today assured that Volvo would be keeping the rights to its technologies but did say Geely would get the right to use those technologies.

The Proton R3 Malaysia Rally Team’s Satria Neo Super 2000 was making decent progress at the Rally of China last weekend when it had the unfortune of a damaged suspension, forcing the team to retire half-way through the 2nd leg during the 13th stage. They managed to finish 4th overall in the first leg. Interestingly according to Proton over half the field of competitors had to retire due to similiar problems.

With the China Rally over and done with, Alister McRae and the Proton Satria Neo Super 2000 will continue on to the McRae homeland of Scotland, which Alister is really looking forward to. Look after the jump for some shots from the rally.

Click here to read the rest of Proton Satria Neo Super 2000 off to Scotland!

BAIC (Beijing Automotive) has unveiled in China its first self-developed electric car, the BE701. The BE701 was built by BAIC’s Beijing New Energy Automotive subsidiary.

Claimed specifications for the car so far looks pretty decent – a 200km range on a full charge, 0 to 100km/h in 15 seconds, and a top speed of 160km/h, which are quite acceptable figures for a car. Maybe not for a car that looks as grand as the BE701 but anyone could live with those sort of specifications.

The 200km range will of course keep it as a city solely for city use, but it will be more than enough for a day’s use before getting to a charge point for an overnight charge.

Beijing Automotive also announced a new clean energy vehicle development and manufacturing facility which it built for 2.28 billion yuan (RM1.13 billion). The facility will be able to churn out 50,000 EVs and 100,000 hybrid models annually.

A reader sent in these shots of the new Mercedes-Benz E-Class Sedan and E-Class Coupe at a private preview at Carcosa Seri Negara sometime earlier this month. Mercedes-Benz Malaysia has already taken up teaser press ads in the newspapers with the tag line “Engineered around you” for the launch.

The base model for the E-Class and undoubtedly probably the most popular one in terms of sales will be the E 200 CGI, which will be powered by Mercedes-Benz’s new turbocharged direct injection engine. We’ve been waiting for this engine a long time, so the the old 1.8 liter Kompressor can be sent into retirement.

Look after the jump for a full photo gallery of the cars.

Click here to read the rest of New E-Class Sedan and Coupe at Carcosa

We should have known this would happen. McLaren and Mercedes-Benz had begun slowly severing their ties, and you can see that from the introduction of the new SLS AMG and the McLaren MP4-12C. And now Mercedes-Benz’s purchase of the Brawn GP team (whom they were supplying engines to this season) will probably mean they could end their partnership with McLaren next season.

The ex-Honda Brawn GP team made history by getting both driver and constructor titles in its maiden race season. The team will now be called Mercedes GP. Mercedes-Benz has taken up a 75.1% stake in the team, while the remaining continues to be held by Ross Brawn and Nick Fry, who will remain as team principal and CEO respectively.

This will be the first time that Mercedes-Benz will have its own team since 1955. They will continue supplying engines to the McLaren team at least until the end of 2015, but I’m not too sure about having their name there. Mercedes currently owns 40% of the McLaren F1 team but McLaren will reacquire it over the next 2 years.

According to the Germans, Mercedes-Benz’s decision to increase their level of F1 involvement was thanks to recent agreements on budget cuts and the higher income share given to teams thanks to a new Concorde Agreement earlier this year.

Click for enlarged image

This is the Bufori BMS R1, a FIA GT3 specification car brought together by the people at Axle Motorsport and Bufori’s Bufori Motor Sport (BMS) division in just 9 and a half weeks. Such a short notice is actually quite crazy to be able to do something like this. The big team above actually includes some ex-Formula 1 engineers so it was an excellent opportunity for locals to work together with real pros and hopefully gain some knowledge.

Why the rush, we asked. Axle boss Alex Yoong’s answer was simple – the Macau Grand Prix is probably the best place to showcase the car in action, so it was that or nothing. It’s the last race of the season, and the whole world will be watching this particular race because usually champions will be determined at a final race. It’s the best opportunity for the team and its car to get maximum international exposure and attention.

Apparently despite having our own F1 track, Malaysian motorsports isn’t thriving due to a lack of funds to go around so you really need to have a strong proposition to make before you can secure decent sponsorship for R&D and etc. They had something that needed to be proven and there’s really no better proof than action and results.

Bufori had actually already begun development of the Bufori CS before the decision was made to produce the R1 race car based on the CS road car. Before that, Bufori had also contacted Axle to talk about things. Bufori wanted a race program to get its name out there and to them Axle was probably one of the best people to manage their racing activities for them.

The race program will benefit the development of the CS road car in some ways other than promotion for the car. Some knowledge gained from racing will be able to be transferred to the road car development, especially in terms of making it handle better, etc. The car is left hand drive and is based built on a steel space frame with an aluminium honeycomb safety cell.

As for the engine, I got the answer I wanted at the media preview of the car – the Bufori CS and the R1 will use a turbocharged version of the 2.0 liter GEMA engine. The race car actually uses a GEMA engine supplied from Mitsubishi. It’s basically the 4B11T from the Lancer Evolution X, mounted longitudinally and mated to a 6-speed Quaife transmission driving the rear wheels. The engine is managed by a Motec ECU and Motec engineers were in Malaysia to help calibrate and configure the computers and sensors. We don’t know for sure how much power the engine is making now as the engine has never been dyno tested, but the engineers are estimating over 400 horsepower, which is plenty in a 900kg car.

The road car will use the same GEMA engines but supplied by Hyundai instead. This is a continuation of the engine supply contract Bufori currently has with Hyundai – the La Joya uses Hyundai’s 2.7 liter V6. In Hyundai terminology they are called Theta engines and the unit will probably be derived from the 2.0 liter turbo Theta engine installed in the Hyundai Genesis Coupe, driving the rear wheels as well.

There will of course be some other differences between the road car and the race car. For one, the race car’s aluminium honeycomb safety cell will probably not make it into the road car as it is too expensive. The engine will also be mounted further up front instead of being right in the middle and pretty much almost right next to the driver. But the carbon fiber and kevlar (vacuum packed method for the R1) composite body will be retained, as this is what Bufori uses to build all its cars.

Hopefully the car will do reasonably well at the Macau GP. I’m hoping for some good results but anything could happen given that this is pretty much a very untested car. Bufori and Axle claims the project is entirely self-funded but as you can see there are sponsor logos on the car. However judging by the sizes of the logos the money won’t be able to cover much.

UPDATE: Video added!

Look after the jump for more photos of the Bufori R1 race car.

Click here to read the rest of Bufori BMS R1: race version of the Bufori CS

According to Deputy Finance Minister Datuk Chor Chee Heung, the new fuel subsidy management system will be implemented from May 2010 onwards, so I suggest everyone be prepared to restructure your household’s monthly budgets for a potential increase in fuel expenditure, especially if you are a middle income earner, a group that like its namesake are constantly squeezed around the world.

The system is currently being finetuned and studies on the subsidy distribution and target groups are currently still underway. The system’s exact mechanism will be announced after the study is completed and a decision has been made.

The PM had previously announce in his Budget 2010 speech that the system would use our MyKad identification card.

Bufori is a company based in Malaysia and so far they’ve been making hand crafted cars inspired by old classic 1930s designs, kinda like what Mitsuoka, except Mitsuoka modifies Nissan cars. They were founded in 1986 and was initially based in Australia but they relocated to Malaysia in the mid 90s.

This is Bufori’s latest project, the Bufori CS, which stands for Compact Sports. It’s very different from the regular 1930s cars that you get. It’s meant to be a sports 2 door coupe, powered by a 2.0 liter turbocharged inline-4 engine at the front. I’m very curious where this engine is sourced from and I believe I will get more answers on the technical details of the car at a test session that I’m going to at 3pm later today.

The Bufori CS is built on a space frame chassis wrapped with a monocoque body made of reinforced Carbon Fiber and Kevlar. The suspension design uses unequal upper and lower arm for the front and rear and fully adjustable coil-over shocks. It will be launched in the first half of 2010 and more details will be unveiled before the end of 2009.

But here’s the most interesting part – a race version of the Bufori CS will be entered in the 56th Macau Grand Prix this month. The race car is called the Bufori BMS R1 and will be entered by the new BMS AXLE RACING team, a JV between Bufori Motorsports and Axle Motorsport. Axle is a familiar name – Alex Yoong is the man behind it. The race car was developed in under 10 weeks and complies with FIA GT3 specs.

Wanna know how much you’ll have to fork out for a Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG if you’re in Europe? The car itself is sold at 149,000 Euros but you’ll actually have to pay an additional 19% VAT which brings the price up to 177,310 Euros. That’s about RM 892k, excluding the kind of crazy taxes you’ll have to pay to bring such a vehicle into Malaysia.

I’m not sure if Mercedes-Benz Malaysia will be bringing in and supporting this car but you can pretty much get anything at Naza Auto Mall if you have sufficient bank balance for it.

But here’s the thing, even at that astronomical price and with the SLS AMG being a single model car, you won’t be getting the best and most expensive SLS AMG out there. There is a whole list of expensive options that you can add to the car, including some ridiculously expensive ones like a carbon fiber engine cover going for over 4000 Euros, which makes it over RM20k. That’s nearly the price of a basic Perodua Viva here in Malaysia.

• AMG ceramic composite high-performance braking system: €9500 net/ €11,305 gross
• AMG performance suspension with a stiffer setup for optimum lateral dynamics: €1200 net/€1428 gross
• AMG light-alloy wheels in a 5-twin-spoke design, size 9.5 x 19 inches (front) and 11.0 x 20 inches (rear), tyre sizes 265/35 R 19 (front) and 295/30 R 20 (rear): €950 net/€1130.50 gross
• AMG forged wheels in a 10-spoke design, size 9.5 x 19 inches (front) and 11.0 x 20 inches (rear), with tyre size 265/35 R 19 (front) and 295/30 R 20 (rear): €2000 net/€2380 gross
• AMG performance steering wheel in leather/Alcantara: €400 net/€476 gross
• AMG sports bucket seats: €3300 net/€3927 gross
• AMG carbon-fibre engine compartment cover: €4000 net/€4760 gross
• “AMG alubeam silver” paint finish: €10,000 net/€11,900 gross
• “AMG monza grey magno” paint finish: €3250 net/€3867.50 gross
• AMG carbon-fibre trim (front stowage tray and rear stowage compartment including lid, AMG DRIVE UNIT surround, surrounds for the centre console, shiftgate and rear, trim strips for centre console and door armrests): €3500 net/€4165 gross
• AMG interior carbon package (carbon-fibre trim, trim on seat backrests and sides, door sill panels): €3500 net/€4165 gross
• Leather nappa exclusive single-/two-tone: €2500 net/€2975 gross
• Memory package with electric seat and steering column adjustment, as well as four-way lumbar support: €1225 net/€1457.75 gross
• 6-disc DVD changer: €660 net/€785.40 gross
• Bang & Olufsen BeoSound AMG surround sound system: €5900 net/ €7021 gross

The SLS AMG is an AMG car – there is no non-AMG ‘basic’ version out there and it’s supposed to be a halo flagship model. I understand if you have to pay a little more for in-car entertainment upgrades like the B&O system or the DVD changer but I’m wondering why things like an “AMG performance steering wheel” has to be a 400 Euro option.

I’m assuming its an upgrade from a standard steering but does that mean what you get as a standard steering is “non-AMG” or “non-performance”?