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Speculation: Mini roadsters from Mercedes and BMW to hit the market between 2011 and 2012?

February 23, 2009 at 11:04 am By Harvinder Sidhu Filed Under BMW, Cars, Mercedes Benz, Rumours

Rumors are circulating that both Mercedes Benz and BMW are planning to develop mini roadsters to taken on other similar-sized roadsters such as the Mazda MX 5 / Miata. Mercedes’ hot little convertible is said to be based on the platform from the 2011/2012 Mercedes A Class and B Class, and is expected to a feature front wheel drive setup, instead of a typical rear wheel drive arrangement.

According to Auto, Motor und Sport, the mini roadster from Stuttgart which could hit the market sometime in 2012 is also expected to feature design cues based on the Mercedes SLA project, which is an 8 year-old concept. Power plant wise, there may be at least four engine options to choose from, with a diesel unit being one of them. The roadster should also carry a fabric convertible top, instead of a more fashionable foldable hard top to save space.

Over at Munich, the BMW Z2 mini roadster is said to be based on the current BMW Z4 platform, and may hit the market a little earlier in 2011. The Z2 should retain the rear wheel drive setup and feature a 150hp 4 cylinder engine, while there may also be a range topping 300hp variant with twin turbochargers.

BMW will most probably also offer an electric powered model of the Z2, but there is no news if Mercedes will offer a similar emissions free version of its mini roadster. Mean while, you can expect the BMW Z Vision Concept to be previewed sometime towards end of the year which will showcase potential design cues for the baby Z4.

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Volkswagen America to demonstrate Passat-Lingyu fuel-cell vehicles at the California Fuel Cell Partnership

February 23, 2009 at 9:19 am By Harvinder Sidhu Filed Under Cars, Hybrids and Alternative Fuel, Volkswagen

Volkswagen’s American division has announced that it has shipped 16 Passat-Lingyu fuel cell cars over from China for a demonstration run at the California Fuel Cell Partnership event. These fuel cell cars with zero harmful emissions which are based on the VW Passat were jointly developed in China by a partnership between Volkswagen Shanghai, Volkswagen’s Research Group and the Tongji University.

With the hydrogen fuel cells located on the floor of the Passat, it is able to produce 55kW of power by simply converting hydrogen into water and electricity with the help of oxygen. The energy produced is then channeled to a 376 Volt lithium-ion battery pack. The Passat-Lingyu is able to reach a top speed of about 145 km/h, and is able to deliver 235 kilometers in terms of range will a full tank of fuel. These environment-friendly cars were first presented at the Olympic Games in China last year.

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2010 Mercedes Benz E-Class Coupe: videos for your enjoyment

February 23, 2009 at 8:52 am By Harvinder Sidhu Filed Under Cars, Mercedes Benz, Videos

Recently, Stuttgart-based auto maker; Mercedes Benz has revealed the 2010 Mercedes Benz E-Class Coupe, which goes on to replace the CLK Class. We now have two videos of the new E-Class for your viewing pleasure; first of which is a 1 minute 21 second-long high-res promotional film of the coupe while another is a 1 minute 47 second-long driving video of the range topping E500 which receives power from a V8 power plant that is able to churn 388hp and 530Nm of torque. The video also showcases the glorious exhaust note of all 8 cylinders working hard.
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Audi A5 and Audi S5 new photo gallery released!

February 23, 2009 at 4:30 am By Paul Tan Filed Under Audi, Cars

Audi S5 Cabriolet

The Audi A5 Cabriolet and Audi S5 Cabriolet have already been unveiled back in early December last year, but here’s a mega photo update with tons of photos of both standard and warm versions of the car. No word of the RS5 yet though, and it’s not confirmed yet if the RS5 will be available in a Cabriolet body, but since there was an RS4 Cabriolet I don’t see why.

The A5 comes with your usual bunch of Audi/Volkswagen Group engines such as the 2.0 TFSI inline-4, the 3.2 FSI V6 and your usual plethora of TDI diesel engines. The S5 gets something more exciting, the second newest engine to be introduced by Audi, a 3.0 litre supercharged V6 with 333 horsepower and 440Nm of torque mated to a 7-speed S-Tronic twin clutch transmission. The honour of the newest engine is of course the 2.5 litre inline-5 turbo set to debut with the TT-RS.

Check out the photo galleries and a video of the A5 Cab after the jump.
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Jaguar XF 3.0 V6 Test Drive Review

February 23, 2009 at 2:18 am By Paul Tan Filed Under Cars, Jaguar, Test Drive Reviews, Videos

Jaguar XF

Sometime in April last year we said goodbye to the Jaguar S-Type sold by SISMA Auto and welcomed the Jaguar XF. While the old S-Type was a modern reinterpretation of the old Jaguar Mark 2 design from the 1960s, the XF can be immediately identified as some kind of downsized Aston Martin Rapide of sorts. It was first shown to the world as the Jaguar C-XF, but like all concepts it was much more fiercer and racier especially at the front with those sleek and slim headlamps that somehow got translated into the fat ones you see here on the production version.

In Malaysia, the XF takes on German rivals such as the Mercedes-Benz E 280 and the BMW 530i, as well as the Japanese Lexus GS 300. At RM 488,888, it has a much higher price than its other rivals which retail at approximately RM 453,800, RM 438,888 and RM 419,444.20 respectively for the BMW, the Benz and the Lexus (some are with insurance some without). But is the XF worth the premium? Perhaps SISMA are pricing it against the CLS instead of the E-class segment.

Read our findings after the jump.
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Guangzhou Toyota launches facelifted Toyota Camry

February 22, 2009 at 9:38 pm By Paul Tan Filed Under Cars, China, International News, Toyota

Toyota Camry Facelift

Guangzhou Toyota, the Toyota JV company in China has revealed a facelifted Toyota Camry in China. Now considering China is big enough for their own development projects, for example the Hyundai Sonata has its very own Toyota-like look in China compared to the facelifted Sonata Transform that the rest o the world gets, we don’t know yet whether this will be the same Camry facelift that Asia will be getting, but it seems likely as it doesn’t seem to have any overly localised design cues and Toyota would most likely want to push as much shared development costs as possible in light of their recent expected first ever loss in many decades.

The new Toyota Camry facelift features a new front end with a “frowny” central air intake design as opposed to the smiley one on the current Camry. The new air intake is much wider and gives the rather tame front end of our Camry a more aggressive look. On the rear there is not much changes except the rear tail lamps seem to now stick out a little, I believe some of you call this the bug-eyed look, but if it’s at the rear what should it be called, bug-butted?

Look after the jump for more shots of the facelifted Camry.
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Audi TT-RS: inline-5 engine sound clip teaser!

February 22, 2009 at 3:10 pm By Paul Tan Filed Under Audi, Cars, International News

Audi TT-RS
Click for enlarged image

Wanna hear how Audi’s new turbocharged 2.5 litre inline-5 engine that’s set to be slotted into the Audi TT-RS sounds like? Audi has released a teaser sound clip of the TT-RS doing its thing, so you can have a listen using the embedded audio player below. Sounds much better than the inline-4 2.0 TFSI, which while is a fantastic engine, is still an inline-4 which by trait sounds a little boring, with the exception of Alfa Romeo’s TwinSpark inline-4s of course, not sure how they pull that off! After enjoying the sound clip, head on after the jump for a gallery of more released photos!
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Proton Exora 7-seater MPV interior details revealed!

February 22, 2009 at 2:30 am By Paul Tan Filed Under Cars, Local News, Malaysian Makes, Proton, Proton Exora - Proton MPV 2009

Proton Exora Interior
Click for enlarged image

Proton Edar’s Proton Exora teaser page reveals how the Exora’s seats and seating configuration looks like. The seats are in the typical three-row MPV 2-3-2 order for 7 seats, and Proton claims them to be suitable for full adult seating.

From the looks of it every seat (wrapped with leather) has its own headrest, and Proton says there are also individual air conditioning blowers for each row. From the details revealed at the Proton Technology Week, it is revealed that the dedicated air conditioning vents for the 2nd and 3rd rows will be located at the ceiling of the Proton Exora MPV. The 2nd and 3rd row of the Proton Exora can also be folded in 6 flexible configurations, and it looks like the 2nd row’s middle seat can be folded down as an armrest. There will be a total of 10 cupholders in the MPV, which is more than 1 for each seat, so there should be more than enough space to keep one’s drinks on a road trip.

As previously revealed, the steering wheel will feature audio controls but there is no mention yet on what the phone button is for. The Proton Exora will have an overhead LCD player that can read VCDs and DVDs along with a variety of other storage devices such as devices using USB input, and a memory card slot that supports SD and MMC. This will likely be available only in the high spec model.

Speaking of specification levels, Proton has also revealed tentative prices for the Proton Exora on its booking page. The tentative pricing are RM 72,000 for the M-Line model with an automatic transmission, and RM 76,000 for the H-Line model with an automatic transmission. This is well under the RM 80,000 maximum figure previously quoted. So far only prices for automatic transmission models have been revealed but if the automatic M-Line is 72K, a manual transmission M-Line could go under RM70k if Proton decides to make such a model available. But I feel manual is a must for the Proton buyer segment, and I am pretty sure their product team knows this too.

Bookings for the Proton Exora just opened yesterday and Proton Edar reported over 350 bookings. Proton managing director Datuk Syed Zainal hopes to achieve between 4,000 to 5,000 bookings before the April launch date, which gives them roughly over a month to go.

There have also been other details on the Exora revealed over the past few months, please read our previous coverage on the Proton Exora to find out more exclusive details!

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Proton MPV exclusive initial details revealed!
SPYSHOT: 2009 Proton MPV sheds some of its disguise
Proton MPV design registered with UK patent office
SPYSHOT: Proton MPV next to a Nissan Grand Livina

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Audi TT-RS teased before Geneva debut

February 21, 2009 at 4:19 am By Paul Tan Filed Under Audi, Cars

Audi TT-RS
Click for enlarged image

Audi has released a short teaser press release for the latest and most powerful variant of the Audi TT they will be unveiling at the Geneva Auto Show, the Audi TT-RS. Hot on the tail of the TT-S which featured a tuned up 2.0 TFSI engine, the new Audi TT-RS has been revealed to use a force inducted inline-5 engine, something that used to be a regular feature in the Audis of the past.

It’s likely to be a turbocharged 2.5 litre unit, basically you could consider it to be one-half of the 5.0 litre V10 turbo in the RS6. A normally aspirated version of this 2.5 litre engine is also found in the Volkswagen Rabbit (Golf) sold in the US. It will feature direct injection, quattro permanent all-wheel drive and great brakes to boot.

0 to 100km/h is said to be achieved in under 5 seconds, thanks to a good power to weight ratio allowed by its Audi Space Frame chassis. We’ll have to wait until the Geneva show for more details of this mini-R8, so stay tuned! For the moment, let us ponder upon this – Volkswagen is scrapping the V6 from its next generation R-model Golf. Instead of a high-boost version of the 2.0 TFSI, couldn’t we see this motor slotted in?

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New Honda Stream RSZ from Honda Malaysia

February 20, 2009 at 6:51 pm By Paul Tan Filed Under Cars, Honda, Local News

Honda Stream RSZ

Though it’s not time for a facelift yet, Honda has given its Honda Stream an equipment update. The second generation Stream is now called the Honda Stream RSZ and as you can expect from its name, it comes with the nice RSZ bodykit that you get when you buy a parallel import Stream in Malaysia, so now the sportier look is available with the official Honda Malaysia import as well.

Other than the bodykit complete with front foglamps, the new Stream RSZ also gets larger 17 inch alloy wheels to match the kit, which I feel was quite necessary because if the original Stream’s 15 inch wheels were retained, they would look pretty odd filling the wheelarches of the sporty looking body. The High Intensity Discharge headlamps are smoked and have light sensors to turn on automatically in the dark.

Honda Stream RSZ

The steering wheel is leather-wrapped and now feature paddle-shifts, but no steering wheel audio controls though. The interior is black instead of the regular Stream’s beige. While some of the product photos you’ll see after the jump show a version without a sunroof, the Honda Stream RSZ we get here will retain the regular Stream’s sunroof.

The new Stream RSZ will be sold for RM155,980 OTR with insurance alongside the original Stream, priced at 149,800.00 OTR with insurance. That’s a slight over RM6,000 premium over the regular Stream, but with the extra equipment you get its pretty decent. For now, the regular Stream will still be available until CBU stocks are cleared out but in the future only the Honda Stream RSZ will be available.

The Stream RSZ comes in 4 colours – Premium White Pearl, Crystal Black Pearl, Polished Metal Metallic and New Red Pearl. The RSZ Stream will be available at dealers from the 26th of February onwards. It comes with a 3 year (100,000 km) warranty and free service for the first 6 months (10,000 km).

Look after the jump for more shots of the new Stream RSZ.
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