Archive for Rumours

Dutch car manufacturer Spyker has made a bid for Lotus, reported Dutch auto magazine AutoWeek. AutoWeek’s unnamed sources claims the Dutch company is already in talks with Proton about the possible porchase. Spyker’s owner however, refused to confirm this but commented it could be a serious option.

Sources say Spyker intends to use Lotus Engineering’s technical know-how to develop it’s upcoming Spyker D12 Peking-to-Paris SUV (shown above). The odd name is to commemorate Spyker’s participation in the 1907 cross-country race of the same name. The concept model, first put on show at Geneva 2006 features full-time all-wheel-drive, four doors with rear suicide doors, a 500hp Volkswagen 6 liter W12 engine, carbon-ceramic matrix brakes and an all-aluminium construction.

Spyker follows Porsche’s footsteps - a sports car manufacturer releasing an SUV model that combines practicality with the sporty prestige of a sports car logo on it’s hood. Spyker also owns the Spyker F1 Team, previously known as Midland F1 Racing.

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I stumbled upon this very intriguing site from the Motor Trader Forums. It’s called What’s In The Hercules?, and it’s basically a website made up to look like a journal of some really curious spy person. Basically he knows there’s a crate in a plane, and he wants to know what’s in it. The crate is supposedly from Russia, and is being sent to Malaysia. The journal chronicles his adventures attempting to find out what is in the crate.

I will attempt to summarize what he’s mentioned on the website so far. So far he’s figured out it’s a car, and by the size of the crate it is a small hatchback. The car has a 1.6 liter engine in it, with 4 cylinders, chain-driven twin cams, 4 valves per cylinder, and a special aluminium alloy cast engine block and cylinder head. There is also some mention of prototype. The crate says “Type: 16L-TC” on it, which could mean 1.6 liters turbocharged. Hmm… R56 MINI Cooper S? Or TC could mean Twin Cam.

Very very interesting campaign, and the website is registered to some Russian name which is most likely fake, but is hosted in Malaysia by a Malaysian web hosting company. The crate is also said to be sent to Malaysia, so most likely this is a teaser campaign building up suspense to a car launch in Malaysia.

The date on the crate says 23rd of March 2007, which could be the launch date… what is this mysterious hatchback?!?!?! I am dying to know! Somehow from the details so far, I am beginning to suspect it is the new 2nd generation R56 MINI Cooper.

You can view two of the videos on the teaser site after the jump, or go to the site directly: What’s In The Hercules?

Click here to read the rest of What’s In The Hercules?

This artist’s impression of the next generation Volvo S40 is thanks to German magazine Autozeitung. The talented artists took design cues from the latest Volvo XC60 Concept, which has also manifested in the new Volvo V70. I heard through the grapevines that the 2009 Volvo S40 will replace both the current S40 and S60 models, as the differences in interior room for the S40 and S60 is pretty much negligible. This would mean the 2009 Volvo S40 will likely be based on the Ford Mondeo/Mazda6 chassis instead of the current Focus/Mazda3 chassis.

Europeans seem to have gone the sleek coupe-like liftback style with all their designs. The new Ford Mondeo has a similiar kind of rear windscreen design, and spyshots of the new 3rd generation Renault Laguna shows a similiar roofline too, sloping so much that it requires a rear wiper.

One more photo after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of 2009 Volvo S40 Artist’s Impression

Reader Khairil sent in these photos of what appears to be computer-rendered images of a possible Proton GEN2 Sedan. Styling of the GEN2 Sedan is pretty much similiar to the GEN2 5-door hatch in our market right now, with a different rear end. A similiar arrangement to the Proton Wira Sedan and Proton Wira Aeroback.

I am glad there are no strange bling bling turbine wheels on the sedan, instead there are some nice traditional 5 thick spoke wheels. I am not sure about the triple-surface design of the bootlid though, but then again these might not even be official shots of the GEN2 Sedan, but serves well to spur our imagination on how it would look like.

The Proton GEN2 Sedan will most likely be cheaper than the Proton GEN2 5-Door Hatch on our market, following the trend set by the Wira Sedan and Aeroback where the Aeroback was more expensive than the Sedan.

Remember Theophilus Chin’s Proton Satria Neo Sedan photoshop?

More photos after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of Proton GEN2 Sedan Computer Graphics

A German car magazine reported that Volkswagen will be ditching it’s retro looks of the Volkswagen New Beetle to something a little more modern and sporty, as can be seen from these sketches. The New New Beetle will be competing directly with the BMW MINI, thus has to share most of it’s attributes - invoking in it’s drivers a warm, friendly and familiar feeling, yet exciting because of it’s sporty potential.

Two more sketches after the jump.

Click here to read the rest of Future Volkswagen New Beetle design sketches

Autobild reports that Volkswagen is working on a small MINI Cooper fighter, but what’s interesting is the car will supposedly use a rear engine, rear wheel drive layout, much like Volkswagen’s own timeless classic collectible, the Volkswagen Beetle. The Beetle’s new incarnation - the Volkswagen New Beetle - has departed from the classic’s RR layout, instead putting everything at the front.

This foray into a niche market of economical but fun and sporty cars could be Volkswagen’s attempt to tap into it’s full potential, which has not been realized, according to Volkswagen’s new CEO Martin Winterkorn.

I remember some time in the past, a group of friends and I were discussing about BMW and it’s turbodiesel technology. We were saying that while BMW has put alot of work into turbodiesels, it still would not have treated diesel technology at the same par as petrol engines until they put a turbodiesel into the Z4 and the 6-series.

Well, if insider news are to be taken seriously, then turbodiesel is now half-way there in BMW’s eyes. Together with the upcoming imminent facelift of the BMW 6-series, BMW is said to be launching a new variant to complement the existing 630i, 650i and M6 - a BMW 635d with the same award winning 3.0 liter twin turbocharged straight-six turbodiesel engine which made it’s world debut in the BMW 535d. With 272hp at 4,000rpm and 560Nm of torque from as low as 2,000rpm under the 535d’s hood, it pushes the mid-sized luxury sedan from 0-100km/h in 6.5 seconds, so expect similar performance statistics for the BMW 635d.

MINI’s previous Concept Frankfurt gave us an insight into the future of the MINI product range - currently comprising of the One, One D, Cooper, Cooper S and Cooper Convertible. You could say the Concept Frankfurt was a modern incarnation of the old school Mini Traveller, a way of BMW MINI telling us that it plans to develop a new station wagon MINI. However due to legal reasons, the new MINI station wagon will not be called the MINI Traveller, but instead a new name has been chosen: the MINI Clubman.

Spyshots have already been circulating the internet, and the MINI Clubman will feature an assymetrical design, with one side having just a driver’s door, but the other side having a passenger door as well as a small suicide door which swings open to facilitate easy entry into the rear seats. Auto Motor und Sport reports that the MINI Clubman will also receive all-wheel drive technology in end 2008.

Two other rumoured MINI projects include an all-wheel drive MINI Cooper is also in the works, as well as something a little more tricky. This tricky little thing will be called the MINI Colorado, and it will be somewhat like the typical MINI Cooper, however it will have off-road design elements to it, with a higher suspension as well as all-wheel drive, facilitating some light offroading. Colorado is just an internal codename for the moment, but the old school Mini had a variant called the Moke, which was somewhat like a tiny cross between a Jeep and a Mini (refer to photo in the top left).

XinHua Finance (XFN Asia) says an industry source informed it that Volkswagen AG has signed an agreement to buy a substantial stake in the manufacturing arm of Malaysia’s Proton Holdings Bhd. The stake involved is the rumoured 51%, and an announcement is expected to be made on Feb 8. This syndicated news report caused Proton shares to surge 90 sen to close at a price of RM7.75, more than 13 percent higher. This proves to be an instant win for shareholders like the EPF which recently increased it’s stakeholding in the national car manufacturer.

In response to this, Proton issued a statement saying it could not confirm this report and it was purely a shareholder’s matter. It said to wait for the government’s announcement before the end of Q1 2007. The PM also spoke regarding this issue, saying he did not want to comment as the matter was still under negotation.

Winding Road reports that the possible replacement for the Honda S2000 that Honda has been working on might not end up in the same market segment as the current Honda S2000 is right now - news is that the new S2000 will gain an additional two seats for the rear and will be trimmed to attract an audience who would typically consider more luxurious vehicles like the Mercedes Benz SLK.

While there has been some work done on a new mock-up, production has not been green-lighted yet. Even if approved, it will likely end up as a 2009 model, a long way to go. A rear-wheel drive convertible configuration will be kept, naturally.

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