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Of all of the cars Top Gear host Richard Hammond has driven – and that’s a lot of cars – it is an oil-burning entry-level luxury sedan that has earned the plaudit, “possibly the best car ever made.” He’s referring to the 2013 BMW 320d in an article for the UK’s Mirror newspaper, further crediting it with “brilliant handling,” an easy-to-use infotainment system, “very accurate steering” and being “one of the nicest Threes to drive in decades.”

His conclusion does come from a lack of negatives just as much as the positives. However, even though it’s still a huge call, we’ve heaped our own ultimate praise on BMW’s gasoline four-pot, the 328i, which trades a quicker sprint to 60 mph for a few mpg less than the 320d’s 52 Imperial mpg (43 U.S. mpg).

Hammond’s a fan of the styling, and in fact the only thing he doesn’t like is a stripe on his 3 Series tester. Click the link to get the words straight from the Hamster’s mouth.

Richard Hammond thinks BMW 320d may be the “best car ever made”

It’s never a bad idea to watch video of a Ferrari taking an aggressive stroll down a winding Italian road, and the creative types at Ferrari were kind enough to produce exactly that. To sweeten the pot, the video features the reworked 2013 California, with 490 horsepower and a significant weight savings of 70 pounds.

The enhanced 4.3-liter V8 also makes its audio debut in the post-jump video, and our ears can’t get enough of the sweet Italian music. You also get to see just how quickly and efficiently the California’s retractable hardtop stows in its boot. Hit the jump to watch and hear the 2013 Ferrari California in Maranello.

Continue reading This is what Ferrari’s reworked California sounds like

This is what Ferrari’s reworked California sounds like

The one point that Formula One racing’s detractors dwell on more than others is the monotony. How a gaggle of high-revving, state-of-the-art race cars speeding around circuits in some of the most exotic locales in the world could be considered monotonous, of course, would leave others scratching their heads, but that’s what the haters hate most. And not entirely without reason. After all, each championship season tends to be dominated by one driver or another.

2008 saw Lewis Hamilton of McLaren and Felipe Massa of Ferrari battle it out for the title until the very last turn of the the very last lap of the very last race of the season, but for many years before and every year since it’s been utter domination: five years of Michael Schumacher, two of Fernando Alonso, Kimi Raikkonen in 2007, Jenson Button in 2009 and two years of Sebastian Vettel that bring us up to the present.

The question on every race fan’s mind, then, is whether this year would again feature a single-team domination or whether we’d see another driver – or drivers – taking the lead. Heading out to Shanghai for this weekend’s Chinese Grand Prix, only two races had already been decided, and each was won by a different man driving for a different team, and neither had won from pole. Would this round prove any different? Keep reading to find out.

Continue reading Shanghai’d at the 2012 Chinese Grand Prix [spoilers]

Shanghai’d at the 2012 Chinese Grand Prix [spoilers]

The Mel Brooks Star Wars send-up Spaceballs may be most memorable for its flying Winnebago, but a hovercraft also features in the hilarious action. Like a lot of movie prop vehicles, the hovercraft that carted Dark Helmet around had no power source of its own (other than a Napoleonic Rick Moranis in some scenes).

The Just a Car Guy blog found the hovercraft in the Justice Brothers Museum, and it turns out that after the movie, this prop became an honest-to-goodness working vehicle much like Lone Star became a prince at the end of the film. Originally built by famous customizer Dean Jeffries in just two weeks, the hovercraft now has a rear-mounted engine and can carry up to eight people in out-of-this-world style. Hit the link for the full story.

Spaceballs hovercraft floats in from obscurity

Automakers aren’t the only ones who produce concept cars. So do design studios, contract manufacturers, racing teams and even component suppliers. Case in point: Alessi Fiberglass. Back in 1979, the company displayed a supercar concept called the AR-1 at the New York Auto Show. The idea, it would seem, was to show off what they could do with fiberglass. Nobody ever expected they’d build it. And they didn’t. At least, not until now.

33 years later, Alessi has resurrected the AR-1, modernized it, and brought it to market. In place of the original show car’s Buick V6 is a mid-mounted, supercharged a 6.2-liter Corvette V8 making up to 600 horsepower. Not enough? Alessi also offers a twin-turbo version with 750 horsepower on tap.

The AR-1’s steel frame is covered with, of course, fiberglass bodywork. Pricing has not been revealed, and Alessi says it will build no more than 50 examples. In addition to the attached photo gallery, you can take a closer look in the video clip posted after the jump.

Continue reading Alessi Fiberglass brings the AR-1 supercar to market… 33 years later

Alessi Fiberglass brings the AR-1 supercar to market… 33 years later

It’s been seven months since I crammed into a supercharged Mazda Miata with the Flyin’ Miata crew and fought tooth and nail for a fifth-place finish in the Grand Touring class of the 2011 Targa Newfoundland. That amount of time has done nothing to dull my desire to head right back into the fray as soon as possible. While I was there, the FM team spent a good deal of time hanging out with our friends over at MotoMan, and the crew just finished putting the final touches on its race documentary.

The first episode shows off the sweet SRT-tweaked Dodge Challenger the MotoMan guys got to play with. With plenty of suspension adjustments, a full cage and a bare-bones interior, the big white beast was as far from the NC Miata we campaigned as you could get. Watch the clip after the jump for an introduction to a few of the other competitors, including SRT CEO Ralph Gilles, as well as an interview with driver Brandon Fitch and myself. Keep an eye out for more episodes, too.

Continue reading MotoMan gives Targa Newfoundland the documentary treatment

MotoMan gives Targa Newfoundland the documentary treatment

If you found yourself in a situation where lives were in danger, would you step up and be the hero?
Junior high students in Milton, Washington were confronted with just such a scenario, and 13-year-old Jeremy Wuitschick manned up in a big way.

When his bus driver went into convulsions, he shot out of his seat, grabbed the wheel, pulled the bus over and had the presence of mind to pull the keys from the ignition. Wuitschick may have averted catastrophe with his actions. Hit the jump to see the hero in action.

Continue reading Brave kid stops runaway school bus when driver has seizure

Brave kid stops runaway school bus when driver has seizure

There’s nothing unusual about vehicles in first-person shooters – Rage has its Jetter and Cuprino, Battlefield 3 has two entire classes of wheeled vehicles – but there’s usually still a person involved. But what about when your vehicle is your shooter? Then you have the PS3 game Wheels of Destruction World Tour, which is essentially Death Race 2 without the felons and bad acting.

There are three classes in the arcade-style game: Scout, Heavy and Assassin. Your job is to pilot one of them in “death matches, free-for-alls, and capture-the-flag frenzies.” The goal seems simple: “battle to crush opponents, slaying everything in your path of relentless devastation, both online and off.”

And don’t forget high scores. There are a couple of gameplay and instructional vids after the jump.

Continue reading Wheels of Destruction combines first-person shooters with futuristic cars

Wheels of Destruction combines first-person shooters with futuristic cars

German aftermarket tuner Loder1899 tells us Horus was an Egyptian god, and Wikipedia says he was usually depicted as a falcon or a man with a falcon’s head. While we’re not seeing much that’s bird-like in this customized Range Rover Evoque, a new front fascia with integrated fender flares and a similar treatment for the other end means the Evoque no longer looks like the baby of the Land Rover clan. The vehicle in the photos is also fitted with optional gigantic 11×23-inch wheels shod with 315/35R23 Michelins and a lowered suspension. Without them, the conversion runs €3,032 – or about $4,000, including German taxes. Awful or awesome? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Continue reading Loder1899’s Range Rover Evoque Horus gets wide

Loder1899’s Range Rover Evoque Horus gets wide

The 2014 Chevrolet Impala just made its debut at the New York Auto Show, and stuck there on its vaguely-Hofmeister-esque C-Pillar is a new version of the classic Impala mascot. The gracefully leaping African antelope is a little smoother and more rounded, but still the well-established icon it’s been since its 1958 introduction. It may seem a small detail, but changing a long-established bit of iconography is tricky. Designers must carefully balance any tweaking against recognizeability and consumer goodwill.

“We kept the stylized interpretation of the animal, and made the impala more muscular. We also added defined edges, to give the impala a sleek form and make it look like it was running fast” says Joan Kallio, lead creative designer for Chevrolet global badging, and the latest version of this chrome animal glyph is surely smoothed and stylized compared to the squiggly 1958 original. If the car is as successfully refined as its logo, the new Impala will do fine. Check out the press release after the jump.

Continue reading The Chevrolet Impala mascot over the years

The Chevrolet Impala mascot over the years

Apparently the Jetta and Passat redesigns are working well, because Volkswagen is reporting 1.36 million vehicle deliveries for the first quarter of 2012. That’s an increase of more than ten percent over last year, and in March alone, VW delivered a record 536,600 cars.

Wait a minute, aren’t things bleak in Europe? Indeed, while Volkswagen managed to eke out a 5 percent increase in European market deliveries, that’s mostly thanks to solid sales performance in Germany. Deliveries to the rest of Western Europe drooped by almost four percent. It seems Volkswagen is compensating for this challenging situation by selling the bejeezus out of its vehicles in markets like Russia, China, South America, and the United States. You know, the entire rest of the world. Check out the press release posted after the jump.

Continue reading What crisis in Europe? Volkswagen announces best-ever first quarter sales

What crisis in Europe? Volkswagen announces best-ever first quarter sales

Well, this looks Hanoi-ing.

Vietnamese traffic lieutenant Nguyen Manh Phan pulled over a bus driver in Hanoi for driving on the wrong side of the road. Instead of cooperating, the driver refused to show his papers and decided instead to flee the scene.

The officer, though, wasn’t keen on seeing driver Phung Hong Phuong get away so easily, so he positioned himself in front of the bus. When the bus began moving, the officer grabbed hold of the windshield wipers and hung on for dear life.

The bus driver did eventually pull over about a kilometer down the road after more officers and civilians pursued, but not before the incident was caught on tape.

Now, having personally visited the country in the last year, believe me when I tell you that traffic laws almost completely go unenforced and everyone drives on the wrong side of the road in Vietnam. In other words, this person must really have been driving dangerously to be singled out. What’s more, he had been released from prison in 2010 for his part in a fatal traffic accident.

The video, along with a news report on the incident, can be seen by scrolling down.

Continue reading Watch this Vietnamese policeman go on a wild ride after stopping a bus

Watch this Vietnamese policeman go on a wild ride after stopping a bus

Well, this looks Hanoi-ing.

Vietnamese traffic lieutenant Nguyen Manh Phan pulled over a bus driver in Hanoi for driving on the wrong side of the road. Instead of cooperating, the driver refused to show his papers and decided instead to flee the scene.

The officer, though, wasn’t keen on seeing driver Phung Hong Phuong get away so easily, so he positioned himself in front of the bus. When the bus began moving, the officer grabbed hold of the windshield wipers and hung on for dear life.

The bus driver did eventually pull over about a kilometer down the road after more officers and civilians pursued, but not before the incident was caught on tape.

Now, having personally visited the country in the last year, believe me when I tell you that traffic laws almost completely go unenforced and everyone drives on the wrong side of the road in Vietnam. In other words, this person must really have been driving dangerously to be singled out. What’s more, he had been released from prison in 2010 for his part in a fatal traffic accident.

The video, along with a news report on the incident, can be seen by scrolling down.

Continue reading Watch this Vietnamese policeman go a wild ride after stopping a bus

Watch this Vietnamese policeman go a wild ride after stopping a bus

Remember Jetgate? Back in the pre-bankruptcy days of late 2008, when the Big Three CEO’s were traveling to Washington to plead their case for funds, Ford’s Alan Mulally, General Motors’ then-CEO Rick Wagoner, and Chrysler’s former chief Bob Nardelli were publicly chastised for flying in corporate jets to the tune of $20,000 per round trip.

Two years earlier, Ford president Mark Fields became a target of outrage when a Detroit-area TV station discovered that his employment contract included $50,000-$70,000 worth of private jet service per week to ship Fields between Dearborn and his home in Florida.

Now this: The New York Times is reporting that Ford spent spent $178,571 on personal air travel for Mulally last year. While Ford no longer has a fleet of corporate jets, according to the report, it pays a charter service to transport Mulally and his kin. And that’s not all. Since this benefit is classified as “security measures,” Mulally gets off the hook for paying taxes on it, as he doesn’t have to report the benefit as income, according to the Times. Mulally received nearly $30 million in compensation last year, according to other reports.

While Ford refused comment, the article calls out the company for using this “common corporate tax trick” that it says robs the federal government of tax revenue from CEO’s like Mulally, meaning that taxpayers are essentially subsidizing his perks.

While the report concerns various corporate executives, it singles out Mulally, suggesting that any potential danger to Ford’s CEO has to be less than that posed to Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who flies commercial airlines. The Times also says that former Apple CEO Steve Jobs “received no security services from Apple last year before he died.”

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Ford CEO Alan Mulally called out as a tax dodger [w/poll]

2013 is scheduled to be the final year of production for the sixth-generation Chevrolet Corvette, otherwise known as the C6. Having replaced the fifth-generation C5 Corvette in late 2005 as a 2006 model, that will mark a seven-year run on the market, which is impressively long in anyone’s book, but fairly typical in Corvette history.

Keeping the C6 fresh all those years had as much to do with special models like the ZR1 and Grand Sport as it has with constantly tweaking smaller things like the options, accessories and colors that have been offered.

For its final model year, the 2013 C6 will reportedly get a last new color called Night Race Blue. The Corvette is already offered in two blue hues: one called Supersonic Blue Metallic (an option that costs an extra $300 on the standard Vette) and a lighter blue introduced for the 2012 model year called Carlisle Blue Metallic. The latter debuted at last year’s SEMA Show to celebrate the Corvettes at Carlisle event in Pennsylvania that claims to attract more privately owned Vettes in one place at one time than anywhere else in the world.

CorvetteBlogger also reports that Chevrolet will be deleting Competition Gray wheels from the options sheet and replacing them with the Black Painted Aluminum wheels you see above.

Chevy C6 Corvette to get Night Race Blue and new wheels for final model year

So there’s good news and bad. First with the good: Subaru’s BRZ configurator has gone live. As we’ve already reported, the base model starts from $25,495 including destination. Now with the bad: We hope you have fun with the configurator, Scooby fans, because that may be all you’ll have for quite some time. According to FT-86Club, demand for the rear-drive-sports-car-for-the-everyman has been so high that Japanese market deliveries have been delayed until January 2013.

While the report says it’s “unclear” whether this will affect the U.S.-market BRZ or its Scion FR-S twin, with demand reportedly four times higher than Subaru parent Fuji Heavy Industries forecast, it’s a good bet that neither brand’s dealers will have a surfeit of cars.

Strong early demand pushes JDM BRZ deliveries into 2013

Yes, many jokes can be made at the expense of Dyson, the UK-based manufacturer of odd-looking vacuums and fans, and its employees. But those hard-working engineers clearly know a thing or two about recombining common parts to find innovative solutions to every day problems.

As hard as they work, they also apparently play hard. Dyson recently held a car challenge for its engineers where the object was to make the fastest car possible using Dyson spare parts and motors from their handheld vacuums. It’s like drag racing for geeks and, true to Dyson form, some of the entrants don’t look like anything resembling a car. Scroll down to watch Dyson’s engineers cut loose and compete for the quickest times.

Continue reading Dyson stops sucking long enough to hold a car challenge

Dyson stops sucking long enough to hold a car challenge

We hate to reinforce stereotypes as much as anybody else, so we’d like to point out that the source for this story comes from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. With that out of the way…

According to TheDetroitBureau.com, the recent study found that older women and people under the age of 20 are most likely to mistake the gas pedal for the brake, causing what many have dubbed unintended acceleration. What’s more, the majority of pedal misapplication cases take place in parking lots.

In stark contrast, NHTSA has found that nearly two-thirds of all motor vehicle accidents are caused by male drivers. So, why are women so much more likely to mistake their pedals? Says the study:

“Possible explanations might include greater exposure by women where these crashes occur most often (parking lots); a poorer “fit” in their cars due to shorter stature, which may increase the likelihood of a pedal application error; or a disproportionately high rate of one or more functional deficits that contribute to pedal errors, such as neuropathy.”

Due to the recent abundance of unintended acceleration claims, NHTSA has proposed that brake override systems be made mandatory on all new cars sold in the United States.

Older women, people under 20 are most often at fault for pedal misapplication crashes

The Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG Coupe Black Series is a whole lotta car. Not only is the name a mouthful, but the 510-horsepower German rocket can be a handful too, well, in the wrong hands. This wouldn’t be the first time we’ve seen techs or valets getting their kicks behind the wheel of a vehicle that doesn’t belong to them, but it seems some employees at one Ottawa-area dealer didn’t get the memo.

Our tipster claims that a couple rogue techs at a dealership called Star Motors (formerly Carling Motors) decided to take out one of the 30 existing Black Series in Canada for a joyride. While we agree that some test drives of performance cars should be spirited to find performance-related problems, it’s pretty clear these guys just wanted some kicks behind the wheel of $115,000 Autobahn assassin.

For over eight minutes they negotiate the streets of Ottawa near the Hunt Club Road dealership, breaking all kinds of laws, risking property and injury in the process. The police would gladly impound this Black Series for some of these speeds, and MB enthusiasts would gladly slap these guys in the face for redlining the motor for so long.

Why any tech would post this on YouTube is beyond us, as they’re are only asking to be fired. The Internet has moved in for some e-justice and MBWorld.com has been set ablaze with nasty comments on the matter. Not only did they identify the location of the dealership, they have also sent the video, the original of which was removed from YouTube but then re-uploaded by a forum member, to Mercedes-Benz Canada HQ and are hard at work trying to find the possible owner to show him what’s been done to his car pre-delivery. Check out the video by scrolling down.

Continue reading Mercedes techs taking C63 AMG Coupe Black Series for joyride caught on video

Mercedes techs taking C63 AMG Coupe Black Series for joyride caught on video

There’s no doubting the driving talents of one Sebastian Vettel. He won his first grand prix when he was still with backmarker team Scuderia Toro Rosso, and went on to win back-to-back World Championship titles for Red Bull Racing. Heck, he’s even taken the Nations Cup at the Race of Champions with Michael Schumacher for the last five years running now. You might even call his skills the stuff of super heroes. But if it came down a bar fight, the grinning whiz kid wouldn’t exactly inspire fear. (Not like Adrian Sutil would, anyway.) But his latest collaboration might stand to change that.

While in China for this coming weekend’s grand prix, the reigning World Champion met up with action star Celina Jade for a little kung fu lesson. They even shot a short film called Kung Fu Vettel: Drive of the Dragon that’s set to be released next month. And then they headed to the track so Vettel could return the favor.

The crossover is the first in a series of promotional events under the “Inspired Performers” banner, orchestrated by sponsor Infiniti. What any of this has to do with luxury automobiles is beyond us, but it made for a decent photo and video op, as you can see from the gallery above and the video teaser after the jump.

Continue reading Sebastian Vettel trades F1 for Kung Fu in martial arts film debut with Celina Jade

Sebastian Vettel trades F1 for Kung Fu in martial arts film debut with Celina Jade