Millionth Range Rover rolls off the assembly line – Click above for high-res image
Before every automaker and their sister-companies got into the luxury SUV game, there was really only one truck to speak of, and that was the . Now 40 years since its original introduction and three generations on, has produced a whopping million Range Rovers, and is teaming up with a local charity to mark the occasion.
The landmark vehicle, a top-of-the-line black , just rolled off the assembly line at Solihull, and is being donated to Help for Heroes. The British foundation assists wounded soldiers upon their return home, and will receive the vehicle during Top Gear Live at Earls Court in London where none other than Jeremy Clarkson, a patron of the organization, will take delivery on its behalf.
The millionth Range Rover, with a retail value of over £85,000, will then be auctioned off for the benefit of the charity’s work, with pre-auction estimates exceeding the £100,000 mark. Full details in the press release after the jump.
Putin channels his inner Patrese – Click above to watch video
Renault’s Carlos Ghosn was recently in Russia to settle on purchasing a 50-percent stake in AvtoVaz, and it appears he brought along a Renault Formula 1 car for his pal Vladimir Putin to flog about. Once installed in the cockpit, Putin gets some instruction from a Renault engineer in French-accented English, then cranks the revs and runs it down what looks like a wet runway. There looked to be at least one spin involved, but considering how finicky F1 cars are to drive even for the paid professionals, it didn’t look like a bad job. for the video. Hat tip to Duy P!
Nissan GT-R interior by Umbrella Auto Design – Click above for high-res image gallery
If the is going to seriously take on the , it’s going to need to do a bit better on the interior fit and finish. ’s own people realized that much when they launched the Egoist edition of the , but what if you’ve already got your Godzilla in the driveway? What are you to do then?
Turn to Umbrella Auto Design, that’s what. The Seattle-based tuners have announced an aftermarket retrofit for the GT-R’s interior that swathes the entire cabin – seats, dashboard, console, instrument binnacle, steering wheel, door panels, shift levers, etc. in luxe and racy black ultra-suede with silver diamond quilting and top-stitch. They’ve even repainted the plastics in black to match. Looks pretty slick, and they can reportedly carry it out on any GT-R in about three weeks. Check it out in the gallery below.
The shutdown of ’s Formula One program should have resulted in a mass layoff of the team’s personnel, right? Well it didn’t. While some may have gone their separate ways, others have been hired; and despite the essential absence of an actual F1 program, is still alive and keeping plenty busy.
Once the dust settled at the operation’s Cologne headquarters, TMG remade itself into an engineering consulting business. The outfit that benefited from years of unprecedented investment from the world’s largest automaker has been undertaking a variety of other tasks for new clients (in addition to specific roles it still plays for Toyota). Preparing test cars for Pirelli’s new contract to supply F1 tires has been one, but according to a report in Autosport, TMG “has proved that F1 skills and technologies could be easily transfered to non-motorsport applications” as well.
As a result, TMG is closing what its own personnel describe as a “breakthrough year” that has taken it from the brink of disaster to a profitable business in its own right. Who would have figured?
Hennessey Venom GT at Cars and Coffee – Click above for high-res image gallery
The crowd of automotive fanatics at Cars and Coffee in Irvine, CA rarely gets too excited about a car. Everything from to to dozens of supercars are fairly commonplace at the weekly gathering. Ferraris and Lamborghinis roll by without eliciting a second glance from onlookers, and even the mighty Bugatti Veyron only attracts minimal attention. It takes something unique car get everyone’s blood pumping at the most jaded car show on Earth. Which brings us to the the Hennessey Venom GT.
Before today, the car had yet to be publicly seen on U.S. soil, so its appearance at Cars and Coffee was a North American debut of sorts. The initial plan was to show the car at SEMA earlier this week, but delays at customs prevented the car from getting to Las Vegas in time.
To say that the Venom GT attracted attention is a huge understatement. The second the Hennessey crew rolled the car off the trailer and lifted the engine cover to expose the twin-turbo V8, a crowd of inquisitive car geeks formed, drooling over each and every detail of the bodywork.
We try and make it to Cars and Coffee more often than not, but sometimes the lure of a cozy warm bed at 6:00 AM on a Saturday morning makes it just too easy to hit the snooze button. When news came that the Hennessey Venom GT would be making an appearance, we made sure we set our alarm clocks (plus a few backups as well) and joined the rest of the early-risers to see the car in person. We came away with quite a bounty of photographs, which you can see in the high-res gallery below.
Honda loves its friendly ASIMO robot, and for the most part, we get a kick out of him, too. (Especially when he ..) The little guy’s latest endeavor is a starring role in a new iPhone app (coming soon to Android as well) designed to get you up and moving. Run With ASIMO is basically a fancy pedometer that uses your phone’s accelerometer to count each step you take.
For every 100 “steps” made (you can obviously just game this by shaking the phone), you level up, eventually evolving your robot through all the generations that preceded ASIMO. As a bonus, for every ‘bot evolution, you get to watch a movie of it in action. Once you unlock ASIMO himself, you can virtually tackle the Suzuka Circuit and compare your times against other players, as well as brag via the usual social networks. Once a million users complete the Suzuka level, the real ASIMO becomes sentient and embarks on his ultimate mission to annihilate humanity. (Kidding! We think.)
Want more details? Honda has them posted . You can download Run With ASIMO for free in the App Store.
Lightning Car Company GT – Click above for high-res image gallery
In February 2009, UK-based announced that it was intent on . Well, the year is almost over and Lightning, as one might expect of any fledgling automaker, is running behind schedule. The company claims that its battery-powered GT will enter a “late prototype” phase soon and hopes to have the vehicle production-ready by spring of 2012.
Since unveiling the GT in 2007, significant changes have been made. The proposed in-wheel motors have been ditched in favor of a rear-drive setup sourced from an unnamed German manufacturer. Performance numbers have been modified to account for changes made to the drivetrain and electric motors. The GT is tipped to run from 0-60 miles per hour in five seconds and range is expected to exceed 100 miles. With a projected price now soaring to £180,000 ($290,628 U.S. at the current exchange rate) we’d have to admit that selling even 250 electric GTs annually (Lightning’s own projected production volume) seems more than a bit optimistic.
Two years ago had 6,049 dealers spread across the United States. Post-bankruptcy, that number is down to 4,500 retail outlets. The dealer cutback was supposed to help GM’s bottom line while simultaneously bolstering sales and profits at the remaining dealerships, but has it worked? Automotive News reports that the early returns are mixed.
Since 2009 was such a bad year for car sales, most GM dealers are faring better so far in 2010, as the company’s overall sales are up six percent. Consider that GM is selling six percent more vehicles without , , and , and the remaining dealers are doing better still. But the biggest winners of GM’s dealer reduction aren’t large dealerships. Many of the 1,500 dealers that got the axe were smaller stores in rural areas. It makes sense, then, that the remaining small-town dealers are doing better as a result.
GM spokesperson Ryndee Carney tells AN that the surviving dealers have a reported 6.7 million customers up for grabs; people who either own a GM vehicle from one of the defunct brands or purchased from a dealership that no longer exists. That’s a lot of potential warranty, service and trade-in cash waiting to be had. To ensure that these customers know where their nearby dealerships are, GM has been mailing out notices with service coupons and other dealer info. Dealers themselves are also doing legwork to pick up orphaned customers, picking up out-of-work salespeople who bring their client lists with them.
It’s hard to tell how long it’ll be until the remaining GM dealers start to feel the impact of the closing of 1,500 dealers, since many of those stores just stopped selling and servicing vehicles in October. The one thing that the entire dealer body would benefit from is a stronger auto market, but that doesn’t appear as though it’ll happen anytime soon.
Mr. Norm’s Super Cuda – Click above for high-res image gallery
Might a fishy new muscle car be bound for U.S. market consumption? According to USA Today, Ralph Gilles, the man who ably heads brand, indicated to a crowd of Mopar-obsessed fans at the 2010 SEMA Show that a resurrection of the classic Barracuda is indeed a possibility.
Keep in mind that Dodge has already re-released the , which was the Barracuda’s fellow pony car sibling from 1970 through 1974, so the car’s platform is seemingly already there. That raises an interesting conundrum, though: how would The Pentastar differentiate the two models if they shared a platform and featured similar styling?
Another question that would need answering is where the model would fall into the current Chrysler portfolio. Remember, the Barracuda wore a Plymouth badge way back when, and that brand got sent to the great scrapheap in the sky several years ago. As such, if it were ever to happen – which is a very, very big ‘if’ – we may be in store for a Chrysler Barracuda.
Would the purists object? Probably, but certainly no more than they did when Dodge brought back the nameplate for a four-door sedan… With that in mind, we want to know what you think. Should Chrysler reintroduce the Barracuda?
TV spot for the 2011 Ford F-150 – Click above to watch the video
The is an outrageously important vehicle here in America. Not only has it been the best-selling pickup truck for the past 33 years, it has out-sold every single vehicle in the country for 28 of those years. So when it comes time to update the bread-and-butter pickup, has to make sure it is still poised to be a high-volume seller.
For 2011, Ford hit a bullseye by adding to the F-150 lineup – a 3.7-liter V6, 3.5-liter EcoBoost V6, and two V8 engines measuring 5.0 and 6.2 liters. By doing this, Ford says that there’s no need to compromise when shopping the F-150 because its range of powertrains provide the most power, best towing capacity and best fuel economy in the class. Checkmate.
To promote this, Ford has just launched its latest series of television ads that showcase the “no compromise” theme. The automaker has signed comedian Dennis Leary to provide the voiceover, and you can check out both of the new ads, as well as Ford’s press release, .
Question: How do Ford’s new advertisements compare with from ?
Gallery:
Photos copyright (C)2010 Jeremy Korzeniewski / AOL
[Source: Ford]
Patrick Warburton and Craig Robinson, together at last, form Max and Al to sell some Chevy trucks.
Master Test Driver Hiromu Naruse was, and still is, a legend for Toyota. This is a video tribute to the Japanese driver that had a hand in nearly every single important sports car to come from the automaker.
BMW Vision Efficient Dynamics (VED) concept will indeed make the jump to production form.
They say that only certain things in life are death and taxes. already escaped one of the two, and now it’s getting a big break on the other – as part of GM’s restructuring plan, it’s eligible for up to $45 billion in tax breaks. Under the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), General Motors can utilizes its pre-bankruptcy losses to offset future tax liabilities. This should provide a large dose of financial help for the automaker, as and works to pay back the US and Canadian tax-paying public.
2012 Mazda5 – Click above for high-res image gallery
We first saw the next-generation when it debuted in Geneva earlier this year, but now has confirmed that the version destined for the United States will be revealed at the later this month. Badged as a 2012 model, the U.S.-spec Mazda5 won’t differ all that much from its European kin in terms of appearance. A good thing, since the mini-minivan benefits from a healthy does of Mazda’s swoopy design language.
Unsurprisingly, the 2012 Mazda5 will be powered by the same 157-horsepower, 2.5-liter inline-four that we enjoy in the and . Happily, Mazda will still be offering the 5 with a manual transmission in addition to the standard automatic, making it more attractive to those of us who prefer the engagement that row-it-yourself gearboxes have to offer. Multi-configurable seating for six is available inside with the usual list of standard and optional features.
In addition to the new 5, Mazda will be bringing its concept that we had the chance to check out a few months back. It previews the next generation of Mazda styling language and we’re eager to get up close and personal with it once again at the LA show. for Mazda’s official press release.
Nestled on the fringe of Stanford University’s campus in Palo Alto, California is one of the coolest toy stores in the automotive industry. Officially it’s called Volkswagen’s Electronics Research Lab, and inside they’re working on some of the most innovative technology that we’ll soon see in cars.
is using the ERL to develop electric cars, autonomous cars, online navigation, new human-machine interfaces and other electronics related technology. The reason the lab is in Silicon Valley is that VW wanted to tap into the “let’s-just-get-it-done” entrepreneurial spirit for which the region is famous. And it’s attracted some pretty interesting talent to work there.
For example, Martin Eberhard, the guy who created and who later had a major fallout with Elon Musk (who now owns Tesla), is now working on electric cars for VW. And yes, he’s still working with laptop-type batteries, which are officially known as the 18650. Eberhard claims he’s going to be able to come out with an electric version of the with a 200-mile driving range, and an Audi e-tron with a 300-mile range.
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John McElroy is host of the TV program and daily web video . Every week he brings his unique insights as a Detroit insider to Autoblog readers.
Honda’s next definition of naked, the CB1000R – Click above for high-res image gallery
It could be said that created a piece of two-wheeled history in 1969 when the company first introduced the as a musclebound, no-nonsense means to get yourself from Point A to Point B. Call it a naked sport bike, a power-cruiser or everything you need and nothing you don’t – no matter what the nomenclature, Honda made a performance motorcycle that happened to look great when it hit the showrooms wearing nothing more than absolutely necessary.
Honda announced that it will once again spare the nonsense and give the American market a naked sportbike known as the CB1000R, packing 998cc of inline four power. Honda calls it also “surprisingly versatile,” with a broad powerband and roomy cockpit. We shouldn’t forget fun either, as the big CB will put down 124 horsepower and 74l pound-feet of twist. Modern amenities to include a fully adjustable 43mm inverted fork and four-piston radial mounted calipers clamping a rotor on each side up front.
We are not sure if it was , or loss of market share that ultimately landed the CB1000R on U.S soil, but at this point, it looks like Honda may be remembering who pays for their motorcycles… the customer, and we like what we see so far. To read the the official jabber and full specs from Honda, .
has produced some iconic sports cars throughout its history, and now those vehicles have been immortalized in stamp form. Released as a limited-edition on November 1st, the Japan Post Network Chugoke Regional Office has created a 12-stamp set officially titled History of Mazda Motor Corporation Hiroshima.
The stamp set is limited to just 3,000 units and each one comes with a 1:64 scale model of a white . Images on the stamps range from the past icons such as the 1950 Mazda-Go three-wheeled truck and aforementioned Cosmo to modern ones like the and . It’s not just cars though, as one of the stamps features an image of Mazda’s infamous rotary engine.
Unfortunately, those of us outside of Japan will not be able to purchase this stamp collection, as Mazda is only offering it in its home market. The price is 2,800 Yen per set, which is about $35 USD based on current exchange rates. The stamps are shown in the image to the right, which you can expand by clicking on it, and Mazda’s official press release is available .
2011 Mercedes-Benz R-Class – Click above for high-res image gallery
has issued a recall for the 2011 , , and due to leaky fuel filters. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Adminstration, the vehicles’ O-ring may not have been properly lubricated, and thus, can result in fuel spilling out onto roads, causing unsafe conditions for other drivers.
NHTSA’s bulletin specifically cites that diesel fuel comes out of these leaky fuel filters, but our friends at have confirmed that this recall does, in fact, apply to both gas- and diesel-powered vehicles. Approximately 2,300 vehicles are affected by this recall, and Mercedes-Benz dealers will replace the fuel filters free of charge. The recall is expected to ramp up sometime this month.
Toyota pays tribute to one of its icons, Hiromu Naruse – Click above to watch the video
Master Test Driver Hiromu Naruse was, and still is, a legend for . The man had a hand in nearly every single important sports car to come from the automaker. He’s logged more hours on the Nürburgring than any other Japanese driver, and those at Toyota called him the “Nur Miester,” or “one and only master,” while friends at referred to him as “the man who knows all the world’s roads.” His job was to drive cars, evaluate them and help figure out how to make them better. When he was done at the office, he raced cars simply because he loved doing it.
His final masterpiece was the , and Naruse made sure it fit in with his highest of standards. He was tasked with driving the supercar near its top speed for extended periods of time, often in the dark. The Lexus LF-A is a technical wonder, which our own “a harbinger of the future and proof that immensely entertaining things are on the way from Toyota.” Editor Lavrinc was , and you would be missing out if you didn’t give it a read.
Sadly, it was behind the wheel of a Lexus LF-A where earlier this year. Toyota has created a short video to honor its one and only master, which you can watch .
Top Gear picks the new Stig – Click above to watch video
The process of Top Gear picking a new Stig has always been a mystery, that is until recently when we learned that where new Stigs are bred. Not all grow up to be tame racing drivers though, with some being too violent and others seeming to suffer from the dulling effects of too much inbreeding.
Top Gear has released this video of the Stig-picking process, and as you might expect, not all Stigs have the natural drive to become skilled wheelmen, but some do have other talents. One Stig shown in the video is a gifted painter and another wants to become a writer. A pink Stig is also shown whose only talents appear to be staring at other Stigs and skipping merrily.
The breeding program is focused on finding that one Stig that will go on to set blistering lap times on the Top GearTest Track. The best are found, and from them, one is chosen. The video after the jump ends with a vision of the program’s new Stig, clearly ready for action in his iconic white outfit. to see the Stig farm and meet the new member of the Top Gear crew. Thanks for the tips, everyone!
2011Volkswagen Jetta – Click above for high-res image gallery
According to a report from Autocar, will be offering a performance-oriented R version of its sixth-generation . The automaker has already launched its and overseas, and VW has long said that it plans to expand its performance offerings around the world.
Volkswagen reportedly showed European media a version of the Jetta equipped with a 3.6-liter V6 during the car’s official launch last week. No power numbers were divulged, but Autocar states that a six-speed dual-clutch transmission was fitted to this Jetta, as was 4Motion all-wheel drive.
Ulrich Hackenberg, VW’s head of research and development, says that the Jetta R is being heavily considered and that if customer demand is there, it will be produced (sounds familiar, doesn’t it?). If the Jetta R does see the light of day, we’re willing to bet that it will come to North American soil, especially since the United States is the new Jetta’s key market. Here’s hoping.
