New Cars

We have covered it before, but I just can’t get enough of this “Green” Morgan. But there is another article on Morgan’s unveiling of the world’s first pollution-free sports car at the Geneva Motor Show. This car is simply gorgeous. For the full article, see The Daily Mail. What do you think of the styling? Would you buy one? How does it fit in with the other Morgans?

The Acabion GTBO reaches 300mph in just thirty seconds, say its designers. The “road streamliner” is capable of 340mph and can do 0 – 300mph in just thirty seconds Based on the cockpit of a jet fighter and using aerodynamic techniques used in aerospace design, the GTBO is a full 90mph quicker than its nearest rival, the Bugatti Veyron, which takes 55 seconds to reach its 250mph top speed. Two-wheeled, but with twin stabilizing wheels at the back for low-speed maneuvering – not unlike those used on children’s bicycles – the GTBO packs an astonishing 800 brake horsepower in its 1,300cc turbo-charged engine. However, it weighs just 700lb, half the weight of the original Mini. The engine and power train are designed in Britain by engineers from the race and dragster community. An electric version, itself capable of 300mph, is […]

Caterham Cars has joined forces with RS Performance to offer “the ultimate in bespoke Seven coachbuilding” to enthusiasts who want an expression of British sports car exclusivity. Caterham has long been the epitome of personalized motoring with almost every version of the 12 000 Sevens on the road differing from one another. The joint venture takes that famous philosophy to an altogether new level. RS Performance is an exclusive, niche engineering house. Born out of the passion and pedigree of its founder, Russell Savory, it will offer an “everything is possible” service to Caterham customers who want truly “built to order” cars. Using the motorsport-honed Caterham chassis and benchmark technology as a cosmetic and engineering base, RS Performance, will “turn imagination into reality”, Savory said. The heartbeat of every RS-badged Seven will be the unique RST-V8 engine.

Mini has crowned its lineup with a second-generation version of the John Cooper Works. Shown just over a week ahead of an official unveiling at the Geneva motor show, the new go-fast Mini is planned to head to the United States in August in two distinct body styles in a move aimed at seeing it appeal to as wide an audience as possible. As with the second generation of the Mini Cooper S–on sale in North America since 2007, buyers will be able to choose between a standard two-door or roomier three-door Clubman at $28,550 and $30,800, respectively. Both models run the same turbocharged 1.6-liter four-cylinder direct injection gasoline engine–the result of a joint venture between Mini parent company, BMW, and French car maker Peugeot.

Jaguar Cars Ltd. has taken 10,000 customer deposits globally for the upcoming XF sedan, including about 3,000 in the United States. That’s a promising start. Jaguar executives say they released the figures to show the impact of the XF even without advertising or cars available to test drive. Instead, Jaguar has combined dealer training with posh customer-only events. The company put together a 21-city road show with a few demo XFs in tow, training entire dealerships at once. Dealerships then conducted events for loyal customers and luxury intenders. Ken Gorin, owner of The Collection in Miami, has 80 sold orders from holding two events, one at the dealership and another in the Miami Design District. “I sold 30 XFs the first night,” Gorin says. “I haven’t seen a reaction like that since the (Porsche) Boxster came out. When people hear […]

Concerns over the quality of the cars being built by Shanghai Automotive (SAIC) at the Birmingham-based Longbridge factory have caused further delays. The MG TF is due to be the first model launched by the Chinese firm in the UK and production began back in May 2007, but it was stopped not long after. Since then, NAC (the Chinese firm that bought the MG brand following the collapse of MG Rover) has been bought out by rival Shanghai Automotive and the delays have been further extended. NAC originally claimed that it would have the MG TF on sale in early 2007 and provide more than 1000 jobs. So far, the car’s launch is more than a year overdue and only 140 jobs have been created. President of SAIC, Chen Hong, claimed that “if we launch the product on the UK […]

Rolls-Royce Motor Cars Ltd. unveiled the Phantom Coupe at a press preview in California, its third model from a common platform since parent company BMW AG relaunched the brand in 2003. Under the skin, the Phantom Coupe is closely related to the softtop Phantom Drophead Coupe and the longer Phantom sedan. The Phantom Coupe is expected to have sportier handling than the convertible, thanks to stiffer springs and dampers, anti-roll bars, modified brakes and an automatic gearbox with an electronic “Sport” program. Besides the roof, other differences between the coupe and the convertible include a posh, fully carpeted interior for the Phantom Coupe. The convertible model has woven fiber floor mats that are rot-resistant if they get wet and an optional teak tonneau cover for the fabric top when it’s down.

Morgan Motor Co., the tiny British automaker so old-fashioned it still uses wood frames, is stepping well into the future with LifeCar, a hydrogen fuel cell hybrid it says will prove “a zero-emission vehicle can be fun to drive.” Morgan will unveil the hand-built aluminum-bodied coupe next month at the Geneva Auto Show, and although there’s no word on whether LifeCar will ever be more than a one-off concept, the company hopes to show hydrogen is a viable – if distant – alternative to fossil fuels. Morgan has spent more than two years working with a British defense firm, two universities and a hydrogen supplier to develop a car it promises will “minimize the fuel cell cost and provide the fuel economy for a 200 mile range.” As impressive as the LifeCar is, what makes it truly remarkable is a […]

It’s been twenty years since Aston Martin, deeply in debt and little more than an automotive anachronism, was swallowed up by Ford empire. Say what you will about Ford’s other British luxury marques, the past two decades have been good ones for Aston. When Ford acquired the brand, in 1987, Aston sales plunged to as little as 42 cars a year and at one point, keeping the assembly line rolling depended on the sale of a single car to a wealthy — and quite drunk — British aristocrat. These days, Aston’s aspirations are positively mass-market, with an array of new products promising to push volume up near 10,000 cars a year, and the company well in the black for the first time in its 93-year history. That’ll be good news for the new owners, David Richards, CEO of racing’s Prodrive […]

Jaguar may resurrect its legendary E-Type sports car. The British motoring icon is tipped to revive the true two-seater sports car to take on the Italian and German sports cars. The most loved of the Jag family was built in the Swinging England period of 1961 to 1974. With its performance, handling and modern looks it was a huge sales success and is still a highly sought collector’s car. Even Enzo Ferrari said it was the most beautiful car ever made.

When you were a kid and you got a radio-controlled car, didn’t you imagine how cool it would be to be the size of GI Joe and able to climb inside and drive it? That feeling is what the new crop of Lotus sports cars is like. It’s just as cool as you imagined it would be, and it’s a good way for GI Joe to meet Barbie, too. We recently got to climb inside and drive the new 2008 Lotus Exige S 240 and the fabulous new 2-Eleven track car, which would make GI Joe leave Barbie far behind, pouting and wanting to drive it. It seemed only a few years ago that Lotus was about to drive off the edge of the map in the U.S. market, but the company now offers seven models to American customers. All […]

Almost three quarters of UK consumers would buy British if given a £100,000 budget to spend on a new car, according to new research from online insurance company swiftcover.com. Sweeping aside their German and Italian rivals, British marques emerge as unanimous favorites amongst UK car buyers, with 69 per cent claiming they would opt for a British brand if they had the money to do so. Topping the ‘Dream Car’ list with almost a quarter of the votes is Aston Martin (24%), followed by Range Rover (19%), Bentley (16%) and Rolls Royce (10%). German and Italian luxury marques faired badly by comparison – with just one per cent opting for a Lamborghini, 9 per cent for a Ferrari, 9 per cent for a Porsche and 2 per cent for a Maserati. The top ten swiftcover.com “Dream Cars” for 2008 are: […]

Aston Martin could co-operate with Daimler AG’s Mercedes on ventures ranging from engines to new models, the British luxury carmaker’s majority shareholder, Kuwait’s Investment Dar, said on Tuesday. Adham Charanoglu, business development manager for Investment Dar, which bought Aston Martin from Ford Motor Company last March, said it had held talks with Mercedes and with LVMH’s Louis Vuitton and PPR’s Gucci on branded merchandising. Charanoglu told the Reuters Islamic Finance Summit that plans to overhaul Aston Martin merchandising had yet to be finished but included opening new centers dedicated to the marquee — made famous by James Bond — in the UK, the Gulf and possibly the U.S. Any brand development would need to be at the top end of the luxury market, with opportunities stretching from apparel, owners’ events and track racing to real estate, Charanoglu said, adding Aston […]

From today’s “Financial Times Limited” come another story about the hopeful return of MG to the market. China’s Shanghai Automotive (SAIC) hopes to begin producing the MG TF roadster in Nanjing in May and at its plant in Longbridge, UK, within three months of that date, a senior executive said yesterday. But SAIC admitted the car’s long-awaited relaunch could be delayed again as it grapples with quality issues and rebuilds tooling bought in 2005 from bankrupt MG Rover and shipped to China by Nanjing Automobile (NAC), with which SAIC merged in December. “We want to begin production of cars at Longbridge as soon as possible, but the first priority for us is the quality of the product,” Chen Hong, SAIC’s president, told the Financial Times yesterday. “If we launch the product on the UK market and don’t have sufficient quality […]

Classical Drives has some great news for us super car fans: Proteus is coming to the US. For those of you that don’t know, Proteus is a British car manufacturer that makes exacting replicas of the legendary C and D type Jaguars. These cars are not fiberglass knock-offs, they have all aluminum bodywork that is hand formed much as the originals were. If you have a fetish for the great racers of the ’60s, you have got to check out these beautiful machines. Drool away.

Britain’s Autocar magazine has the first spy shots of the first rolling prototype of the Rolls Royce’s new small car. It has been dubbed the RR4 until they find a suitable name for the new vehicle. Autocar reports that the new model will carry on with the Phantom’s design language, from the thick C-pillar to the suicide rear doors. But the new model is significantly shorter and lower than the Phantom, which will inevitably lead to speculation that it’s based loosely on BMW’s 7-Series sedan. We’re not saying, we’re just saying. Engines are to include the Phantom’s 6.75-liter V-12 and potentially, the 400-hp, 4.4-liter twin-turbo V-8 found in BMW’s M3. Also surprising is the magazine’s report that a diesel Roller might even be under consideration. Rolls Royce is boosting capacity in Goodwood to build the new car, and prices in […]

The first production Lotus Elise-based, $98,000 battery-electric Tesla Roadsters will be exported to the U.S. from Lotus Engineering in March, now that Tesla Motors has received all regulatory approvals to import the first production Tesla Roadster (“P1”) for sale. Initially at a limited rate pendng the supply of a redesigned single-ratio transmission, series production is scheduled to begin on 17th March. Transmission problems have delayed series production, and early production units will be equipped with an interim transmission that meets durability requirements but limits acceleration to 5.7 seconds from 0 to 60 mph. Tesla Motors engineers have designed a permanent solution for mass production that supports the original specification of 0 to 60 mph in 4 seconds. The planned solution is said to offer some very positive benefits. Instead of a complex two-speed transmission design, Tesla will achieve the original […]

To start the review Clarkson says, “Normally I avoid road-testing cars made by small British companies like Ascari because nobody is going to buy one anyway. However, some things are worth a bit of extra effort and the Ascari A10 is one of them. With a tweaked version of BMW’s old M5 engine sitting in the middle of the carbon fibre tub, you have the power of 600 horses in a car that weighs about the same as a sausage dog.” Read the full review here.