While it may seem a bit dangerous to put both a stock Lamborghini Gallardo and a special Superleggera version which has also received two turbochargers from the tuners at Heffner, giving it almost 1042 HP, on the same road, it seems that they decided to do it.
Just sit back, relax, and enjoy the stunning engines on those two extreme cars.
That’s right, the title is correct, it seems that because studies show texting while driving is a whopping 23 times more likely to provoke an accident, the US government wants to ban it. But guess who started militating against this fact by saying that it is completely safe and necessary?
Nope, not the Twitter or Facebook junkies, but the US association of truckers, who these days rely on dash-planted computers and keyboards in their laps to plot out routes, get in touch with their headquarters and keep their customers up to date.
While I myself and plenty of people can realize that this new effort will impede their work, it’s nothing that a cell phone with a headset can’t fix. The truckers have revealed that if they were to pull over to send text messages or access the Internet, then every minute would cost the transport companies about $1.50, which would get pulled from the pay check of the driver.
A spokesman for the American Trucking Associations has even went so far as calling the new law bill “overkill” and that it will not improve anything. His statement just goes against common sense and the fact that trucks are now responsible for 12% of the deaths occurred on highways every year.
What do you think? Would the thought of having a huge truck, driven by a man who is texting, using the Internet and doing all sorts of other things, on the same road as your small car make you feel safe? Share your opinions by leaving a comment.
We all know and even felt the worldwide economic crisis, and companies in almost any branch of the industry have felt it even worse. It seems that even though projections about the future are optimistic, Kuwaiti financial company Investment Dar is facing some serious troubles, and has just signed an agreement in order for the investors to give it time to solve its problems and get back on the profit side of things.
Why should it bother us that some Arab fund is running out of “oil dollars” you say? Well how about the fact that it owns about half of famous UK automaker Aston Martin. That’s right, Investment Dar, alongside other names like former racer Dave Richards, banker John Singers and Adeem Investment bought the company from Ford in March, 2007. The money paid by Dar was around $925 million, but just last year it seems that the company was trying to get a loan of about $1 billion, in order to solve its financial problems.
Hopefully though the company will get a break thanks to this agreement from investors and will manage to pull itself from the hole it dug. Also, let’s keep our fingers crossed for Aston Martin, even though some of their cars aren’t driven by the most qualified people.
BMW is in the middle of a new marketing strategy called Joy is BMW, through which the Bavarian automaker reveals how their cars can bring many smiles to the faces of their drivers. The first ad, simply called Joy was already released, but now a new one has appeared.
Entitled Jump for Joy, it reveals just a few … “interesting” (to say the least) ways to get into a BMW, whether it is your own or a friend’s. However, before your go and try some of these stunts with your own car, whether it is a BMW or not, the company does warn you not to try this at home. Enjoy the new ad from BMW, and if it’s possible, try to imagine how many takes the guys in it must have taken in order for the jumps to be just right.
If there’s one thing which really detracts people from buying hybrids and hydrogen-powered vehicles, that would be the performance. Many people really want to feel a rush when they hit the gas, no matter what their fuel efficiency might dictate. But how about this project from a team of engineers from the Ohio State University, which has just set the world record for the fastest hydrogen-powered vehicle with a speed of over 300 mph / 484 km/h.
The project first started as a join effort between the engineers at Ohio State University and the ones from Ford. After creating the Fusion 999 model, which set the record of 207 mph, the Ford guys decided to leave the team and apply the knowledge for their parent company. The students however decided to stick with it, and achieve the goal of doing 300 mph with a hydrogen-powered vehicle.
As such, the Buckeye Bullet 2 was born. It was then taken to the famous Bonneville salt flats in order to set the new world record. The two runs needed to properly set the record registered an average of 303.025 mph (487.671 kph), for the flying kilometer of road traveled, and 302.877 mph (487.433 kph) for the flying mile. The fastest speed recorded during the training runs was an even bigger 489 km/h, but couldn’t be set as a record.
Even though we can’t expect future hydrogen cars to overtake us on the highway at those dizzying speeds, it’s good to known that the technology is there and maybe it will be adapted for normal use. Enjoy the video with the world breaking run.
Alright, the first thing you are thinking about is what type of Rolls Royce that was, it was a slightly older one, from 1983, as it seems that people who nowadays drop a fortune on a new Phantom don’t really try drunk driving.
The accident happened earlier this year, but now the Winchester Crown Court finally passed a verdict for 50-year-old Robert Caton, which drank two whiskey bottles and drove his car into the front window of Tesco supermarket in Andover, Hampshire. He was jailed for 16 months for destruction of property and another 3 for refusing to take a breathalyser test.
What’s worse it seems that at that time, the man even asked a security guard in what time can he evacuate anyone in the supermarket, but still drove two times while the people were trying to escape. Among the victims was a pregnant woman.
All of these crimes were seemingly caused by Caton’s case of depression and the anger towards Tesco, as he saved up for a bed an cupboard set for his son, but the mattress, which he though would be included in the set, needed to be bought separately. Throw in a hefty bill coming from one of his utility suppliers, and Caton apparently snapped.
The judge of the court delivered the sentence and said that his actions were actually “deliberate” and that: “If every citizen of this country who felt aggrieved against a shop or a bank acted like you there would be complete mayhem. Frustration is no defense or mitigation.”
This just goes to prove how many people, no matter what car they have, can try to hide their problems but then choose to hurt others around them. Hopefully he got what he deserved and the time in jail will show him that life can be much worse.
Football (soccer) players really have it all, from lots of money to pretty women and, most importantly, very fast cars. But it seems that they don’t really have the skill to “tame” such wild machines, as 21-year-old Danish striker Nicklas Bendtner for Arsenal London football team in the UK crashed his beautiful £120,000 ($270,000) Aston Martin DBS into a tree on the A1, while heading to his team’s practice session in Hertfordshire.
The football player escaped with only a few injuries, mostly just bumps and bruises, with the most severe ones being some grazes on his knee. The father of the Arsenal striker declared that he is a bit shaken up, but according to the coach of the London team, Arsene Wenger, he will be able to play once more during this weekend.
While we usually condemn such behavior, especially if it ends up with such a beautiful car being destroyed, it’s still good to hear that he made it out alive. Perhaps next time he will be more careful with his future new supercar.
Well this is certainly something, it seems that a Nissan GT-R owner woke up one morning to find that his beautiful supercar is sticking much closer to the ground, but not thanks to some new low-profile wheels or anything like that, quite the opposite, as all of the four wheels of car were stolen by some thieves.
What’s worse, they didn’t even have the decency to put some cinder blocks or wooden stubs under it, so the beautiful, high performance brakes were just resting on the asphalt. It seems that because the owner never had any problems with wheels theft and usually kept his car in the locked garage, he didn’t order any lug nuts to prevent the wheels from being stolen.
Do you have any such stories that you would like to share? Don’t be afraid to leave a comment below.
Toyota and the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration have just released an urgent message to all Toyota and Lexus owners to remove the driver floor mat as it seems there is an issue with the gas pedal becoming lodged in it and increasing the speed of the car.
This has already claimed a lot of lives, with the most recent one involving an off-duty California state trooper, which was driving along with his three family members in a 2009 Lexus ES350 when the accelerator pedal got jammed in the mat and led the car to its maximum speed of 120 mph (193 km/h). Needless to say they crashed and lost their lives, making Toyota and the NHTSA formally investigate the matter.
“Obviously the tragic accident in San Diego was certainly an eye opener for all of us and we’ve paid very, very diligent attention to moving forward to try to make sure none of us will be reliving that kind of a very tragic situation,” said Toyota spokesman Irv Miller.
As such, almost 3.8 million vehicles will be recalled in order for the floor mats to be removed and other, safer ones, to be installed. The Toyota models recalled are the: 2007-2010 Camry, 2005-2010 Avalon, 2004-2009 Prius, 2005-2010 Tacoma and 2007-2010 Tundra. The Lexus models recalled are the: 2007-2010 ES 350 and 2006-2010 IS 250 and IS 350 sedans.
In case you find your gas pedal lodged by this floor mat, attempt to dislodge it, if this isn’t possible, step on the brake pedal with your two feet. You can also attempt to turn the engine off but don’t pull the key out of the ignition. If your car has a start/stop button, press it for three seconds until the engine stops. Hopefully though you won’t have any problems
As you all know, large American car company Chrysler isn’t in the best of financial situations, but after partnering with Italian automaker Fiat, it hopes to bounce back and even contend with old rivals of the brand, like Cadillac.
We’ve already heard Fiat president Sergio Marchionne say that five new facelifts will be made to the Chrysler lineup in the next year and a half, but now it seems that this statement also included something about Chrysler’s medium-sized sedans, the Sebring and the Dodge Avenger, which won’t be discontinue next year, as reports indicated, but will keep on being manufacturer until 2012, when Fiat will provide a platform for a new Chrysler model.
This is great news for the people working at the Sterling Heights plant, which produced the two models, and who were protesting in the last few weeks against Chrysler. Sadly though, it seems that cut backs will be made, as the Sebring and Avenger only managed to sell about 40,000 units in August, while the segment leader, Toyota with its Camry model, managed to move around 238,000 units.
Malchionne also revealed that the two companies will elaborate a five-year plan so that the future won’t be so uncertain at Chrysler.
Volkswagen is definitely a busy company these days, releasing new things almost every week. After the Frankfurt Motor Show, the company decided to further amplify the hype surrounding its L1 concept, which boasts a very impressive fuel economy.
Part of this strategy was a new video, which shows some of the design stages through which the model has gone through. But a few eagle-eyed viewers have noticed that at around the 4:37 mark, another clay model is seen in the same hall as the L1. Judging by the overall shape, it is a Golf, but catching a glimpse of the healights and the slightly more aggressive stance, it isn’t the current Golf VI model, but a new generation of it, the often rumored Golf VII.
The seventh generation of the popular hatchback has already been talked about by VW design boss Walter de’Silva which revealed that he can’t even catch a good night’s rest because of it. Featuring, as I’ve said, a more aggressive stance and a coupe-like body, the new Golf has a new pair of headlamps, but is still in the clay modeling stage.
Set to be launched around 2012, it definitely seems that the company wants something completely different with this future generation, as the current one just seems an fairly unattractive mix between the Scirocco and a Touareg. All we can do is fuel the speculation fire. Take a look at the video below and share your thoughts on it.
Well as much as anyone with a spare 469.99 Canadian Dollars would love for the title to be true, we are talking about a new promotion from Audi Canada which sells a special 1:1 scale print of a new Audi R8 V10 car for your own garage.
Anyone who wants to show the world just what kind of beautiful car he wants to own and is a resident of Canada can go and purchase this stunning print, which is offered in three different sizes, depending on the type of garage you own.
While this new promotion might make you scratch your head, in my opinion it’s nothing short than brilliant. This will make many people jealous and might even give some nasty head bumps to those who would want to closely examine your new acquisition. What do you think? Don’t be shy to leave a comment to this story.
In the last few weeks we’ve been hearing a lot from various automotive industry representatives that fully-electric cars aren’t feasible just yet and how other types of technology, like hydrogen, will be more reliable. But it seems that despite this, General Motors’ future electric model, the Chevrolet Volt, has already amassed over 50,000 pre-orders, according to the company’s PR man, Bob Lutz.
He revealed that even though times are tough, dealerships across the US have recorded much more pre-orders for the Volt than the company expected. He still declined to put a real price tag on the mode, which will be launching next year, but estimates are that it will be around $40,000. Don’t forget though, that anyone purchasing the car will get back 7,500 dollars from the government as an ecological bonus.
If the popularity of the Volt continues to rise, then people will have to wait a bit until GM will be able to produce all of the models in order to satisfy the demand, as according to the road map, the company will reach 50,000 Volt models in 2011.
Were you one of the people who are interested in the fully-electric Volt? Don’t be shy to share your opinion with us below.
Let’s face it, while the Toyota Prius may have set a new benchmark in popularity for hybrids, it hasn’t won any beauty contests. With some naming a turtle (both in looks and performance), many owners have been searching for things to liven up the car.
Japanese tuning company Tommy Kaira may have just what many Prius owners have been searching for, as it just released concepts of up coming bodykits and aerodynamic packages that it will launch for the 2010 edition of the new Toyota Prius. While the overall look of the car will remain intact, these new kits of bumpers, spoilers, side skirts and grille trims will definitely make your Prius more attractive. Coming in both normal and carbon-fiber flavors, the new parts will be launched soon enough.
Already available for the Japanese market are a set of quad tail pipes, which will make the small car sound bigger. Lowering kits and 18-inch alloy wheels will also be available soon enough.
Do you think that these new bodykits will make people more interested in the Prius? Don’t be shy to drop a comment to this article.
Here’s something that was pretty clear from the start, it seems that Ferrari will be unleashing a convertible Spider version of the brand new 458 Italia supercar in the next few years. The statement, made by the president of the company, Luca di Montezemolo, revealed that the plans are in place, but the new California model will be marketed as the most important convertible in the car lineup.
Fans and enthusiasts alike were clinging on the fact that the model which the 458 will replace, the F430 saw the coupe and the convertible editions announced and launched in the same year. It seems that they will now have to settle with the California or the old F430 in order to drive a Ferrari and feel the wind in your hair.
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