Auto News 5

News 30 Oct, 2012

Jaguar has unveiled the Concept Speedboat at the launch for the new XF Sportbrake estate

Pictures 30 Oct, 2012

Keeping up with some of Volkswagen China's products is a bit like keeping up with all the models Nissan has named Sentra, Almera and Pulsar - you need to know your cars and perhaps call on some professional help like the goldmine that is our very own Product Life Database (PLDB for short). You sure need it after you go there and encounter a Mark 2 Jetta with a different nose to the one you remember, or a Mark IV Golf with the same generation Jetta's front end...

US component manufacturer body, OESA (Original Equipment Suppliers Association), says the current shortage of skilled engineers is not sustainable as the American automotive industry enjoys prolonged recovery.

Audi aims to match last year's operating profit of 5.35 billion euros ($6.92 billion) in 2012 despite falling profit in the third quarter.

Malaysia's Proton and Japan's Honda Motor have agreed to explore opportunities to collaborate on the development of new products and technologies.

Honda may share car platforms and production facilities with Malaysian carmaker Proton Holdings, owner of the British sports car maker Lotus Group International Ltd, according to a statement from Proton's parent, DRB-Hicom.

Reynolds and Reynolds, a leading provider of business management software for auto dealers in North America and Europe, is exploring a sale to private equity that could fetch around $5 billion, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Chrysler Group's third-quarter net profit rose 80 percent to $381 million on strong sales of cars and light trucks in North America.

From press release

Canadian race car driver Maryeve Dufault will be one of the three judges on the second season of the reality competition series GT Academy 2012.

Premiering on Spike TV on Thursday, November 1st at 11:30pm EST/ 8:30pm PST, this six-week series will follow the top 16 virtual racer finalists who emerged from a pool of over 400,000 racing hopefuls.

Dufault, along with Danny Sullivan and Boris Said will judge the 16 virtual racers on various criteria as they compete in a week long boot camp for the chance to become a part of a professional race car team.

Photo: Nissan GT Academy

Maryeve Dufault, known for making history as the first Canadian female to compete in a NASCAR Nationwide race, has competed in the ARCA stock car series in the U.S. For the past two seasons.

The GT Academy competition was to see if if video gamers have the skills to get into a real car and make it as a pro race car driver.

In July, after three months of online competition, the top 32 of 400,000 Gran Turismo 5 online gamers met in San Diego to determine the 16 finalists for GT Academy. Over two days of virtual racing competition on identical gaming sleds, the fastest 16 were invited to the legendary Silverstone Racing complex in England to begin an intense boot camp that combined physical and psychological challenges in addition to on track driving in a variety of performance vehicles.



The six-week GT Academy television series will capture every challenge and all of the human drama of a very intense week.

At the end of each episode, competitors' performances are evaluated and critiqued by pro racers Danny Sullivan, Maryeve Dufault and Boris Said. Those who don't make the cut go home. One winner emerges and remains in the U.K to undergo intensive professional racing training that will qualify them to earn their international competition license.

Making its sixth appearance at the SEMA Show in Las Vegas, Lexus unleashed six monsters led by the LF-CC Concept, which made its American debut.

Visitors can also marvel at the LS 460 F Sport by Five Axis, the GS 350 F Sport Supercharged by VIP Auto Salon, and the 416-horsepower IS F CCS-R.

Last but not least is the LFA supercar, both in standard trim and with the Nürburgring performance package.

Lexus IS F CCS-R (Photo: Lexus)

VIP Autos Lexus GS 350 F Sport (Photo: Lexus)

Lexus LS 460 F Sport by the Five Axis design studio (Photo: Lexus)

Lexus LF-CC (Photo: Lexus)

Lexus LFA (Photo: Lexus)

Jean-Francois Caubet, a long-time Renault contributor, will step down from his position as managing director following this weekend's Grand Prix of Abu Dhabi.

Caubet arrived at Renault in the '70s and became the director of communication and marketing for the make's Formula 1 team under the orders of Flavio Briatore.

Jean-François Caubet. (Photo: Renault Sport)

In 2009, Caubet became the general manager of [link artid="149196"]Renault Sport F1[/link]. Caubet, who will turn 64 on November 5th, will retire on Sunday night.

Current Renault Sport F1 president, Jean-Michel Jalinier, will take over Caubet's responsibilites.

Caubet is the second boss for Renault Sport F1 to leave the company in just a month. September 21st it was announced that assistant director, Cyril Abiteboul, was leaving Renault to become the CEO of the Caterham F1 Team (which uses Renault engines).

Visitors at the Essen Auto Show in Germany (December 1-9, 2012) will get to see the many accessories from the John Cooper Works (JCW) and MINI RAY collections.

The former will be on display on a MINI Cooper S, both inside and out. They also improve the suspension and driving dynamics of the car. A spectacular multimedia show featuring 3D effects will present all the technical details.

Meanwhile, MINI RAY products add flair to various MINI vehicles, not to mention a dash of bright colour to the dark pavement. The components are made of high-quality materials and are offered in six exclusive colours such as Alien Green, Vitamin Orange and Energy Pink, to name a few.

Both the JCW accessories and MINI RAY products reflect BMW's high standards in terms of design, quality and safety. Sales and installation are taken care of by MINI dealers and service partners. There is no impact whatsoever on the car's warranty.

Photo: MINI

Luca Filippi and Daniel De Jong set the best lap times of the two test sessions held Tuesday at Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona.

In the morning session, Filippi set his best lap time in 1m29.775, ahead of Daniel De Jong (1m30.115), both drivers running for Team Coloni.

In the afternoon, it was De Jong's turn to be quickest, with a lap in 1m30.408, which was not fast enough however to beat Filippi's morning time.

Formula 3 Euroseries' new champion Daniel Juncadella had an impressive run in the afternoon, as the Spaniard stood on the top of the timing sheets for most of the session, before ending up with the third best performance.

Amongst the drivers on track in Barcelona, Canadian driver Gianmarco Raimondo made his GP2 debuts with team Racing Engineering. Raimondo, who currently leads the F3 Open International standings, ranked 24th and 19th overall.

In an effort to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Beetle, Volkswagen has developed a fleet of highly tuned show cars for SEMA. A very special Golf R is on display as well.

APR and VWvortex teamed up to transform a 2013 Beetle Turbo into a 500-horsepower all-wheel-drive hot rod. Meanwhile, the Beetle Beach Battle-Cruiser gets a Revo Technik turbocharger and offers everything you need for a perfect day on the beach and the waves.

The Beetle FMS Automotive pays tribute to the 1956 Beetle, and the retro-looking Beetle Rotiform harkens back to classic tuner's cars from five decades ago.

Finally, Volkswagen unveiled the Golf R H&R, which rides on 19'' BBS Super RS wheels and has been upgraded with the new Phantom series G-Stop kit from Goodridge.

Photo: Volkswagen

As continuously variable transmissions (CVT) gain popularity across North America, Hyundai plans to work on dual-clutch transmissions instead.

''Dual-clutch has a better future with us. It has better fuel economy advantages. It's better for the enthusiast driver. It matches [our product philosophy] better,'' said Mike O'Brien, vice president of product planning at Hyundai Motor America.

The Korean automaker currently offers a dual-clutch transmission in the Veloster coupe only. However, based on O'Brien's comments, expect other Hyundai models to follow suit in the next few years.

Source: Automotive News

Meet Leena Gade, race engineer who became last June the first female engineer to win the legendary 24 Hours of Le Mans which earned Audi a 10th victory in the French sportscar endurance classic.

Auto123.com spent some time with Gade during the running of the Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta last weekend.

Gade, aged 35, from South Harrow near London, masterminded the outstanding victory of the diesel-engined Audi R18 TDI driven by Benoit Treluyer, Marcel Fassler and Andre Lotterer at Le Mans, covering over 3,000 miles in 24 hours.

Gade was born in the United Kingdom, but spent a part of her childhood in India. When her family moved back to England she started to watched Formula 1 Grands Prix on television at the age of 13 with her sister. "Nigel Mansell was a big star. That's how we both got interested," she pointed.

"I've always been interested in engineering. As a kid I would take things apart and put them back together from a mechanical point of view," she added.

Photo: Audi Motorsport

She studied automotive and aerospace engineering, took a job at Jaguar and then started her motorsport career as a part time mechanic and data analyst. She joined Audi's race team in 2007 and then was promoted to race engineer.

Her job is to monitor every aspect of the race, including the pit stop strategy, the tire pressure, the fuel consumption, the various temperatures and pressures, the weather and track conditions as well as the set-up of the R18.

"I am responsible for the entire crew, mechanics, background engineers, assistant engineer. I'm in charge of that," Gade said.

"Then you've got the drivers, the set-up of the car and the strategy side of things. I'm responsible for the final decisions on the race car. If a part on the car moves, changes temperature or changes pressure, I'm logging it. The collected information is then used by me to give instructions over a radio to the driver to help him maintain tires or maximise the engine performance for example. I'm the main contact to the driver. The driver-engineer psychology has to be strong and trust plays a vital part in gaining performance," she added

Gade insists that working in such a male-dominated world has never been a problem.

"If it's something you really want to do in life, you really need to push yourself," the former University of Manchester student said.

"My sister and I really wanted to work in motorsport engineering. We never gave up. This is what we always wanted to do in life. And every time someone said 'You can't do this' or 'You haven't got the experience for that', well that's what we did. We went off and got that experience," she continued.

The victory at Le Mans did not change her.

"Two weeks after the Le Mans race, the sheer number of people who contacted me was amazing," Gade said. "For them, it was a really big deal, but I was just doing my job," she concluded.

This article was originally published on Auto-Venus.com.

Brazil's Autódromo Internacional Nelson Piquet, also known as Jacarepaguá, after the neighbourhood of Rio de Janeiro in which it was located will soon be demolished.

The road course welcomed the Grand Prix of Brazil 10 times between 1978 and 1990, as well as the MotoGP Brazilian Grand Prix.

It will be demolished to allow the construction of structures for the 2016 summer Olympic Games. So far, the plan for the site it to become an Olympic Training Centre.

Jacarepaguá was the scene of Michelin's first win in Formula 1 en 1978 when Carlos Reutemann won the Grand Prix of Brazil, driving a Ferrari 312T2.

The circuit was also the scene of the first victory for a semi-automatic gearbox in F1 when Nigel Mansell won the 1989 Grand Prix behind the wheel of his Ferrari 640.

From press release

Jack Daniel's Racing's black and white livery will feature on the Nissan Altima V8 Supercars of Todd and Rick Kelly next year's Australian V8 Supercars series.

V8 Supercars Nissan Ultima. (Photo: Nissan Motorsport)

Nissan Australia Managing Director and CEO William F Peffer Jr joined team co-owners and Bathurst-winning drivers Todd and Rick Kelly to unveil the spectacular Altima V8 Supercar.

The Nissan Altima V8 Supercar has been designed and built to the category's new ‘Car of The Future' regulations, which include 18-inch wheels, transaxle gearbox and independent rear suspension.

V8 Supercars Nissan Ultima. (Photo: Nissan Motorsport)

“The look of the Altima and sound of the VK56DE engine are second-to-none. Once V8 Supercars has homologated the aerodynamic package on the Altima, we will begin our testing to ensure it drives as fast as it looks and sounds,” said Todd Kelly, 2005 Bathurst 1000 winner and Kelly team Racing Director.

To date over 23,000 man-hours have gone into the design and building of the Nissan Altima V8 Supercar.

V8 Supercars Nissan Ultima. (Photo: Nissan Motorsport)

The Formula 1 engine regulation will change dramatically from 2014. Gone will be the normally aspirated, 2.4-litre V8s in favor of turbocharged, 1.6-litre V6 motors.

With this decision, the FIA hopes to close the gap that exists between the technology of the modern road going cars and the F1 cars.

For a number of years, there have been hybrid street cars available on the market. In a very good technical features written by Wayne Ward and published in Race Engine Technology magazine, the authord explains why road car technology must now find a way in race cars.

Heat Motor Generator Unit (Photo: Magneti Marelli)

Ward explained that basic principle of a ‘normal' hybrid system, such as that in a Honda or Toyota hybrid, is that the kinetic energy which would normally be converted to heat during braking, is stored and then re-used at an appropriate time.

This is called regenerative braking, and is a laudable aim with real environmental benefits. Efficiency is increased, and less fuel should be used.

He points out that the irony is that hybrid systems on roadcars would give the greatest improvement on those that are driven aggressively.

The trucking business relies on what is called turbo-compounding -- a system where excess energy is extracted from an exhaust gas turbine and transferred back to the driveline, increasing torque.

Ward indicates that F1 will embrace a new concept in 2014, when the new engine rules take effect. The F1 rules are published in draft form on the FIA website, and define the energy recovery system (ERS) as “a system that is designed to recover energy from the car, store that energy and make it available to propel the car”, and as part of this it specifies that a “Heat Motor Generator Unit is the electrical machine linked to the exhaust turbine of a pressure charging system as part of the ERS”.

The Race Engine Technology article states that the system will be able to store recovered energy rather than having to deploy or waste any energy available to it. The ERS will combine recovery of heat from the exhaust flow and from braking. Note that the heat recovery is linked to the use of a turbocharger.

Unlike regenerative braking hybrids, this is not a piece of equipment that can be adapted to an existing, normally aspirated engine for an instant performance increase.

Ward concludes by writing “For once, motorsport will be a worthwhile development arena for relevant technologies for passenger and haulage vehicles. The FIA ought to be warmly applauded for bringing in such a brave set of rules. Unfortunately, at this early stage, involvement appears to be limited to wealthy automotive manufacturers. The costs of developing a new energy recovery system alongside a new F1 engine to compete against the likes of Renault, Mercedes and Ferrari are immense”.