#Honda Civic Factory Performance Concept
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Honda Civic Factory Performance Concept, 2008. Presented at SEMA, a prototype Civic sedan with aerodynamic improvements, super-light alloy wheels, a lighter HFP exhaust system and an upgraded HFP suspension kit. The concept offered the possibility of improving both fuel economy and performance
#Honda#Honda Civic#Honda Civic Factory Performance Concept#2008#concept#prototype#sports sedan#Factory Performance Concept#design study#aerodynamic
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Top 10 Wildest Paint Colors You Can Buy Right from the Factory: 2017
Your average daily commute is likely filled with cars painted in standard, mundane shades. But every now and then, you might come across a car that sports such a wild paint job that you think it’s a custom aftermarket shade, and that’s where things get interesting. SEE ALSO: The Paint on this Porsche Costs More Than a Porsche Automakers are getting more daring with the paint shades they offer from the factory, and even if they appeal to a small percentage of their customers, wild exterior colors add a lot of personality to a car. Don’t believe us? Take a look at some of the wild paint shades you can get straight from the factory below. Top 10 Wildest Paint Colors Audi Viper Green Audi‘s shade of green is one of the nicest we’ve ever seen, and it suits the RS3’s wild personality perfectly. The German automaker also offered it on the S3 in limited quantities, along with a few other unique shades including Glut Orange, Vegas Yellow, Misano Red, and Sepang Blue. Like other luxury German automakers, Audi offers its buyers the opportunity to choose from a plethora of custom shades through its Audi Exclusive program. ALSO SEE: 2018 Audi RS 3 Review BMW Frozen Dark Red Metallic BMW is kicking off the launch of its new M5 with a First Edition model sporting Frozen Dark Red Metallic paint. It’s a matte finish that fits the high-performance sedan perfectly, giving it a classy yet aggressive appearance. The paint shade comes from BMW Individual, which offers further customization options for BMW buyers regardless of the model. Chances are, BMW will eventually offer this shade in its lineup for any customer willing to pay for it. Dodge Go Mango Mopar and Dodge arguably have the richest history of awesome paint shades, and this year, the American automaker followed up the revival its of Plum Crazy purple in 2016 with Go Mango orange. Go Mango orange originally got revived on the 2016 Dodge Dart, but after missing for 10 years, it’s back on the Challenger and Charger models. It’s not identical to the original Go Mango shade, as Dodge said it has been modernized for today’s vehicles. Ford Orange Spice Available on the 2017 Ford Fiesta ST, Orange Spice might just be the perfect shade for the hot hatch. And despite being a metallic shade, Ford only charges $595 additional for the option, which is the same as the boring and ubiquitous White Platinum. Ford Grabber Blue Very few cars can pull off a baby blue shade, but the Ford Mustang Shelby GT350 does it naturally. And that’s because this is Ford’s Grabber Blue, which has a rich history with the Mustang. In fact, some would say it’s one of the most iconic colors offered on the sports car. Honda Energy Green Honda isn’t exactly known for wild paint colors, as its cars appeal more to the general consumer looking for a steady daily driver that gets good gas mileage. But the Japanese automaker does have a history of offering unique shades like Electron Blue Pearl, and Energy Green shows Honda is back to being a bit daring. It’s similar to the shade Honda rolled out on the Civic Concept that previewed the latest model, and we’re thrilled the automaker took it to production. Lexus Molten Pearl The introduction of the Lexus RC F sports coupe was the perfect time for the luxury Japanese automaker to bring an exciting shade to its typically conservative palette. It’s called Molten Pearl, a unique shade of orange that works quite well on the RC F and was also available on the GS F. Unfortunately, it appears Molten Pearl is being phased out for the 2018 model year on the RC F, being replaced by Flare Yellow. Mercedes-AMG Green Hell Magno Mercedes-AMG introduced its hot GT R in a wondrous green shade, aptly named Green Hell Magno since the GT R was developed at the Nurburgring, which is also known as the Green Hell. It’s an aggressive and unique shade of matte green that fits the GT R brilliantly. It almost makes any other color on the GT R look strange, even the stunning Solarbeam Yellow Metallic. ALSO SEE: 2018 Mercedes-AMG GT Review Porsche Miami Blue One of the more polarizing colors Porsche offers is Miami Blue. Seen here on the Cayman, it’s also available on 911 models and it really helps the sports car stand out in a crowd. It is a really refreshing and vibrant take on blue and even makes Porsche’s Lava Orange (also pictured) look mundane. Volkswagen Kurkuma Yellow Metallic Yellow paint is normally reserved for cars that are fast and race-inspired, and that’s everything the Atlas is not. But Volkswagen has made a bold choice by offering the Kurkuma Yellow Metallic shade on its new three-row crossover, and we’re surprised by how well it fits the model. It’s pretty wild to think someone might be transporting an entire family in a bright yellow SUV. But hey, this is 2017 after all. The post Top 10 Wildest Paint Colors You Can Buy Right from the Factory: 2017 appeared first on AutoGuide.com News.
http://www.autoguide.com/auto-news/2017/10/top-10-wildest-factory-paint-colors-you-can-buy-today-2017.html
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2018-03-31 23 CAR now
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The Plant That Builds the Honda Civic Type R Is Closing
Honda announced it will close its Swindon, U.K., manufacturing plant in 2021 when production ends on the current-generation Civic. All Civic hatchbacks in the U.S., including the Civic Type R, are made at the Swindon factory. Once the Swindon plant closes, Honda may bring production of the Civic hatchback to North America.
A Honda spokesman tells us that the company is “considering adding production of the Civic hatchback in North America, starting from the next-generation model, to serve our customers in the North American market. Since we launched the stylish Civic hatchback in the U.S. in 2016, [it has represented] nearly 20 percent of Civic sales volume . . . So, this would support our efforts to make optimal use of our global production network to meet the needs of our customers.”
The decision comes as Honda evolves its EV strategy. “The significant challenges of electrification will see Honda revise its global manufacturing operations, and focus activity in regions where it expects to have high production volumes,” Honda said in a statement.
Honda chief executive Takahiro Hachigo said the move was not related to Brexit, the U.K.’s decision to leave the European Union (EU). “We had to consider the rise of electrified vehicles, and the different speeds at which electric vehicles will be taken up in North America and Europe,” he told Reuters. “This decision was not informed by Brexit.”
As you may recall, Honda has big plans for electrification. Honda created an EV platform first seen on the Urban EV concept from 2017, a new version of which will be shown at next month’s Geneva Motor Show. Globally, two-thirds of the cars Honda sells will have electrified technology by 2030. That target is 2025 for Europe, Honda announced at the time.
The Swindon factory produces 150,000 cars per year and employs around 3,500 people. Honda made the announcement just a few weeks after Nissan reversed a decision to build the new X-Trail at its Sunderland, U.K., plant. Nissan said, “While we have taken this decision for business reasons, the continued uncertainty around the U.K.’s future relationship with the EU is not helping companies like ours to plan for the future.” Meanwhile, Panasonic and Sony have decided to move their European headquarters from Great Britain to the EU.
The closing of the Swindon plant is part of a larger restructuring for Honda’s manufacturing network. The automaker said it will stop building Civic sedans in Turkey starting in 2021. The plant in Turkey currently makes 38,000 units per year. Honda says its European headquarters will remain in the U.K.
The post The Plant That Builds the Honda Civic Type R Is Closing appeared first on Automobile Magazine.
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The Plant That Builds the Honda Civic Type R Is Closing
Honda announced it will close its Swindon, U.K., manufacturing plant in 2021 when production ends on the current-generation Civic. All Civic hatchbacks in the U.S., including the Civic Type R, are made at the Swindon factory. Once the Swindon plant closes, Honda may bring production of the Civic hatchback to North America.
A Honda spokesman tells us that the company is “considering adding production of the Civic hatchback in North America, starting from the next-generation model, to serve our customers in the North American market. Since we launched the stylish Civic hatchback in the U.S. in 2016, [it has represented] nearly 20 percent of Civic sales volume . . . So, this would support our efforts to make optimal use of our global production network to meet the needs of our customers.”
The decision comes as Honda evolves its EV strategy. “The significant challenges of electrification will see Honda revise its global manufacturing operations, and focus activity in regions where it expects to have high production volumes,” Honda said in a statement.
Honda chief executive Takahiro Hachigo said the move was not related to Brexit, the U.K.’s decision to leave the European Union (EU). “We had to consider the rise of electrified vehicles, and the different speeds at which electric vehicles will be taken up in North America and Europe,” he told Reuters. “This decision was not informed by Brexit.”
As you may recall, Honda has big plans for electrification. Honda created an EV platform first seen on the Urban EV concept from 2017, a new version of which will be shown at next month’s Geneva Motor Show. Globally, two-thirds of the cars Honda sells will have electrified technology by 2030. That target is 2025 for Europe, Honda announced at the time.
The Swindon factory produces 150,000 cars per year and employs around 3,500 people. Honda made the announcement just a few weeks after Nissan reversed a decision to build the new X-Trail at its Sunderland, U.K., plant. Nissan said, “While we have taken this decision for business reasons, the continued uncertainty around the U.K.’s future relationship with the EU is not helping companies like ours to plan for the future.” Meanwhile, Panasonic and Sony have decided to move their European headquarters from Great Britain to the EU.
The closing of the Swindon plant is part of a larger restructuring for Honda’s manufacturing network. The automaker said it will stop building Civic sedans in Turkey starting in 2021. The plant in Turkey currently makes 38,000 units per year. Honda says its European headquarters will remain in the U.K.
The post The Plant That Builds the Honda Civic Type R Is Closing appeared first on Automobile Magazine.
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The Plant That Builds the Honda Civic Type R Is Closing
Honda announced it will close its Swindon, U.K., manufacturing plant in 2021 when production ends on the current-generation Civic. All Civic hatchbacks in the U.S., including the Civic Type R, are made at the Swindon factory. Once the Swindon plant closes, Honda may bring production of the Civic hatchback to North America.
A Honda spokesman tells us that the company is “considering adding production of the Civic hatchback in North America, starting from the next-generation model, to serve our customers in the North American market. Since we launched the stylish Civic hatchback in the U.S. in 2016, [it has represented] nearly 20 percent of Civic sales volume . . . So, this would support our efforts to make optimal use of our global production network to meet the needs of our customers.”
The decision comes as Honda evolves its EV strategy. “The significant challenges of electrification will see Honda revise its global manufacturing operations, and focus activity in regions where it expects to have high production volumes,” Honda said in a statement.
Honda chief executive Takahiro Hachigo said the move was not related to Brexit, the U.K.’s decision to leave the European Union (EU). “We had to consider the rise of electrified vehicles, and the different speeds at which electric vehicles will be taken up in North America and Europe,” he told Reuters. “This decision was not informed by Brexit.”
As you may recall, Honda has big plans for electrification. Honda created an EV platform first seen on the Urban EV concept from 2017, a new version of which will be shown at next month’s Geneva Motor Show. Globally, two-thirds of the cars Honda sells will have electrified technology by 2030. That target is 2025 for Europe, Honda announced at the time.
The Swindon factory produces 150,000 cars per year and employs around 3,500 people. Honda made the announcement just a few weeks after Nissan reversed a decision to build the new X-Trail at its Sunderland, U.K., plant. Nissan said, “While we have taken this decision for business reasons, the continued uncertainty around the U.K.’s future relationship with the EU is not helping companies like ours to plan for the future.” Meanwhile, Panasonic and Sony have decided to move their European headquarters from Great Britain to the EU.
The closing of the Swindon plant is part of a larger restructuring for Honda’s manufacturing network. The automaker said it will stop building Civic sedans in Turkey starting in 2021. The plant in Turkey currently makes 38,000 units per year. Honda says its European headquarters will remain in the U.K.
The post The Plant That Builds the Honda Civic Type R Is Closing appeared first on Automobile Magazine.
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Civic Type R AWD? Testing an Orbis/Honda Civic Type R With 100-HP ‘E-Nitrous’ AWD!
In April and July I reported on a radical new wheel-motor system from Orbis Wheels that completely eliminates the center hub structure of the wheel and instead uses a small, high-speed electric motor to power the rim via a ring gear and pinion drive. At the time, the startup company’s functional proof-of-concept test vehicle was an electric minibike, but because dorky minibikes don’t stop much traffic—even on the Society of Automotive Engineers show floor—the company also mocked its idea up on the rear axle of a traffic-arresting winged and spoilered Championship White Civic Type R. “Made’ja look!”
The whole point of this crazy wheel-reinvention is to eliminate the unsprung weight that has prevented widespread adoption of in-wheel or hub-mounted motors to date (Ferdinand Porsche first proposed the idea in 1897). That SAE-show prototype’s corners still weighed some 20 pounds more than the Honda parts, but a summer spent beavering away on computers and CNC milling machines has managed to completely erase the unsprung weight penalty. Yes, the entire metal and machinery clockworks you see framed within the new wheel rim weighs precisely as much as the Honda-spec tire, wheel, brake system, hub, and knuckle that left the Swindon factory. And none of the weight loss came from using costly or exotic materials.
The wheel and the brake system save most of the weight. By moving the point at which the brake clamps way out to the wheel rim, the mechanical advantage increases enough to drastically reduce the braking force required along with the amount of heat the brakes generate. That allows the weight of the new steel rotor to drop from 12 pounds to just over 2, while the tiny six-piston caliper cribbed from a Buell motorcycle weighs a similar 2-plus pounds, down from the Honda’s 12-plus pounds (and that Buell chomper is too strong, so it’ll soon be replaced by a 1-pound Brembo two-piston bike caliper). Eliminating the wheel spoke and hub structure that formerly transmitted the massive cornering and braking forces between the road and the suspension drops the wheel mass from 29 pounds to 13 pounds—that’s carbon-fiber wheel mass achieved with aluminum. The billet-machined aluminum knuckle/upright shaves a half-pound off Honda’s cast original and bolts right up to all the original suspension mounting points, preserving factory geometry.
The new wheel bolts on and off about as easily as the factory one. Simply remove the wheel cover (the team has 3D-printed a black cover that mimics the look of the front factory wheel and spins with the wheel, but the final design will require a stationary cover that helps keep dirt and debris out of the wheel and features air ducting). Next, pull a retaining pin that allows the caliper to swing downward and inward off the rotor, undo three “lug nuts” that hold the outer wheel-retention roller carrier, and the rim pops right off. (A matching set of three fixed, tapered Delrin rollers contact the inside of the rim so that the lower two inner and outer rollers carry the car’s weight and the upper ones keep the wheel from tilting while cornering.) The electric motor’s pinion easily engages with the ring gear on the wheel with no need to carefully align anything.
These two permanent-magnet AC electric motors, borrowed directly from a Zero S ZF13.0 electric motorcycle, add about 50 hp and 70 lb-ft of torque to each rear wheel. They spin the wheel rims via a fixed 6.2:1 gear ratio. They’re powered by Zero Motorcycle batteries with a total pack capacity of 13.3 kW-hrs. Removing the back seat and cargo area floor and mounting these batteries and the controller that makes it all work adds about 180 pounds to the curb weight of the original Civic Type R.
Orbis cofounder Marcus Hays has brought that same white SAE-show CTR to the Hyundai Motor Group California Proving Ground for us to sample on the eve of our 2019 Car of the Year evaluation days. This is also a proof-of-concept prototype, and as such it’s undergone no vehicle integration work, so the electric axle is controlled via a thumb throttle from a Jet Ski that’s mounted to the shifter. It works just like a nitrous-shot button. And the noise coming from the dozen rollers on those wheels is nearly deafening, despite evidence of aftermarket sound-deadening materials slathering the cargo area.
But what fun! Flick that thumb-switch, and a great whirring noise attends a firm shove in the back as 100 extra horses nicely fill in the torque interruption of the manual shifts. We played around with the car (and used up maybe 6 percent of the battery pack), then passed the wheel to chief tester Chris Walton, who just took “ownership” of our very own Civic Type R long-term test car. Having very recently mastered the somewhat tricky launch of a car that doesn’t let you free-rev the engine to desired level for launch, Chris does a couple of unboosted runs to establish a baseline for the Orbis car with all its extra battery weight. Oh, and it’s also carrying the extra weight of a ride-along mechanic who knows how to instantly shut everything off should something go “poof.” Also note that because the rear motors cannot yet be declutched, when they’re free-wheeling—as during this baseline run—they’re regenerating electricity and adding drag.
Chris’ baseline comes in at 6.3 seconds to 60 mph—considerably off the pace of four stock test samples that range from 5.0 to 5.8 seconds. The trackside crowd erupts when Chris makes his first e-Assisted run, which is visibly and audibly quicker, louder, and more exciting. Within two more runs he’s shaved 1.7 seconds off the baseline, outrunning our quickest CTR by 0.4 second—impressive, given our car’s 342 pounds of added burden. A bit of quickie math to predict the performance without our 154-pound passenger suggests we’d have run a 4.4-second time, or 0.6 seconds quicker than our best stock CTR.
A quick look at the graphs of each run clearly shows how the e-motors keep the car accelerating during shifts, which on Chris’s baseline run consumed 0.25 second on the 1-2 upshift at 27 mph and 0.20 second on the 2-3 upshift at 58 mph. It’s easy to imagine a production-optimized battery and controller further reducing the onboard mass and improving those times by another few tenths—presuming the sound deadening required to mask the roller noise doesn’t add all that mass back.
Chris’ original runs are aborted just above 60 mph out of fear that with the 6.2:1 gearing we might overspeed the unpowered e-motors and demagnetize them. Orbis’ next engineering challenge is to employ clutches to disconnect the motors at higher speeds. Hays mentions that an all-electric AWD Lotus 7 kit car the company is converting will employ two different gear ratios—2.2:1 in front and 6.2:1 (clutched) in the rear. Such a setup would provide strong rear-biased acceleration feel and all-wheel-drive traction from rest, stronger front regenerative braking from all speeds, two separate peak-efficiency speeds, and with those rear motors disconnected, improved cruising range and efficiency.
With a great 0–60 time in the bag, Hays gives the go-ahead to attempt a quarter-mile run. Chris sets out to establish a baseline, but his first run is aborted toward the end by a “poof” and some smoke. When the e-motors are not being powered, they regenerate energy, and the rate of regen delivered by that 306-hp Honda mill at 80-plus mph was more than any Zero bike was ever expected to see. The team discovers a blown fuse, and without a handy replacement, our test session is ended.
We’re confident Orbis can easily overcome these electrical obstacles. We’re less optimistic about the long-term durability of those rollers running on the wheel rim. The rims got very hot during our few short runs, and there was no debris to contend with. Can Orbis design shields and covers that keep debris out? How much debris can they tolerate? And can the unholy racket these roller rims make be reduced or sufficiently masked? Watch this space for answers, and look for the Orbis Civic at this year’s SEMA show.
Read about our long-term Honda Civic Type R here.
The post Civic Type R AWD? Testing an Orbis/Honda Civic Type R With 100-HP ‘E-Nitrous’ AWD! appeared first on Motor Trend.
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Widebody C7 Corvette Has the Looks & the Power
Enhancing the look of the new Stingray is no simple task, given how much effort GM put into the body shape. With extensive use of CFD (computational flow dynamics), Corvette engineers analyzed digital “ribbons” of airflow, allowing them to trace the path of a single air molecule in and around the body.
As a result, the look of the C7 wasn’t merely about styling, but aero driven in order to keep up with an increased focus on track performance. The airflow aspect had to not only reduce fuel consumption and optimize lift/drag characteristics, but also enhance several other areas, such as brake and differential cooling.
Space doesn’t permit covering all those technical aspects in detail, but it does indicate a decided shift in design emphasis. Looking back on the history of various Corvette body shapes, it hasn’t always been about functionality and pure aerodynamics. At one point, Zora Arkus-Duntov and Bill Mitchell differed about the shape of the C3 (produced from 1968-’82). Duntov, a race-bred engineer, wanted it to be smaller, lighter and more slippery. Mitchell, a marketing maven who understood how styling can impact sales, wanted it to be sexier even if that meant increased wind resistance. Mitchell won out, and the coke-bottle curves of the C3 became enormously popular.
Which leads us to Ivan Tampi’s curvaceous C7 conversion, called the XIK Widebody kit. (The initials are a play on the expression “it’s sick.”) The massive, bulging fenders make an impressive visual statement, as do a number of upgrades to the exterior, with extensive use of carbon fiber. So much so that it’s nearly unrecognizable as a Corvette, with the look of a European exotic.
The body conversion has 15 main components in all. These consist of front and rear splitters, along with a variety of vents, overlays and bezels. The interior also has cover pieces for the dash, console and door panels, plus suede-style Alacantara and leather upholstery.
The rolling stock is much meatier than factory, with Kompression Wheels’ Murci Twisted, measuring 20×10 up front and 21×14 in the rear, wrapped with Pirelli rubber (285/25/20 fronts, 355/25/21 rears).
Tampi didn’t come by these eye-catching Corvette mods easily. He has been muscling up a wide variety of cars for more than two decades. A self-taught automotive designer, as well as in composite technology and fabrication, he started out in the mid-1990s by creating a front bumper design for the Honda Civic in his garage while living in his parents’ attic in Los Angeles. He named the new design The Street Fyghter. It was such a hit that he followed up with The Street Fyghter II, and a full body kit as well, called Black Widow.
When Tampi shifted his attention to the Ford Mustang market his company, Ground Designs 2000, grew rapidly. Unfortunately, a number of other aftermarket companies took note of his success and splashed his Black Widow design for the Mustang and undersold him.
Fortunately, Ford was impressed by Ivan’s creativity and gave him two project cars to build and market: a Focus and an F-150. Ford asked him to create a body kit design to help promote its latest model vehicles. His Ford Focus design won Ford Choice awards at the SEMA show in 2003.
Despite his design achievements, Tampi took a business hiatus for several years, and pursued a venture in the fashion industry. But his automotive passion didn’t die, and he later came back with a vengeance.
In the summer of 2013, he completed a widebody kit design for the BMW Z4 and debuted it at the 2014 SEMA Show. Although it didn’t do as well as he hoped, he realized that the upcoming 2014 Corvette C7 was the hot ticket—no surprise there. While walking the SEMA show he took note of some new Corvette feature vehicles with widebody kits and said to himself, “This is right up my alley. It’s what I’m known for!”
Tampi got straight to work on some renderings. But one thing was missing: he needed a Corvette. He partnered up with longtime friend Bob Matias and formed a new company, Ivan Tampi Customs (ITC). This firm purchased a new Shark Gray 2016 Stingray in September 2015, yet there was still another challenge. Tampi had less than four weeks to transform his renderings into an actual widebody shape and make it to the SEMA show.
Not only that, he was taking his fabricating skills to a whole new level, in keeping with the GM technology that went into the C7’s design. Gone were the days of eyeballing the measurements to create a kit. Tampi made his carbon-fiber components with a much higher degree of accuracy and precision, using the latest in techniques for 3D scanning, Alias autocad and a five-axis milling machine.
While subcontractors provided the materials and technology needed to make the new widebody Corvette design, Tampi was hard at work on the physical aspects, and the new shape began to come together in short order. But it was still a daunting task, as he had to form the plugs, plus make the parts and pull the stock Corvette bumpers off and install his new design. All the while shaping and perfecting the fit, putting on all the trim pieces and then getting it painted and transported to Las Vegas. And all this would be accomplished by him and only him.
Ivan Tampi Customs debuted the XIK Widebody kit at the 2015 SEMA Show in Las Vegas as a feature vehicle. A few months later in 2016, Jonathan Vaknin was searching online for a custom design, looking at hundreds of photos. When coming across the XIK, he stopped in his tracks.
“It was amazing,” he recalls. “I fell in love!” He says he had never seen anything like it, and knew he had to have it.
After taking his car in for a fitting, it took Tampi about two weeks to install the body components. (ITC only sells a factory-installed body package, starting at $15K, not including paint, wheels, tires and interior upgrades). Then Vaknin had a custom mix of red with gold paint applied by Donlyson Auto Concepts, along with fitting new wheels and tires. All told, it took nearly four months. But he wasn’t done yet.
About a month after getting the car back, he shipped it to Tampi right before 2016 SEMA to get an interior redo as well. “It was a crazy build,” Tampi notes.
Once the car’s ultra-aero shape and cabin remodeling were completed, Jonathan was so wowed by the look, he’s decided to up the output to more than 1,000 horses by the 2017 SEMA Show, probably with a ProCharger supercharger and other performance parts. Not only that, he has a new paint scheme in mind. Some Corvette projects are never done. Vette
The post Widebody C7 Corvette Has the Looks & the Power appeared first on Hot Rod Network.
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Borla’s Pipe-Organ Tech Gets Your Car Riffing Like AC/DC – Technologue
Did you know exhaust systems function like elaborate organ pipes? I always thought they were more like long megaphones or trumpets, transmitting and muting the sound of the explosions happening in the cylinders. Nope. The noise is actually generated by the rush of exhaust gasses passing—sometimes at sonic or supersonic speeds—through an exhaust valve opening, just like compressed air entering an organ pipe. This probably isn’t news to folks in the exhaust-system biz, yet Borla Performance Industries is only just now getting patent protection for tuning exhaust pipes like organ pipes.
Maybe that’s because not enough musicians design exhaust systems. David Borla, son of the performance exhaust company’s co-founders, Alex and Alyse Borla, started out in the music biz. The composer and performer held a Sony recording contract and has several IMDB movie soundtrack writing credits to his name. Now serving as the company’s sales and marketing VP, David initially riffed on the idea behind his dad’s XR1 racing-muffler patent. That concept uses a bundle of perforated tubes inside a muffler to achieve greater noise attenuation and better flow than a single large perforated tube can deliver. His experimentation with combinations of perforated and unperforated tubes resulted in the company’s line of Acoustically Tuned Applied Kinetics (ATAK) products.
Then one night David was contemplating the whole organ pipe concept and realized that “one of the things that makes an organ what it is are the polyphonic notes—playing more than one note at the same time. Harmony.” He reckoned that if pipes could be combined to engender pleasing chords like triads (a root note plus its third and fifth intervals) or perfect fifths (the kerrang of an AC/DC power chord—root plus fifth interval), the result might inherently sound more pleasing—an exhaust chorus instead of a soloist. So he visited organ pipe factories and learned how varying a pipe’s size can help it convert one note into another.
Now his team records an engine’s exhaust signature using a frequency-spectrum analyzer that helps identify pleasing and objectionable frequencies. (V-12s mostly produce the former; four-bangers generate a ton of the latter.) Pipes are then selected to enhance the sweet notes, de-emphasize or cancel the sour ones, and generate harmony. Borla has just scratched the surface of what this technology can do and is working to develop computer simulations to speed development of new systems. At press time, polyphonic pipes are available for the Focus RS, Fusion Sport, Challenger R/T, and Infiniti Q60S, soon to be joined by BMW M3/M4, Honda Civic Type R, and Kia Stinger systems.
Lessons learned so far: Location of the polyphonic pipes makes a huge difference—they’re quite close to the engine on the Focus RS system, just ahead of the tailpipe mufflers on the Fusion, and just aft of the cross-over pipe on the Challenger and Q60S systems. Polyphonics can restore much of the richness and sound character lost to turbochargers. And systems can be tuned loud or quiet—the Q60S system sings 4dB louder than stock (too loud for Euro pass-by regulations), but forthcoming Mustang EcoBoost and GT systems will be Euro-compliant.
“You’re not going to listen to it and go, ‘Oh, that’s a C triad,’” David Borla notes, “because there are harmonics and overtones. And engine speed, heat, and humidity can all affect the note. But these combinations just sound cool, and they sound different.” They also look cool. Most feature four smaller pipes spliced into the main pipe using header collectors.
Pricing for these million-mile-warranted T-304 stainless steel systems is higher-end but not crazy—$1,208 for the Focus RS cat-back system, with competitor prices ranging from $499 (MBRP’s aluminized steel) to $1,475 for a cp-e system claiming a 5 percent power boost. (Borla makes no specific performance claim for its cat-back system but does for its high-flow-catalyst downpipe.) Your choice—an exhaust that sounds like full-on AC/DC, or an Angus Young unplugged one-note solo.
Read more by Frank Markus here:
Assessing the First Case in a Predicted Autonomy Epidemic
Recirculated CO2 or “Fresh” Pollution?
GTHO! Going in Depth with Mazda’s Brilliant Skyactiv X Engine
Exploring the Future of EV Charging with Continental’s ALLCHARGE Concept
Source: http://chicagoautohaus.com/borlas-pipe-organ-tech-gets-your-car-riffing-like-ac-dc-technologue/
from Chicago Today https://chicagocarspot.wordpress.com/2017/12/20/borlas-pipe-organ-tech-gets-your-car-riffing-like-ac-dc-technologue/
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Steering Wheel Paddle Shifters
Pinalloy Silver Metal Steering Paddle Shifter Extension Fit Honda Jazz Civic CRV
Spec:
• Brand: Pinalloy
• New, Unused
• Material: High quality Aluminum
• ONE-PIECE-CUT finished (No any screw on it)
• Matte Surface
Including:
• Pinalloy Alloy Paddle Shifter Extension x 1 set (Left & Right)
• Tools set x 1
Compatible Vehicles:
• Honda Fit (Jazz) GE Model (2009-2014)
• Honda Civic FA / FD Model (2010-2014)
• Honda CRV RE Model (2009-2016)
www.pinalloy.com, found in 2015 in China, international retail seller, provide auto accessories to enhance your joy with very reasonable price. We have aligned factories with technology:
CNC router
• CNC is a computer controlled cutting machine related to the hand held router used for cutting various hard materials, such as wood, composites, aluminum, steel, plastics, and foams. CNC stands for computer numerical control. CNC routers can perform the tasks of many carpentry shop machines such as the panel saw, the spindle moulder, and the boring machine. They can also cut mortises and tenons.
• A CNC router is very similar in concept to a CNC milling machine. Instead of routing by hand, tool paths are controlled via computer numerical control. The CNC router is one of many kinds of tools that have CNC variants.
• A CNC router typically produces consistent and high-quality work and improves factory productivity. Unlike a jig router, the CNC router can produce a one-off as effectively as repeated identical production. Automation and precision are the key benefits of CNC router tables.
• Drawing of a Tabletop DIY - CNC router. Silver: Iron, Red: Stepper Motors, Light Brown: MDF, Dark Brown: Hard Wood
• A CNC router can reduce waste, frequency of errors, and the time the finished product takes to get to market.
Carbon
• It is a chemical element with symbol C and atomic number 6. It is nonmetallic and tetravalent—making four electrons available to form covalent chemical bonds. There are three naturally occurring isotopes, with 12C and 13C being stable, while 14C is radioactive, decaying with a half-life of about 5,730 years. Carbon is one of the few elements known since antiquity.
• Carbon is the 15th most abundant element in the Earth's crust and the fourth most abundant element in the universe by mass after hydrogen, helium, and oxygen. It is present in all forms of carbon-based life, and in the human body carbon is the second most abundant element by mass (about 18.5%) after oxygen. This abundance, together with the unique diversity of organic compounds and their unusual polymer-forming ability at the temperatures commonly encountered on Earth, make this element the chemical basis of all known life.
• The atoms of carbon can be bonded together in different ways: allotropes of carbon. The best known are graphite, diamond, and amorphous carbon. The physical properties of carbon vary widely with the allotropic form. For example, graphite is opaque and black, while diamond is highly transparent. Graphite is soft enough to form a streak on paper (hence its name, from the Greek word "γράφω" which means "to write"), while diamond is the hardest naturally-occurring material known. Graphite is a very good conductor, while diamond has a very low electrical conductivity. Under normal conditions, diamond, carbon nanotubes, and graphene have the highest thermal conductivities of all known materials. All carbon allotropes are solids under normal conditions, with graphite being the most thermodynamically stable form. They are chemically resistant and require high temperature to react even with oxygen.
• The most common oxidation state of carbon in inorganic compounds is +4, while +2 is found in carbon monoxide and other transition metal carbonyl complexes. The largest sources of inorganic carbon are limestone; dolomites and carbon dioxide, but significant quantities occur in organic deposits of coal, peat, oil and methane catharses. Carbon forms a vast number of compounds, more than any other element, with almost ten million compounds described to date, which in turn are a tiny fraction of such compounds that are theoretically possible under standard conditions.
You are also welcome to leave us comment from "Contact Us" page, or email us: [email protected]
For more details on our products and services, please feel free to visit us at Paddle shifter extensions , Mustang paddle shifter, paddle shift, Steering wheel paddles & Steering wheel paddle shifters
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2018-03-31 20 CAR now
CAR
Auto Spies
#NYIAS: An Italian Stallion — Maserati Launches An All-new 590 HP Machine, The Levante Trofeo
#NYIAS: Agent 001 DETAILS The All-new Lamborghini Urus In These REAL-LIFE Pics, Is It Blowing YOUR Doors Off?
#NYIAS: Mercedes Drops In With The AMG C 63 - Is 500HP Enough To Lead The German Pack?
#NYIAS: Jeep Goes All Out With Factory Performance Parts - Are You Ready To Load It Up At The Dealer?
#NYIAS: Lexus Shows Off Structural Blue High Tech Shade - Is It Cool Enough For You?
Autoblog
Tesla says Model X involved in fatal crash was on Autopilot
Terrifying video shows cyclist’s view of head-on collision
VW storing around 300,000 diesels at 37 facilities around U.S.
2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee vs. midsize crossovers and SUVs: How they compare on paper
Junkyard Gem: 1996 Chevrolet Caprice Classic 9C1 Police Car
Car Throttle
Audi RS3 Vs BMW M2 Vs Mercedes-AMG A45: What's The Best 'Junior' Posh Performance Car?
10 Awesome Cars Added To The Car Throttle Garage In March
Should Car Enthusiasts Still Hate The Chrysler Crossfire?
E30 M3 And Tsukuba Part Of GT Sport's Latest Update
This Used V12 Virage Is A Forgotten Piece Of Aston Martin History
Electrek
Tesla confirms Autopilot was activated during fatal crash under investigation after reviewing data logs
Electrek Podcast: Tesla solar roof back into focus, big week for self-driving cars, Model 3 production, and more
Green Deals: WORX WG719 Electric Lawn Mower $152 shipped (Reg. $200), more
Self-driving Chevy Bolt EV test car gets a ticket for not yielding to pedestrian, GM contests
Major automakers team up to launch electric vehicle marketing effort in the Northeast
Inside EVs
NTSB Retrieves Modules From Fatal Tesla Model X Crash
Here Is How Hyundai Improved Hydrogen Fuel Cell Cars – Nexo
2018 Volvo XC60 T8 Plug-In Hybrid Test Drive Review – Modern Marvel
Popular Mechanics Declares Tesla Model 3 Its 2018 Car Of The Year
Supplier Schaeffler To Create Independent E-Mobility Division
Jalopnik
Tesla Says Autopilot Was On Before Fatal Model X Crash, But That Driver Didn’t Abide Warnings
U.S. Labor Agency Files Amended Complaint Against Tesla For Alleged Worker Rights Violations
Once Again It’s The Car Time
Let This Screaming GSX-R1000 Swapped Fiat X1/9 Echo Off Every Hill
Listen To The Howl Of The Troubled Yamaha V12 F1 Engine
Motortrend
2019 Bentley Bentayga V-8 First Drive
Refreshing or Revolting: 2019 Toyota RAV4
Auto Showdown: 2019 Nissan Altima vs. 2018 Honda Accord
McLaren 570S Spider Track Pack Loses 73 Pounds
Jaguar Will Probably Kill off the F-Type R
Reddit Cars
2018 Tesla Model 3 Long Range (Car and Driver Review)
Someone Just Paid $22,750 for an 18-Year Old Civic
This Original-Owner 1968 Shelby G.T. 500KR Never Sees a Trailer
Tesla admits Autopilot was engaged during last weeks fatal crash
Superlite Cars SL-C with an LT4
Sunday Times Driving
Lotto winner rewards himself with new car… but it’s not what you might expect
The Clarkson Review: 2018 Kia Stinger GT S
Tesla owners facing extended wait for repairs
Rapist taxi driver John Worboys to remain in prison after release decision overturned
Top tips to deal with your driving nerves this bank holiday weekend
The Car Connection
2018 Lexus ES
2018 Lexus LX
2018 Lexus LC
2018 Lexus LS 500
2018 Lexus GS
The CarGurus Blog
Recap: Here’s What We Saw at the New York Auto Show
CarGurus Now Lets Shoppers Search for Carsby Engine Sound
Top Headlines From March 24 – 30
Automotive Easter Eggs: Cars with Hidden Surprises
5 Things We’re Looking Forward to at NYIAS
The Torque Report
BMW to launch ‘Access by BMW’ subscription service
Honda to idle Accord production for almost two weeks
Jaguar XE SVR isn’t in the cards
Lincoln Aviator will look almost identical to the concept
Cadillac will release a new vehicle every six months by 2022
The Truth About Cars
Mid-size Refresh: 2019 Kia Optima
Bark’s Bites: New York’s Greatest Misses
Toyota Discovers Bigger Pistons Aren’t Better, Issues Camry Recall
EPA Readies Rollback of Fuel Efficiency Regulations
Amid Stock Slide, Tesla Issues Largest Recall to Date
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Fast and Loose: There’s No Oversight for Nurburgring Lap-Time Claims
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Numbers don’t lie. They defy interpretation. That’s one reason why car-obsessed souls pore over performance numbers such as horsepower, acceleration times, and lateral grip with religious zeal. We’ve all watched with varying levels of envy, awe, and stupefaction at how ’Ringmeisters tame what Sir Jackie Stewart once called the Green Hell. The German Nürburgring’s Nordschleife, a 12.9-mile hilly, twisty, and frighteningly fast ribbon of asphalt through the Eifel Mountains, has become the go-to benchmark for sports-car and supercar goodness, with the barometer of performance being the clock.
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But who’s in charge? Who is scrutineer of the ’Ring-running cars for technical compliance to production-car standards, as would exist in organized competition under FIA, SCCA, or IMSA? How do we know that they retain their production street trim and tune with legitimate production-issue parts? Lastly—and here’s where the lap times start to bend under the weight of absolute truth—who is responsible for the official timing of the lap?
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No one. All the timing numbers and stats on the Nordschleife spreadsheet for a claimed “road-car lap record” must carry an asterisk with a caveat: “unofficial.”
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A fast lap around the Nordschleife means street cred on Mullholland, the Tail of the Dragon, over the Stelvio Pass, up the Hakone hill-climb in Japan, and even at your local Cars and Coffee gathering—anywhere gearheads assemble. Manufacturers make grand hay of resetting the “road-car lap record” on the Nordschleife, as Porsche just did with its 911 GT2 RS by posting a six-minute, 47-second scorcher. That’s 10 seconds quicker than the Porsche 918 Spyder supercar, which broke the road-car lap record with a time of 6:57 only four years ago. It’s also five seconds quicker than the Lamborghini Huracán Performante’s much scrutinized time of 6:52.01, set late last year.
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The Lamborghini Huracán Performante ran a much scrutinized time of 6:52.01 in October 2016.
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The Nordschleife circuit itself, which does not include the modern Grand Prix course, is 12.9 miles (20.8 km) in length, but even that is not entirely accurate as it relates to these lap-record attempts by road cars. Most of the attempts are terminated 656 feet (200 meters) shy of a technically complete lap, coinciding with the entry and exit of the small pit lane that most manufacturers use as their staging point, marked T13 on many Nordschleife track maps. Therefore, lap times are of a 12.8-mile (20.6 km) lap, not the full length. Successive flying laps are only allowed when the circuit is closed to any other activity on it at the same time. The rental fee to ensure this sits at the equivalent of a cool $70,500 per day. Many manufacturers therefore conduct record attempts during the hour right before or right after the track is open for what are called Industry Pool days, when the circuit is open to manufacturer testing. But the attempts do not technically take place during the proper Industry Pool period.
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In 2013, Nissan claimed the GT-R NISMO was the world’s fastest volume-production car. Later, engineers admitted that the car had been significantly modified.
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Porsche has made as big a deal over Nordschleife lap times as any carmaker. The company made an epically big deal about setting the road-car lap record in 2013 with the then new 918 Spyder, driven by Marc Lieb, who was a three-time class winner at Le Mans and twice FIA GT champion (and went on to an overall win at Le Mans in 2016). That 6:57 lap, witnessed by Sport Auto magazine, used factory stock Michelin Sport Cup tires and the factory Weissach weight-reduction and aero package, although the removable roof was permanently affixed in place. This would turn out not only to be an impressive lap but one that set another record of sorts: It provided more tangible details on verification and car specification than nearly any attempt before or since.
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Two months later, Nissan claimed to have broken that record with its GT-R NISMO, becoming the “world’s fastest volume-production car.” However, engineers later stated that the record car had significant modifications from the standard car. Another recent example is the Honda Civic Type R, current holder of the front-wheel-drive production-car record, except it was wearing sticky nonstock tires during its record-breaking run earlier this year. And therein lies the exact problem with Nordschleife records: no third-party verification.
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The Honda Civic Type R, current holder of the front-wheel-drive production-car record, was wearing sticky nonstock tires during its record-breaking lap.
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There was a recent rumor that at least one manufacturer’s claimed lap times were arrived at by stitching together the best segment times of several laps in order to come up with a more impressive, ideal total lap. While it’s very hard to put in a perfect lap at the very long Nordschleife, such a stitched-together lap time is fantasy.
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Even Porsche is somewhat circumspect about the whole concept. We asked Frank-Steffen Walliser, Porsche’s head of GT racing development, for some insight. Walliser stated that nobody acts as scrutineer for the record attempts, and he actually finds some fault with this. “This is why Porsche hires a notary to verify the timing of all our attempts,” noted Walliser. “We also use two different cars with two different drivers so that we can establish that the lap time is repeatable. Our aim is to generate objective results.
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Walliser said Porsche has asked the management of the Nürburgring “to work on this, to define clear rules for record attempts, and to provide clear definitions on several items like weight class, whether cars must carry a production engine number or VIN, and a minimum production figure to avoid specially built ‘record cars.’ Perhaps even conduct a chassis dyno test to show the car’s power level at the time.”
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Walliser also said that, while there is no requirement for any manufacturer to use a roll cage at the Nürburgring, Porsche always does for safety reasons, but it’s a bolt-in cage, rather than welded. (Welded cages afford far greater structural stiffness and therefore a greater performance benefit.) However, to compel the track to provide timing verification or any other third-party scrutineering is a bit much. Racetracks hold events, stage races, and provide safety support during official race weekends. They are not in the business of scrutineering cars or handling the timing of what amounts to a private event.
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General Motors has been testing at the Nürburgring for many years, and the company confirmed that there’s no independent verification done of lap-record attempts. When Chevrolet publishes a Nordschleife lap time, as it did recently with the Camaro ZL1 1LE (7:16.04), it uses a video recorder and a separate timing device to document the lap. But according to a spokesperson, Chevrolet uses a strictly stock vehicle with production tires, production brakes, and a stock state of engine tune. The only nonstock deviations conform to a GM edict that require a roll bar, racing harness, helmet, and HANS device during any high-speed testing by anyone anywhere. And although the vehicles are largely production representative and GM said the roll bars the company installs are not designed to improve chassis stiffness, the harness certainly improves lap times to some extent. (Most automakers use harnesses in testing at the Nürburgring, not just GM.)
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The only nonstock deviations on the Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE were a roll bar and a harness.
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But here’s one common trait of all these cars that have reset the “road-car lap record” at the Nordschleife over the recent past: They are all seriously, shockingly, ridiculously fast cars. Many of them can lap the ’Ring—and likely any track—faster than most outright race cars of 10 to 15 years ago. Perhaps they couldn’t keep up that pace over the duration of a full race, but certainly for that one magic lap. There are also no regulations requiring the record-attempting cars to have onboard fire-suppression systems or other commonplace racing items like master electrical shut-offs, master fuel shut-offs, or racing-style break-away shut-off valve (to prevent pressurized fuel igniting in the case of a heavy impact). Yet they outperform many dedicated race cars, which are absolutely required to carry such equipment.
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Porsche GT2 RS Shatters the Production-Car Nurburgring Nordschleife Lap Record [Video]
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2018 Camaro ZL1 1LE Storms the Nurburgring in 7:16.04 [Video]
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Watch the Lamborghini Huracan Performante’s Scorching Lap of the Nurburgring [Video]
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So, while we have no proof that manufacturers cheat at the endeavor of setting new Nürburgring records, there is nonetheless no mechanism to verify legitimacy when claiming those records for a production road car in street trim. It’s all a gentleman’s agreement. There’s no scrutineering official from the Nürburgring or ADAC (German auto club) or the FIA in pit lane, inspecting cars with a body jig and testing boost pressures and wastegates. The lap timing itself is not regulated at all.
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Which, from a glass-half-full perspective, makes timing and scrutineering at the ’Ring an opportunity that is there for the taking.
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from remotecar http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/caranddriver/blog/~3/ZVEcEtG-_8M/
via WordPress https://robertvasquez123.wordpress.com/2017/10/21/fast-and-loose-theres-no-oversight-for-nurburgring-lap-time-claims/
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Honda Civic Type R Pickup Concept Hauls More Than Just Ass
It was only a matter of time before Honda started making special versions of the Civic Type R, but little did we know the first one would be a pickup. Created at Honda’s U.K. factory in Swindon, this vehicle swaps out the rear seats and cargo area for a truck bed.
To create the vehicle, Honda started with a pre-production Type R and modified it from the B-pillars back. It keeps its signature rear wing, which Honda made movable to allow easy access to the back. The bed looks properly durable to hold all types of equipment. In this picture, we can see Honda’s lawnmower products in the rear.
The truck retains the same suspension, powertrain, and gearbox as the standard Type R. It also features the same driving modes, which include Comfort, Sport, and +R. It probably won’t be as quick as the regular Type R, however, which we’ve tested hitting 60 mph in 5.0 seconds. Honda says the truck can zip to 62 mph in less than 6 seconds and reach a top speed of over 165 mph. With these specs, Honda calls it “potentially one of the fastest pickup trucks on U.K. roads.”
“We have a special projects division at the factory in Swindon and this project was a fantastic opportunity for the team to show just what their creative minds could do,” project lead Alyn James said in a statement. “The passion that our engineers have for Honda is shown in our latest creation and we are even considering taking it to the Nürburgring to see if we can take the record for the fastest front-wheel-drive pickup truck!”
Honda says it has no plans to put the Type R pickup into production. But last year, we heard Honda was considering other Type R variants, including a version that is more powerful than the existing model’s 306 ponies. Speaking with Automotive News, Civic chief engineer Hideki Matsumoto said the company was also looking into a grand tourer and an all-wheel-drive variant.
The post Honda Civic Type R Pickup Concept Hauls More Than Just Ass appeared first on Automobile Magazine.
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Honda Civic Type R Pickup Concept Hauls More Than Just Ass
It was only a matter of time before Honda started making special versions of the Civic Type R, but little did we know the first one would be a pickup. Created at Honda’s U.K. factory in Swindon, this vehicle swaps out the rear seats and cargo area for a truck bed.
To create the vehicle, Honda started with a pre-production Type R and modified it from the B-pillars back. It keeps its signature rear wing, which Honda made movable to allow easy access to the back. The bed looks properly durable to hold all types of equipment. In this picture, we can see Honda’s lawnmower products in the rear.
The truck retains the same suspension, powertrain, and gearbox as the standard Type R. It also features the same driving modes, which include Comfort, Sport, and +R. It probably won’t be as quick as the regular Type R, however, which we’ve tested hitting 60 mph in 5.0 seconds. Honda says the truck can zip to 62 mph in less than 6 seconds and reach a top speed of over 165 mph. With these specs, Honda calls it “potentially one of the fastest pickup trucks on U.K. roads.”
“We have a special projects division at the factory in Swindon and this project was a fantastic opportunity for the team to show just what their creative minds could do,” project lead Alyn James said in a statement. “The passion that our engineers have for Honda is shown in our latest creation and we are even considering taking it to the Nürburgring to see if we can take the record for the fastest front-wheel-drive pickup truck!”
Honda says it has no plans to put the Type R pickup into production. But last year, we heard Honda was considering other Type R variants, including a version that is more powerful than the existing model’s 306 ponies. Speaking with Automotive News, Civic chief engineer Hideki Matsumoto said the company was also looking into a grand tourer and an all-wheel-drive variant.
The post Honda Civic Type R Pickup Concept Hauls More Than Just Ass appeared first on Automobile Magazine.
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BMW M2 Competition: Interview with the BMW M Boss
The introduction of the brand new BMW M2 Competition marked the opportunity for me to sit down with BMW M’s Boss, Frank van Meel, to discuss the future of the brand that has pioneered concepts that guarantee pure driving pleasure, encompasses an history of motorsport and sheer driving passion every single day – on the road or on the track.
A few days ago at an undisclosed location near Munich, Frank ran me through the highlights of the M2 Competition during an exclusive first look at the vehicle. The M2C is the replacement to the current M2, which has been with us for the last two years. The highly successful and best-selling M-car has proved that the market was desperately looking for a M-car positioned at a lower price point.
With the M2, the Germans found a sweet spot positioned in between the hot hatch market, with models such as the Ford Focus RS, Honda Civic Type R and the Volkswagen Golf GTI and more expensive sports car like the Porsche Cayman (S) and Audi TT-RS. With the release of the M2 Competition, BMW M aims to keep this position and strengthen it with a more capable vehicle still based around a winning formula.
MR: What is the story/idea behind the M2 Competition?
FvM: The main idea behind the M2 Competition is the aim for us as a brand to develop a four-way product line up for BMW M models, the so called; Base, Competition, CS and CSL model hierarchy. This is our aim for the future, and therefore a M2 Competition model was the logical next step in the lineup of the M2.
MR: What does the M in the M2 Competition stand for?
FvM: More…
MR: In what way is the M2 Competition an evolution of something that should perhaps have been there from the beginning?
FvM: The initial M2 was always intended to be like it is now and has been over the past years. The newly developed M2 Competition is based on a large number of ideas we had internally and, was in my opinion a natural development following the success of the base M2 Coupé. The steps we have taken on driving dynamics and performance are in my opinion the right steps and a natural development within the timeline of the model. Although there was never a requirement from within the market to create the M2 Competition.
MR: Why opt for the S55 engine and introduce such a massive change to the key character of the M2?
FvM: During the development of the M2 Competition, we faced a major challenge with regards to the N55 engine due to a number of reasons. First of all, we felt we pushed the engine performance to its limits. 370 horsepower is a great number, but we wanted more. Secondly, we needed changes to meet the new European emissions standards, and so a business decision was made to move to the S55 engine and develop a brand new exhaust system for the M2 Competition which includes the same particulate filter as on the M4.
MR: Would you have kept the base M2 available for sale, if the WLTP would not have played any role in the decision making process?
FvM: Yes, the production of the M2 LCI would not come to an end this summer if the WLTP did not play a role. We would have continued the M2 next to the M2 Competition and both cars would have been built alongside each other at the factory in Leipzig, Germany.
MR: In what way did you listen to the existing customer base and included their remarks in this new car?
FvM: We have most definitely taken notice of what the current customer base and community has shared with us. We looked at where we could improve the package for the M2 Competition. The main change following comments was adding the M mirrors. The majority of the customers wondered why they were missing on the base M2 Coupé and therefore we added them. They are the same mirrors used on the M3 and M4 models. Other changes such as the new M Sports seats, M sports brake kit and the tweaked suspension will also be greatly appreciated by the customer base. Especially those would like to have that additional performance, a key asset of the Competition range.
MR: How did you separate the M2 Competition from the base M4 and made sure the price tag did not increase too much?
FvM: Interesting question. Pricing will be revealed mid-May so I cannot comment on the exact price levels of the M2 Competition yet, but I can ensure you that we looked thoroughly into positioning the vehicle between the outgoing M2 LCI and the base M4. This is the main reason why we didn’t add a carbon fiber roof, adaptive suspension or ceramic brakes to the M2 Competition. We really wanted to make sure that the M2 differentiates itself from its bigger brother both on specification level and price tag. The base price will not increase drastically!
MR: When does the M2 Competition hit markets across the globe?
FvM: Production of the new M2 Competition starts this Summer. The initial deliveries will start end of August or early September depending on your market. We intend to supply and produce for the U.S. market first, since it is our most popular market for the M2. Still, due to the transport time to the U.S., the time frame of the first deliveries are expected to be quite similar across the world.
MR: Will you follow the same path as with the M3/M4 doing a special limited run before the production ends?
FvM: Unfortunately, I cannot comment on any future models, but with our future focus on a four model hierarchy I leave it up to you to decide if you would like to see more M2 derivatives in the future.
MR: If you would spec a M2 Competition what would you include in the specification? Which color would you go for? DCT vs manual?
FvM: As a Dutchman, I would opt for Sunset Orange as the exterior color. I would opt for the optional M wheels, take the manual gearbox and the M Sports brake kit, simply because the grey calipers look a lot better with the Orange body color. On the inside, I would go for the M Sports seats with matching orange stitching. To finish off the specification, I would add M Performance parts, like the carbon fiber mirror caps, carbon fiber diffuser and carbon fiber rear spoiler. The Alcantara M Performance steering wheel is something that belongs to the CS and CSL line up, and is not something I would personally opt for.
MR: What would you like to say to the owners that currently drive a M2? What should they do? Should they move to the M2 Competition?
FvM: First of all, I would like to say; you have made the best possible decision. Great choice! If you feel like it, cannot resist the change or you are in the market for a new car, then please do upgrade to the new M2 Competition. You will love it! If you are not, then please stay with your beloved M2. Enjoy it, drive it, make it your own and be sure to keep that M smile on your face through every single mile or kilometer. In the end, both cars are quite different, but have an extremely strong character that is unique to the 2-Series M line up.
MR: What is currently favorite model in the current M line up?
FvM: Uhmmmm, this is almost an impossible question to answer. It is like asking a father which of his kids is his favourite. Today, he may favor the youngest, the next day it is the eldest. I am in the lucky position that I can cherish, love and favor all the cars in the M line up at any moment of the day.
MR: Do you have any last words to those diehard M fans and followers within the community across the globe?
FvM: As the CEO of BMW M, I am really grateful for the fact that we have such a huge community of true fans and ultimate car girls & guys that support our brand and enjoy our products. All I can say to them is that I hope that they keep enjoying their moments behind the wheel of any M car and that they will share the emotion of the most powerful letter in the world among their friends and fellow petrol- and gearheads alike.
[Source: DriveTribe]
The article BMW M2 Competition: Interview with the BMW M Boss appeared first on BMW BLOG
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Borla’s Pipe-Organ Tech Gets Your Car Riffing Like AC/DC – Technologue
Did you know exhaust systems function like elaborate organ pipes? I always thought they were more like long megaphones or trumpets, transmitting and muting the sound of the explosions happening in the cylinders. Nope. The noise is actually generated by the rush of exhaust gasses passing—sometimes at sonic or supersonic speeds—through an exhaust valve opening, just like compressed air entering an organ pipe. This probably isn’t news to folks in the exhaust-system biz, yet Borla Performance Industries is only just now getting patent protection for tuning exhaust pipes like organ pipes.
Maybe that’s because not enough musicians design exhaust systems. David Borla, son of the performance exhaust company’s co-founders, Alex and Alyse Borla, started out in the music biz. The composer and performer held a Sony recording contract and has several IMDB movie soundtrack writing credits to his name. Now serving as the company’s sales and marketing VP, David initially riffed on the idea behind his dad’s XR1 racing-muffler patent. That concept uses a bundle of perforated tubes inside a muffler to achieve greater noise attenuation and better flow than a single large perforated tube can deliver. His experimentation with combinations of perforated and unperforated tubes resulted in the company’s line of Acoustically Tuned Applied Kinetics (ATAK) products.
Then one night David was contemplating the whole organ pipe concept and realized that “one of the things that makes an organ what it is are the polyphonic notes—playing more than one note at the same time. Harmony.” He reckoned that if pipes could be combined to engender pleasing chords like triads (a root note plus its third and fifth intervals) or perfect fifths (the kerrang of an AC/DC power chord—root plus fifth interval), the result might inherently sound more pleasing—an exhaust chorus instead of a soloist. So he visited organ pipe factories and learned how varying a pipe’s size can help it convert one note into another.
Now his team records an engine’s exhaust signature using a frequency-spectrum analyzer that helps identify pleasing and objectionable frequencies. (V-12s mostly produce the former; four-bangers generate a ton of the latter.) Pipes are then selected to enhance the sweet notes, de-emphasize or cancel the sour ones, and generate harmony. Borla has just scratched the surface of what this technology can do and is working to develop computer simulations to speed development of new systems. At press time, polyphonic pipes are available for the Focus RS, Fusion Sport, Challenger R/T, and Infiniti Q60S, soon to be joined by BMW M3/M4, Honda Civic Type R, and Kia Stinger systems.
Lessons learned so far: Location of the polyphonic pipes makes a huge difference—they’re quite close to the engine on the Focus RS system, just ahead of the tailpipe mufflers on the Fusion, and just aft of the cross-over pipe on the Challenger and Q60S systems. Polyphonics can restore much of the richness and sound character lost to turbochargers. And systems can be tuned loud or quiet—the Q60S system sings 4dB louder than stock (too loud for Euro pass-by regulations), but forthcoming Mustang EcoBoost and GT systems will be Euro-compliant.
“You’re not going to listen to it and go, ‘Oh, that’s a C triad,’” David Borla notes, “because there are harmonics and overtones. And engine speed, heat, and humidity can all affect the note. But these combinations just sound cool, and they sound different.” They also look cool. Most feature four smaller pipes spliced into the main pipe using header collectors.
Pricing for these million-mile-warranted T-304 stainless steel systems is higher-end but not crazy—$1,208 for the Focus RS cat-back system, with competitor prices ranging from $499 (MBRP’s aluminized steel) to $1,475 for a cp-e system claiming a 5 percent power boost. (Borla makes no specific performance claim for its cat-back system but does for its high-flow-catalyst downpipe.) Your choice—an exhaust that sounds like full-on AC/DC, or an Angus Young unplugged one-note solo.
Read more by Frank Markus here:
Assessing the First Case in a Predicted Autonomy Epidemic
Recirculated CO2 or “Fresh” Pollution?
GTHO! Going in Depth with Mazda’s Brilliant Skyactiv X Engine
Exploring the Future of EV Charging with Continental’s ALLCHARGE Concept
The post Borla’s Pipe-Organ Tech Gets Your Car Riffing Like AC/DC – Technologue appeared first on Motor Trend.
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