Sunday, February 27, 2011

Tony Stewart to drive F1 car

AVONDALE, Ariz. -- Barring an unforeseen scheduling hiccup, two-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart and 2008 Formula 1 World Champion Lewis Hamilton will swap race cars in an exhibition later this year, Stewart-Haas Racing spokesman Mike Arning confirmed Saturday.


The seat swap comes at the hands of Mobil 1, a mutual sponsor for the two drivers, and is expected to take place at Watkins Glen International sometime during the summer.

The cars involved will not be show cars. They will be legitimate race-prepared machines.


Hamilton will man Stewart's road course ready No. 14 Chevrolet Impala, and Stewart will drive Hamilton's 2010-model F1 McClaren. The respective drivers' race teams will travel with them to the event to tune the cars.

Stewart was not available for comment Saturday.

This isn't the first time NASCAR and F1 have hosted an event like this. In 2003, Jeff Gordon traded rides with Juan Pablo Montoya at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, after which both expressed greater appreciation for the other's respective discipline. Gordon made two runs in Montoya's BMW/Williams F1 machine.




"To get the opportunity here today to do this fulfills really every desire and dream that I had," Gordon said at the time.

2012 Ford Mustang Boss 302

Jim Farley, Ford’s group VP of global marketing, didn’t have to fly to California for the debut of the Mustang Boss 302. No one told him to. “It’s just that I’ve been driving my own Mustang right through the last two Michigan winters thinking about this project,” he said. “From a business standpoint, the Boss 302 shouldn’t have happened. But it happened. My dream for the car was that it would make a lot of money for a guy street racing. It should be a car that winds up on YouTube doing something illegal. I’ve been waiting 20-plus years to launch a car like this.”

The decision to resurrect the Boss 302 was made in the darkest days of the recession. Is Ford brave or what? Especially since it’s so rare that offspring are able to match the feats of legendary forebears, as Charlie Sheen can attest.


To eke out of the Mustang GT’s 5.0-liter V-8 a bonus 32 horses, Ford created a new intake manifold with runners resembling velocity stacks. Different cylinder heads were deployed—stronger alloy and altered ports—with each head undergoing 2.5 hours of CNC massaging. The bearings are race-spec and the baffled pan holds 8.5 quarts of synthetic oil.


The result is 444 hp at 7500 rpm, a happy medium between the Mustang GT’s 412 hp and the Shelby GT500’s 550 hp. The Boss’s V-8—unlike the brutish Shelby’s—doesn’t so often overwhelm its chassis. In fact, what you first notice—and this is very BMW-ish—is that the Boss’s engine, driveline, and suspension draw virtually no attention to each others’ eccentricities. It lends the package a gratifying sense of unity that inspires confidence.


This V-8 is so vigorous and charismatic that it ought to be carved on Mount Rushmore. The engine revs nearly as quickly as you can flex your right foot, feeling as if it displaces maybe three liters. What’s more, despite all that cam, it idles as smooth as a Camry.


Sans traction control, launching the Boss takes some practice, although never has practice been so fun. Side-step the clutch with too many revs and you’ll trigger axle tramp followed by a cumulous cloud of Pirelli particulates that will only swell in size all the way through second gear. The trick is to slip the clutch from around 3500 rpm, then mat the throttle when the axle says, “Yeah, I’m feelin’ settled and relaxed back here.” The result is 60 mph in what we estimate to be the mid-fours, which would put the Boss right on the heels of the jackhammer GT500. And once that live axle is placated . . . well, the Boss doesn’t feel as if it loses an inch to its Shelby sibling. The accelerative kick flings sunglasses and coins and pens in the center bin backward against a plastic wall, sounding as if they’ve just hit the bottom of a ventilator shaft.


This is accompanied by a mellifluous resonance-free exhaust note that is an unlikely aural congruence of, say, Lexus IS F and Roush/Yates Sprint Cup engine. It’s a four-way exhaust—two sewer pipes astern and one per side, exiting just in front of the rear wheels. A restrictor plate in each side pipe lends the Boss federal pass-by legality, but the baffles can be unbolted in less time than it takes to read this review. It’s lucky that the rumble is so rich, because the engine is seriously loud at idle.


The Boss’s suspension has likewise benefited from a lavish labor of love. Compared with the GT, it boasts higher-rate springs, a fatter rear bar, new bushings, and 19-inch Pirelli P Zeros that, at the rear, are mounted on 9.5-inch-wide wheels. What’s more, each shock offers five settings that are adjustable via screwdriver, creating the possibility of very strange chassis behavior at the hands of very strange owners. Again, is Ford brave or what? And experimenting with dampers is educational, fun, and will make you feel like Parnelli Jones’s crew chief.


Ford has forever treated its Mustangs as blue-collar contrivances of unprepossessing heritage. The cockpit thus remains dour and rudimentary, despite the Alcantara-wrapped steering wheel and the faux machine-turned aluminum trim. The acres of coarse pebbled-plastic surfaces, in particular, would be (and have been) rejected in far less expensive machines, notably in Ford’s own Focus. The gaping void between the top of the rear tires and the rolled fender lips is an eyesore. The steering column doesn’t telescope. And the brake and accelerator pedals should be closer.
We expected the Boss 302 to be little more than a marketing exercise in nostalgia, a somewhat more brutal, slightly faster GT, with alluring graphics but primitive predilections. It isn’t. Nose to tail, this feels like a whole new equine, thoroughly sorted, conscientiously massaged, the object of considerable forethought and ambition. As automotive resurrections go, this is a knockout that venerates the original Boss while embarrassing it objectively and subjectively in every meaningful measure. What this is, is the best Mustang ever.

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

2010 Acura ZDX


Acura released a series of teaser images, Acura officially pulled the wraps off the concept version of the ZDX crossover at the 2009 New York International Auto Show. Interestingly, the previously released teaser shots actually show early production lighting elements, rather than those found on the NYIAS concept, but we’re told that, other than the lights, there are few changes between the concept and the ZDX that will roll into Acura showrooms this fall as a 2010 model.


Designed by 28-year-old Michelle Christensen (who was only 25 when she penned the first version of the vehicle), the five-passenger ZDX is based on the MDX platform and will be positioned above that seven-seater as a flagship within Acura’s lineup.

Although Acura claims that the ZDX will introduce “an entirely new category of luxury vehicle,” no one will be able to help comparing it to that other four-door coupe crossover thingy, the BMW X6, although the ZDX’s ride height is markedly lower. Still, like the X6, it is none too dainty at 192.6 inches long, a vast 78.5 inches wide, and 61.8 inches tall. There are 108.5 inches between the centerlines of the 19-inch wheels, which are shod with 275/40-series Michelin Latitude tires.

Acura confirms that it will be powered by the same 300-hp, 3.7-liter V-6 that powers the MDX. The six will be mated to an all-new six-speed automatic with steering-wheel-mounted paddle shifters. It will, of course, come standard with Acura’s nifty Super Handling All-Wheel Drive system.


The interior of every ZDX will feature leather seating surfaces, and occupants will get plenty of light from above via the standard full-length glass roof. For lane changes—which undoubtedly will be hampered by those huge C-pillars—the ZDX will offer a blind-spot information system, as well as a multi-angle rear-view camera, surround-sound audio, navigation and, we imagine, a whole lot more if it is to, as Acura claims, achieve “a whole new level of prestige” for the brand. Customers will be able to see for themselves when the ZDX goes on sale this winter.

2010 Acura TL 6


The unceasing risk inherent to benchmarking your competition is that they have smart, creative folks all working just as hard to improve their products. The brass ring on the sport sedan ride is one of the most highly coveted in the world, and it's also the fastest-moving ride there is.

We've seen this pattern unfold before. But for right now, this prototype of the 2010 Acura TL SH-AWD equipped with a close-ratio six-speed manual transmission is one of the most remarkable fast sedans we've ever driven, faster than all the big names in the sport sedan game. And yet it will face newer versions of the sport sedan elite that might appear before this 2010 model reaches the street next year.


The competitor cars each featured a manual transmission, the sportiest configuration currently available, and aftermarket brake pads that would stand up to an afternoon on the racetrack. The cars included a 2008 Audi S4 Quattro manual; 2008 BMW 335i Sport; 2008 BMW 335xi Sport and a 2008 Infiniti G35s.



The 2010 Acura TL SH-AWD 6MT kicked serious butt. And we're not talking tenths of a second on a 1.6-mile racetrack, but instead 2 seconds (a light-year on a short racetrack like this) separated the TL from the next quickest sedan, the Audi S4 Quattro, on the challenging Dynamics Handling Course. This Alan Wilson-designed, 13-corner course is a laboratory instrument, and it dissected the strengths and weaknesses of these five cars with an array of fast/slow, compressed/unweighted, opening/closing corners.


The six-speed gearbox has been designed and built solely for this car. It's more than simply an evolution of the front-wheel-drive 2008 TL Type-S's six-speed, but instead a design that accommodates both the engine's impressive output as well as the additional complexity of all-wheel drive. Though its mainshaft and axle half-shafts have been beefed up to accommodate the V6's 273 pound-feet of torque, the manual transmission manages to be 110 pounds lighter than the five-speed automatic in the same car


The electric-assist power steering has been remapped to offer a more pronounced build-up in effort as the speed of the car increases, but even if some still consider the general feel to be light, we are huge fans of a low-friction feel as long as the overall effect is quick and precise like this. Because the electric motor is located on the steering rack itself rather than the steering column, there's good communication between the front tires and your hands


All things considered, Acura has finally put its highly complex and effective SH-AWD system to its best use in the 2010 Acura TL SH-AWD 6MT. This all-wheel-drive technology has always seemed a bit wasted in the MDX and RDX sport-utilities. It belongs in a sport sedan, and it has found a worthy home in the TL

Monday, February 21, 2011

Best New Car: Ford Mustang GT manual


Anderson said the redesigned Mustang GT boasts high resale value, good fuel efficiency, relatively low maintenance and insurance costs and a “killer” 412-horsepower engine. (Base price: $30,495)

Ford Mustang GT

Ford Mustang GT
Ford Mustang GT
Ford Mustang GT

Best New Car: Infiniti M56 four-door


This model offers good resale value, relatively low maintenance and insurance costs — and a beefy 420-horsepower engine that nonetheless gets 25 mpg/highway. (Base price: $58,775)


Best in Class: Porsche Boxster Spyder manual. The spartan 300-horsepower Boxster Spyder offers “power and performance without paying for the extra bells and whistles,” Anderson said. (Base price: $62,150)

Infiniti M56 four-door

Infiniti M56 four-door


Infiniti M56 four-door

Best New Car: Lincoln MKZ Hybrid.


This luxury ride gets the nod partly because it costs the same as a gas-powered MKZ at a time when most automakers charge some $5,000 extra for hybrid versions of cars.


“You don’t have to make a choice between being green and saving money,” Anderson said. (Base price: $35,180)

$45,000-and up rides


Best in Class: Mercedes-Benz E350 Blue-TEC. The Mercedes E-Class already took Kiplinger’s “Best New Car” award when it premiered last year, but the new diesel version rates a “Best in Class” honor for 2011.


Anderson said the model’s clean-diesel engine gets a category-leading 33 mpg/highway even though it puts out 210 horsepower. (Base price: $51,775)


Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Most Expensive Cars In The World: Top 10 List 2011


1. Bugatti Veyron $1,700,000.
This is by far the most expensive street legal car available on the market today. It is the fastest accelerating car reaching 0-60 in 2.6 seconds.



2. Lamborghini Reventon $1,600,000.
The most powerful and the most expensive Lamborghini ever built is the second on the list. It takes 3.3 seconds to reach 60 mph and it has a top speed of 211 mph.



3. McLaren F1 $970,000.
In 1994, the McLaren F1 was the fastest and most expensive car. Even though it was built 15 years ago, it has an unbelievable top speed of 240 mph and reaching 60 mph in 3.2 seconds.


4. Ferrari Enzo $670,000.

The most known supercar ever built. The Enzo has a top speed of 217 mph and reaching 60 mph in 3.4 seconds.


5. Pagani Zonda C12 F $667,321.
Produced by a small independent company in Italy, the Pagani Zonda C12 F is the 5th fastest car in the world. It promises to delivery a top speed of 215 mph+ and it can reach 0-60 in 3.5 seconds.


6. SSC Ultimate Aero $654,400.
Don't let the price tag fool you, the 6th most expensive car is actually the fastest street legal car in the world with a top speed of 257 mph+ and reaching 0-60 in 2.7 seconds.


7. Saleen S7 Twin Turbo $555,000.
The first true American production certified supercar, this cowboy is also rank 3rd for the fastest car in the world. It has a top speed of 248 mph+ and it can reach 0-60 in 3.2 seconds. If you are a true American patriot, you can be proud to show off this car.

8. Koenigsegg CCX $545,568.

Swedish made, the Koenigsegg is fighting hard to become the fastest car in the world.



Koenigsegg CCX side view

9. Mercedes Benz SLR McLaren Roadster $495,000.
A GT supercar, the SLR McLaren is the fastest automatic transmission car in the world with a top speed of 206 mph+ and reaching 60 mph in 3.8 seconds.

10. Porsche Carrera GT $440,000.
A supercar with dynamic stability control and a top speed of 205 mph+ and it can reach 0-60 in 3.9 seconds.