Paul Newman, racer, actor, and philanthropist, died at home on Friday at the age of 83, following a protracted battle with cancer. He’ll be deeply missed by the automotive community, though we’re glad that he got out to the track last month for what he probably knew would be his last laps. Rest in peace, man. Here’s the news:

• The Detroit automakers got their $25B in federal loans approved, so expect much gnashing of teeth from TTAC. But don’t worry, they’ll get the vindication they’ve been hankering for: Wall Street’s mega-bailout plan was rejected, so the automakers will surely be screwed by proxy. Freep.
• Why is Kyle Busch’s Toyota such junk? Why? Following a heim joint failure at New Hampshire and a grenaded engine at Dover, the former JGR wunderkind suffered more hope-destroying mechanical demons this weekend at Kansas when his engine started sputtering with a fuel-pressure problem. This makes Busch’s mechanical failure rate in the Chase so far three for three, in what Rowdy.com’s Buck and Bass are calling the worst Chase start, for any driver, ever. At this point, I’m almost starting to feel kind of sorry for the guy. NASCAR.com.
• The NICE (for No Internal Combustion Engine) "MyCar" has won the electric car of the year at the 2008 GreenFleet awards. Nope, I’d never heard of ‘em either. The Auto Channel.
• In the UK, an amputee was issued a ticket for parking in a handicap spot. The attending officer felt the woman’s prosthetic leg didn’t carry as much weight as one of those little blue wheelchair badges. APP.

So if you’re a Mopar Or No Car kind of guy and are sick of high gas prices, what do you do? You build an electric Duster. Bruce bought this A-body back in 2006. It had a fresh 360 but otherwise was pretty rough. Over the course of two years he did a resto-mod on the car, which included body work, new paint, and even digital gauges and an RFID keyless ignition system.

But Bruce didn’t stop there. With gas prices on the rise, he was already researching alternative fuels. Then he heard about Tesla and the Volt. In June he picked up a copy of The Zero-Carbon Car, and within an hour was planning his new project. Since he’s a meteorologist, he decided to call it the Electrical Storm. Continue reading…

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This morning, I hopped on to a bus with the other journalists and left downtown Seoul for Hankook’s R&D Center in Daejeon. The drive took about two hours, and while the country—Korea is 80 percent mountains and lush—was beautiful, I have to admit that the burly jet lag from the 13-hour flight across the Pacific made it impossible to keep my eyes open for the entire trip. After arriving, we had a Q&A session with Hankook’s top engineers before heading into the facility. Unfortunately, all the various testing gear they demonstrated for us was top-secret, so they didn’t let anyone take pictures. The first piece of equipment was the flat-track machine, which basically looks like a giant belt sander. Once it’s running, the engineers then lower a tire mounted to a shaft on to the surface, and can compress and twist it to simulate the kind of stress it will endure in the real world.    

Continue reading "Touring Hankook's R&D Center, Keumsan Plant and Proving Grounds" »

I’m not sure what it is, but I’m always drawn back to the Delorean. And the only thing more cool than a conventional-engined DeLorean would be one with all-electric power, right? Back in June, Jen wrote about a man who created his own DeLorean EV, and now it looks like he’s trying to sell it on eBay. Who knows where the reserve is set, but with the Buy It Now at $100,000, it’s going to have to end up in the collection of someone who’s seriously dedicated. Check out the auction!

Driving 1800 miles in two days (while easily doable given a proper car, a case of Red Bull, and a company gas card) can still beat the crap out of you. That’s why our arrival at the Lajitas Resort just outside Terlingua, TX was a welcome break from the road. The parking lot was filled with dozens of cars from Shelby’s entire recent model range including the relatively mild Shelby GT, to the positively insane  600+ horsepower GT500 Super Snake. As nice as our glass roof Mustang was, it was just too sedate given the company we were in.

I handed off our keys to Jim Owens, VP of Marketing for Shelby Autos, and in turn was handed a new set of keys, this time to a posh hotel room by the pool. Though the Lajitas Resort is about twenty miles from anything, we had come a long way since the Super 8 motel. I showered and headed down to dinner. At the buffet-style dinner, I shook hands with all the major players at Shelby Autos, Amy Boylan, President, Gary Patterson, design engineer extraordinaire and test driver, and Carroll Shelby himself. As it turns out, they were pleased with the promotional work we did for them surrounding the GT500KR launch and as such, greeted us with great enthusiasm. It was nice to see a friendly face after our Texas dive-bar experiences.

Continue reading…

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When a New Jersey woman fitted a GPS tracking device to her husband’s car last year, she got a lot more than she bargained for. The device, a LandAirSea GPS Tracking Key, is half the size of a cigarette pack, waterproof and comes with a strong, magnetic mount. For as long as its batteries last, it will record driving speed on a second-by-second basis, as well as the location, time and date of every stop the vehicle makes. A set of batteries can easily last two weeks. Suspecting her husband of infidelity, she did not mention the device and by any definition was clearly engaging in an invasion of his privacy.

Days later, the husband was involved in what appeared to be a tragic accident. While taking family babysitter home, they stopped to look at some horses from a countryt road. George Ford, Jr. of Piscataway, NJ, told police that he accidentally ran over the 12-year old girl as he turned his truck around to leave. However, once investigators for the Chenango County Sheriff’s Department found the GPS device, a different story emerged. Continue reading…

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I welcomed an AMC Concord into my life. Actually, it was that same car I first saw parked on the street outside of CarDomain headquarters a couple of months ago. The owner got the note I left on the windshield, then called me when it came time to get rid of the car, which had belonged to his late mother. The junkyard wanted to give him 100 bucks for it, but instead, for the paltry sum of $75, the Concord became my latest rescue project. It’s a strong-running, immaculately maintained little two-door RWD sedan—and it’s the first car I’ve owned that has either a trunk or an automatic transmission! Check out my new ride page.

How about you? What did you do this weekend?

We get a lot of boring press release spam, but this one from the Istituto Europeo di Design di Torino was pretty cool so I decided to go ahead and post it. The "Dream" exhibition, which opened last week in Turin, Italy, features a bunch of gorgeous cars designed in Turin from the 50s until today. Full press release and more great pics after the jump.

Continue reading "Dream Exhibition at Agnelli Pavilion in Turin" »

I can’t tell you much in the way of context for this video, but it appears to be raw footage (for a TV ad?) of the 2009 ZR1 and the 2010 Camaro SS ripping it up on the track. The sound quality is crap, but the visuals are pretty interesting—take a look.