With just over a year left to ending production of the current Range Rover, Land Rover have decided to put on sale the most expensive Range Rover ever – the Autobiography Ultimate Edition. The Range Rover truly is a benchmark for 4x4s, blending luxury, comfort, and ruggedness like no other. However, the Ultimate Edition focuses more on luxury; now with two individual rear seats (electrically adjustable) replacing the bench seat and a handcrafted interior that makes use of soft-feeling leather. The interior also has a rear console extension featuring a machined aluminium laptop table, a drinks chiller, and comes with two iPads. The boot space gets the luxury touch as well, with the load space having a yacht-inspired teak floor with metal and leather detailing. For the longest of times, Ford pretty much had the market of 500hp-plus muscle cars all to itself with the Shelby GT500 – no more. Chevrolet has unleashed its latest weapon aimed squarely at conquering Ford in the muscle car game, and it’s called the Camaro ZL1. Unveiled at the 2011 Chicago Auto Show, many car geeks were expecting the next high-performing Camaro to be named Z28, as a way of paying tribute to previous high-performing Camaros. The ZL1 comes equipped with the same engine found in the Cadillac CTS-V, an aluminium 6.2 litre supercharged V8 producing 550hp and 550 lb ft of torque, matching the Shelby in terms of power but exceeding it in torque. Those American ponies are then channelled through a six-speed Tremec TR6060 manual transmission, and though Chevrolet haven’t given any acceleration or speed figures, the ZL1 should be good for a 0-60mph time in the mid 4 sec range and a quarter-mile time in the low 12s or high 11s. Dodge has unveiled the 2012 Charger SRT-8 at the 2011 Chicago Auto show. The latest offering from the Street and Racing Technology team comes equipped with the latest 6.4 litre Hemi V8 engine first seen in the 392 Challenger SRT-8, which means a power output of 465 hp and 465 lb ft of torque. The new engine comes with a new active exhaust valve, but aimed more at improving fuel economy. What about acceleration times? Dodge is estimating a top speed of 175 mph, while 0-60mph is expected to be in the high 4 sec range, with the quarter mile being completed in the high 12s. The Honda S2000 went out of production late in 2009 after ten years in sports car service, and up until the Ferrari 458 Italia arrived, the S2000's engine produced more horsepower per litre than any other naturally-aspirated engine in the world, with the Italia’s 126hp/l just about passing the S2000’s 120hp/l. The S2000 was offered with a high-revving 2.0-litre four cylinder engine producing 240hp and 153lb ft of torque (250hp for Japanese cars). As with many high-performance Hondas, the engine was connected to a sweet-shifting six-speed manual transmission, sending power to the rear wheels. And if you decided to make a 0-60mph sprint, you would get there in 6.2sec and reach a top speed of 150mph. Also, the VTEC system meant that you could rev the engine to 9000rpm without it exploding. It’s been nearly two weeks since the Ferrari FF has been revealed to the world’s motoring press, and they seem quite excited to get their hands on the successor to the 612 Scaglietti. Who wouldn’t be when a 650hp V12 resides under the bonnet, and a top speed of well over 200 mph is promised. One thing that immediately sent alarms ringing in my head though, is how unbelievably similar in concept the FF is to the Jensen FF of 1966. For those of you who have no idea what I’m on about, the British-built Jensen FF was one of the first production cars to use all-wheel drive as a means to improve on-road handling rather than off-roading. First there’s the name - FF. With the Ferrari, FF stands for “Ferrari Four” where as in the Jensen it stands for “Ferguson Formula”, different meanings but both with the intention of pointing out their all-wheel drive systems. Mini has decided to give its Cooper S models a dose of high efficiency and big torque with the introduction of the Cooper SD. The SD is the highest performing diesel variant, which will be available in all of the five (Hatch, Convertible, Clubman, Countryman, and Countryman All4) Mini variants. The Cooper SD has a turbocharged 2.0 litre four cylinder diesel engine producing 143 hp at 4000 rpm, with torque rated at 225 lb ft available from 1750 rpm to 2700 rpm. Indeed the figures show that the SD has 41 hp less than the petrol-powered Cooper S, but it does produce 34 lb ft more. |
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