Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2015 i topCar

IT WOULDN’T MAKE a great spy novel: John le Carre’s latest blockbuster, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Nerdy Automotive Engineer. The car manufacturers, you see, are really hopeless at espionage – they don’t send agents in under deep cover, armed with microfilms and Rolex watches that sprout hidden garrotte wires. Instead, they wait until the competition launches a car at a motor show, then brazenly deploy a team of engineers to climb all over it like school kids on a climbing frame. It’s often clumsy and conspicuous, and I think it’s getting worse. It’s been going on for years of course. I remember in Frankfurt in 1997, when Volkswagen launched the Golf Mk4. That car’s interior was such a dramatic step forward in build quality, it kind of freaked out the other…

FITTINGLY FOR A brand that began life as the Micro Car Company, Smart has spent precious little time out from under the financial microscope. Although global Fortwo sales now total 1.6 million, it has taken 16 years to get there. Hopes of expanding the brand’s reach beyond two seats and 100000 units per annum were dashed when the short-lived joint venture with Mitsubishi that helped realise the original Forfour back in 2004 failed to meet required volumes. The Fortwo soldiered on man alone, until now. Back in partnership, though this time with Renault, Smart has launched an all-new Fortwo right alongside a four-seat, four-door model, again badged Forfour. We’re in Barcelona to drive the newcomers and first impressions are great. As you’d expect, the exposed ‘tridion’ safety cell in contrasting…

› HIS PAIR COST the equivalent T of 18 million rand each, give or take the odd 911 Turbo plus duties, and even if you can afford one, you can’t have it. They’re all sold, all 499 LaFerraris and 375 McLaren P1s, to a wealthy few who have collectively spent nearly R16bn in the pursuit of automotive nirvana. But hypothetically speaking, suppose a vacant slot appeared on the list of each, and watching TV tonight you noticed the cushion felt a bit uncomfortable, lifted it up and discovered a year’s worth of winning Lotto tickets down the back of the sofa. Which would you have? Which is best? LaFerrari, or the P1? We drove a P1 from its home in Woking to Ferrari’s home town of Maranello to find out.…

WHAT DO YOU do for an encore when you’ve built and/or restored some of this country’s most iconic racing BMWs for a string of aficionados, and been involved with the brand on road and track for the best part of 40 years? You build one of your own, that’s what. Interestingly, the car chosen for this purpose had very little to do with South Africa (in racing terms), yet is arguably – after the Batmobile – one of the most instantly recognisable racing Beemers ever. Fittingly, this car also succeeded the CS/CSL in the brand’s tradition of elegant and fast coupes, though it was conceived as a spacious and plush tourer, unlike its predecessor. Nevertheless, the E24 6 Series evolved into a worthy Group A endurance racer. In the mid-1980s…

THE HISTORY › T STARTED IN Buenos Aires, I Argentina, in January 1978, when Alan Jones became the first driver to start a Formula One race in the name of Williams Grand Prix Engineering. The car was the FW06, the first Williams designed by Frank’s partner Patrick Head. It failed to finish, but later that season Jones put it on the podium at Watkins Glen, kickstarting what has become an F1 legend – spawning nine constructors’ championships, seven drivers’ titles, 114 race victories and 128 pole positions at the time of writing. Ferrari and McLaren have started more Grands Prix than Williams, but no individual team boss has more Formula One starts to his name than Sir Frank himself. The 2014 season-ending Abu Dhabi GP was the 72-year-old’s 630th race.…

CHEVROLET TRAILBALZER by Wayne Batty MONTH 4 UPS | Tough, practical and simple with a side order of modern tech DOWNS | No premium vibes YOU CAN LAMENT the demise of the station wagon in SA all you want, but a large, tough bakkiebased SUV is the ideal family vehicle. It’ll go anywhere, carry everything and doesn’t mind getting dirty. The Trailblazer epitomises this ethos of utility perfectly. It is the only long-termer I’ve run where I’ve been happy to cart kids off to the beach in, safe in the knowledge that though the rear footwells will return disguised as sandboxes, they’re easily cleaned. This was a constant source of joy-killing anxiety when stewarding premium, light-hued leather-clad, thick cut-pile carpeted German machines before. ‘No honey, you can’t walk on the…

1 | VISIT THE CASTLE Located within the famed Nordschleife, the Nürburg Castle should be your first stop. Built in 1 166 on a volcanic basalt cone 206 metres above sea level, it offers expansive, selfie-ready scenery, and gives you an idea of the gradient changes you’ll soon be driving. 2 | HIRE A MOUNTAIN BIKE Hire a bike and pedal the racetrack perimeter. A 30km loop offers everything from roads to root-filled single track with serious elevation changes along the way. Stop at the famous corners, read the graffiti or grab a gelato or beer in Adenau. 3 | STOP AT A PETROL STATION Look for the Shell garage alongside the Döttinger-Höhe straight. Yes, you can top up your tank outside, but the real treat is inside where everything…

100, AND OUT WITH THE ECO-BIAS! The i8S will be BMW’s centenary present to itself. It’s a re-engineered i8, with an inflationary approach to the powertrain – today’s three cylinder count will be upped to four or even six. Throw in the front-mounted electric assistance and peak power should climb by almost 150kW IT COULD HAVE BEEN AN M8! Engineers originally proposed a mid-engined M8 supercar with 470kW for the centenary, but chairman Norbert Reithofer decided the enhanced i8 is a more progressive statement NEW M6 IS A FAT-FIGHTER The current M6 weighs a frankly leviathan 1925kg, blunting its agility. A smaller footprint and exotic materials should peg the new coupe closer to the 1700kg mark GRAN TOURER OR 911-CHASER? The 911 is facing competition like never before, with cars…

HOW IT FLIES The AeroMobil 3.0 is pushed through the air by a Rotax 912 engine driving the rear-mounted prop, and born aloft on carbonfibre wings that unfold to a width of 8.3m. Take-off speed is 145kph, and you need to keep it above 65kph or it’ll fall out of the sky HOW IT DRIVES On the ground the propeller is disconnected and the Rotax 912 engine powers the front wheels. Despite a modest 75kW, the 1352cc four-cylinder will supposedly hit 160kph in this guise – and return 8L/100km IS THIS THE ultimate crossover? The AeroMobil 3.0 is a road-legal car that flies. It might be a prototype but this ‘roadable aircraft’ showed its airborne prowess at Vienna’s Pioneers Festival. For Štefan Klein, chief designer and co-founder of Slovakian firm…

10 F1 safety upgrades since 1994 1 1994 10mm under-car skid block introduced 2 1995 Engine capacity reduced from 3.5 to 3.0 litres; chassis extended by 30cm to protect the driver’s feet; side-impact test introduced 3 1996 Higher cockpit sides introduced; 75mm side headrests become compulsory 4 1997 Energy-absorbing structure introduced on the gearbox 5 1998 Width of cars reduced from 2m to 1.8m; side-impact test made tougher 6 1999 Wheel tethers introduced; extractable seat made compulsory 7 2000 Side-impact test increased by 20%; 2.5mm layer of bulletproof kevlar introduced along cockpit sides; roll-hoop raised by 20mm 8 2003 HANS device made compulsory 9 2006 Energy-absorbing Tepco barriers introduced 10 2011 Kevlar strip introduced across top of visor, as a result of lessons learnt from Massa’s accident in Hungary ’09…

NEED TO KNOW OPEL CORSA 1.0 ECOTEC 5-DOOR PRICE Not yet ENGINE999cc, 12v, 3-cyl petrol turbo, 85kW @ 5000-6000rpm, 170Nm @ 1800-4500rpm TRANSMISSION 6-speed manual, front-wheel drive SUSPENSION MacPhersontype strut front, torsion beam rear LENGTH/WIDTH/HEIGHT 4021/1746/1481mm WEIGHT 1199kg PERFORMANCE 10.3sec 0-100kph, 195kph, 5.0L/100km, 117g/km ON SALE March 2015 As if finding giraffe at the coffee stop outside Frankfurt, Germany wasn’t weird enough, the new Corsa I’d arrived there in on its European launch displayed more go kart-like steering tendencies than a Mini Cooper. Ok, so coffee and kuchen (cake) at the Opel Zoo explains the long-necked African treat, but the steering is much more of a surprise given that the previous car had the reflexes of a tranquilised wildebeest. More about that steering later though as the unusually beneficial switch…

THERE WAS A time when fervent Porsche acolytes scorned the very sight of the Boxster/Cayman vehicle genus, regarding the pair more as the poor man’s alternatives to the 911 rather than bona fide pedigrees. Not anymore. Now in its second-generation, the Cayman has garnered a large following and revoked past perceptions, compliments of its precise handling and no-holds-barred approach to performance. To further stress Porsche’s faith in the Cayman moniker it’s now available for the first time as a Gran Turismo Sport or GTS, a badge reserved exclusively for the sportiest model in each range. So the Cayman you see here should, by all accounts, dish out the same sense of superlative poise and aggression to that of its GTS namesakes and rivals alike. A slithering, tree-lined Tarmac rollercoaster will…

I› T WAS PRETTY surreal watching Steve McQueen’s epic car chase in the movie Bullitt from my Emirates seat, knowing that the very next day, I too would be careering up and down the same hilly streets of San Francisco. I woke the next morning to the sound of murmuring V8s and looked down from my hotel room to see a row of GTs silently burbling into position outside the entrance to the St. Regis. While Steve’s muscled ’Stang cut a patriotic profile against the San Francisco skyline in the late 1960s, the silky smooth profile of these German GTs looked almost futuristic in today’s tech-crazed city, regarded as the cultural, commercial and financial center of northern California. To witness this array of polished bodies gleaming in the morning sun…

WHAT’S MORE SURPRISING: that Williams F1 had zero input into the iconic Renault Clio Williams road car, or that they did have input into the Metro 6R4 Group B rally car, the Jaguar C-X75 hybrid supercar, and provided hybrid technology to help power Audi and Porsche to victory at Le Mans and the Nürburgring respectively? You all knew that F1 design superstar Adrian Newey didn’t actually fettle a French supermini, right? Williams has long dabbled in successful extracurricular activities – remember the BTCC Lagunas driven by Menu and Plato, or BMW’s Le Mans-winning V12 LMR? – but things took a decisive and slightly more esoteric turn in 2010. Since then, Williams boffins have applied the same problem-solving genius that brought us active suspension and traction control on Prost’s F1 car…

JUTTING AS IMPERIOUSLY from the ground as the whale tail on a 1980s Turbo, the Delugan Meissl-designed Porsche museum in Stuttgart is so striking it’d be worth the €8 (around R110) merely to stand outside. But inside it’s an automotive Guggenheim, a multi-level, cars-as-art journey through Porsche’s history, as told by over 80 exhibits, from the very first Porsche, a recently unearthed electric car from 1898, to the latest 919 Le Mans racer. On any given day you’ll find the place buzzing with visitors, not only Porsche fans, but teenagers on the kind of school trip we could only dream about. But what the slick new touchscreen information displays now fitted next to each car won’t tell them is that barely a mile away, in a nondescript grey warehouse very…

KEY INDICATORS – OCTOBER 2014 INDUSTRY TOTAL 59 384 | PASSENGER CARS 40 666 | LCV 15 827 | EXPORTS 32 169 IN THE RAMP-UP to the year’s end, typical shifts in the vehicle buying pattern come into play. October bore this out, while still surprising with an aggregate figure high enough for commentators to argue the year could end on par with 2013, not the predicted 4.5% down. Exports tallied a new record of 32 165 units, reports Naamsa, led by the Ford Ranger (7 072 units), Mercedes C-Class (6 524), VW Polo (5 972), Hilux (5 361), and BMW 3 Series (4 825). This was 33% (7 973 units) above the strike-affected equivalent month in 2013. Domestic new vehicle demand was up 4.7% (2 654) year on year,…

EVEN MERCEDES ISN’T immune to the supermini-SUV craze swamping the industry: here comes the G-Code, a 4.1m-long ‘sport utility coupe’ concept said to preview Merc’s future design direction. G-Code was designed by Mercedes’ new advanced design studio and product engineering centre in Beijing – one of five centres dotted around the globe to soak up and respond to local market trends. We can only assume the Chinese are fans of late-2000s Saab design, because the rear light bar, glasshouse and surfacing remind us of some Swedish concepts. But that’s not the mad part. The mad part is that this concept is powered by cow emissions and detailed under the influence of Star Trek. The combustion engine runs on hydrogen derived from methane with supplementary plug-in electric drive. Basically the engine…

› CLAREN IS GRADUALLY M lifting its skirts to reveal more about the track-only 735kW P1 GTR – Woking’s riposte to Maranello’s XX programme. This month’s tease includes an undisguised prototype getting the spanking it so thoroughly deserves, and the first images of the pared-back interior. Front and centre inside is a steering wheel modelled on that of the 2008 championship-winning MP4-023 F1 car, festooned with switches and controls made easy to operate with race gloves on. But note also the total lack of roll cage – the P1’s standard carbonfibre ‘MonoCage’ structure delivers FIA-grade rollover protection without the need for additional reinforcement. Impressive, but we wager these details are not what most P1 GTR punters are spending their hard-earned dosh for. Nor is the reason for purchase going to…

THE COLLAPSE OF the Marussia and Caterham teams came as a shock to most fans, yet their demises had long been predicted within the paddock, for both joined the sport on a promise (made in 2009 by then-FIA president Max Mosley) of $40m (then R300m) annual budget caps, yet, by the time the duo – together with (defunct) HRT and (stillborn) USF1 – got their acts together, the Englishman was history, having stepped aside. Thus the newcomers faced the might of such as Ferrari and Red Bull Racing, who annually spend upwards of $300m (R2.5bn) on winning motor racing’s greatest prize. Yet the newcomers were forced to rely on pay drivers, customer engines and out-sourcing to do so. In short, they fortnightly faced the giants of the sport with figurative…

Beauty, it’s said, is in the eye of the beholder. In the case of the Lexus NX, it’s tempting to suggest that either the beholder was hungover and didn’t turn up on the day, or poked out said eye on one of the sharp edges. But perhaps that’s just my opinion. And at least this arresting tangle of angles disproves the theory that all modern cars look exactly the same. Besides, the showroom-ready NX has been dialled back a bit (sanded down?) compared with the original LF-NX concept, which had the appearance of something badly reassembled after an unfortunate interaction with a wood chipper. The genuine article is much more finely honed than that. Muscular, even. The Audi Q5 and BMW X3 had better start worrying about their lunch money.…

JOAN MIRÓ IS BIG. I’d never even heard of him before I found myself trudging through the bright halls of Es Baluard Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Palma de Mallorca. This pioneering artist, who refused to be tied down to a particular movement, is (I’m told) helluva influential in international art circles. In the city to drive Mercedes-Benz’s mildly facelifted B-Class, it’s easy to draw comparisons between the two artistes: both are easy enough on the eye and both are influential without causing much of a fuss. So persuasive has the B-Class concept been, in fact, that it has quietly amassed more than one million sales since the market launch of the first generation back in 2005. That’s the kind of figure that is unlikely to go unnoticed;…

YES, WE KNOW that the vast majority of SUVs sold on the local market will never be used to their full potential, but owning one safe in the knowledge that if an off-road adventure was to present itself, the family transport of choice would meet the challenge without flinching has proven to be a highly successful marketing ploy. Rightly or wrongly, that SUVs are seldom tasked with unearthing unchartered territory is not the point: they stand as a haven of safe travel for the family in any conditions and in today’s world that stands for a lot. Two all-new additions to the ever-growing ranks of mid-range SUVs are the Mazda CX-5 2.2DE Akera AWD and the Nissan X-Trail 1.6dCi LE 4WD, each representing the top of the range for their…

IWON’T SHOW YOU the rather cringeworthy email but seven years ago, as a young motoring journalist, I plucked up the courage to email Porsche and request a 911 test drive. ‘It doesn’t even need to be the Turbo,’ I said rather persuasively, or so I thought. I’ll save you the suspense. No one answered that email. ‘There will be blood’ might be too strong a retort but let’s just say I have the memory of an elephant and I never forget. The opportunity to get behind the wheel of a 911 has been a driving force in my career ever since. That day has finally arrived. As fate would have it my date with 911 destiny was to come in the US at an extraordinary venue. ‘The fastest race circuit…

NO MATTER HOW hard anybody tries to usurp the perennial 911, Porsche always seems to have an answer. On the day we at last drive Mercedes’ spanking new V8-engined coupe with its box-fresh GT S badge, Porsche brings along a new kind of 911 with the same moniker: 911 GTS. Sorry Mercedes, but nobody ever said this was going to be easy. The AMG GT S is one mega Merc, though – the baddest Benz there’s ever been. It’s even meaner than last year’s SLS Black and much more awesome than the crazily expensive yet underwhelming SLR co-developed with McLaren. The 375kW AMG GT S, which easily beats the 463kW SL65 AMG against the stopwatch, will be launched mid-2015 together with a less expensive base version rated at 340kW. The…

IT’S SATURDAY JULY 11, 1987, and Walter Röhrl lines up on the start line at Pikes Peak in his Audi Sport Quattro S1... In 10min and 47.85sec it will be the end of an era. The German is participating in his first (and only) Pikes Peak Hillclimb and the pressure is on. He only qualified second fastest the day before behind ‘fast Finn’ Ari Vatanen due to a malfunctioning charge-cooling system. This leaves the only Audi in the field like a sitting duck against the three-car strong attack from long-feuding rivals Peugeot. Hillclimb organisers run a reverse grid to keep spectators glued to the edge of their lawn chairs. Röhrl is the second-to-last competitor. He launches from the line in his 440kW beast; the 2.1-litre five-cylinder howling through the clear…

OVER THE YEARS Pietermaritzburg has featured strongly in the history of motor racing in KwaZulu-Natal, with Alexandra Park and Roy Hesketh featuring during the pre- and post-war periods, respectively (see July 2014 TopCar). But the Garden Province was home to many other tracks, some only briefly – even to one-offs – while others made a more lasting contribution. One of the earliest centres for racing was Greytown, situated on the banks of a tributary of the Umvoti River in a timber-producing area. The Umvoti 50 held on 11 April 1936 is said to have been South Africa’s first ‘round the houses’ race, a 12-lap event over the 6.76-km gravel-surfaced circuit that was won on handicap by W Bowyer in a 918cc Morris from H F Hooper’s 2 969cc Talbot, W…