Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2016 i topCar

THERE IS NOTHING like a back-to-back comparison when it comes to determining the finer nuances of subtly evolved siblings. Which is why we’re driving three different versions of BMW’s remarkable i8 plug-in hybrid on the same day: a run-of-the-mill production model, the upcoming i8 | Evo featuring a comprehensive driving dynamics makeover, and the latest Formula E pace car, driven by Bruno Correia. For 2018 the facelifted i8 is due to get a more powerful electric motor and a meatier battery. Right now, however, the focus is on improved vehicle dynamics. A handling update will be signed off later this year as a no-charge upgrade boasting recalibrated Bilstein shocks with matching springs, enhanced chassis control software by Conti, lighter ATS alloy wheels, wider Michelin tyres, bigger AP Racing brakes and…

DURING THE BUILD-up to the European Grand Prix – held in Baku, a city technically in Asia even if part of Azerbaijan lies on the European tectonic plate - Lewis Hamilton swaggered about. He spent little time on simulators, he said, suggesting he could spend “£100 (R2000) on a PlayStation and learn the same amount.” Simulators, the triple world champion added, “are more use to engineers than drivers, because the sensations of driving real cars cannot be replicated correctly in a sim.” In a further swipe at his peers, many of who spend hundreds of nausea-inducing hours slaving away in simulators, the Mercedes driver maintained that “You don’t feel the speed, you don’t feel the physicality of it.” Hamilton also revealed that, contrary to common practice, he no longer walks…

IT LOOKS JUST like the C-Class. Don’t tell me it doesn’t because it does. It just does. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing necessarily but, and this is just my opinion. The E-Class defines the Mercedes-Benz brand more than the C, more even than their flagship S, and certainly more than its little As and Bs. So naturally, I hate to see this, its tenth iteration, play follow-the-leader to a smaller sibling. It’s for the most part wonderful, a technological tour de force, accomplished in every conceivable way and we’ll unpack all of that after this rant. The E-Classes of old have been solidly hewn things constructed with bold horizontal lines and bluff noses and rumps, imbued with the same stateliness of its intended owners. This youngest version has…

BLACKADDER SAID IT best when he described Baldrick’s artistic efforts in Blackadder Goes Forth as those of a ‘colourblind hedgehog in a bag’. Little did we know he could see 27 years into the future and was in fact describing the new Mahindra KUV 100. Pronounce it ‘one-double-oh’ to avoid correction from Mahindra top brass, but cast an eye over it at your peril. Yes, styling is always subjective, but there’s that front grille, upright like a Range Rover’s, design elements piled high like a triple decker Big Mac, and the red pinstriped headlights stretching the length of the front fender like smeared mascara. The whole point of ‘hidden’ door handles is to hide them, something Mahindra’s totally missed the point on by finishing them in contrasting silver. And don’t…

Astra bucks the trend and is actually smaller than the model it replaces AS YOU READ this you’ll know who won Euro 2016 – at least the football competition. In the Euro battle for the triple turbo hatchback crown the outcome is not so clear. Representing France is the Peugeot 308 GT-Line, Germany’s strikers are the Opel Astra 1.0T and the Ford Focus 1.0T and the UK stalwart is the Mini One Hatch. Of course it’s not that simple – just like football clubs, nationality is fluid; the Opel is part Polish, the Mini German, the Focus American. Clear? Let the game begin – the tussle is going to be fractious, one of our hardest fought battles to date. Size matters Full-size family hatches have grown steadily since their introduction…

1910s 1916: In the beginning Gustav Otto’s aero company and the Bayerische flugzeug-werke(BFK) merge in 1916 – the sperm and the egg as far as BMW is concerned. Early efforts are all about aero engines. 1917: Meet the Fokker Engineer Max Friz knocks up the first BMW engine, the straight-six IIIa. In a preview of things to come, the engine’s a belter. Helps make a menace of ace Ernst Udet and his Fokker. 1917: Registered trademark While merry hell rages on the Western Front, the Bavarian Motor Works registers a trademark with the Imperial patents office. Its logo is a propeller on a blue and while background. Still is. 1920s 1921: Diversification BMW expands into engines for myriad applications, from marine and motorcycle engines to powered ploughs. Horses face mass…

The BMW M4 GTS is the fastest production machine M has ever built MY KNUCKLES ARE glowing, gripping the steering wheel so tightly the bones look like they’re about to burst from my hands like green quads from Bruce Banner’s cords. I’m en route to North Wales and stretching the legs of the BMW M4 GTS. The traffic thins and the road opens up, a metaphorical invitation for you to marry throttle to bulkhead and divorce car from speed limit. It’s a brilliantly immersive drive in a quick car, an opportunity to get under the thing’s skin before you even reach the photoshoot. But I’m not getting under the skin of the GTS. I’m barely scratching the surface, struggling to go quicker on the trackday-spec Cup tyres than I would…

WHEN YOU COMBINE the design talents of three Italian styling studios with the ‘Cuore Sportivo’ (Sporting Heart) of one of that country’s most charismatic motor manufacturers, you would expect something special to be the outcome. That is precisely what happened in March 1989 when Alfa Romeo revealed the ES30 (Experimental Sportscar 3.0-litre) concept on the Zagato stand at the Geneva Salon. The project had begun some 19 months earlier when cash-strapped Fiat was looking to improve the profile of its new subsidiary, Alfa Romeo. Fiat boss Vittorio Ghidella challenged two teams to come up with an attention grabber to revive Alfa’s fortunes, and the SZ, as it was to be called in production, was the result. Truth is though that although the trademark ‘Z’ appears on the flanks, Zagato actually…

Whoa! That’s a big fella… Certainly is. Conceived to ease China’s traffic problems (20 million new cars a year and counting) the Transit Explore Bus will carry 1400 people. The TEB runs on rails at the side of the road and straddles two lanes of traffic, allowing it to pass over vehicles up to 2m in height while travelling at 60kph. Those same cars will be able to pass underneath when it stops to pick up passengers. I’m sensing a snag... Just one? Not only will that 2m limit give misplaced trucks a haircut, we’ve visions of the stilts slicing cars in half if they don’t respect yellow box junctions. Still, it would apparently cost just 16 per cent of an equivalent underground system to implement and use electric power…

AS A SOUTH AFRICAN clocking almost four decades on this planet, two of which were accompanied by a driver’s licence, you’d probably scoff at the notion of me never ever having owned a bakkie, that proudly SA phenomenon elsewhere known as a pickup. Further elsewhere known as a minitruck and Down Under named a ute. In truth I’ve never even been in a long-term relationship (test or other) with one, even though I’ve often admired them from afar. It’s worth knowing my history though, or rather my culture. See, I’m a product of the Cape Flats, where bakkie ownership was akin to a curse. Or, a curse to a kin, as family and friends would come out of the woodwork seeking your help transporting well… woodwork. Furniture, rubble, a miscellaneous…

AS WE CLOSE in on 10000km with our auto-shifting Clio a few more things have come to light, the principal of which is the engine. The 88kW, 1.2-litre turbo four has really hit its straps. Not only surprisingly urgent when you want to get away from the lights in a hurry or need to overtake it has also just recorded its best full tank fuel economy and range figures of 6.55›/100km and 637km respectively. And that’s without once resorting to the Eco button, which while I’m sure has been cleverly calibrated by some French-speaking labcoats to save fuel, requires much more throttle angle to maintain momentum. Feels counterintuitive to me. Secondly, the gearbox can get caught out in stop-start traffic when you’re almost forced to stop before the car ahead…

FOR THE FIRST time this year, domestic vehicle sales showed an increase over the previous month, while export sales also bettered the April 2016 figure. The May 2016 statistics, issued jointly by the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa (NAAMSA) and Lightstone Auto, the independent provider of the South African new vehicle sales information to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and the automotive industry, showed that local manufacturers and distributors sold 42 907 vehicles over the six market categories, with a further 33 676 being exported. By comparison, last month the respective figures were 40 371/32 819. For May 2015, the totals were 47 832/33 414. The 2016 year-to-date totals are 227 515/136 526. Mercedes-Benz (2375), Associated Motor Holdings (Hyundai, Kia, Daihatsu) together with Amalgamated Automobile…

VOLVO IS GETTING serious about small cars. From 2017 it rolls out its new 40 series, kicking off with a compact XC40 crossover aimed at the Audi Q3 and BMW X1. That’s to be followed by two further 40s: a successor to the current V40 hatchback and a yet-to-be-confirmed compact saloon sibling. As a warm-up, Volvo’s unveiled two concept cars built upon the 40 series’ brand-new CMA platform architecture, christened – with admirable logic – the 40.1 concept and 40.2 concept. Compact and future-proof: CMA platform Not the Country Music Awards but Compact Modular Architecture, Volvo’s small car structure is as flexible as its name implies, catering for battery electric, plug-in hybrid and models with conventional engine and both front- and four-wheel drive. It’s the first platform to be shared…

G RAN TURISMO IS a phenomenon. The PlayStation racing game series has shifted more than 76m copies, teaching 10-year olds across the globe how to oversteer 750kW GT-Rs since 1998. In November it returns, with Gran Turismo Sport the first new instalment since 2013’s Gran Turismo 6, and the first developed for the latest-generation PlayStation 4. Taking advantage of the PS4’s extra processing power, every car and circuit has been remodelled from scratch since GT6 with more uncannily realistic graphics than ever, but the big news is the introduction of an organised league of global online multiplayer Gran Turismo championships – recognised and regulated by the FIA, no less. That’s no joke. In Sport mode, the game’s eponymous main section, players will be able to enter a year-long calendar of…

A COLD WIND IS blowing dark curtains of rain across Lake Como, but the only thunder to shake the Orwellian scene is the exhaust noise of the 2002 Hommage. A stab at the starter button is all it takes to convert the turbo straight-six from an internal to an external combustion engine. Stuffed with electronic and mechanical anabolic agents, this wildly camouflaged BMW M2 dares to hammer out such a loud and blunt exhaust tune that not even the local Mafia godfather would get this jam session without frontiers through type approval. After 20 seconds the Stones’ 19th Nervous Breakdown (1966) gives way to Adele’s Hello (2016), the decibel tornado tailing off to a perfectly civilised breeze. BMW now all but owns Villa d’Este’s Concorso d’Eleganza. The Bavarians typically bring…

IT DOESN’T HAPPEN often that you get the chance to drive two derivatives of a brand-new car along the same route within 30 minutes of each other. It’s a dream scenario really, an empty, perilously narrow, roller coaster of a Slovenian rural road. The car: Mercedes’ C-Class Cabriolet. The derivatives: C 300 and C 43. The result: a character chasm wide enough to fit the whole of Stuttgart. I exit the beautiful Vila Vipolže in the consonant-challenged village of Dobrovo v Brdih, Slovenia in the Mercedes-AMG C 43 first, merge into ‘traffic’ – exactly one ’82 Fiat Panda – and dive off left accelerating hard past a ran-when-parked Skoda Felicia now resting in a field. Just a few hundred metres in and I’ve learned two things already: The steering’s near…

AUDI’S DECISION TO hold the earliest press driving event for its newest and littlest SUV in Havana, Cuba, might represent a form of compensation by contrast. Surrounded by a heady mix of time warp 1950s Americana, Soviet-era Ladas and the occasional smattering of more modern machinery (800 per cent import duty keeps this to a minimum; Audi presently sells 50-200 cars in Cuba a year), a convoy of red ‘pre-series’ Q2s flanked by a pair of bright blue Q7s certainly generates plenty of local interest. I haven’t been so popular driving an Audi since… well, I don’t think I’ve ever been popular driving an Audi. It’s also fair to say the appearance of the thing does rather grow on you. Elements like the cut away ‘tornado line’ along the side…

THE 570GT IS TO MCLAREN what the Rocky Mallow Road edition is to Cadbury’s Dairy Milk. All the talk is of two per cent slower steering than its 570S supercar sibling, up to 15 per cent more marshmallowy suspension, caramel-coloured luxurious leather upholstery, crunchy biscuit pieces, and an opening glass hatch which overhauls the luggage capacity from one pair of pants to two. In McLaren’s recipe book, this transforms the ballistic S coupe into a Grand Tourer (hence the GT suffix), an Aston Martin rival, if you will. One relentless, 40-minute hyperloop to the volcanic summit of Tenerife later, and I can tell you no V8 Vantage or DB9 ever felt like this. Behind the carbonfibre passenger cell, hidden beneath the sloping, leather-lined ‘Touring Deck’, hides McLaren’s trademark 3.8-litre twin-turbo…

THE EXCELLENT Volkswagen Up needs no introduction to us. When we first tested it in early 2015 we were blown away not only by its affordability and relative versatility, but by how fun it was to drive – no wonder it has outstripped VW’s modest expectations, shifting over 3550 units since launch. And now, the only reason small car buyers might not have considered one, its 3-door configuration, has been eliminated with the addition of a 5-door model. Rather shrewdly, Volkswagen also took the opportunity to add two new lifestyle derivatives: the Colour Up (R189100) and the Cross Up (R181400) featured here. Is it just a bit of faux-4x4 styling fun, or does it build upon the Up’s sterling reputation? Mass appeal Let’s start by delving into the issue of…

S70/2 V12 (McLaren F1) 1990. Gordon Murray and Paul Rosche, chief engineer at BMW motorsport, know each other well from the Brabham-BMW F1 years. When Honda goes quiet on the idea of building the light, compact and powerful V12 Murray wants for ‘the world’s best car’, Rosche asks ‘What do you really want?’ Murray tells him: big displacement, tiny package, rigid enough to be a stressed member, less than 250kg, 410-plus kW and a 7500rpm redline. BMW delivers with a 6064cc tour de force melding the tractability and reliability of a road engine with the power and response of a purebred racer. S65 V8 (E90/E92 M3) The first time the M3 gained two cylinders – in the transition from light and mighty four-pot E30 to bulkier six-cylinder E36 – the…

1 THE PERFORMANCE Hydrogen fuel stack uses patented tech to produce 210kW driving a pair of electric motors each developing 185kW, but capped at 172kW. Single-speed transmission can be tailored to each circuit, with driver-controlled electronic torque vectoring for max performance. 2 THE HYDROGEN TANKS There are three high-pressure tanks, one each side of the driver and a smaller third one across the car’s centre. Made from aluminium and spun carbonfibre, they store 6kg of hydrogen at over 10000psi; enough for 40 minutes track time at 50-70 per cent power. Refuelling would take 3 minutes. 3 THE CAR’S DESIGN Design driven by Pininfarina’s ‘Geometrical generator’. When viewed from overhead the proportions are dictated by two triangles intersecting at the centre of the car. This drove the location of the tanks,…

MUST ADD LOADS OF WEIGHT? The whole caboodle weighs more than 100kg – but that’s actually pretty light given just how much stuff it packs in, the Bentayga’s line director points out WHAT IF I CRASH IT? Modular design makes it possible to replace sections of the harness in the event of accident damage WHAT’S IT ALL MADE OF? Given the huge currents they must carry, not all of the cables are, well, cables. The starting system’s powerline is actually an aluminium pressing EXTREMES OF TEMPERATURE? Each Bentayga ECU is assembled in a sterile, dust-and moisture-free environment. Completely sealed against the elements, they’re designed to operate from -40 to +50degC. EVER HAD TO do a spot of wiring around the house? Spare a thought for the poor souls tasked with…

THERE IS SOMETHING essentially futile about spending a year with a car that ultimately doesn’t make it to the finish line. Finish line? Yes, because Mazda has 90 per cent confirmed that the 6 will not be offered in South Africa going forward. Frustrating indeed (the hedging as much as anything), especially when it has proved so competent as both a tourer and commuter. Globally, Mazda6’s natural enemies are the Honda Accord, VW Passat and Ford Fusion (Mondeo in other markets). With the possible exception of Passat they all battle in South Africa, largely because they are caught halfway between executive sedan and family car. And as they endeavour to move upmarket and offer more features, the problem is exacerbated; their key selling point is their relative value, and if…

AS SOMEONE who actually owns a Nissan, and now someone who’s running one long term, my mind’s wrapped up this month with the idea of brand loyalty. How does it take root and how is it nurtured? These days, marketers are their own publishers and they’re not shy to use every media platform at their disposal – social media in particular has given savvy marketers a megaphone. But as a football-mad youngster in the ‘90s, long before social media, a fleeting glimpse of AC Milan’s gorgeous red and black strip emblazoned with its gold championship star and silver cup hanging off the rack at Totalsports was all it took for me to become a devout fan. I didn’t know a thing about the club or even where they were from…

IT WAS HIGH drama and tears of sadness and jubilation at the 84th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans as, with one lap to go, a mere four minutes shy of 24 hours, the leading No.5 Toyota TS050 Toyota driven by Kazuki Nakajima ground to a halt just beyond the start/finish line suffering what appeared to be massive engine failure, handing the lead and victory to the No.2 Porsche 919 Hybrid of Neel Jani, Marc Lieb and Romain Dumas who had been trailing by around 90 seconds. Worse still for the Toyota Gazoo Racing outfit, the No. 5 car, after restarting, would not even claim second place as it was eventually disqualified from the race for not completing its last lap within the allotted six-minute time limit, Nakajima…

BMW CELEBRATES ITS centenary this year, so the BMW Group – of which Rolls-Royce Motor Cars is a part – has rolled out the ‘Vision Next 100’ project to investigate at the future of its brands’ products. BMW itself, and Mini, have also built concepts with the same title as part of the centenary-related developments. It’s an all-electric, carbonfibre-based autonomous coupe, with 28-inch wheels – ones that are assembled from 65 individual pieces of aluminium, at that. You won’t have to hire a chauffeur, either, or – heavens forbid – actually attempt to drive it yourself. Rolls-Royce surmises that the concept would be controlled by an AI called ‘Eleanor’, after the model on whom the Spirit of Ecstasy was based. This AI would function as an assistant and driver, studying…

IN ONE HAPPY month I covered more than 50 years of American automotive history, or so it felt. It began on a bright sunny day driving the latest Ford Mustang and ended on a grey day not driving a Tesla. (It drove itself.) The new Mustang is the first official right-hand drive version of the iconic pony car. Ford sells it to help elevate its image: to get out of the gutter and, to quote Wilde, look at the stars (namely, BMW and Audi). Witness the ‘unlearn’ ad campaign, to transform its image. The new GT, a Le Mans programme, and the Mustang are all part of the strategy. Ford is probably the only mass maker that can get away with this. After all, it did win Le Mans this…

LAUNCHING ITS PLUG-IN hybrid X5 xDrive40e, BMW took the opportunity to punt its solar carport, a formidable structure made out of laminated bamboo and solar panels that you erect in the driveway. It will charge your new car (and house) via a wallbox. BMW is looking at ways of making its whole green effort a holistic, rather than a hit-and-miss, process. Called 360° Electric, this strategy includes various product and service packages. Chief among those products is the X5 xDrive40e, latest addition to BMW’s hybrid range, complete with full electric capability. It’s the ‘full electric’ bit that’s important. Switch the eDrive button to Max eDrive and the car operates exclusively on electric power, no matter how flat you put your foot; in Max mode the 2.0-litre turbocharged engine is not…

BACK IN 1997 when Prius first landed on planet Earth, Mandela was president, our Constitution was just coming into effect, the Defence Force finally destroyed all its land mines, everyone wanted a Nokia 5110, Hong Kong went back to China, Princess Diana was killed and Max Verstappen was born. Clearly then a Very Long Time Ago. The intervening 19 years have been extraordinary ones for motoring. GPS went mainstream in 2000, Facebook and Google reinvented conversation and research, electronics and satellite technology fast-forwarded the advent of the autonomous car, catalytic converter development radically reduced emissions and battery technology charged into new territory. 2016 and we’re in Blade Runner territory, comparatively speaking. Cue Toyota’s fourth generation Prius, competing now in a world of equals: far more efficient petrol and diesel engines,…

ANOTHER YEAR; ANOTHER Nissan GT-R or at least that’s what it feels like. With every year the GT-R gets stronger and the suspension trickery gets smarter but the engineers knew exactly what kind of potential this beast was capable of when they first fine-tuned it back in 2007. This year’s version is even more focused than its predecessors and, to prove that it’s not just another GT-R, Nissan has flown us to Düsseldorf to test it on the pristine German road network that flows into Belgium before unleashing it and all of its wrath on the hallowed asphalt of the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps – it doesn’t get any more special than this. We’ve tested many of these over the years and have always been impressed by the way each one…

WHEN brainstorming catchy headliners for road tests your typical journalist will explore a range of pop-cult references. There’s music of course, cinema naturally and (among other things) novels – think anything by Tom Clancy and you’ll get the idea, for example The Shunt for Red October. Lyrically, anything from the ’70s era of Rock ‘n Roll will suffice, as will any typical ‘90s schlock action flick. You mention Die Hard and Lethal Weapon, and immediately my colleagues and I go Citi Golf and Ariel Atom respectively, with Schwarzenegger’s Total Recall being a favourite headline for any occasion where a manufacturer suffers a particularly catastrophic production fault across their range. Which brings me to the Kadjar. You might have thought I’d be stumped by a car whose name is a mish-mash…

THE 1800TI DOESN’T look like a revolution. You’ll search long, hard and ultimately without success for shards of violent change in its neat three-box proportions and understated detailing. Truth is it looked understated in 1963. Next to 2016’s M4 GTS and extrovert M2, all swollen musculature and eye-candy detailing, the meek 1800 is all but invisible. But follow the strands that bind BMW’s more dynamic output and you realise this is it: The Big Bang. The 1800TI defined Munich’s blueprint for brilliance: sports car bothering performance with versatility and affordability. From the first M3’s light and gutsy four-cylinder engine to the new M2’s engaging balance, there’s a little Neue Klasse and 1800TI in every BMW that’s mattered since. Prior to the TI – Turismo Internazionale – BMW’s products were compared…

Brabham BT52 You want specific output? The 1.5-litre four in the back of Piquet’s 1983 title-winning Brabham, boosted to near-oblivion, punted out a reputed 1044kW in qualifying. Fabulously expensive custom-brewed fuel helped keep the engine in one piece and generate the power. Piquet did the rest in Gordon Murray’s neat riposte to a rule change banning ground-effect aero. Schnitzer M3 (E30) Sport Evo Pristine white BBS alloys. Greasy slides on hot Yokohamas. 283kW from a normally-aspirated 2.5-litre four… In the early 1990s the German touring car series was a maelstrom of serious driving talent and big-budget squads. M3 Sport Evo lost out to the title-winning Merc 190E in ’92 but the striped Schnitzers remain iconic competition BMWs. Procar M1 What to do when you’ve an M1 supercarbased racer to blood…

I wanted the old pony to outshine this bright newcomer and shove its clever electronic wizardry up its tailpipe I HAD IT ALL PLANNED...Enter our protagonist, the new kid on the block, an all-wheel drive hatchling and potential usurper here to challenge the tried and tested formula of rear-wheel drive. The Focus RS you see features a new-fangled Drift Mode, an electronic shortcut that means to dupe the mechanicals into believing it’s a rear-powered sideways star. To make matters fair I did my best to take the powerplant out of the equation by finding a near-as-dammit identical counterpart in its bigger brother, our antagonist, the Ford Mustang 2.3 Ecoboost. While the Focus RS bristles with 257kW and a maximum of 470Nm, the ‘Stang settles for 233kW and 430Nm from the…

THE 48-VOLT system is a platform for future technologies that you will see during the course of the next months and years. You will see it in each and every new Audi coming, especially on a new platform like the next A8. In the next stage you will see that we can even recuperate [using] the 48-volt system, and the energy we are recuperating will be higher – much higher – than we are putting in. OUR COMING A8 will have some parts in carbonfibre. We have to carefully look at where you can explore the potential of carbonfibre, and where not. We’re balancing these things – the safety issues and of course the weight-reduction issues, and that’s why you will see some multi-material mix in our future cars, too.…

DRIVE SUPER FAST, SAFELY CONTINENTAL SPORTCOMPACT6 Tyres, arguably the most important item on a car. The SportContact 6 is for the big stuff, 19-23-inches and rated to 350kph. With ingredients like Black Chili Aralon 350 you know it’s serious. There are 41 variants on offer too. Price dependent on size www.continental-tyres.co.za SELF DIAGNOSIS TORQUE OBDII ANDROID APP Workshops spend millions on OBD diagnostic tools, but you can spend way less and have similar functionality on your Android phone. You can scan for faults, clear codes and make some changes too. You will need an OBDII plug adapter though. Just don’t change too much or you will need a real workshop to fix your mess. R54 www.play.google.com DINKY CARS WITH TECH ROBOTIC ENHANCED VEHICLES The makers of Robosapien now…

TopCar Drive-Thru Review: Land Rover Defender 110 Heritage Edition MORE THAN FIVE decades old and the Defender is still with us. What better way to review the British legend than to take one of the heritage editions (130 will be coming to SA, priced at R667 300) for that most civilised of things - a cup of tea. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? Catch the full video here – topcar.co.za/land-rover/ topcar-drivethru-review-land-rover-defender-110-heritage-edition/ SUV or Bakkie? Depends where you’re from… A car can be all things to all people, but what does it mean to our editor Calvin Fisher? Decisions... 24 Hours of Le Mans: Heartbreak for Toyota, victory for Porsche Toyota fails on final lap, Porsche gifted second victory in a row and Ford marks…