Paintless Dent Removal Illinois

A renaissance plan loaded in equal measures with glory and peril.

Lotus and the Andy Warhol Phenomenon

Andy Warhol was the man who came up with the 15 minutes of fame concept, and that’s what Lotus Cars pursued at its Paris show press conference. Most of the show’s 31 press conferences on Thursday were scheduled for 15 minutes, and Lotus crammed six new product presentations into that meager time span. To understate the obvious, doing so was an ambitious plan. But it also was an appropriate one, because it’s a microcosm of the challenge that Lotus has assigned itself: six new cars over the next three-plus years.

Keep Reading: Lotus Goes a Little Bit Crazy: All-New, Six-Car Lineup Debuts at Paris Auto Show – Car News

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Bringing you two e-tron firsts: a top that drops and a plug-in hybrid drivetrain.

Two is better than one, as the saying goes, and Audi is taking that to heart with its five-year goal of selling two cars in the U.S. for every one it sells now. The brand apparently feels that the philosophy applies to concepts, too, as it trotted out a second dream machine at the Paris show, the e-tron Spyder shown here. It joins the Quattro concept on the Audi stand in the City of Light.

Keep Reading: Audi E-Tron Spyder Concept – Auto Shows

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Volkswagen has released three new renderings and a little more information about the company’s upcoming “New Mid-size Sedan” (NMS), the unimaginatively codenamed Passat replacement for the U.S. A refresher: While Europeans were introduced to a reworked Passat at the Paris auto show today, we’ll instead get a bigger, cheaper, and softer model specially designed for American tastes. It will fight it out in McDonald’s parking lots against the likes of the Honda Accord and Hyundai Sonata. (One can’t help but think VW’s press team timed this New Mid-size Sedan announcement to eliminate the confusion engendered by the Euro Passat reveal.)

The three new computer-generated images of the NMS aren’t detailed even by Paint-by-Number standards, but we can glean a little information. The long roofline and rough proportions of the doors to the rest of the car imply that VW is going to deliver on its promise that the NMS will be bigger than the Passat it replaces, more on par with the Accord sedan (which now exceeds even BMW’s 5-series in length). The front fascia and rear end will be clean and simple like the newly introduced Jetta’s, and—prepare for a scoop!—judging by the pictures, the NMS will offer alloy wheels. We hope that the production car will, unlike the car in the sketches, have windows one can actually see through.

More seriously, Volkswagen confirmed that the NMS is on track for a January debut at the 2011 Detroit auto show, and should go on sale in the third quarter of 2011. Volkswagen hasn’t confirmed the Tennessee-built car’s engine lineup yet, but we do know the company’s excellent 2.0-liter turbo-diesel will be available as an option. The base price should stick close to $20,000, and the 2.5-liter inline-five also found in the Jetta (a car with which the NMS is said to share 30 to 40 percent of its parts) is expected to be the standard engine. We remain hopeful, however, that VW will also install the wonderful 2.0-liter turbocharged and direct-injected four-cylinder found in the GTI and CC, among others.

Volkswagen has said that it expects to sell 150,000 copies of the NMS per year, which would more than quintuple the number of Passats annually rolling out of U.S. showrooms.

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A lightweight, retro-futuristic nod to the Ur-Quattro.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Audi Quattro. To celebrate, the car that started it all—now known as the Ur-Quattro, or “original Quattro”—has received a futuristic second coming. This concept throws modern tech and styling at the all-wheel-drive rally-weapon idea and hints at weight-saving innovations to come from the four-ringed brand.

Keep Reading: Audi Quattro Concept – Auto Shows

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On Tuesday, we posted an audio recording of a mystery car’s exhaust note. To hear it again, click play above. This exhaust note does a good job of masking the 556 hp produced from the supercharged 6.2-liter V-8, housed in the 2011 Cadillac CTS-V coupe automatic.

Like that sound? Download the MP3 and quiz your friends, make your own ringtone, or just lull yourself to sleep with sweet, sweet vehicular ear candy.

2011 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe Automatic Exhaust MP3 (Right-click to Save As…)

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Trumpchi concept in Beijing

In a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal, Guangzhou Auto’s Chairman Zhang Fangyou announced that Guangzhou’s own self developed car will launch in December this year. At the Beijing Auto Show in April this year, Guangzhou showed off its first concept sedan which is based on the Alfa Romeo 166 platform that Guangzhou Auto bought from Fiat prior to their signing of a 50:50 joint venture.

Guangzhou Auto recently launched on the Hong Kong stock market and is China’s second biggest auto maker after Dongfeng Motor Corp based on market capitalization but is in strong competition with other state owned car companies that have recently launched their own car brands.

Chairman Zhang revealed that Guangzhou Auto’s joint ventures with Toyota and Honda currently account for around 85% of Guangzhou Autos revenue at the moment but this is expected to be reduced as Trumpchi models become available to consumers.

The Trumpchi models will be available for purchase in December this year, and Guangzhou Auto are aiming to sell 300,000 units in China and possibly abroad by 2015. A Trumpchi SUV is expected to follow after the initial launch of the sedan.

China’s central government is eager to push consolidation on the burgening Chinese car industry, but Guangzhou Auto’s recent purchase of Guangzhou’s Yue Jiang Coach Company for a mere 1rmb.

According to information supplied, it appears that Yue Jiang Coaches has already gone bankrupt as of 2008 and no longer has the ability to produce vehicles, however its assets are apparently 80 million RMB, net assets are worth over 86 million RMB.

Guangzhou Auto has recruited an asset management company to review Yue Jiang’s accounts and look over Yue Jiang’s debt of 120 million RMB. Although Guangzhou Auto has taken over the company, Yue Jiang will still be permitted to carry out its own R&D for a period of 3 years.

It is unclear what Guangzhou Auto are eager to become a coach maker, however both Chery and BYD have recently announced their plans for pure electric or hybrid coach technology, it could be that Guangzhou Auto are eager to play catch up with their neighbours.

Luxgen and Dongfeng sign deal

Earlier today in Beijing, the Chairman of Dongfeng Auto Group Mr. Xu Ping He and Yulong Auto’s Mr. Yan Kai Tai announced the creation of a new partnership that will see Yulong’s Luxgen motors being produced in China. In front of 300 selected guests and VIP’s, Mr. Xu and Mr. Yan announced that the Luxgen brand, originally a Taiwanese branded vehicles that was self developed by Yulong Motor, will be produced in Hangzhou.

Dongfeng Auto are expected to invest 775 million RMB into the partnership, which will see it being a fifty-fifty joint venture run the by the pair. The first Luxgen plant will be based in Hangzhou’s Xiaoshan Industry park and has a wide mandate to produce passenger vehicles including MPV’s, SUV’s, sedans and also pure electric vehicles. Dongfeng will be assisting Yulong with the development of the Luxgen brand for the Chinese market, although it is unclear how far this will go. The first Luxgen model is expected to be produced in July but a launch will happen towards the end of 2011 and will be sold under the Luxgen moniker, although it will be called Na Zhi Zhen in Chinese.

The Taiwanese-Chinese partnership is expected to promote further reunification between the two, which have been separated since the Nationalist government of China fled the mainland in 1949 and set up base camp in Taiwan, however in recent years the Taiwanese and Chinese government have relaxed their stance towards one another. The mainland government gave its blessing to the partnership earlier this year on July 29th, and have since revealed that total investment in the project is expected to reach 3.4 billion RMB.

Luxgen is a relatively new brand and was developed by Taiwan’s Yulong Motor for use within Taiwan and China. Luxgen currently has two models in its line up, both of which have been spotted out testing in the Chinese mainland before now. Luxgen’s MPV and SUV are powered by a 2.2 inline 4 engine built by the Chunghwa Engine Corp and has a turbo supplied by Garret, the engine is good for 173bhp of power (270Nm).

BAIC Motors new logo

The forthcoming Beijing Auto brand was announced earlier today and will be officially known as BAIC Motors. Beijing Auto Works is aiming to once again become a major player in the Chinese automotive industry, and has already made major breakthroughs in the industry thanks to its partnerships with Mercedes and Hyundai that have seen it produce over 1.27 million cars in 2009, making it the the fifth largest car manufacturer in China and with sales revenue of over one billion RMB.

At this years Beijing Auto Show we got a taste of what BAIC Motors have in store over the next few years, they had the C30 EV, C60, C71, B90, B40 and B61 models on display. Of course we have already seen the BAIC Motors C30 MPV on display several times in automatic and manual form on China Car Times already.

And now, a Jaguar concept car for Spaceman Spiff.

Jaguar desperately needs a BMW 3-series fighter priced between $30,000 and $40,000. While we continue to wait for that rumored announcement, Jaguar is using the très chic Paris auto show to unveil an eleventy-billion-dollar, two-seat, twin-turbine, quad-electric-motor-powered 205-mph slingshot that should be in production in about, oh, never. Cue the Star Wars theme. Did we mention that there was British government agency money involved in this project? The C-X75 is at heart a research project designed to fuse aerospace and automotive technologies. The car was developed over a nine-month span and paid for by Jag, while the powertrain springs from a joint project with the British government–sponsored Technology Strategy Board. On the most basic level, the car’s complex powertrain is a range-extending hybrid that operates roughly like the Chevrolet Volt’s. In the Jag, a 19-kWh, 330-pound cache of lithium-ion batteries provides up to 68 miles of pure-electric AWD propulsion from four 195-hp electric motors. Mounted inboard, each drives a single wheel through a 3:1 gear reduction, and together create a claimed 1180 lb-ft of torque. (Four electric motors? Maybe Jaguar should have called it the XJ440.)…

Keep Reading: Jaguar C-X75 Concept – Auto Shows

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