What the hell is that? - The Chevrolet EN-V

At first glance it may seem as a fatal sidetracking, because I'm reviewing what appears to be a kinder-suprise on wheels, but don't lose hope. This ridiculously comical thing is a serious concept.

See that Chevrolet-badge in the front? It's not a cruel joke about Chevy, so don't laugh. It's GM's take on the future. It's called the EN-V, which stands for Electric Networked Vehicle and it is, according to GM, a revolutionizing step towards the day after tomorrow.


Built in co-operation with Segway, the EN-V was first revealed at the Shanghai World Expo in 2010 under the name GM EN-V. It made real promises about zero-emissions transport and autonomous driving, much like something out of a sci-fi flick. Shortly after, in 2011, came the thing you're looking at now, the Chevy EN-V, a less concepty concept. (under)Powered by two electric motors it promises a top speed of 40km/h (25mph) and a range that won't get you home. But that's not the point.

A vacuum-cleaner? -No. EN-V

The point is other stuff. Like being eco-friendly for example. Or being fashionable, as the designs are intended to "express individuality" and apparently create a new fad of having the trendiest vacuum-cleaner.

It's a concept that, if introduced, is supposed to take the driving out of driving and make moving about a lot more safe, green and, you guessed it, dull. It's supposed to be the ultimate means of transport and the destroyer of the realms of auto-enthusiasm.

If you think of it, the Chevy EN-V would make moving around a lot like taking the elevator, except on a multidimensional plane. It's very practical, effective, useful, boring and vapid.

There's a reason why there isn't an industry revolving around elevator-enthusiasts, because nobody is entusiastic about that sort of thing. Taking the elevator is an epiphenomenon. And that's what the EN-V would do for motoring, it would transform driving into an epiphenomenon. No more would the sentence "I'm out driving" be valid without being followed by a reason or intent of destination. Driving in itself would not exist anymore. If that's the future I will kill myself.

-HS

Your thoughts on this... Thing?

HS on: Korean cars and xenophobia/koreophobia

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You know how creepy people go birdwatching on weekends and everyone finds them a bit retarded? Well, I'm one of those creepy people, except I like cars. So, the other day I went out carwatching. That wasn't very much fun though...

Finland, like many other places in the last few years, has been overrun by the Koreans. Wherever you go there's always a Hyndai or KIA lurching about in your peripheral vision, ruining your day with boredom.

The reason for this recent Korean invasion is that the Koreans finally managed to merge with the natural automotive habitat of each country, blend in so to say, and that's just fine on my part, mostly. My beef is that Hyndais and KIAs, unlike BMWs and other cool things, are a bit too dull and  polarbear-sensitive, not exactly dedicated carwatchers material. Or are they?

As I was walking around the city-center observing KIAs and Hyndais I smirkingly thought to myself  "oh man, I remember 5 years ago when no-one would set their foot in a Korean car, other people sure are xenophobic...", and then it hit me. I'm a dirty, filthy, sneaking xenophobe too;


BMWs and Hyndais share the same parts, except I hate the particular parts that end up in the Hyndais. And there's the Hyndai Coupé, why do I automatically resent it on a cellular level? Why do I feel obliged to hate the new Hyndai Veloster even when I know it's decent? Or the KIA K9 concept? Or the KIA Kee concept? and the list goes on...


Only one denominating factor exists. They're Korean. The bottom-line is the Koreans could make the best sports-car known to man and still be deemed garbage by petrolheads simply because "Korean cars are extremely average and eventless"; The presumption that lives in all of our brains. A mere updated version of the presumption that occupied our brains five years ago when "Phh, Koreans can't build cars" was the standard.

A Korean sports-car is bound to flop, and the Hyndai Veloster is the most recent case of proof. The car itself is actually not half bad. The only real issue is that it's a Hyndai. The conflict occurs because the car is built for petrolheads.

Petrolheads will hate the Veloster from the beginning and not buy it because of the associations generated by the name Hyndai, and if that isn't enough to put them off, they certainly won't buy it because they'll get laughed at by fellow petrolheads at work, and normal people won't care about the Veloster because they just want to go from place A to place B comfortably. So by that logic the Veloster has no market. In fact, no Korean sports-car has a market unless some urgent marketing-propaganda from the Koreans' side is applied. They'd have to realize this pretty soon if they ever want to get past the image of merely providing oversized vacuum-cleaners with a long warranty...

I bet if you'd slap a Citroen-badge on the Veloster you could sell the crap out of it as a "sporty coupe DS3". Branding is a motherf'ker, and that's where the battle is ultimately won. Nobody can rationally explain why they'd rather have a Mustang over a Vauxhall VXR8 because the Vauxhall is just simply better, but still everyone wants the Mustang. That's playing with emotions, or in other words effective marketing. Someone should translate that into Korean... Maybe they'd get it then...

Hopefully in five years the Koreans have gotten far enough for me to be able to like the Veloster without feeling embarrassed. I can only hope.


-HS


Your thoughts?

Video of the week: Ken Blocks of the real world

You know how funny shit gets even funnier when someone takes the funny out of it? This a prime example.

I assume everyone who visits this blog has seen Ken Block's amazing Gymkhana videos, but if not, quickly scrabble off to youtube and watch, because this is a re-take on that.

A few humorous lads have taken the essence of Gymkhana and transferred it to the world of average people; on a budget. Here's the brilliantly hilarious result. Wallow in the irony.

-HS

Toyota returns to WRC?

Do you remember the Celica? Or the Supra? Or the MR2? All magnificent Toyota sports-cars, and all gone.

In 2005 Toyota changed their strategy and aimed for the even greater masses, and so all petty little niche cars had to go. All the cool stuff went either Lexus and got an astronomical price-tag or went extinct. I call this the beginning of the Avensis-era, a testament to every-day mundanity and a salute to the wrist-cuttingly dull necessity.

The enthusiasts were forgotten, which was a big mistake, obviously. Now they've finally woken up to the fact that there's something between the Lexus-tier and boring people. Every-day enthusiasts require a market too, and Toyota acted a bit dyslexic for a few years figuring that out, enough time to cock up their image.

So lately Toyota has made big efforts on regaining their lost sporting-mojo. One of those efforts is the Toyota/Subaru collaboration Scion FR-S/BRZ. Another one is this; Toyota plans a return to World Rally Championship in the not so distant future. After an absence of 13 years it would be a welcome surprise to see Toyota back on the muddy stages re-inventing themselves as a rally-brand.

Toyotas re-take on sporty: the GT86

According to the Toyota-representative, their 1.6 liter turbocharged engine is still in the testing-phase, but the car would most likely be ready by next year. He also hinted that the rally-car would be based on a Toyota Yaris, so all of you (me included) who expected something in the likes of Celica-rebirth nostalgia are sadly going to be disappointed. We'll just have to hope that the whole thing generates some sportier Toyotas and grows greater than the Yaris..

WRC Toyota Celica in 1998

If nothing else, at least they are able to brand their Yaris as a "sporty" car, detect the irony.

I get a bit nostalgic now and then about the rally-Corolla and Celica mental associations generated as a youngster playing Richard Burns Rally on the computer, and I hope this venture generates something equally legendary, because if it's just about the Yaris I'm going to pass.

-HS

Is the rally-Yaris a middle-finger to our faces? I sure feel so, how about you?

Ferrari might go greener than you think

Ferrari in a nutshell: The V12

Ferrari, with their more than potent V12's and V8's, is not the stereotypical carmaker to involve the attributes eco-frendliness and low fuelconsumption  in their creations... Ferrari is more about flamboyance. A sound that'll make your ears bleed and an as high as possible power-to-sex-appeal ratio.

Usually, the green doesn't mix with the cool, but the competition between Ferrari and Porsche has changed that for good.



As you know, Ferrari and Porsche are enemies. Really, really bitter enemies. They've competed for the supercar-supremacy for, well, as long as there have been supercars, and they've always been neck and neck, one trying to outdo the other.

The Porsche 918 Spyder. Pretty neat.

A few years ago Porsche humiliated Ferrari. In fact, they humiliated the entire supercar-scene. Their revolutionary 918 Spyder concept, which is now in development, promised to combine a fuel-consumption of 3liters/100km (78mpg) and an emissions-chart of 70g/km whilst still managing to pump out 718hp when needed. Promised 0-100 for this pseudo-Prius? 3.2 secs. Everyone was staggered. Ferrari had no choice but to respond.

It's a quite slow response, though, but only in the time-wise sense. The response is this: a V12 Enzo-successor, probably named the F70. No launch-dates have been set but it's thought to be revealed sometime this fall.

The F70 will look something like this.

Promised specs for the F70 are mind-boggling. It'll feature a signature V12 developing 800hp and electric motors contributing with a 120hp, making for a total of 920hp. This power will be neatly packaged in an obviously red body weighing just over 1000kg. Dare I imagine what happens when you put the foot down? It's suspected that with those specs the F70 will be fast enough outrun the so-far most brutal supercar of them all, the Bugatti Veyron Supersport.

Now we'll just wait for Porsche to counter... The introduction of these two super-hybrids have changed the entire supercar scene. All of a sudden the two hottest supercars in the world are hybrid, and it seems that's the path to walk in the future. The Ferrari-Porsche rivalry is a brilliant thing to follow.

The 599 Hy-KERS concept, technological ancestor to the F70

As an addition to to the "mandatory" F70 hybrid response to Porsche, reports say that Ferrari has also filed a patent for a more conventional hybrid-system. The patent concerns a 90-degree forward mounted V engine, which would point at a system based on the Maserati-Ferrari V8 rather than the 65-degree V12. Of course, the patent-filing in itself still doesn't say much, but it could pave the way for a "green" Ferrari California... Anyone interested?

Anyone feeling excited about hybrid yet?


-HS


Sources: autoweek.com, automobilemag.com, caranddriver.com





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Lada 2107's discontinued

I bring you sad news. A legendary symbol for poo went extinct on Monday. AutoVAZ announced that they cease production of the Lada Riva. The car that gave our jokes substance for 40 years has now passed into history.

The official statement was "The Lada 2107 has become outdated in technology and due to a drop in demand is no longer profitable", and that, I suspect, was an understatement. The Lada 2107's techy bits got outdated in the late 80's, but still they managed to produce them for another 20 years. They had to get something right with it, then.

from 9gag.com

The contrast is huge when you think of it. In Russia cars stay the same for 40 years, while in Europe carmakers drop fancy concepts sooner than your brain manages to process the last ones. On the surface it might sound like autoVAZ is seriously slacking off, but here's something for you to think of: If you polish a turd long enough it will eventually shine.

That's the case with the Lada Riva; a proletarian piece of cheap transport, poo if you will, polished and polished until it eventually shone. A testament to simplicity and moderacy, something European carmakers could familiarize themselves with a little more.

If, or when it broke down, even a regular person could mend it. It wasn't difficult and it wasn't exciting but it was honest, and that was, and still is the beauty of it. It's nothing special but it doesn't act like anything else either. It simply is just it, bad. But in a good way, if you know what I mean? A nice counterbalance to the ever-accelerating western mentality.

Lada did something with that model that only few carmakers have managed to do. They created something permanent, something that could one day join the Model-T and the Fiat 500 etc. as a milestone in automotive history. The model maybe ceased production, but the legends, stories and jokes will live on for a long time to come.

I'm sure as hell going to miss that boxy communistwagon, and come to think of it maybe I'll even get one just for the sake of it. At least they're cheap.

Now, let's take a minute to remember the 2107 by these jokes collected in it's memory:

What's the difference between a Jehovah's witness and a Lada?

-You can shut the door on a Jehovah's witness.

Someone wrote in the newspaper: "To the person who stole my Lada in -15 degrees frost. Keep the Lada but please tell me how the hell you got it running?!"

How do you double the value of a Lada? -Fill the petrol tank.

How do you make a Lada disappear? -You apply rust-remover to it.

What occupies the last 16 pages of the Lada owner's manual? -The bus- and train timetables.

What do you call a Lada at the top of a hill? -A bloody miracle!

What do you call several Ladas at the top of a hill? -A scrapheap.

What are shock-absorbers called in a Lada? Passengers.

Why does a Lada need a rear wash-wipe? To remove the flies that crash into it.

-HS

Getting misty-eyed over the 2107?

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It's official: Audi buys Ducati

Long has it been gossiped about in corridors and office-lunchrooms, but now finally there's some clarity into the matter. An anonymous inside source confirms that Audi is officially set to buy the Italian motorcycle-company Ducati from its owner Investindustrial.

Said source also confirms that an initial agreement has been made, and that the deal now only awaits final formalities. The trade is due to be approved by VW's supervisory board as soon as today, and if that goes smoothly Audi is home free. VW boss and supervisory board chairman "der Alte" Ferdinand Piëch already expressed his interest in buying Ducati in 2008, so Audi will most likely have no difficulty getting the deal contra-signed.

I'm not sure if those two brands quite match...

The trade sum according to the agreement is somewhere around 860 million euros ($1.1 billion), which at that amount would value Ducati at 7 times its last year's earnings with its debt of about 200 million euros not counted in. 

Both Audi and Investindustrial have declined to comment on this matter, but obviously they don't really need to either because we have our own ways of getting to the bottom of things. Hehe.

When Audi reels in Ducati it will become the 11th brand under Volkswagen Group's belt, joining alongside the Italian supercar-brands Bugatti and Lamborghini as a curiosity in the VW Group's high-end accessory department. 

Viewed in a bigger scale the Ducati-deal is small potatoes for Volkswagen Group, who has also had an interest in Fiat group's Alfa Romeo. This Ducati-affair is merely another step for Volkswagen Group in creating the VW Italy empire and gaining a foothold in peoples hearts rather than their minds as they've done this far, a PR-trick so to say. Christoph Stürmer, an analyst for IHS automotive commented: 

"Ducati is one of the finest machines you can buy but strategically it's insignificant for Volkswagen, Its revenue is more than Lamborghini's and Bugatti's combined, but to the automotive operations, it's a mere accessory."

The legendary 916SPS

This Ducati-deal is also a way for VW Group to get into the two-wheel competition with BMW who owns Husqvarna and makes bikes under its own name. And what a spectacular way it is. Ducati, since its debut in the Superbike World Championship in 1988, has won 14 championships and 16 manufacturer's championships, dictating the pace in the 90's and 2000's single-handedly, winning almost everything in their way. The mentality "develop for track, use on road" is a deep-rooted tradition with Ducati, and with their enormous successes in the racing-field they have long sold bikes according to the business-model "Win on Sunday, sell on Monday".


I think personally it's a real shame, this. I can't quite accept that an act of passion, a lifestyle, is eaten up by a German super-empire. What will become of Ducati when Audi is in charge of it? I hope they'll leave the Italians alone with it, because we want a Ducati not a machine. The flair certainly disappears as soon as you slap an Audi-reminder on it...


-HS


What do you think? Good or bad?


source: reuters, autonews.com




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Video of the week: Caterham proves its qualities as a winter-car

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I am fully aware that my sense of time has wandered off a bit lately, and I apologize for the consequences that has had on the timewise implications made by the name "video of the week". Maybe I should call it the "Video of the random time frame when I feel like posting a video" section in the future. Oh hell, I'll just call it "video of the week" for the simplicity of it. So here goes.

The fellows at Evo did a fine thing a while ago. They took one for the team, strained themselves in the cold of France, fought the bleek boredom of spending hours and hours in luxury hotels and wrestled a yellow beast in the mountains, just to provide us average people with some entertainment.

What they did was put a Caterham Supersport through its paces. Not just on the track as usual for a Caterham, but in the snowy French mountains, thus proving the Caterham's qualities as a proper winter-driver. No? No, That's just silly. But in any case very ballsy and envy-inspiring. I'd love to do that for a living.

Every now and then I ponder how those legitimate car-journalists schemed themselves into a paid job drifting a Caterham around in the French mountains. That's my version of Nirvana, Heaven or whatever you want to call it, so if any editors are reading: I'll do it for free!!

Now, watch this man have some proper fun and note the face at the end; we carlovers are just overgrown children after all:

For more of these Evo diaries visit evo.co.uk. 

-HS

You jelly? Sure you are!

You thought Saab was gone? Think again.

Everyone who hasn't been on a vacation in a cave for the last year or so has certainly heard about the sinking ship called Saab. Long did they struggle, and they always seemed to ninja their way out when it looked as they'd go bust. The ninja-tricks repertoire wasn't endless though.

"Last Saabs ever produced"

Inevitably time cought up with them, and on the 19th of December 2011 Saab had to sign into bankruptcy. The media around the whole Saab-case was spectacular when they finally sank, the bankruptcy made headlines all over the world, and everyone, no matter how much they'd hated or loved Saab in the past, seemed to get misty-eyed about the phrase "last Saabs ever produced". Top Gear even did a "Saab history special" to honour the quirky Swedish carmaker.

Saab gaining strength like an amoeba in a rehydrated puddle

Now months have passed, and the idea of a Saabless future has slowly made itself comfortable in the cognitive parts of one's brain, but that notion might be useless. Saab, it seems, is a cat, and it still has a few lives to go.

According to Hans Bergqvist, the man in charge of the bankruptcy nest, six new offers well exceeding the nest's value of 400 million euros have been made. Good news for the Swedish, because all bidders plan to continue production in the Trollhättan factory in one way or another.

Bergqvist hasn't revealed any information on the bidders, but at least the Chinese Youngman Group has come forward and said they've made an offer.

The decision on Saab's new ownership will be made by summer, so Saab might ninja its way out of this one too, who would have guessed? It seems as though you can't simply kill off Saab like that.


-HS

source: tekniikanmaailma.fi


Good news, right? At least we'll see the exciting aero-x concept develop (hopefully)

The return of group B

Group B, the combination of a word and a letter that, when spoken, makes rally-fans go berzerk, is back. Kind of at least, in the closest way possible.

An event called "rallye group B" taking place in Cheshire and North Staffordshire the 26-27. of this month will allow proper competitive rallying with those legendary group-B monsters once more. This is a very, very rare event since the group B was banned in 1986 due to the cars being pretty much undrivable. The original expression was "too fast to race".

a missile on wheels called the Lancia 037

All the legends that emerged from that era, Peugeot 205 T16, Lancia 037, Ford RS200 etc. haven't seen proper action since, except in historic classes where they appear just for show... until now. It's going to be a truly savage spectacle. A resurrecrtion of all that's primitive and brutal in men.

The event has already gained over 60 entries, so expect an amazing line-up of nostalgia and fury when the group B monsters among others are unleashed once more in the hands of europe's finest drivers.

This is the closest you will get to reliving "the good ol' times" when these sort of things still were legal, so if you have the chance, I strongly advice you attend!

For more information visit the website rallyegroupeb.com

Here is a small reminder of why the savage group B was originally banned. It's the last interview with Henri Toivonen at the Corsica Rally, before he died in an explosive crash in the second leg. In the video he complains about the cars being too powerful, saying "This rally is completely insane. We've done 4 hours of fast stages today, and with this speed and these modern cars it's impossible, your brain can't simply keep up. You can't simply do a race like this!"


-HS

More bad-assery from Volvo

 You know the image; Volvo is boring, not for the racetracks. This, let me assure you, is quite the opposite. It's a Volvo S60 race-car made by Polestar, the fast upcoming performance-division of Volvo, designed to compete in the Swedish TTA Racing Elite series.

This race-car is an extension of the Polestar-tuned, already mad Volvo S60 T6 called the S60 R-design.

Horsepower for the R-design is 330,but for the race-car they've upped the horses to 420. And those horses are absurdly, for a modern car with a Volvo-badge, fed to the rear wheels. Volvo has gone delightfully out of their mind lately.




My brain almost exploded when I saw that thing, that race-car is damn sexy. Let's bellow in the naive hope of them making a purebread sportscar of that design one day, rear wheel drive of course, and feel the warm tingly feeling grow inside. I honestly would not have thought a Volvo could look that desirable.

I like where Volvo is going with their new image, soon Volvo-drivers might be able to compete in virtual-penile sizes with those usual high-end BMW-, and Merc drivers.


Source: tekniikanmaailma.fi

-HS

What are your thoughts on the new direction Volvo is going in?

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HS on: the essence of biking

You might wonder why I deserted this blog a week ago and went silent. Here's a flimsy explanation: see, last week spring arrived properly. I know this because the primitive section of my brain commanded me to take out my bike, and that is an as accurate indicator of spring as the dog-poo that appears from under the melting snow on all the sidewalks.


A week ago I still owned an Italian 125cc 2-stroke Cagiva (or in english a chainsaw with fairings), but not anymore, I sold it. And I'm a bit sad.

The Ducati for those who aren't old enough to own a Ducati

Some would say the little 2-stroker was incredibly annoying to drive, powerband high up there in the northeastern corner of the rev-counter, engine shivering like a frightened dog, exhaust emitting oil- and petrol-fumes that induced an alarmingly fuzzy feeling in your head and so on.

I would say this was all character. You had to know every bit of it's personality, be friends with it, before you could ride it properly. And when you did, it was enormous fun. The lightness, the agility, the powerband, the smell, the lack of power, everything. It was like a trip through time to a time where only the brave and the stupid would get on a bike. A notion of being someone really testicle-swelling special, if you will.

It was nowhere near practical, reliable or civilized. In other words, everything a bike should be, just that I didn't realize it then. And so I sold it and went looking for something bigger, thinking "POWEEEERRRR".

I looked at many bikes, most of them with over 5 times the power of my old bike and most of them japanese, but none seemed to tickle me in the right places. The torque was even throughout the revs, the sound was sterile, the feel was perfect and so on. Riding them you felt that you were riding quality bikes. They were all too... predictable. It was then I realized I wasn't looking for engineering perfection, I was looking for soul. Imperfection, annoyment, unpredictability, quirkyness. Everything I had had in my former bike.

The Ducati 750 Supersport, my solution

So I decided to go back where I started except with a few more cubic centimetres, I bought a Ducati. A Honda-owner will have a hard time understanding why someone would want a dysfunctional bike with a bad temper over a quality piece of engineering-porn, but it's deeper than that. The appreciation one develops for a bike is so much greater when it has a personality, something you can get to know over time... The V-twin helps too.



 To summon my somewhat fuzzy point, let's throw in an analogy. The Honda is like a paid luxury-escort; you take her out for a night and have a blast, she's perfect but that's it, there's nothing more to it, where as the Ducati is like the lovable, kind yet sometimes a bit hard-to-handle girlfriend of yours who no matter what has stood by your side through good and bad. You would never drop a girlfriend like that for a few nights with a luxury-whore.

In my mind a bike should be an event, emotion-stirring, annoying, indulgent, insensible, not a means to travel to an event on two wheels. That's why I miss my old 2-stroker, and having experienced the whole of it I have a hard time believing anything could top the eperience of my old Cagiva. I've realized it's not the power or the speed. It's all senses but.

-HS

P.S. Sorry for posting something totally off-topic, just had to get this off my chest :P I will activate myself again!


Any bikers reading? Your thoughts and comments please!