Golf Mark VI GTI Concept - a world full of surprises

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Volkswagen

I don’t know if my heart can take shocks like these anymore. A new GTI… And just look at how radical it looks. But wait, this is just a concept, who knows what the final production version will look like.

WTF? It looks just as you would expect it to, given the new Mark VI. Not bad, just incredibly unsurprising. And, again, that’s not really a bad thing. It’s got smoked tail lights and red contoured radiator grille, 18” ‘telephone dial’ rims and meaner looking headlamps, bottom-flat steering wheel and black glossy dashboard and a 2.0 TSI engine that develops 208bhp. That means that dynamic-wise it takes the new GTI 7.2 seconds to reach 62mph from a stand-still, and if the road is clear it doesn’t stop until it reaches 148mph. These numbers make it the faster GTI to date, which tells a story about the older GTIs and how badly the R32 is needed in order to keep in touch with the hot hatch category.

Saab 9-X Air

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under News, Saab

Everything that’s thin or light, nowadays, gets called ‘Air’. Saab hasn’t made public the weight of the 9-X Air Concept (or at least I never bothered to look it up), nor is it really any thinner than other convertibles, so I take it the ‘Air’ part refers to the Canopy Top. The unconventional flat folding roof is mounted on the two rear pillars that curve upwards, a distinct trait from the other convertibles out there.

If you ever felt like your car was missing a drawer, you should check out the 9-X Air. Don’t dismiss it so fast, though, as the thing that comes out of the back of the car is large enough to accommodate two golf bags and it’s spring operated to keep the weight low.

You can look at the Saab 9-X Air in Paris. Or in the pictures below. The biggest thing with this car is that Canopy Top which Saab is planning to have patented. It allows for a better wind protection for the passengers and a very large and unobstructed field of view for the driver. It all sounds good. I might just like this Canopy thing.

Welcome to Honda City

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Honda, News

It’s not a large City, but it does resemble some of the larger ones. For example, Accord City. Still, as is the norm with smaller cities, it’s cheaper to live in and although you don’t get the same levels of comfort, its good enough for the money you pay.

If I haven’t lost you already with my pathetic attempt to talk about the car as if it were an actual city, please do go on reading. The City comes with an all new 1.4 litre i-VTEC engine which develops a whooping (I’m just kidding) 100bhp. Still, pretty decent for a car that will mainly be sold to people who are very money-conscious.

Has the world shrunk?

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under News, Nissan

No, I don’t think it has. Because if you go round its back and look at the front, you exhale a sigh of relief: it’s not you getting smaller and this is not a big Qashqai - it’s a regular sized new Murano. But the back could have had you fooled.

The old Murano was a beautiful car. The new one, well let’s just say it’s not an ugly one, but it has lost some of the uniqueness of the first model. The new Murano is still a very luxurious SUV with all the gizmos you would expect to find in a car priced at over 32.000 pounds, it’s just the wrappings that don’t look that striking. Still, if you’re looking for an SUV, you could do much worse than this.

Performance-wise, the Murano has a revised version of the 3.5 litre V6 which takes it from 0 to 62mph in the oddly round number of 8 seconds. Fast enough for something this size or, to be honest, any other size.

Why Orlando Bloom should be afraid:

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Chevrolet

This is a new - well,  actually the first - Chevrolet MPV seven seater that will be unveiled (where else?) at the Paris Motor Show. It’s called Bloom. Sorry, Orlando. It looks as if you need to sedate your family before you can convince themto get in and that’s about it. Other than it’s SUV-like looks, it’s just your ordinary MPV, with seven seats and lots of space, both for passengers and cargo. Oh, and the steering wheel is eeringly familiar. Maybe because we’ve seen something like it before on the Honda Civic.

A new Vauxhall hatchback that’s not an Astra…

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under News, Vauxhall

…as we used to know it. The new Vauxhall Astra 09 that will replace the soon-to-be-old Astra Mk5 after it will be revealed at the Frankfurt Motor Show next year. It seems GM is not willing to allow Volkswagen to get its paws on all the middle-class buyers.

Judging from the recently showed Insignia and these drawings, it will look good. Judging from the same recently showed Insignia, it will be well-built and have a nice overall quality feel. Judging from all this, GM and Insignia are heading in the right direction.

New flowing stuff from Mazda

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Mazda

One cold December night, Mazda turned from yet another Japanese automotive manufacturer to a design leader - at least as far as concept cars go - faster than it took Cinderella to climb down the palace stairs with just one shoe. I’m talking about the Furai concept, in case I lost you at the shoe part.

Now, they’ve come up with another concept that has a different sound to it, after Furai and Kazamai. It’s called Kiyora, which means `clean and pure` - exactly what Pete Doherty isn’t. It is an `urban compact car` designed to feel at home in an urban landscape. Contrary to what you might think when looking at the pictures, the main theme of the design wasn’t fire, but water. It will be on display at the Mondial de l`Automobile, at the Mazda stand, in case you’re curios to see if somebody else can look natural at its wheel except Songoku.

i30>i20>i10 - the Hyundai mathematics

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under Hyundai, News

Hyundai will be launching the new i20 at the Paris Motor Show this October. What is i20? Is it the average between the i10 and the i30, as somebody who had spent too much time studying maths would think? Well, maybe only in size, because it looks far better than the i10 and also slightly better than the i30. I would actually say its looks are on the par with the Vauxhall Corsa, which is a good thing, although the Corsa is two years old.

The i20 will be positioned above the Hyundai Getz among Hyundai’s line-up, and with its longer wheelbase and more dynamic looks, that’s exactly where it should be. Hyundai will be showing an eco concept (oh, the surprise, the awe and the originality) called i20 i-blue, which will drive just as well as the normal car but will emit far less CO2. If that’s the case, give me a good reason why the “normal” rendition should still exist and I won’t pick on Hyundai again. Ever again, that is.

Get Kia’s Soul - no Voodoo involved

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under KIA, News

Yup, at the Paris Motor Show they will officially announce that production for what Kia describes as ‘an urban crossover’ will begin next year. Righthand drive cars will be manufactured starting March 2009. Well, they’ve been showing it to us a concept for so long that I’m less bored of my own car than I am of the Kia Soul. Still, it looks promising and given the pricing policy of Kia, it should also be great value for money.

Seat’s Jekyll and Hyde

Posted by Car Magazine MotorPlay under News, Seat

Seat will be displaying two new Ibizas at the Paris Motor Show and to say they’re not very much alike is like saying Piers Morgan and Jeremy Clarkson don’t really enjoy each other’s company. That’s because one of the two Ibizas is the sportiest guy of the family, and the other is the guy that smells flowers and has an ant farm.

It’s the new Cupra, with a 1,4 litre engine and a whooping (for that kind of displacement) 180PS (182bhp). It comes with 17” alloy wheels, Cupra sport seats and aluminium pedals. Also it sports a DSG 7 speed gearbox complete with F1 style padels on the steering wheel.

The other guy also has a 1,4 litre engine, this time diesel, and the only thing he can brag about is the low fuel consumption (74mpg) and the lowest CO2 emissions - 99g/km. Which is a lot, really, if you think about it. It’s not such a boring car either, with its 80PS (~81bhp) power output and sporty looks (except for the 14” wheels, that is), it will carry you around town without ever giving you one reason to complain. The Seat Ibiza Ecomotive is a car for those who hate to see their money go on fuel but still want a car that looks good.

Red for Cupra, white for Ecomotive - you got it, right?