Author: autoevolution

Renault Trafic is one of the best sellers in its segment in Europe, with a market share of 13.5 percent. So it’s easy to understand why the French car manufacturer considers this model to be very important in its line up. Renault just announced the launch of the new Trafic, a car better focused on the requirements of our target customers.

The new Trafic has a dashboard redesigned to incorporate practical stowage spaces like an A4 document holder at the top of the centre console, a storage slo… (read more)

A lot has been said and written about FIA’s refueling ban for the 2010 season of Formula One, but only a few words were focused on the fact that two drivers that are part of this season’s roster have actually driven F1 machines in the past under the same circumstances.

As you all know, this is not the first time the international federation imposed such a rule in the championship, as refueling was also banned during the 1993 season. If that number doesn’t ring any bell to you, we’ll remind yo… (read more)

Sales of the light commercial vehicle market are quite important, so car manufacturers keep building new cars to respond to their clients’ needs. Renault is one of the automakers interested in this segment, so it just presented its new big volume compact van, the Kangoo Express Maxi.

The Renault Kangoo Maxi is 39 cm longer than the standard Renault Kangoo Express and is available as either a two-seater or a five-seater. The new model has a load capacity of 4.6 cubic meters, and can carry 800… (read more)

German carmaker Daimler announced its FleetBoard telematics service solutions for commercial-vehicle fleets is celebrating 10 years of existence in 2010. The company has equipped more than 60,000 vehicles with telematics services, and sold over 8,000 hardware units these past ten years.

According to Daimler, in 2009 only, FleetBoard customers were able to reduce CO2 emissions by a total of 174,000 tonnes.

"Last year we also decided to introduce the DispoPilot system. With the help of… (read more)

What you are about to read here is a short behavioral guide for tourists who go to Romania and decide to try out the the capital’s public transport service. Because, as you will see in the video below, buying a ticket is apparently not enough…

It all happened in a cold, very snowy Friday in February, on a bus which takes passengers from the outskirts of Bucharest and usually dumps them in the surrounding villages.

According to the people in the bus, the driver was paying attention to j… (read more)

The 2010 World Rally Championship will kick off later this week, in Sweden, a place where Sebastien Loeb hasn’t been particular successful in recent years. His overall results in the snowy rally includes only one win and 2 additional podiums, out of 8 participations.

Consequently, the Frenchman can only start the 2010 campaign of the WRC with mixed feelings, as he admits he sometimes looks at the Swedish rally as one of his favorite outings in the series. However, most of it has to do with th… (read more)

VW Group, which currently builds Skoda Yeti in Czech Republic, will start production of the crossover SUV in Ukraine later this month. Eurocar, who’s currently in charge of VW Group’s operation in Ukraine, will handle production in the country, insideline.com reported today citing a company statement. The Yeti will be priced at around $25,000 in Ukraine and will compete against Nissan Qashqai, Suzuki Grand Vitara and Kia Sportage.

Across Europe, the car is offered with a choice of five engine… (read more)

Subaru had a great year in the United States, as the Japanese car manufacturer managed to pull the unthinkable and sold more cars in 2009 than in 2008. And you have to agree that this is quite an accomplishment, especially as only few automakers were able to do that.

Thanks to the big sales, the marketing budgets are okay, so Subaru thought about bringing back the Master of the Mountain. This means that the Subaru Master the Mountain team is back and ready to travel to ski resorts across the … (read more)

Porsche’s practical supercar, the 911 Turbo just got one or two knife’s edges sharper, with the release of the 911 Turbo S version.

The 911 Turbo’s biturbo 3.8 liter direct injection boxer six cylinder engine now offers a 30 HP premium, offering 530 HP (390 kW). These are accompanied by 700 Nm (516 lb-ft) of torque, when the engine is high on overboost and 650 Nm(479 lb-ft) in the rest of the time. Being a member of the turbo family, the car also offers an impressive list of goodies, as it co… (read more)

Ferrari have indeed been quite quick during the first test meeting of the off-season, in Valencia, but that doesn’t mean the Italian technicians won’t pay a great deal of attention to their championship rivals in the upcoming few weeks. In fact, the Scuderia’s technical director Aldo Costa has already raised some issues regarding last year’s controversial double diffuser rules.

According to the Ferrari technical, the aforementioned car part will again be subject to many rule interpretations p… (read more)

With all the excitement surrounding the huge and never-ending recall of Toyota models, we just about forgot that the Japanese carmaker is still building cars, not only repairs the old ones. Until we found out the prices for the first ever Australian built hybrid.

The Camry hybrid, because this is what we are talking about, will retail in its market of origin in two version, entry-level Hybrid Camry and Hybrid Camry Luxury, who will retail for AU$36,990 and AU$39,990. For both, the carmaker w… (read more)

Citroen has just enriched its commercial vehicles lineup in France with the launch of the new C3 Enterprise, a model that will also go on sale in other European countries in the upcoming months. Technical details include a single engine – the powerplant range will most likely receive new units in the near future – that will be matted to a five-speed manual gearbox. The 1.4-liter HDI unit develops 70 horsepower.

The French specification comes standard with ABS, EBD, front airbags (driver and p… (read more)

TTXGP and Road America signed an alliance the past weekend that will see the Wisconsin road course serve as a host site for an additional round of the TTXGP zero carbon motorcycle race series in the United States. The TTXGP eGrandPrix at Road America will be held on June 3-6, as part of the Suzuki Superbike Doubleheader weekend.

Team registration for the TTXGP North American Championship will open on February 12, 2010. The zero emissions race championship is seen as an international platform … (read more)

The fact that Bernie Ecclestone is strongly supporting the candidature of Stefan Grand Prix for a place on the 2010 Formula One entry list is no news to anyone. He admitted to this plenty of times before, and continues to do it throughout every media intervention he does in the UK.

Talking to the Express newspaper the other day, the Formula One chief executive once again revealed his worries that Campos Grand Prix and US Grand Prix Engineering (US F1) will not be able to make the grid for th… (read more)

Spectacular as it may seem, the nearly 40 percent jump in sales registered by German carmaker Audi are not all that impressive, as we are confident other carmakers around the world will post similar performances. The reason is that January 2009, the month to which the current figures are compared to, was one of the weakest for carmakers.

Audi sold 77,800 cars this January, with 16,798 in China (50 percent over the same month of last year), 6,510 cars in the US, up 37.9 percent and 33,300 car… (read more)

Between worldwide efforts made to help Haitians in need, there are still people who cannot forget about the victims of Abruzzo earthquake. So is the case with current MotoGP Champion Valentino Rossi, who is auctioning a tailpiece from his title-winning 2009 Yamaha M1 MotoGP racer to help the victims of the L’Aquila earthquake, visordown.com reports.

There’s a bit of Abruzzo in my ninth world title, said Rossi I’ve never forgotten the images of the earthquake and the immense tragedy that follo… (read more)

This is really a tough year for Japanese automaker, as most of them are forced to deal with serious safety issues affecting hundreds, thousands or, in some cases, millions of vehicles. After Toyota confirmed that approximately 8 million cars are equipped with what seems to be a faulty throttle pedal, Suzuki is also issuing a recall in China, saying that over 10,000 cars are presenting gas filter problems.

China’s General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ… (read more)

As expected, the voluntary recall of the Toyota Prius kicked off today, but not globally yet. Toyota’s New Zealand office was the first to announce the recall of all the 260 2010 model year Prius, to update the braking system software. Owners will be notified via a letter of the recall, just-auto.com reports, citing Toyota New Zealand’s CEO Alistair Davis.

The fault, Davis says, is not dangerous, as the car will stop if the brakes are pressed harder, but the recall is needed to avoid any unw… (read more)

While other teams are preparing for their car launches prior to the second test of the off-season, at Jerez de la Frontera, Ferrari confirmed their testing schedule for the aforementioned meeting. If Felipe Massa debuted the new Ferrari F10 in Valencia last week, it will now be Fernando Alonso’s turn to take the car to the track first, during the first two days of testing.

Consequently, Massa will get to take over from Alonso for the last 2 days of testing, namely February 12 and 13. As annou… (read more)

After the launch of the long-awaited Countryman, MINI is believed to prepare the launch of the facelifted Clubman S, a model that would feature several enhancements over the current model. However, here is a brand new set of spyshots showing the future Clubman S which, judging by the pictures, will be 99 percent the same with the existing version.

Details are unavailable for the time being but, as we can all notice in the spyshots, the only "improved" feature of the car is actually … (read more)