cars – Page 5 – Hand Coding

Manumatics-only for future BMW M3s

September 18, 2002August 13, 2005 Ashley Bischoff1 Comment

It appears that, within the next few years, BMW will only offer a manumatic shifting option on their M3:

The company’s second-generation SMG is an option on the M3, and the next-generation M5 will also feature the Formula One racing-style paddle shifters, sans the traditional clutch pedal and gearshift lever. According to Rolf Scheibner, product manager for M cars, it won’t be long before SMG is the only transmission option for the performance cars.

Many M3 die-hards aren’t happy about this and, initially, I wasn’t either. However, I then reasoned that if it’s good enough for Formula One (all Formula One cars now use manumatics), it’s probably good enough for me :).

Ford Testifies to Stop Ride Sharing

August 29, 2002August 13, 2005 Ashley BischoffLeave a comment

From BBSpot, Ford Testifies to Stop Ride Sharing:

A recent study by the Gartner Group supports Ford’s claims that ride sharing runs rampant across the US. The study showed showed that children under the age of 16 were the biggest offenders. Almost 99% of children in that age group said they had shared a ride in the past week. The study also showed that ride sharing had spread to the Internet in the form of “Car Pool” message boards where the “Road Robbers” set up their swaps. […]

Ronin

August 11, 2002August 13, 2005 Ashley BischoffLeave a comment

I finished watching Ronin just now, recorded from TNT onto TiVo. I enjoyed the film as a whole, and the car chases in particular. Though I’ve only seen clips of it, it appeared that Ronin may have a similar feel to The Bourne Identity.

As a motorsports enthusiast, my favorite moment was watching the wheels of the Audi S8 lock/spin/lock/spin as the anti-lock brakes took hold through one of the turns — nice. It’s no wonder that one of the stunt drivers was former Formula 1 driver Jean-Pierre Jarier.

I think I’ll buy the DVD sometime. All the same, I wish the ending were more clear-cut :-/.

Release Dates for 2003 Cars

August 8, 2002August 13, 2005 Ashley Bischoff2 Comments

From the track-junkies mailing list is this page from Consumer Reports listing the releases dates for 2003 cars. From “Acura” to “Volkswagon”, they’re all there.

Some dates are more general (the 2003 Acura RSX is listed as “October 2002”), while others can be quite specific (the 2003 GMC Envoy is listed as “8/09/02”).

Car Resale Values

August 8, 2002August 13, 2005 Ashley BischoffLeave a comment

MSNBC has a write-up on a study by the Automotive Lease Guide on car resale values. Any monkey could guess that “brands such as Chevrolet and Ford ranked below average, while European brands and top Japanese brands did well”, but it goes into more than just that:

The winners: Volkswagen among the mass market-manufacturers and Mercedes-Benz among the luxury makers. [&hellip]

Behind Volkswagen in the mass-market category were Honda, Toyota, Subaru, and Nissan. Following Mercedes were luxury-makers BMW, Acura, Lexus and Audi. […]

On par with resale value, for me, is a vehicle’s fun-to-drive factor. But, it seems that American cars aren’t doing so well there, either :-/.