used car for sale

Archive for the ‘bmw’ Category

BMW went back to their roots during the production of a vehicle based largely upon the original 328 sports car.

They have opted to show this luxury vehicle off at the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este event in Italy, where the classic car broke the outright speed record. Performance car enthusiasts may remember seeing the 328 win the historic revival challenge in this area recently.

The German team have delivered an aesthetically pleasing vehicle, complete with leather bonnet straps, trademark wheels and the ever popular vertical kidney grille. There are no doors, so drivers will have to climb as gracefully as possible into the cockpit.

Once behind the wheel they will have to adjust to looking through a split windscreen, just like that found on the 1930s motor.

Drivers may remember that the original 328 team used lightweight construction methods. Indeed, fellow car manufacturers must have looked on in wonder as BMW produced a high performance vehicle which weighed just 780kg.

In keeping with the streamlined approach BMW have fitted the Hommage out with parts made from carbon fibre reinforced plastic (CFRP). It is clear that no expense has been spared on the new offering, which also comes complete with exquisite leather upholstery.

Adrian van Hooydonk, BMW Design Chief, said, “Even 75 years ago, the BMW 328 stood for sportiness and agility through lightweight construction. The BMW 328 Hommage car pays tribute to this past and shows how BMW lightweight construction will develop. Carbon is the material of the future.”

“With the BMW 328 Hommage, we wish to pay homage to the passion and inventiveness of the fathers of the BMW 328” Karl Bumer, CEO of BMW Group Classic, added.

“They created an icon, which is considered a milestone in the history of the automobile.” he continued.

Whether the Hommage will have quite the same impact on the motoring world is doubtful. However, it is difficult to think of another manufacturer who could have seamlessly blended the old and new styles.

Those people who are lucky enough to drive this vehicle will be able to make use of the various retro instruments while listening to their favourite tunes via the inbuilt iPhones. They will have fun pushing the straight six engine to the max and listening to the warble of the

.

http://www.longlife.co.uk/blog/index.php/tag/italy/

Sex Slaves – Italy

Owned by Connecticut autocross ace Mark DaVia, this 2001 twin-turbo Porsche 911 has become all too familiar to One Lap competitors contending for overall honors. With a mere 450 horsepower going to the pavement, it wasn’t the quickest car in the field, and DaVia modestly says he’s "not the fastest driver." But that didn’t keep him from claiming his fourth straight trophy for overall honors, a One Lap record.

Driven by Honda engineer Bryan Johnson, this supercharged 2006 Civic Si finished an amazing fourth overall in 2006. This encouraged Johnson to enhance the Civic’s power by replacing its 2.0-liter engine with a 2.4-liter four from the Acura TSX, supercharged to "about 300 horsepower and 230 pound-feet of torque." The revised setup looked like a contender for first overall until a camshaft disintegrated midway across Wyoming on day two of the tour.

The official C/D ride for 2007 was this Audi S6 sedan. The combination of Quattro all-wheel drive and Michelin Pilot Sport PS2 tires made it a formidable player in damp conditions, such as the wet-skidpad kickoff event at the Tire Rack, where it posted the third-best result among 85 contenders.

One Lap is the ultimate anything-goes competition, but even so, a Geo Metro is unique in event annals. Veteran Lappers David and Faye Teal commandeered the Metro from their son this year when other rides failed to materialize. Like many One Lap teams, the Teals make the annual run in part to raise money for charities, in this case Laps to Conquer MS. A multiple sclerosis patient herself, Faye Teal has participated in 21 consecutive Laps, tops among all active Lap Dogs. The Metro effort generated $5000 in donations, and the Teals finished 81st overall.

Don’t feel bad if you don’t remember the 1996 Subaru Brighton, because hardly anyone else does, either. But Doug Wilks, proprietor of the Top Speed tuning shop in Alfaretta, Georgia, remembered it as the lightest Subie body shell capable of handling all-wheel drive and fitted one with a Subaru Impreza WRX STI powertrain. Weight-saving measures included removing the windshield wipers and yielded a race weight of about 2600 pounds. Running max boost, the Subie’s turbocharged flat-four engine put about 500 horsepower to the pavement and, with Luke Russell at the wheel, established itself as a top contender with the second-best time at the tour’s first road-course event. Unfortunately, electronic problems led to a burned piston, and the Brighton fell out of the hunt by day four.

Brent Braun’s VW New Beetle began life in 2004 with a 1.9-liter turbo-diesel engine, but that wasn’t wild enough, so Braun bolted in a 3.6-liter VW V-6, turbocharged it, and added all-wheel drive and VW’s excellent DSG dual-clutch automated manual transmission. With something over 400 horsepower on tap, the boosted Bug was one of the quickest cars in the field—until the DSG failed to answer the call for round two at Hallett Motor Racing Circuit in Oklahoma on day five.

Most One Lap entries are wannabe race cars, but this innocent-looking 1995 Chevy Cavalier Z24 is the real thing. Prepped to NASCAR Grand Am Cup standards—1800 pounds, 200 horsepower—the car was built and campaigned by Ed Magner. Although the Cavalier is retired from racing, Magner rents it annually to Swiss chocolatier Robert Dubler. Dubler brings a posse of his Swiss henchmen to the event every year, and they campaign a Pontiac Grand Am as well as the Cavalier. This year he handed the Chevy’s helm to upstate New Yorker Amanda Hennessy, who overcame a blown-out shock and broken CV joint to finish first in her class, 35th overall.

Article source: http://www.caranddriver.com/features/07q2/2007_one_lap_of_america-feature/the_cars_page_3

There is no doubt that the Corvette is the most thoroughly documented car in America. Volumes have been written about it during its colorful, if somewhat checkered, 32-year lifetime, and that is not about to change. As it is obligatory that we continue to add to the reams of trivia generated in behalf of this beloved machine, we now bring you an early peek at the 1986 model — a version that is identical to the 1985 model, save for two major improvements and a few minor details.

First let us deal with the minutiae. In accordance with the whims of the DOT, the new Corvette has a high-mounted brake light. It has been neatly integrated into the targa bar, but it still looks more like a navigational aid for small boats than an automotive safety device. Aside from an assortment of new body colors, the exterior is unchanged. The interior receives only subtle alterations, including a slightly thicker-rimmed steering wheel and a reangled instrument cluster to reduce windshield glare.

The big news consists of two items: a concerted effort to pare down the car’s substantial bulk and the addition of a Bosch ABS anti-lock braking system. The principal source of the weight reduction is the use of aluminum cylinder heads, which, combined with the judicious excising of ounces elsewhere, has scavenged about 125 pounds from the chunky beast. Not only does this improve overall handling and acceleration, but the Hardy Boys who serve as the tiny Corvette engineering group are hopeful that fuel economy will be similarly boosted.

This successful visit to the fat farm, however, will surely be overshadowed by the new anti-lock brakes. The installation is indeed impressive, and it indicates that the old "Not Invented Here" syndrome that has infested Detroit will continue to be ignored by Corvette engineers — as it was with the adoption of Bilstein shock absorbers last year.

Although GM’s own Delco Moraine Division is developing its own ABS, the West German Bosch unit is certainly the match of any in the world. The whole system — the modulator (mounted behind the driver’s seat in a storage well), the wheel-speed sensors, and the plumbing — weighs only about nine pounds, and it’s worth every extra ounce. It is essentially the same setup employed by Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi, although it has no on/off defeating capability; the Corvette ABS works under all lockup conditions, whether the driver likes it or not. Presuming the driver is of sound mind, he

will like it — even worship it — under most of them.

The system is undetectable during normal driving. But if you apply the brakes on slippery pavement, or if you are forced to brake hard while trying to execute an

in extremis evasive maneuver, the Corvette will tiptoe to a stop, its four wheels locking and unlocking in an uncanny, computer-controlled syncopation that almost eliminates brake-induced skids. We found that it is indeed possible, despite Chevrolet’s claims, to make the car spin if one is foolish enough to mash the brake pedal while cornering hard, and it is said that ABS is not the hot tip on undulating gravel roads; but for the normal driver encountering rain-slicked streets, ice, or sleet, or in emergency straight-line stops on dry pavement, it is an answered prayer. It will take a few of these stops to acclimate oneself to the odd, modulating feedback through the brake pedal, but surely this is a small price to pay for such safety.

There is little question that by 1990 similar anti-lock systems will be as common on land-borne vehicles as headlights and fuel tanks. There is also little question that General Motors is devoutly committed to making its plastic Chevy the equal of any car on earth in terms of performance and engineering excellence. In this sense the Corvette with Bosch ABS is a marriage made in fast-driver heaven. And America’s favorite sports car, already superb, is for 1986 even better.

Article source: http://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/car/archive/1986_chevrolet_corvette-road_test

G92 optioned Camaro (fastest production 5.0 liter IROC-Z)