GM
There are businesses that let you glaze your own pottery, cook your own steak or pick your own strawberries, but when it comes to the hands-on experience, a new offer from General Motors has them all beat. If you order a 2011 Corvette Z06 or ZR1, you have the option of traveling to GM's Performance Build Center in Wixom, Michigan, and hand-assembling your car’s LS7 or LS9 engine. It’s called the Corvette Engine Build Experience, and is believed to be the first program of its kind (if any readers would like to dispute that claim, please do so). If you don’t like the idea of providing GM with your mechanical expertise for no cost, don’t worry - you’ll have to pay an extra $US5,800 for the privilege. Read More
For those in the U.S. looking to be the first to get their hands on the Chevrolet Volt GM has announced that it is now taking orders for the vehicle that is due at the end of the year. The Volt will initially be available to customers in California, New York, Washington, D.C., Texas, Michigan, Connecticut and New Jersey, but will be available nationwide in about 12-18 months from the start of production this winter. Read More
A few days ago, I managed to get up close and personal in Shanghai with one of the most interesting concept cars the world has yet seen. SAIC's Yez concept car is the first automobile, concept or otherwise, that's ever been conceived to have a negative carbon footprint. That is, it removes more pollution than it creates. Read More
With the long-awaited Chevrolet Volt set to hit showrooms later this year, GM has announced that early adopters (in certain cities) will be eligible for one of 4,400 free home charging stations. The 240-volt fast-charge station deal is tied to a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) program which aims to assess electric vehicle charging infrastructure requirements, meaning those who take up the offer will be required to share data on charging and use of their vehicle. Read More
Not long ago we told you about the Moto Student competition, wherein teams of students from across Spain and the rest of Europe are competing to build racing motorcycles. Well, a similar competition is underway in the US, and it’s called EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge. In this contest, teams of North American engineering students are competing to convert GM-supplied vehicles into super-efficient, super-clean-running, high-tech wonders. The second year of the three-year contest wrapped up this week, with Mississippi State University (MSU) taking the top spot. Read More
Each year as part of the Design Los Angeles Conference held at the LA Auto Show, creative types from major car companies get to stare into their crystal balls and let their imaginations run wild in designing the car of the future. In 2007 the theme was the car 50 years from today, last year the challenge was to envision how motor-racing will look in 2025 and this time around, the brief is to look at what young people will be driving in the year 2030. Read More
We’ve been following the Chevrolet Volt since it was a gleam in GM’s eye and, with the anticipated production date of 2010 rapidly approaching, GM has announced that its extended-range electric vehicle is expected to achieve city fuel economy of at least 230 miles per gallon. Read More
Salt might be great with popcorn and peanuts, but it’s not so good with soil. The U.N. estimates that the world loses at least three hectares of arable land every minute because of soil salinity. Most crops simply can’t cope with too much salt. Which is why a breakthrough by a team at the University of Adelaide in Australia could have a profound effect on the food supplies of our future: they’ve found a way to genetically modify plants to become more salt tolerant. Read More
