Monthly Archives: April 2012

Suzuki Alto goes VED-free

April 18, 2012   Sean

Suzuki has fiddled with the Alto so that it becomes the latest city car to be VED- and London C-Charge exempt. Nice to know.The reduction has come by fiddling with the engine block, adding Dual Variable Valve Timing (VVT), which not only lowers emissions and improves consumption, but makes the engine feel more responsive as well, says Suzuki.

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Babe Barnato’s Battered Bentley could make Brooklands mint

April 18, 2012   Sean

A battered Bentley once owned by original Bentley Boy Woolf ‘Babe’ Barnato will go under the hammer in May, and could fetch a fortune. It’s in a right old state, but this decrepit pile of rust is what’s left of a first series 3½ litre Derby Bentley, ordered in 1934 by former Bentley chairman Barnato.
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Revised Audi R8 to get twin-clutch gearbox

April 18, 2012   Sean

Audi will put a heavily updated R8 on sale this autumn. It will have the usual styling nip and tuck that all midlife updates get…but it will also have an entirely new gearbox, necessitating the re-engineering of much of the car. Zoiks!Says Autocar, the distinct lack of a super duper twin-clutch automatic gearbox in the R8 has “put off significant numbers of buyers from all over the globe,” prompting Audi to get its act together, and sharp – a whole new R8 is due in a couple of years, but Audi reckons the gearbox is needed before close of play on this one.
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Insurers slammed for extortionate admin fees

April 17, 2012   Sean

Some insurance companies are charging ‘extortionate’ fees for a driver to change minor details on a car policy, a study by Which?  has found. The consumer magazine investigated car and home insurance company administration fees after complaints from consumers.It found that Hastings was charging customers £35 to change a surname on a policy, while Axa and Swiftcover were charging £30 for minor changes including transferring the policy to a new car or changing address.
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Russia kills off the Lada

April 17, 2012   Sean

After more than four decades in production, the legendary Lada is about to be killed off because sales are becoming the joke. We’ve all heard a hundred gags about the Russian brand (What do you call a Lada at the top of a hill? A miracle. BAZING!), but in its home turf the cars have continued to sell like dirty western cheeseburgers for decades.
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