Tesla will further delay production of its Tesla Roadster due to transmission problems. The all-electric Roadster was originally slated to begin production in September, but development delays have pushed back the production date to the first quarter of 2008. The latest round of problems could even push that date back further.

According to sources familiar with the project, the current transmission can't withstand the torque of the electric engine while shifting gears. Two of Tesla's suppliers are scrambling to find a solution, but it remains unknown when the problem will be solved.

Despite the defect, Tesla has already built the first Roadster and will deliver it to its buyer. However, the customer is being warned that the transmission will fail within the first few thousand miles.

Tesla is contemplating fitting the first batch of Roasters with the faulty transmissions with the intent to replace them with the new transmission once it comes on line.

The electric automaker also announced that the Roadster's EPA range ratings have slipped from 245 miles to the 220-230 mile range.

Source: Tesla Roadster facing more delays, EPA ratings slip

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Last night, two Mitsubishi Evolution X preview cars were displayed at an unveiling in Perth. Both were specially flown in from Japan for a series of previews around the country for media, dealers and potential customers.

Announced at the preview was Australia’s intention of receiving two models of Evo X; an entry level specification (known in Japan as the GSR), and the top-rung MR version. Both were at the preview.

The entry level model will score Brembo brakes, Recaro seats, 18-inch alloy wheels, and is available with either manual, or Mitsubishi’s new Twin Clutch Sportronic Shift Transmission (TC-SST). The MR will also receive two-piece rotors, forged BBS wheels, Bilstein shockies, and Eibach springs and comes only with TC-SST.

Car Advice was invited to explore the car up close and personal, and all we can say is we can’t wait to road test it.

Interior quality has been lifted to a level not previously experienced in the Evolution series, with decent plastics, and a fit and finish more befitting a car of this price level. Seating is extremely supportive and comfortable, with heaters as an option.

The paddles are straight from the Outlander VRX, however the steering wheel is bespoke. The leather used on the wheel isn’t quite as grippy as the current Evo, and stitching could have been a little better too.

Mitsubishi is staying tight lipped as to whether the MR would have the options of sunroof and satnav as fitted to the Perth preview car, however the feeling is that Australia won’t get them. The MR displayed also had keyless start.

Pricing wasn’t announced, however our sources at Mitsubishi tell us that $60-70K is the current ballpark figure. Dealers are currently taking orders and deposits, however the release date is not until April next year.

Thanks to Tomislav Jakovljevic for the photos.

Source: Evo X previewed in Perth

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Special Events Magazine, the official and premier magazine of the special events industry in North America, nominates events and companies to receive the Gala Award.

Daunting challenges, amazing results: This describes the work of the Gala Award nominees listed below. Members of the Special Events Magazine Advisory Board spent hours poring over hundreds of entries before selecting these companies. Watch for our January issue, which will include profiles of all our nominees; the Gala Award winners will be named Jan. 18 at The Special Event 2008 in Atlanta. See you there! — The Editors

We mention this today because nominated for Best Fair/Festival is MINI United!

As mentioned above, winners will be announced at a special event in January. I wouldn’t be surprised to see MINI United actually pull off the win. It was a great event!

[ Gala Award Nominees 2007 ] Specialevents.com

Written By: DB

Source: Gala Award Nomination for MINI United

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Going green is the trend in the automotive scene. Volkswagen has taken a big leap to join the bandwagon as it introduces the space up! blue fuel cell concept. This Volkswagen vehicle can get to 65 miles by using the combination of an electric motor, lithium-ion batteries and a solar panel.

The third of the Volkswagen’s up! the space up! blue is a micro van that capable to carry more load. The difference is that this variant features a rear-mounted, all-electric 45 kW (61 PS) motor along with twelve lithium-ion batteries and “a large solar panel on the roof that feeds up to 150 Watts of extra energy into the battery.”

65 miles can easily be achieved when the space up! blue is fully charged, but this number can reach to 155 miles once the high-temperature fuel cell (HT-FC) is used.

In the report done by BusinessWeek, Volkswagen said that the new HT-FC system has greater advantage than other fuel systems, such as lower weight, greater everyday utility and lower cost.

The space up! blue is 144.9 inches long and “weighs 1,090 kilograms including the fuel cell and batteries.” The high temperature fuel cell can be found in front of the car, while the lithium-ion batteries are under the rear seat near the motor.

Source: http://www.businessweek.com/autos/content/dec2007/bw20071211_614856.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_autos

Source: Volkswagen gets electric

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Volkswagen was recently given two of Japan’s top automobile prizes, thanks to its TSI technology. It was awarded in the category of “Technology of the Year” by CAR OF THE YEAR committee and the jury of the Automotive Researchers’ and Journalists’ Conference (RJC).

The Golf GT, Golf estate and Golf Touran, all feature the TSI engine. All of these vehicles successfully landed in the CAR OF THE YEAR category of “Most Advanced Technology Award 2008″. Auto Spectator reports that the jury of the RJC gave the first prize in the category of “Technology of the Year” to the Volkswagen TSI technology. President of the Volkswagen importer in Japan, accepted the award, Tsutomu Umeno, and said, “The vote taken by these juries is a clear indication that Volkswagen technology is setting standards in Japan and will continue to do so in future.”

After developing the TSI engine, Volkswagen vehicles got petrol-direct-injection, twin charging through compressor and turbo charger that decreases cubic capacity to 1.4 liters. This can improve fuel efficiency as well as he vehicle’s emissions.

News from: http://www.autospectator.com/cars/volkswagen/0035683-volkswagen-tsi-receives-two-awards-japan

Source: Volkswagen’s TSI won Japan’s top aswards

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Simona Alina
Filed in: Dodge | Supercars / Exotic cars | dodge viper | $90K-$100K

When Chrysler unveiled the Dodge Viper SRT 10 ACR at the Los Angeles Auto Show they have announced that the supercar will be priced under $100k. And they kept their promise: the SRT10 ACR is priced at $98,110, including an $850 destination charge.

A standard Viper SRT10 is priced at $85,985, so the ACR package - available only on the coupe will costs around $12,000.

The 2008 Dodge Viper SRT10 ACR is powered by the Viper SRT10’s new 8.4-liter aluminum V-10 engine that produces a ground-shaking 600 horsepower and tire-smoking 560 lb.-ft. of torque. It features a deep-skirted V-10 aluminum engine block, cylinder heads equipped with Computer Numerically Controlled (CNC)-shaped combustion chambers, large valves and Variable Valve Timing (VVT).

Source:MotorTrend

Source: 2008 Dodge Viper SRT10 ACR priced under $100.000

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To the bane of carmakers around the world, the U.S. Senate has approved a new energy bill that will see average fleet fuel economy levels rise by 40% to 35mpg (6.7L/100km) by 2020. This is the first major change in the corporate average fuel economy program, or CAFÉ, since its implementation back in 1975. The first phase of the new standard will start with 2011 model-year vehicles.

The new measure is expected to receive its final vote in the House of Reps next week before being signed by President Bush and passed into law, reports Automotive News.

According to Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye, the new standard will save more than one million barrels of oil a day by 2020. The U.S. currently uses roughly 21 million barrels a day, with about 8 million of them for cars and trucks.

One of the new standards opponents, Senator James Inhofe, criticized the standard saying it will create more dangerous vehicles as carmakers make vehicles smaller and lighter to reduce fuel consumption.

Source: U.S. Senate approves 35mpg by 2020 fuel standard

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Sam Abuelsamid
Filed under: Etc., Ethanol, Chrysler

In another of Chrysler’s experiments with new ways of producing biofuel feedstocks (see also here), they have teamed up with Purdue University to make use of an environmentally contaminated site. Instead of the typical agricultural crops, they have planted poplar trees at a site called Peter’s Pond in central Indiana. Chrysler worked with Purdue Associate Professor Rick Meilan develop a new hybrid variety of poplar that can absorb more contaminants from the soil. A second goal of the new hybrid was to make it easier to process the tree into ethanol after harvesting. The trees developed by Prof. Meilan are able to absorb up to ninety percent of contaminants like trichloroethelyne from the soil. The lignin that binds the cellulose together has been modified to allow the cellulose to be more easily broken down.

[Source: Chrysler]

Chrysler Partnership with Purdue University Taps Environmental Powers of Poplars

# Hybrid Poplars Tested at Rural Indiana Site
# Faster Phytoremediation – Using Plants to Clean Up Pollution
# Purdue Researchers Also Developing Poplars for Better Biofuels

Auburn Hills, Mich., Dec 12, 2007 - Chrysler LLC is partnering with Purdue University to test the powers of poplar trees to clean up environmental spills and, in separate work, develop poplars that can serve as feedstock for improved renewable biofuels.

In the first stage of the project, plots of hybrid poplars have been planted at Peter’s Pond, the site of an environmental cleanup being conducted by Chrysler in rural central Indiana.

Chrysler’s collaborator on the project is Purdue Associate Professor Rick Meilan, who is looking for ways to greatly improve hybrid poplars’ ability to clean up contaminants in the environment. Meilan is also part of a team researching altered varieties of poplars that would improve the process of turning harvested plants into bio-ethanol for use in Flexible Fuel Vehicles (FFVs).

“This project supports our most important environmental principles at Chrysler: respect for the environment, returning our former sites to productive use, and promoting the use of clean, renewable, American-made biofuels such as ethanol, in our vehicles,” said Deborah Morrissett, Vice President of Regulatory Affairs at Chrysler.

Chrysler has invested more than $10 billion over the past two decades to either refurbish existing sites or to prepare vacant sites for productive use.

Chrysler has also produced nearly two million Flexible Fuel Vehicles capable of running on E85 (85 percent ethanol), gasoline or a mixture of the two fuels. The company will produce an additional 500,000 FFVs in 2008.

Meilan is part of a research team that is developing altered poplars with much greater ability to take up contaminants. In their research, Meilan and colleagues found that engineered poplars removed more than 90 percent of pollutants such as trichloroethylene (TCE) from a test solution in one week, compared with just 3 percent of pollutants removed by unaltered poplars. TCE, a commonly used solvent, was found in the soil and groundwater at Peter’s Pond.

In addition, the specially-engineered poplars were able to break down the pollutants 100 times faster than the unaltered poplar.

Meilan will plant the specially-engineered poplars at the Peter’s Pond site next spring. Their ability to remove TCE from the soil will be compared with the hybrid poplars already planted at the site.

The process of using plants to absorb pollutants from the soil, known as phytoremediation, should work well at Peter’s Pond since the remaining pollutants are within 10 feet of the surface and readily accessible to poplars’ roots.

“Peter’s Pond is the perfect place to take this process out of the lab and test it on a field-sized scale,” said Meilan.

Meilan and colleagues are also developing hybrid poplars that can be refined into ethanol more easily. One of the barriers to producing ethanol is lignin, a compound that helps give the plant its strength. However, lignin impedes access to cellulose, the primary source of sugar in the plant to be converted into ethanol. By developing poplars with modified lignin, Meilan hopes to make renewable ethanol faster and cheaper to produce.

If the process works out, it can be readily adapted to many other parts of the world, Meilan noted.

“Poplars grow across a wide geographic range and in many different climates,” Meilan said.

“People have had their eye on the poplar for a long time.”

Chrysler’s FFV Lineup

For the 2008 model year, Chrysler offers 11 products with the E85 Flexible Fuel option:

* Dodge: Dakota, Ram, Durango, Avenger, Grand Caravan
* Chrysler: Aspen, Town & Country, Sebring sedan and convertible
* Jeep: Grand Cherokee, Commander

Chrysler also promotes the use of biodiesel, another clean, renewable, American-made alternative fuel. Jeep® Grand Cherokee and the Dodge Ram and Sprinter diesel vehicles are all approved for use with B5 (5 percent biodiesel) fuel and are delivered to customers running on B5.

History of Peter’s Pond

The property known as Peter’s Pond was once used for gravel mining operations.

In the mid-1960s, oils from the Chrysler Transmission Plant in Kokomo were disposed of in three abandoned gravel pits. Cleanup of the site was begun in the mid-1980s, and Chrysler continues to monitor the groundwater and soil today.

Two small areas on the site still have small amounts of pollutants. Chrysler proposed the phytoremediation system using poplars to polish the remaining pollutants from the soil and groundwater.

Ultimately, the plan is to return the Peter’s Pond site to farming, a major economic activity in central Indiana.

Source: Chrysler/Purdue University program uses poplars for cleanup and fuel feedstock

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John Neff
Spy Photos, Trucks/Pickups, HUMMER

var digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/autos/2010_HUMMER_H2_SUT_Spied’; Well looky, looky. KGP Photography has caught a lengthened HUMMER H2 SUT out testing in full military apparel, complete with a white star! Looking something out of a G.I. Joe play set, this tester has got a lot of extra inches added behind the B-pillar creating a bed much longer the standard H2 SUT. So what’s going on here? Glenn Paulina from KGB surmises that this HUMMER H2 SUT may be riding on the GMT900 platform that’s also used by the Suburban and the General’s half-ton pickups. The current H2 SUT rides on an older GMT820 platform, according to Winding Road. This suggests that the H2 SUT may be maturing into a bonafide truck of trucks, with the intent of further distinguishing itself from the upcoming H3T. If this is true, it’s also possible that HUMMER could be considering a lengthened version of the HUMMER H2 SUV itself, creating a kind of Suburban HUMMER. With the H1 officially gone, there’s certainly no chance of cannibalizing your own sales, though that doesn’t address the question of whether consumers want an even bigger HUMMER SUV or truck at the moment.

[Source: The Car Connection, Winding Road]

Source: Spy Shots: HUMMER H2 SUT, or is it?

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Simona Alina
Filed in: Nissan | technology

Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. will introduce two pioneering technologies with its new Fuga, set for release in Japan this month - the world’s first Distance Control Assist and navigation-enabled Intelligent Cruise Control systems.

Nissan’s pioneering Distance Control Assist system helps control the distance between two vehicles under various traffic conditions, from congested urban roads to high-speed expressways. The improved Intelligent Cruise Control system integrates route-information via the on-board navigation system to monitor the vehicle’s cruising speed to match actual road conditions i.e. the sharpness of the next curve on the road.

1. World’s First Distance Control Assist

The Distance Control Assist system determines the following distance of the driver’s vehicle, as well as the relative speed of both vehicles, using a radar sensor installed in the front bumper.

When a vehicle approaches close to the vehicle ahead and the accelerator is not engaged, the system activates the brakes to decelerate smoothly. Alternately, if the accelerator is engaged, the acceleration actuator is activated through a "push back" mechanism to help the driver to release the pedal.

In a situation where the vehicle ahead slows down or brakes, requiring the driver to respond by braking, the system instantly alerts the driver through message and audio warnings. Simultaneously, the system pushes back the accelerator to assist the driver to switch to the brakes.