The all-new Kia Soul was launched in the UAE today, at an event held in Dubai. The Soul, a compact hatchback that is bordering on becoming a small crossover SUV, will initially be available only in 1.6-litre form, with the 2.0-litre version being held back to gauge demand.
Before anyone gets too excited, this is not a full-blown comparison test. Getting the Nissan GT-R for a test drive was a good excuse as any to assemble a few other sports cars and a photographer. We’ve had our 2000 BMW M Roadster for more than a year, the 2009 Nissan GT-R tester was with us for only a few days, and our friend’s 2009 Ferrari F430 Spider was still being broken in so we couldn’t push it. But we did get a feel for three different approaches to speed.
Suzuki, a small player in the global car market, is celebrating 100 years of business on October 2009. German companies such as Audi are also celebrating 100 years in far grander fashion, and keep focusing on a handful of old innovations and motorsports victories while still not being able to build a reliable car. But Suzuki has successfully brought trustworthy transportation to the masses, influencing millions of lives, with everything from the Suzuki-Maruti 800 for lower-income people right up to the cheap Suzuki Samurai for budget offroaders.
The 2010 Ford Mustang GT made its official UAE debut at an event on July 16th in the Dubai Autodrome, even while the car is already on sale. Looking very familiar, it has been overshadowed by the 2010 Chevy Camaro, so much so that Ford Middle East recruited the Emirates Mustang Club to drum up support for the launch event. Being among so many Mustang fanboys is enough to passively intimidate anyone into saying only positive things about the pony car.
Most car enthusiasts know of the Mitsuoka Orochi, an organic “supercar” that started life as a concept car in 2001, and finally reaching production in late 2006. Built by Mitsuoka Motors in Japan, the final version turned out to be popular only for its styling, as it was powered by a basic 230 hp 3.3-litre Toyota V6. However, few know about the custom coach-building activities of the Japanese company. Mitsuoka is active in their home-country, rebuildling current-generation Japanese cars to resemble British vehicles of the 1950s and 1960s. And some of their creations are downright hokey.
In August 1939 the safety pioneer Béla Barényi started his work in Sindelfingen. He invented for example the principle of the crumple zone, a trailblazing innovation which entered series production at Mercedes-Benz in 1959. With the help of its in-house accident research function, which was founded in 1969, Mercedes-Benz engineers in the following years have developed several innovations in passenger car safety. Mercedes-Benz is using the new S-Class ESF 2009 concept to celebrate this culture of development, with a look towards safety technology to come.
It is a slow news day today, just like the crime statistics in the safe city of Dubai. The jails are filled with loan dodgers and disgruntled labourers rather than murderers and mafia dons, and we figured we’d highlight the Dubai Police’s latest weapon in their fight against crime – the Dodge Charger.
The all-new Chevrolet Malibu has been on sale in the U.S. for a while now. The midsize sedan had finally become an equal competitor to its Japanese rivals in the States, but the GCC line-up was making do with a lopsided range consisting of the Korean Epica and the Australian Lumina, neither of which has a 4-cylinder engine that could compare with those in the Camry, the Accord and the Altima. So General Motors decided to bring the Malibu here again, after a gap of nearly a decade.
One of our readers sent in photos of yet another car that went up in flames in the UAE for no apparent reason. It seems to be becoming a common occurence, and is simply being blamed on heat and bad maintenance. While some cases have been due to age or bad stereo installations, others can simply be attributed to the source of the cars. Take this Jeep, for example. I also drive a Jeep, but mine is a GCC-spec version with full service history. The one in the photo is not.
Back before World War II, BMW had identified a certain niche of people who had a yearning for a specific kind of car. “These are people who, once they see an aerodynamic car body with a long and sleek engine compartment, as well as a speedometer extending all the way to 150 kph, feel that strong yearning for wide open roads simply perfect for driving fast, for Alpine passes just begging to be conquered, and for competitors so easy to overtake.” Those were words spoken by BMW when they launched their first roadster in 1934.