Índice para June 2015 em Automobile

SEE MORE NEW 200-MPH-PLUS CARS FROM THE GENEVA SHOW STARTING ON PAGE 60. McLaren 675LT TOP SPEED: 205 mph MODEL YEARS: 2016- The 675LT is the most track-focused, street-legal model in McLaren’s Super Series line. Only one-third of the parts on the 675LT are different from the 650S, but McLaren says the 675LT is an all-new model—OK. LT stands for Longtail and harkens back to the McLaren F1 GTR race car from the late ’90s. Like the GTR Longtail, the 675LT has been notably altered to improve aerodynamics. The 675LT produces— cue Iron Maiden—666 hp. Ferrari F40 TOP SPEED: 201 mph MODEL YEARS: 1987-1992 The first 200-mph production car, the Ferrari F40 captivated every car enthusiast of its time. Its magical allure is as strong as ever, even if its…

When’s the last time you saw a truly epic car chase in a movie? No, not the mostly computer generated scenes from the “Fast & Furious” series but rather a classic in the spirit of John Frankenheimer’s “Ronin”? George Miller, the creator and director of the “Mad Max” movies, is staking his reputation and likely a $100 million-plus budget on a movie that is almost entirely a car chase. Miller says his new film, “Mad Max: Fury Road,” which hits theaters May 15, begins with a chase that doesn’t end until the movie does. The chase is the movie. “Ronin” was all Audis, Peugeots, and Benzes barreling through France. The vehicles of Miller’s “Fury Road” are far different—dozens of bizarre and reimagined muscle cars and rat rods bashing their way…

“I got the call to drive for Ferrari while I was riding my bike,” Jeff Westphal says, flashing a boyish grin. “Right here on this exact hill. Best ride of my life.” Then the Scuderia Corsa driver leans over his handlebars and flies down the hill, legs churning. He tucks into a long, curving switchback, swooshing over rough pavement and exiting inches away from an enormous redwood tree. I click into a bigger gear and follow, trying to mimic his smoothness, his gait, his speed. Ain’t gonna happen. I’ve got my work cut out for me. In fact, I’m going to get my butt kicked on both two wheels and four today. We’ve just parked our black Ferrari 458 Spider up the hill and swapped our driving shoes for Pearl…

Bill France Sr. would not establish NASCAR for another 21 years, but perceptions regarding automotive speed vaulted to a new plane on March 29, 1927, on Florida’s famous Daytona Beach. The Sunbeam 1000 HP Mystery, powered by two Sunbeam Matabele 22.4-liter V-12 aircraft engines actually yielding closer to 900 hp, became the first automobile to exceed 200 mph. Thirty-year-old Henry Segrave drove it to a top-end of 207 mph and a new land speed record average of 203.79 mph. The car, nicknamed “The Slug,” is on display in England’s Beaulieu National Motor Museum.…

RONALD “STEADY” BARKER DIED peacefully Jan. 25, 2015, at age 94. “His engine missed a stroke and he coasted to the finish,” read the suitably irreverent death notice in London’s “The Daily Telegraph,” quietly marking the passing of one of automotive journalism’s all-time most amusing representatives. An eccentric bachelor who favored old Lancias long before it was fashionable (Wait. What? It’s still not.), Steady Barker was also known to sometimes rely on a 1908 Napier Grand Prix car for personal transport. There’s naught more eccentric than that, unless it was riding a motorcycle into his living room to serve tea, which he did on occasion, or the time he commemorated his 80th birthday by walking on the wing of an airborne Boeing-Stearman biplane. But the reason I bring it up:…

Don’t let the spec sheets fool you— these rival high-performance sedans could hardly be more different. And they don’t like each other. To say the 2015 Mercedes-AMG C63 sedan happens to perform similarly to the BMW M3 is like saying Russian troops happen to be vacationing in Crimea. Mercedes-AMG’s latest effort targets BMW’s venerable supersedan with all the focus and intent of a laser-guided missile. Look at the numbers: 0-60 mph in 3.9 seconds for the M3, 4.0 seconds for the C63 (3.9 seconds for the more powerful C63 S). Top speed is governed at 155 mph for both the BMW and the Mercedes (option packages for both remove the governors). Also, Mercedes barely beats BMW in fuel economy, hitting 29 mpg combined on the European cycle versus 28 mpg…

BE BLOODIED, BRUISED, AND BROKEN, PLEASE Rally is vicious and violent, a nonstop gauntlet our 2014 Ford Fiesta ST couldn’t possibly survive. So why bring it to the 100-Acre Wood Rally in Salem, Missouri? To watch it fail, finally, at something. Ford’s $22,000 wunderkind quickly stole the spotlight from its big brother, the Focus ST, by being better at, well, everything. On road courses, we’ve passed cars with double the power that cost twice as much. At autocrosses, we’ve put it on three wheels carving between cones. On the street, we’ve shamed import tuners between stoplights. We even took it ice racing, smashed it into hard-packed snowbanks, and came out unscathed. This rally, though, will surely force the capable, versatile, durable Fiesta ST beyond its breaking point. Pushing it there…

This Infiniti Q50 is a completely modern sedan. It’s a car that can go anywhere, do anything, and show you a pretty fine time to boot. And yet for all the style, safety, and speed shown by our 2014 Infiniti Q50 AWD Premium in every season of the past year, you’d think it would get a little more respect from us. As we page through the logbook of this all-wheel-drive version of the Q50, we find records of gas stops from one end of the country to the other. In the 19,993 miles we spent with it, this car went from Ann Arbor to Los Angeles, not to mention visits to out-of the-way places such as Blackwells Corner, California, and Moab, Utah. It saw a record season of snowfall in…

SCOTTSDALE, ARIZONA | JANUARY 10-18, 2015 1973 JAGUAR XK-E 2+2 | SOLD AT $135,300 FEATURE CAR S/N UD1S74974 SILVER GRAY OVER BISCUIT BROWN leather. 314-hp, SOHC 5.3-liter V-12; four-speed manual transmission. Recently and very nicely restored. Excellent throughout: The paint is top-quality; all exterior trim is bright and sharp; all brightwork is highly polished. This original California delivery car is equipped with traditional wire wheels and all-important air-conditioning. This is one of 7,297 Series 3 2+2 Coupes produced between 1971 and 1975. THE STORY BEHIND THE SALE: IT’S HARD TO IMAGINE the impact that the Jaguar E-type (properly referred to as “XK-E” in the U.S.) had in the marketplace when it was introduced in 1961. Fast, sexy, and exotic enough to turn heads from Monte Carlo to Modesto, it had…

You’ve heard it before: “The next BMW 3 Series will be even better than the last 3 Series.” Yet recent iterations of the sport sedan have lost ground to the competition. We’re hearing again that the next 3 Series will be better than the last, and this time there’s compelling evidence to support the claim. The forthcoming iteration of the 3 Series will be built on a more capable chassis that is set to be the backbone of all future rear-wheel-drive BMWs. It’s longer, lower, and wider, yet is lighter than before. The 3 Series will feature active steering, adaptive suspension dampers, and standard brakebased torque-vectoring. Then there’s the really good stuff: suspension geometry that adjusts on the fly, quicker torque distribution for the optional all-wheel-drive system, more capable brakes,…

I DON’T THINK THE ABSOLUTE NUMBER OF recalls a manufacturer puts out is necessarily my biggest concern (“Editor’s Letter,” April 2015). I think that one has to consider a number of other factors. 1) What is the nature of the recalls? What percentage is related to safety or significant performance issues? 2) What prompted the recall? Was it the result of proactive quality monitoring, or was the company compelled to recall the vehicle due to government agency intervention, consumer outcry, bad press, and so on? And 3) How does the company handle the recalls? Does it assume responsibility and act quickly, or does it drag its feet? Of course, if a company is issuing an unusual number of recalls on a regular basis, this has to say something about quality…

AUSTIN, TEXAS Gilded lilies, roasted ortolan, and late-career Liam Neeson have a new partner in overkill: the Bentley Mulsanne Speed. Bentley’s flagship sedan has already distinguished itself from its rival, the Rolls-Royce Phantom, as a car that an owner might care to drive, at least when Jeeves has the day off. The upgraded Speed will invite an even smaller handful of heroes and Neros from Wall Street to Beijing to roll up their French cuffs and go slumming in traffic or to lounge on magisterial, massaging rear thrones and survey the games from a distance. These emperors should detect a seat-of-the-toga difference between a standard Mulsanne and its speedier counterpart. A re-engineered version of the company’s venerable 6.75-liter V-8 with dual turbos bumps torque from 752 to 811 lb-ft. That’s…

AMID THE FLASHBULBS AND BREATHLESS CHATTER surrounding the new C63 and C63 S, it would be easy enough to overlook the new 2016 Mercedes-Benz C450 AMG 4Matic coming this fall. That would be a mistake. In some ways, it even outshines its costlier and faster brethren. No twin-turbo V-8 here. Instead, the C450 uses a smaller, lighter, twin-turbo 3.0-liter V-6 making 362 hp and 384 lb-ft of torque. Obviously, the C450 can’t match the V-8 cars in straight-line go, but the drop is less than you’d probably guess: Mercedes claims 0 to 60 mph in 4.9 seconds (versus 4.0 for the C63). As in the C63, a seven-speed automatic is standard, but it’s a different unit than in the V-8 cars. Nonetheless, the C450’s 7G-Tronic Plus offers the same full…

THESE THREE POINTS ARE MINE. DON’T WORRY.” So said Sébastien Ogier to Volkswagen Motorsport boss Jost Capito before Rally Mexico’s final stage March 8. Indeed, the driver who went quickest here would receive those bonus markers. Ogier, two-time defending World Rally Championship titleholder, had already devoted three days and 20 stages to stomping his competitors, reminding us in the process why rallying speaks so forthrightly about driving skill. Even in an era when technology reigns supreme in many forms of motorsport, a rally driver’s car control is what really matters. Now, at 7,500 feet above sea level on El Brinco, the event’s 21st and final stage, Ogier and navigator Julien Ingrassia have nothing to gain by pushing hard and everything to lose by running off the course. Yet they don’t…

THE INFO NUMBER PRODUCED: 264,634 I ORIGINAL PRICE: $3,232 (NADA) I VALUE TODAY: $11,000–$28,000 (HAGERTY) It was no secret that the Mercury Cougar had been based on the wildly successful 1965 Ford Mustang, but it was much more than a badge engineered version of the original ponycar. It was sporty, yet it was also luxurious. It had not only style but also grace. In short, the Cougar was the very definition of what Mercury promoted as “America’s most complete luxury sports car.” Then again, the 1967-’68 Cougar was arguably America’s only small luxury sports car of the era. The first-generation Cougar has a look all its own, which is highlighted by a grille that has much in common design wise with the business end of an electric shaver. Complete with…