Now that Mercedes has given the standard S-Class facelift, it’s time for the AMG models to get a touch up. The actual car won’t be revealed until the Shanghai Auto Show later this month.
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You name it and John Hennessey will make it faster. From Vipers to Vettes to Challengers, Hennessey Performance will take competent sports cars and make them into tire-shredding speed demons with more horsepower than any street-going vehicle should ever logically have. The latest creation to come from the Texas tuner is the GTR700 based on the Nissan GT-R. The upgraded Godzilla now sports 715 horsepower and 662 lb-ft torque thanks to numerous modifications including a stainless steel exhaust system, new ECU programming, modified turbos with larger compressor wheels, 100mm cold air intake, high-flow fuel injectors, transmission cooler, clutch pack upgrades, and more. The result is stupefying. Sixty mph comes up in just 2.8 seconds, 100 mph in 6.7 seconds and 150 mph in 14.5 seconds. Compared to a stock GT-R, the GTR700 reaches 186 mph in less than half the time.
BMW is working on a new 1-series that should arrive in the U.S. by 2012. What keeps getting us excited are rumors about SuperSport Version of the new little Bimmer.
CAR is furthering some of the same rumors we reported back in January about the hottest 1-Series. This means a return to fast four-cylinder engines in the U.S. with a 2.0 or 2.2-liter turbocharged powerplant. The 300 hp expected in this engine is the same as in the six-cylinder used in the current 135i. The difference will be the weight savings of a smaller engine as well as other lightweight replacements BMW will implement for the SuperSport model.
The most recent reports pegs the new 1-Series with new styling that include narrow LED headlamps (CAR’s rendering above). The SuperSport model will get its own distinctive look, including dual round headlamps that is reminiscent of the 2002 tii. So even if BMW won’t use the proper ‘tii’ name, at least it can still look like it.
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McLaren has been hinting at offering a full range of sportscars for a while, but now there is some real exciting news: it’s working on a successor to the McLaren F1. When the original F1 debuted back in 1992, it was the fastest and most expensive car in the world. It’s 240 mph top speed held the production car record until the Bugatti Veyron beat it in 2005 (then the SSC Ultimate Aero beat the Veyron.)
Now a source within McLaren to a news, “We have just started looking at doing another F1. It is a clean sheet design.” So will the new F1 try to regain its spot at the top of the supercar mountain? All we can guess right now is that the BMW-sourced V12 in the original will be swapped out for something from McLaren’s new partner Mercedes. A likely candidate is a reworked version of the 6.3-liter V8 that’s already in service in cars like the SL63 AMG and the new E63 AMG.
Unlike the original F1, the new one will likely be more conventional. There were only 106 of the first F1s build over its seven-year life cycle, and only 64 of those were intended for road use. For McLaren to break even on this new car, it will likely have to raise the production numbers and maybe even forget about the gold engine lining.
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The Mercedes-Benz CLS was one of those cars that when it hit dealer showrooms it was RED HOT.
Stylish and well equipped, although based on the E-Class the CLS was a sexy alternative to the stoic sedan from MB, and buyers flocked to dealers to own this fashion statement. Mercedes-Benz was even so brazen as to market this car as a coupe even though the 4-doors really made it a sedan. The low slung roof line and seating for 4 however met the coupe requirements for MB hence the marketing as such. Like most fashion trends however, the style came and went and now the current CLS simply takes up space at dealers as sales have fallen off drastically.
In the meantime however, BMW, Audi and VW all want a piece of this new market segment created by Mercedes and have rushed their own interpretation of the 4-Door coupe to the auto show circuits, but so far only VW has official plans for production with the Passat CC.
Mercedes-Benz is not one to sit on their laurels however, and a redesigned CLS is coming for model year 2010. Wearing a front end very similar to the CL-Coupes, MB has done a good job updating the CLS coupe without straying to far from the formula set forth with the original. The pictures are grainy, but they are good enough to get a sense of what the new design looks like.
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