Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Cadillac One Presidents Cars

The Presidential State Car is the official state car used by the President of the United States. It is also known as Cadillac One and here it is it all its glory.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Luxury Concept Cars

Luxurious cars concepts and designs modeled by some of the top automobile companies such as Audi, Mazda, Peugeot, Toyota etc.

Audi Locus
Audi Locus designed by Ugur Sahin is a concept car envisioned to have a curvy structure and the main characteristics of the design are the way its surface shapes are formed with a continuous flow from front until the back of the car.

Peugeot e-Motion
Peugeot e-Motion is an electric-powered sportscar with a design characterized by the combination of concave and convex surfaces. The dynamic look is enhanced in the sideview by a sharp crease line which flows from the headlights, into the doors and continues with the rear lights.

Lamborghini Concept S
Lamborghini Concept S is a concept car designed by Luc Donckerwolke, the head of Lamborghini design, using the Lamborghini Gallardo’s floorplan. Shown at the 2005 Geneva Motor Show. It was intended to be a modern interpretation of the single-seat roadsters of the past.

Mazda Taiki
Mazda Taiki was revealed at the 40th Tokyo Motor Show in October 2007 and basically sets a new ideal for the front-engine rear-drive sports car of the future and continues the evolution of the Nagare design theme, following in the footsteps of the Mazda Nagare, Mazda Ryuga, and Mazda Hakaze concept vehicles.

BMW ZX-6
BMW ZX-6 concept is one of the final projects of the Transportation Design students at Turin-based IED (Instituto Europeo di Design), which was developed in partnership with BMW with the goal of creating a car for 2015.

Toyota 4WingX
Toyota 4WingX was one of the ten design proposals idealized and presented by students of the Transportation Design Course of IED Turin which makes use of the same hybrid power technology found in the Toyota Prius but provides a unique style and shape.

Mazda Nagare
Mazda Nagare concept was revealed at this year’s Greater Los Angeles International Auto Show and is the first of a series of design concepts that Mazda will showcase this global auto show season, including Los Angeles, Detroit, Geneva and Tokyo.

Audi O
Audi O concept was designed by Ondrej Jirec, a design student from the Czech Republic who is beginning studies at the Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, California in 2008. It was designed to fuse a powerful and innovative audio system with a stylish and sporty four-seat hatchback.

BMW Snug
Snug is a concept which aims to create a sense of community: a simple, fun object, designed for people who appreciate personal relationships, people who are different from the others, in their opinions and in their feelings.

Lexus LF-A RoadsterThe LF-A is a 2-door exotic concept car built as a prospective halo car for the Lexus division. Integrating the simple elegance of the new Lexus design initiative with racing–inspired style, sculpted curves and fluid lines make a dynamic statement.

KTM XBow - Winter Car Fun

Since the launch of the KTM X-Bow in mid-2008, the radical, lightweight, mid-engined concept with its stunning carbon fibre monocoque has attracted massive interest from both consumers and from the media. It has been bestowed with numerous awards, of which the latest is Top Gear magazine's 'Sportscar of the Year'.


Anyone wishing to experience KTM's first sportscar doesn't have to wait until the spring: just in time for the cold season, the open top sportscar has been made winter proof!

Watch a video of the KTM X Bow in action:



To assist with catching that perfect four-wheel drift through the pristine white winter wonderland, there are numerous accessories from the KTM PowerParts and PowerWear collections to choose from. Pirelli Sottozero snow tyres are available – with central locking as well as with five bolt wheels.


For intrepid drivers that like their thrills to be more extreme – a common trait of X-Bow buyers – snow chains are available, which are of course homologated and ensure good traction under the most demanding of conditions.


Drivers are protected against 'Jack Frost' with advanced clothing by Schöffel and a helmet by Schuberth, all specifically designed for winter action in the X-Bow. The full set (helmet, jacket and trousers) is available from 950 Euro*.


And once the fun is over, the X-Bow too is allowed to jump into its protective winter attire: an indoor cover is available from 380 Euro*, and for protection on the ski-lift car-park an outdoor cover is available from 325 Euro*.

Hydrogen Scorpion Car

A Texas startup has finally pulled the wraps off its 40-mpg, 450-horsepower Scorpion roadster, a hand-built hydrogen-burning "eco-exotic" that is sexier than Angelina Jolie and has the performance to provide more grins than nitrous oxide.


Ronn Motor Company unveiled the Scorpion today at the big SEMA, or Speciality Equipment Market Association, automotive trade show in Las Vegas, which may be the perfect place to debut so flashy — and innovative — a car. The company hopes the Scorpion does for hydrogen what the Tesla Roadster has done for batteries.


"We want to build cool cars, just more responsibly”, company president Ronn Maxwell told Wired.com. "Our hope with the Scorpion is to implement a paradigm shift not only in how the industry looks at supercars but at cars in general."


The Scorpion gets its sting from a hydrogen delivery system the company calls H2GO. While cars like the Honda FCX Clarity and Chevrolet Equinox use hydrogen fuel cells to drive electric motors, the Scorpion uses electrolysis to convert water into gaseous hydrogen. The hydrogen is mixed with 91-octane gasoline to improve the fuel economy and reduce the emissions of the car's 3.5-liter internal combustion engine.



Maxwell, a 40-year auto industry vet and lifelong gearhead who holds several patents, is using the limited production — just 200 will be built — Scorpion to prove the technology works and legitimize the H2GO system the company will begin selling for $1,000 early next year. The way he sees it, if H2GO works on the Scorpion, it'll work on your Civic.


Maxwell didn't offer much in the way of specifics, saying the publicly traded company is still dotting the i's and crossing the t's on the venture. But he says H2GO is good for a 15 percent to 33 percent improvement in mileage, a noticeable increase in power and a significant reduction in overall emissions. The company is pursuing EPA certification of the Scorpion so people can get a better idea of what the system is capable of. Maxwell insists the 40-mpg figure is the real deal.


Photos courtesy Ronn Motor Co.

The trucking industry has been using hydrogen boosting for years. But the Scorpion is significant because it uses what the company calls real-time hydrogen delivery as part of an original factory design. And unlike BMW’s Hydrogen 7, Scorpion does not keep any 30-gallon tanks full of liquid hydrogen lying around at −253 °C (−423.4 °F).

“Our system does not require any pressurized hydrogen storage. It’s completely safe and uses water from your garden hose to create hydrogen on demand. We are simply increasing the efficiency of what’s already there”, says company COO Damon Kuhn. “Even better, the infrastructure to support this technology is here right now, not 10 years from now.”

Kuhn is referring to the biggest challenges to hydrogen's use in vehicles — the need for a fueling infrastructure, a venture that by any measure will take many years and many millions of dollars.

Ronn Motors is confident that the sexy Scorpion will top 200 mph. The chrome-moly chassis and carbon-fiber body surrounds a twin-turbo 3.5-liter V6 in a car that weighs just 2,200 pounds. The engine was sourced from Acura — it's the same mill found in the TL Type S, albeit turbocharged — and mated to a six-speed gearbox. The car will set you back $150,000, and if 450 ponies isn't enough, another $100 grand will get you a tweaked version with another 150 horsepower.

Tom duPont, publisher of the duPont registry, pulled the sheet off the Scorpion this morning and said, “If it was a square box with a bunch of batteries, I wouldn’t be getting pre-orders from NBA basketball players. The exotic styling and amazing performance mixed in with the environmental angle is really inspiring a lot of attention.”

Aptera Concept Car

The Aptera is one hell of a cool car. Always love it when style and philosophy come together. The future’s definitely bright if it’ll make such kinds of designs common.

The Aptera (Greek for “wingless”) is an environmentally-friendly car that’s as clean and green as it is fantastically futuristic. The three-wheeled hybrid, which offers an all-electric or plug-in hybrid option, isn’t just a concept- you can reserve your own with just a $500 deposit.

Seating 2.5 with plenty of room for luggage, the Aptera can get up to 230 miles per gallon at 55 miles per hour, and has an (electronically limited) top speed of 95 mph. Plus, it’s just so darn cool looking, we can’t resist the arthropod automobile aesthetic.