Motoring News

If you’ve been dreaming of owning one of these rare high-performance cars the Melbourne-based company has just made the move into performance territory more palatable. 

It has launched two new entry models, the ClubSport GXP and Maloo GXP with driveaway pricing of $61,990 for the six-speed manual sedan and $55,990 for the manual.  The cars are based on the Pontiac GXP, which sold for a brief period in the United States.

HSV says the sedan and ute are ‘limited editions’, meaning just 400 sedans and 350 utes will be built.  However, HSV executives are mindful that as an entry level car, both are expected to sell out quickly.

HSV general manager sales and marketing, Darren Bowler, says it is unlikely the GXP will join the lineup as a new model, beyond the limited edition cars.  “We don’t want too many variants in our model range,” he says.

Audi has been accused of having too many variants before, and it wouldn't be the first time that an importer was accused of having too many models in what really is a small market.  But the number of models Audi has on offer now could have some people again wondering how it supports such a broad range on low volumes. But if the buyers are there and the four-ringed brand is making money, who are we to argue?

The A5 range has comprised a two-door coupe and droptop adjunct to the A4 sedan and wagon range. But now we have the A5 Sportback - a four-door four-seat coupe version of the A4, but sleeker and even more elegant than the handsome sedan.  It weighs less than the long-running A4 sedan, but is longer, wider and lower and just 2mm longer in the wheelbase.

Drivetrain and price

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According to tests carried out by NRMA Insurance, each glance at the phone while texting takes an average of 1.4 seconds, with the vehicle covering 22m when travelling at 60km/h.

Tests were carried out on a closed road with 10 drivers aged 20 to 54 texting "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog". The driver's faces were filmed with the test revealing participants glancing at their phone an average of 38 times.

All states have penalties for illegal talking or texting on a mobile while driving, but that didn't stop more than 200,000 drivers last year - and those are just the ones who were caught in four states. In New South Wales, almost 40,000 drivers were caught illegally talking or texting on mobile phones in the past year. The NSW fine for illegal mobile phone use is $253 and three demerit points.

That's the bottom line on the 911 Turbo S convertible, which will be unveiled next month at the Geneva Motor Show before local sales in September.

The force-fed droptop, which also comes as a coupe for $423,300, has had a major power boost from the 'regular' 911 Turbo's 368 kiloWatts to a full-house 390 - with 700 Newton-metres of torque.

Porsche says the extra punch drops the 0-100km/h sprint time to 3.3 seconds and lifts the top speed to 315km/h.  The Turbo S comes standard with Porsche's Sport Chrono package, including launch control, as well as paddles to shift the PDK seven-speed, dual-clutch gearbox.

It's the first new Turbo S model from Porsche in five years and comes with traction management, all-wheel-drive and a mechanical rear differential lock.

The company’s local CEO, Edward Lee, has confirmed the snappy-looking little i20 hatch will be here within about two months, and a replacement for the Sonata sedan later in the year..

“It will arrive at the end of April or early in May,” Lee says of the i20.  And this time, it will definitely follow through. Currency and supply issues stalled the arrival of the i20 late last year, but a shipload of them is already on the water – Australia-bound.

However it doesn’t mean the immediate end of the popular Getz - the best-selling nameplate in the Hyundai stable, challenged only by the i30 for a month last year.“We have decided to run the i20 alongside the Getz for this year,” Lee says, adding that it come in somewhere “close to $15,000”.

Skaife is in favour of everything from a travelling school show with interactive driving simulators to go-kart racing as ways to build skills before youngsters hit the road for the first time in a car.  He is keen to see more pre-license training to prepare for kids and says there is plenty of proof that early education works.

"Driving is a life skill. It's as simple as that. It's essential and kids need all the training they can get," Skaife says.  "There is a reason why country kids are, generally speaking, better drivers. They get more experience at an early age.

"They are out on the farm driving a ute with a load of hay, or a mower, or a quad to do the chores. They understand the basic skills of driving so they have less to worry about when they get a license."  Skaife is a father of three and says he started his eldest, his son Mitch, on go-karts to teach him about driving.

The decision to run with the alpha-numeric nomenclator is a victory for commercial commonsense and will allow Hyundai to leverage off the huge buyer goodwill already created by the award-winning i30 small car.

"There has been a great deal of discussion with Hyundai head office over how we would market the YF (Hyundai's internal designation of the new model) in Australia and while we don't see this as any sort of victory we are very pleased with the outcome," Hyundai Australia's director of marketing, Oliver Mann, says.

"I can't speak for other markets around the world but I would expect that the i45 name will at least flow to New Zealand."  With the i45 nameplate settled the Sonata replacement will join i20, i30, ix35, iMax and iLoad as the latest member of the new-generation Hyundai family.

It's the Sportswagon, a value-added wagon that first hit the road in Australia in the early 1980s.  This time around it will be a tickle-up on the Impreza hatch with a pricetag just below $30,000.

The Impreza XV, as it is called, will be previewed at the Geneva Motor Show next month and looks basically similar to a car sold in the USA as the Outback Sport - even though it is based on the Impreza.

"The Sportswagon started in the early 1980s with the Leone. It was the original idea to transform a wagon into a lifestyle recreational vehicle.  In those early days we put things on it like white Sunraysia wheels, bullbars and roof racks," says Nick Senior, managing director of Subaru Australia.

The potent Porsche 911 is currently a track car only but the technology that gives it a boost comes straight from Formula One and has clear potential for go-faster road use.

The latest GT3 R Hybrid is fitted with the Kinetic Energy Recovery System developed by Porsche for Williams Grand Prix, although it was not used by the F1 team before KERS was outlawed at the end of the 2009 system.

Now Porsche has picked it up for its flagship endurance racer and, if it works well, it could easily go into the next generation of 911s.  "At the moment, nobody knows what is going to happen," admits the head of Porsche Cars Australia, Michael Winkler.