KEY POINTS:
The Fiat 500has won the International Car of the Year award. The 58 specialist journalists from 22 European countries gave the car 385 points ahead of the Mazda2 and Ford Mondeo. The win was a clear one - 57 of 58 voting included it in their shortlist, and
33 scored it top. This is only the second time an A-segment car has won the award and takes Fiat's total to 12, since the 124 won in 1967. There's already hot demand for Fiat's modern Bambina - it's due on sale in New Zealand in March but supply is tight, and the first three months worth of cars has already sold out.
**********
The 'green' car race is on
General Motors aims to be the first carmaker to produce 1 million fuel cell-powered vehicles a year in the race to develop "green" vehicles for the mass market. "You have to make sure that any of these technologies are out there in great volume to make a difference for the environment," said Elizabeth Lowery, a GM vice president. Larry Burns, GM's vice president of research and development, said some months ago that the company aimed to have fuel cell-powered vehicles, which run on hydrogen and emit only water vapour, in showrooms around 2011 or 2012, and to ramp up production to a million vehicles a year worldwide after 2012.
**********
Superb lighting effects
Skoda's new Superb features headlights that adapt to your environment. Intercity mode is close to the current dipped light, but city mode uses a wider, shorter light path to avoid dazzling oncoming cars, and to illuminate adjoining footpaths.'Highway' lifts the lights to offer a longer reach. Raining? The light path is wide and shorter, dipping the lights to avoid dazzling oncoming cars with too much wet road deflection. Each mode is speed-dependent.
*********
Racy stories
We've all heard of Bruce McLaren, Bernie Ecclestone and Jack Brabham but Phil Kerr has remained in the background - until now, with the release of his lavishly illustrated book To Finish First. Kerr met McLaren when the pair were teens, racing on Kiwi beaches. They went to the UK together where Kerr spent decades at the highest level of top-flight racing management, inside Formula One, Can-Am and the Indy 500, and mixing with the greats. His book offers a wonderful blend of track and off-track stories and a rare insight into the sport from someone who was a part of it.
*********
Kia's biggest fan
Kia's Namyang R&D centre in Korea features an acoustic wind tunnel with the largest fan of its kind in Asia. The fan's 8.4m diameter uses a 2535kW motor to turn at up to 242rpm and can generate a wind of up to 200kph. The fan - which uses carbon composite blades to minimise noise and vibration - runs with just 5mm clearance to the housing within which it travels. A wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling mesh prevents flying technicians from hitting the whirring blades, and access is via a tiny prison-style door.
