08-11 Scion Xb Power Mirror W/ Signal Lamp Driver Side Left Lh L on 2040-parts.com

Embattled Wagoner forced to quit as GM boss

By Ben Pulman Motor Industry 30 March 2009 11:34 Rick Wagoner has been forced to step down as General Motors chairman and CEO by US President Barack Obama, as a condition of the beleaguered automaker continuing to receive state aid. Wagoner was meeting with US government officials on Friday when the request was made for him to ‘step aside’. Wagoner had been GM president and CEO since 2000, and chairman since 2003 – his resignation ends a 31-year career with a company.

Local Motors 'Design Our Car' competition opens

Local Motors has opened its first-ever ‘Design Our Car' competition, which encourages collaboration within the manufacturing community. The open-source automaker is providing two of its Rally Fighter cars, one of which will be built at the company's micro-factory in Arizona while the other will be built live in the Emerging Technology Center at September's International Manufacturing Technology Show (IMTS) in Chicago. Ideas from the design and engineering community are being sought to help design and select a skin for the Rally Fighter that will be built by the Local Motors team this spring.

BYD E6 – Next Gen Electric Car battery technology

Chinese car maker BYD are using revolutionary battery technology in the BYD E6 The biggest problem with electric cars (or one of them, at least) is that the battery technology is not really up to the ambitions of car makers. Chevrolet’s Volt (aka Opel Ampera) is a good case in point. Tellingly, a Toyota tecchy referred to the science behind the Chevvy Volt as ‘Vaporware’, and the whole project is founded on the expectation that the technolgy will develop quickly enough to make the car a reality.