1986 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am Owners Manual on 2040-parts.com

Design Contest: LA Design Challenge 2008

The entrants for the fifth annual Design Challenge, part of the Design Los Angeles automobile designers' conference, have now been announced. Nine Southern California automotive design studios - including Audi, BMW, GM, Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Mercedes-Benz, Toyota and Volkswagen - have been pitted against one another and asked to develop a concept which best answers a brief entitled 'Motorsports in 2025'. "Automotive designers have always been fascinated with motorsports and this year's Design Challenge has provided them with the opportunity to use their creative talent to look at these cars with new eyes, using innovative technologies and approaches," said Chuck Pelly, director of Design Los Angeles and partner in The Design Academy, Inc.

Falcon F7 spotted in the wild

The Falcon F7 made its debut at the 2012 Detroit auto show. Since then, we haven't seen it. We were offered a test drive, but Falcon Motorsports cancelled it an hour before the appointed time, leaving us to wonder what happened.

Buy a Spyker Bond and get a cheap Spyker B6 Venator

Buy a Spyker Bond and get a cheap B6 Venator (pictured) Last year, Victor Muller seemed to have pulled off something of a coup for Spyker by delivering concepts of the B6 Venator Coupe and Spyder to much acclaim, which looked like a car that could kick-start Spyker’s rather troubled business model. After a foray in to Saab ownership, Victor Muller lost Spyker to CPP, but CPP’s reliance on finance from Victor’s pal Vlad the banker proved to be CPP’s downfall and Victor emerged, somehow, back in control of Spyker. But despite Victor’s legendary ability to schmooze finance from the most unlikely sources, it seems he’s run in to a bit of trouble with financing production of the Venator, so he’s come up with a plan that looks to be a cross between a lottery and crowd funding.