98-02 Mercedes-benz E320 E430 Auto Dimming Rear View Mirror on 2040-parts.com

Finalists announced in Car Design News-Opel/Vauxhall interactive competition exterior design phase

Car Design News is pleased to announce the finalists in the exterior design phase of the Car Design News – Opel/Vauxhall interactive design competition. Pierin Giacomo and Victor Uribe of IED school of design in Turin (who are finalists in the interior phase) are joined by Jadir E Minutti, from IAAD in Turin, Italy and Lina, from Creapole school in Paris, France. The approaches of the students to the exterior design phase differed greatly, and because of this the judges felt that four, rather than three, students merited being invited to Geneva where the winner of the exterior design phase will be announced, together with those for the interior phase which closed in December 2010.

New 2013 Nissan Note gets more appealing

The new Nissan Note has turned in to a Ford Fiesta basher as Nissan turn the Note from a boring little MPV in to a convincing small hatch. We did think the Invitation would be watered down to produce a slightly titivated new Note for production, but much of the style has found its way through in to the new Note – which we first saw in the JDM Nissan Note last summer – and the Note now looks set to take on proper compact hatches like the Ford Fiesta. The nose of the new Note is now more convincing – with new headlights and grill – and the doors get a great big feature crease that looks like a giant smoothing iron has stamped its mark, although Nissan say it’s a ‘Squash Line’  whose ‘angles were inspired by the flight of a fast moving squash ball travelling around a court’.

Mercedes S 500 Plug-In Hybrid price & specs – costs from £87,965

The Mercedes S500 Plug-in Hybrid arrives in the UK It’s more than a year since the Mercedes S500 Plug-in Hybrid was revealed, and now it’s finally going on sale in the UK and, if your pockets are deep enough, it offers a perfect ‘cake and eat it’ car. Under the skin there’s a 3.0 litre V6 biturbo delivering 329bhp and an electric motor adding a further 116bhp which together give the S500 Plug-in the ability to blat to 62mph in just 5.2 seconds but return official economy of 100.9 mpg and emissions of a measly 65g/km. That combination means that you won’t have to pay Boris to drive through London, and your BIK rate will be a very modest 5 per cent, making the S500 plug-in Hybrid a perfect choice for every board member in the country currently paying 35 per cent on their petrol S500, BMW 7 Series or Audi A8.