Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid race car revealed

Porsche will bring its latest hybrid know-how to the racetrack in the form of the new 911 GT3 R Hybrid, revealed here for the first time prior to a planned public premiere at the Geneva auto show in early March. Developed by a team of engineers at Porsche's Weissach R&D center, Porsche plans for the stripped-out race car to act as a rolling laboratory. The German carmaker wants to explore the potential of hybrid drivetrains in a racing environment before an expected announcement that it will return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans in a factory capacity, perhaps in 2012, with a race car boasting technology based on that used in the 911 GT3 R Hybrid.

Hyundai i40 saloon – that’s the Euro version – finally arrives

It's the Hyundai i40 Saloon for Europe As we reported last week – after Hyundai had, rather pointlessly, teased us with an image – the European version of the Hyundai i40 saloon is about to launch at the Barcelona Motor Show. So we have details, although much of what we have is what we already know from the Hyundai i40 Estate. What we do know is that the European  i40 – whatever guise it comes in – seems a fine car and a real threat to the sector domination by the Ford Mondeo and VW Passat.

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.