9in Ford Rear Panhard Bar on 2040-parts.com

Vehicle dependability surged in 2009, J.D. Power survey finds

In the depths of the Great Recession that threatened their existence, automakers built better vehicles. A lot better. The improvement in dependability of three-year-old 2009 vehicles from the year before was one of the biggest ever measured in the J.D.

Essay: Variable Degrees of Translucency

Car door panels and fenders are generally made of steel, sometimes of aluminum or plastic composites, and you can't see through them. Car windows, on the other hand, are made of a transparent sandwich of glass and plastic - and you can see through them. But in the future there will be variable degrees of transparency: translucent elements where once there were none, traditional window areas that will have opaque elements and graduated progressions from opaque to see-through.

Honda Civic Type R Mugen 2.2 revealed. But why bother?

Honda Civic Type R Mugen 2.2 - will it sell? When Honda finally confirmed the Civic Type R Mugen for very limited production – just 20 were being made – back in 2009, we did comment that the price - £38,599 and a £12k premium over the stock Type R – did not auger well for sales. In the event Honda has only managed to shift sixteen of the original Type R Mugen, but despite that sales failure they have decided to punt out a more powerful – and inevitably more expensive – version of the Type R with a bored and stroke 2.2 litre version of the original 2.0 litre in the Type R – the Honda Civic Type R Mugen 2.2.