Arias Pistons 12.5:1 Compression 82mm Bore Honda B-series on 2040-parts.com

Geely at Shanghai 2011: Geely MINI Cooper & Geely London Taxi

Geely's take on the London Cab & MINI Cooper Regular readers – in fact anyone who takes notice of car news – will probably recognise Geely as being the Chinese car maker who bought Volvo in 2010. Proper car anoraks may also remember the ‘Chinese Rolls Royce‘, a Phantom ‘Homage’ from Geely that came equipped with a ‘Throne’ in the back to transport a lone plutocrat. It looked a lot like a Russian cold war ZIL meets cartoon Phantom and there was no mistaking it was a Chinese car for a Chinese market.

Vauxhall Astra VXR Extreme gets 300bhp

The Vauxhall Astra VXR Extreme (pictured) gets 300bhp When the Vauxhall Astra Extreme popped its head above the parapet at the end of January as a potential range-topping Astra, we did wonder if it was going to get more power as well as suspension and cosmetic tweaks. It is. Vauxhall still aren’t saying just how powerful the Extreme is, but they do say it will have ‘more than 300 pS if (and probably, when) it goes in to production.

Land Rover Defender reprieved

Land Rover Defender reprieved until 2017 - and maybe beyond It’s the news that all die-hard Land Rover Defender fans – and there are still plenty of them – wanted to hear; the current Defender has won a reprieve until at least 2017. It had originally been thought that the iconic (that word again, but it’s justified in the Defender’s case) Landie would be forced in to the annuls of motoring history by Euro emissions rules. But thanks to plans to endow the current Defender with a version of JLR’s 2.2 litre diesel, it now means that the Defender as we know it can keep on trucking until at least 2017 with its new, Euro5 compliant engine.