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

Nissan unveils new generation 'black cab'

NISSAN has unveiled its new ‘black cab’, adapted specifically for London and designed to win business from cabbies looking for a more reliable, more functional and less polluting vehicle. This year, emissions legislation will force many older taxis off the road, and noting the financial struggles of Manganese Bronze, the makers of the traditional black cab, Nissan has seen the opportunity to muscle in on the market. The famous London taxi design has come in for much criticism from cabbies for its unrefined drive, patchy reliability and questionable cabin ergonomics.

Call for ban on on vehicle-side advertising

ALL ADVERTISING and promotional banners on commercial vehicles should be banned as they are distracting to other drivers and tempt them to use mobile phones while driving. This is the call from Flexed, a car leasing company, which has carried out a survey that shows a quarter (23%) of drivers admit to trying to type a website address into smartphone after seeing an advert on a lorry. A further 10% of drivers admitted they had tried to take a camera phone photo of an advertisement on a commercial vehicle to use later.

Ram introduces CNG-powered pickup

Aside from the Honda Civic Natural Gas, compressed-natural-gas-powered vehicles have usually been converted after the fact, generally for fleet use. Chrysler is hoping to carve out a niche in the corporate-pickup segment by selling a factory-built CNG Ram 2500 that can seamlessly switch over to gasoline operation when the natural-gas tanks run dry. The twin 4.6-cubic-foot CNG tanks (which store the equivalent of 18.2 gallons of gas) take up a section of the bed, while an eight-gallon gasoline tank provides fuel during start-up and then reserve capacity when the compressed tanks are tapped out, allowing the bruiser a measure of operational flexibility.