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

Ellesmere Port's bid to build Ampera hits snags

By Rob Golding Motor Industry 09 October 2009 15:02 Prime minister Gordon Brown’s personal crusade to get Vauxhall's version of the Chevrolet Volt petrol-electric plug-in hybrid – the Ampera – built in Britain's Ellesmere Port factory in 2012 is a dream delayed, CAR can disclose today.News that the UK Astra plant is the best in Europe, that the Astra's Delta platform will underpin the Ampera, and that Volt will be on US sale from 2010 had been taken to mean that Vauxhall would be churning out the cars in the north west within three years.But the prospect of an electric car industry growing up around the run-down Merseyside manufacturing site is not imminent, CAR has learned.'No Ampera to be built in Europe before 2015'Vauxhall insiders have made it clear that the car to be known as the Vauxhall/Opel Ampera in Europe will be an import from the US for at least five years. One senior planner told us: 'The US will be the sole source of Amperas until at least 2015.'Bob Lutz, GM's former product supremo who recently came out of retirement as a PR, said that the low value of the dollar made the US an ideal site for the manufacturing of export cars. And with forecast sticker prices of the range-extender electric car standing at a scary £35,000+, every price saving is vital to its marketability.The European market also needs time to get its electricity recharge infrastructure in place before it is worth making cars onshore in volume, GM high-ups point out.

What Americans want, according to Fiat design boss Ramaciotti

American cars are big; European cars are small. And it's always been that way. But that old distinction may be diminishing, says Fiat Group design boss Lorenzo Ramaciotti.

SHO-down in Motown

“There are no egos in this club,” said Tom Ochal, owner of a pristine 1993 Taurus SHO. “The other guys might have a problem with aftermarket wheels or other-make parts, but not us.” That same sentiment was echoed throughout the parking lot at the 19th-annual Taurus SHO club convention at Ford World Headquarters in Dearborn, Mich., right before the crew took off to the Waterford Hills racetrack in nearby Clarkston. At least 100 cars SHO-ed up for the 2010 meet.