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

Volvo celebrates the seatbelt’s golden anniversary

By Freddie Fulton Motor Industry 12 August 2009 10:11 Today marks the 50th anniversary of the three-point seatbelt. It was patented by Volvo engineer Nils Bohlin in 1959, but the Swedes magnanimously opened up the tech to other car makers as they saw the real-world safety benefit of seatbelts in all cars. The design was so effective that in Germany the patent registrars listed it in the top eight inventions which have made an impact from 1885 to 1985.

2012 Ford Focus ST gets 297bhp

Those clever chaps at SuperChips have given the 2012 Ford Focus ST a bit of an ECU tweak to deliver 297bhp and an extra 85lb/ft of torque. When we reported last week that WTC outfit Arena had in roped Ford’s tuner of choice, Mountune, to give the new Ford Focus a makeover, we were a tad disappointed to discover that they were tweaking the rather journeyman Focus Zetec S. That meant the Zetec S got 200bhp – a handy jump – but we bemoaned the fact that they hadn’t fiddled with the Focus ST to give us a car to fill the void left by the absence of a Focus RS in the current iteration of the Focus.

Lamborghini Gallardo: Chinese owner takes umbrage

Lamborghini Gallardo destroyed in China by disgruntled owner Maybe China doesn’t have any effective consumer rights laws to protect disgruntled consumers. Or maybe the owner of the Lamborghini Gallardo in China, who organised its destruction on China’s ‘National Consumer Day’ to make a point about Lamborghini’s failure to address his problems, had just reached the end of his tether. But whatever the reason, the sight of an almost new Gallardo being destroyed by a team of boiler-suited, sledgehammer-wielding chaps certainly garnered a crowd.