Corvette Shifter Knob, With Emblem & Red Script, Black, 6-speed, 1997-2004 on 2040-parts.com

Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid (2011) first official pictures

Porsche has released details of its updated 911 GT3 R Hybrid – the 2010 original nearly won last year's Nurburgring 24hr race before (ironically) it retired with petrol engine failure.  The 2011 Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid – the lowdown Before this report disappears in a chorus of ‘it looks the same as last year’s one’, let's outline where Porsche’s engineers have been busy. At the unfashionable end of the car remains a 4.0-litre flat-six engine producing approximately 470bhp. Up front are twin electric motors, now producing 75kW of power each (up from 60kW) and combined these give the GT3 R Hybrid a 197bhp electric boost, which can be programmed to activate automatically via the throttle pedal, or manually selected during overtaking. F1-derived hybrid tech for the 911 GT3 R Hybrid Power for the two electric motors doesn't come from batteries, but flywheel accumulator technology from Williams Hybrid Power, an offshoot of the Williams Formula 1 team. The flywheel, encased in a carbonfibre safety cell in the space where the passenger seat would be, spins at up to 40,000rpm and acts as a mechanical energy store for the electric motors. Regenerative braking feeds energy back into the flywheel system – no surprises there, as the technology is derived from Williams' exeprience with Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems (KERS) in F1.

1965 Shelby Daytona Cobra sells for $7.25 million at Monterey auction

The championship-winning 1965 Shelby Daytona Cobra Coupe CSX2601 sold for a record $7.25 million on Saturday at an auction in Monterey. The sale is believed to be a record for an American car at auction. Bob Bondurant drove it to victory in the 12 Heures du Reims--fittingly on the Fourth of July in 1965 to secure the FIA title.

Mitsubishi Outlander GT

The Mitsubishi Outlander GT will show at the New York Motor Show [ad#ad-1] The picture above is the Mitsubishi Outlander GT Concept (which is not a Photoshop mis-hap – just another version of a car maker’s ‘tease’ image, this time blurred). This is Mitsubishi’s efforts to make the Outlander more appealing, and from what we can see it’s taken a design cue from the Lamborghini Reventon, by putting a ‘Stealth Fighter’ nose on the front. Actually, as a blurred image, the front end does look a little reminiscent of the Lagonda Concept we saw at Geneva last month.