Four Seasons 55274 Discharge Line on 2040-parts.com

Budget 2009 - UK gets £2000 scrappage scheme

By Ben Pulman Motor Industry 22 April 2009 15:15 Chancellor Alistair Darling has announced a £2000 car-scrapping incentive, and a surprise 2p per litre increase in fuel tax in the latest budget. Darling delivered his Budget speech at 12.30pm GMT today. Scroll down the page to see our edited highlights of the 2009 Budget, read in-depth details of the scrappage scheme and see how the motor industry has responded.

Aston Martin One-77 (2009) wins top design prize at Villa d’Este

By Tim Pollard (photography by Mike Goodbun) First Official Pictures 27 April 2009 10:39 It’s having a long drawn-out gestation, but Aston Martin’s One-77 supercar made its world show debut at this weekend’s Villa d’Este, where it scooped the top prize for concept cars and prototypes. We’ll forgive you if you thought the One-77 had already been unveiled, but the car at Geneva was a technical cutaway rolling chassis – the first finished car is the one show in our photos above. The One-77 won more than 30% of the votes among the eight cars entered in its category.

Volkswagen Golf R 400 revealed – and it looks production ready

The VW Golf R 400 (pictured) revealed ahead of Beijing A few days ago we had a teaser sketch for the VW Golf R 400, a 395 bhp version of the Golf R, which we assumed would be nothing more than yet another uber-powerful Golf Concept. But with underpinnings largely taken from the production Golf R, and a fully functioning interior, this Golf R 400 looks more production ready than any Golf Concept before. The Golf R 400 still uses the regular Golf R’s 2,0 litre Turbo, but VW has managed to squeeze an extra 99bhp and 52lb/ft of torque to produce supercar-rivalling performance of 0-62mph in 3.9 seconds and a top speed of 174mph.