National Bearings 510074 Front Wheel Bearing on 2040-parts.com

Average cost of car insurance down 12.5%

The average cost of insurance is now 12.5% lower than it was a year ago, thanks to new EU rules on gender equality. That’s according to over four million quotes analysed on Confused.com. On Bing: see pictures of male drivers Women and car insurance – all the facts The rules, introduced at the end of 2012, said a person’s gender shouldn’t affect their insurance premium.

McLaren MP4-12 650S hits the Web ahead of official Geneva reveal

Images of the new McLaren MP4-12 650S have leaked to the Internet ahead of a planned unveiling for the British supercar at the Geneva Motor Show in early March. Created in response to customer demand for an edgier version of the McLaren MP4-12C offering greater levels of driver engagement, the 650S runs a more heavily tuned version of McLaren's twin-turbocharged 3.8-liter V8 direct-injection engine producing a claimed 25 hp more than the variant used by standard sibling for a total of 641 hp (as its name suggests 650 ps -- metric hp). Further details remain scarce ahead of the MP4-12C 650S's official public unveiling in Switzerland two weeks from now, although information passed on to prospective customers at a private presentation of the new two-seater held last week suggest it is also in line to receive a series of modifications to its seven-speed dual clutch gearbox, suspension, steering, brakes and aerodynamics -- all aimed at providing it with a more aggressive nature and added racetrack ability.

Ford's EcoBoost engine torture test gets TV broadcast, Web chat

Towing logs in Oregon and race cars in Florida, then running the Baja 1000 race. Ford did all that with one EcoBoost V6 built for truck duty. How did the engine fare?