Porsche 924/924s/944 Tapered Bearing 79mm 016.311.375 B on 2040-parts.com

Big Three Truck Premieres

Once just a local agricultural fair, the State Fair of Texas, Dallas, has now become the launch platform of choice for automobile manufacturers to present new trucks. Texas is an immense market for pickup trucks and this year, the Detroit Three were there, along with Toyota, to present world premieres. And for the auto executives that make the trip down, the Texas Fair is surely the easiest assignment they will get each year: people in Texas like full size trucks and buy them as personal vehicles not because they need their capacity but rather because "it's Texas here, y'know".

ICEM Style creative design software launched

ICEM Ltd, known for its ICEM Surf Class A surface development software, has launched ICEM Style, a new software product developed specifically for use by creative designers in the transportation design and industrial design industry. The launch presentation highlighted the integrated workflow from concept development in ICEM Style, through to refinement in ICEM Surf, enabling designers and engineers to share the same model data throughout the design process. According to ICEM, it is now possible, for the first time in a concept design tool, to design in a photo-realistic modelling environment, without using third-party visualisation products, or to wait for a static rendering to be generated.

174-mph Volkswagen Golf R400 heads for Beijing motor show

Volkswagen has divulged plans to reveal a spectacular new Golf R-based concept car called the Golf R400 at this weekend's Beijing auto show. Said to preview a possible limited production model from Volkswagen's increasingly active R performance car division, the Golf R400 runs a powered-up version of the Golf R's turbocharged 2.0-liter direct-injection gasoline engine aimed at providing it with the sort of firepower to match the current king of the Euro hot hatchback brigade, the Mercedes-Benz A45 AMG. VW The VW Golf R400 makes 395 hp from a 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine.