Sprint Car Midget Micro Racing Carrera 6" 3/4 Shock on 2040-parts.com

Visionary tech

Ignore the marketers: There's nothing new under the technological sun. Cost and reliability concerns may have hindered the early adoption of these auto-tech breakthroughs, though you'd never know it based on their present-day ubiquity. 1941: Crossovers The combination of a fully enclosed, carlike body and all-wheel-drive underpinnings got its start with the Volkswagen Type 87 Kommandeurwagen.

Bentley Continental V8 S (2013) at Frankfurt motor show

This is the new Bentley Continental V8 S, set to be unveiled at the 2013 Frankfurt motor show. It’s the Bentley for buyers who don’t want (or can’t afford) the most potent W12 models, but don’t fancy an ‘entry level’ version of the V8 either. It’s got 521bhp, 502lb ft, and will hit 60mph in less than five seconds.

Project Car Hell, Straight Eight, Two Doors Edition: '47 Buick or '53 Packard?

Welcome back to another session in the Hell Garage, where you choose between a pair of projects that match coolness with torment. We've been through air-cooled German cars, cheap Italian cars and incomprehensible French cars in recent weeks, and now we're going to winch a couple of big American two-doors with straight-eight power out of the Lake of Fire. Before the V8 reigned supreme in luxury-car land, cars with long hoods and smooth-running inline-eight engines showed that you had made it, and we've found a pair of such cars that should be gorgeous when restored…after about a decade of work.