Vintage 1960s Fram Filters Decal Sticker on 2040-parts.com

Tyre kickers cost industry millions

CUSTOMERS who have no intention of buying a used car are costing dealers millions of pounds every year in wasted time and lost purchases. By taking up the time of sales staff and keeping them away from genuine buyers, so called ‘tyre kickers’ soak up time touring showrooms and asking questions. Some will even take a test drive while having no intention to buy a car.

Aston Martin DB9 4WD Plug-in Hybrid revealed by Bosch (video)

Bosch has built a plug-in hybrid Aston Martin DB9 We’ve always believed one of the best uses for hybrid powertrains is to provide extra performance on high-end cars, something Bosh has demonstrated by fitting the Aston Martin DB9 with a hybrid setup. The hybrid DB9 hasn’t been built to preview a production hybrid DB9 (although it probably should) but to demonstrate what Bosch can do with an existing car. Aston Martin donated the DB9 to Bosch for the hybrid project, and Bosh has fitted the DB9 with three electric motors – one at each front wheel and one next to the Aston’s V12 – which gives the DB9 something in the region of an extra 250bhp to play with.

One Lap of the Web: Dancing grandmas, fun with captions and drunken driving

We spend a lot of time on the Internet -- pretty much whenever we're not driving, writing about or working on cars. Since there's more out there than we'd ever be able to cover, here's our daily digest of car stuff on the Web you may not otherwise have heard about. -- Here's your daily giggle: Watch some dancing grannies cruise in their Mitsubishi i-MiEV in an ad for Cambio, a Belgian car-sharing company.