Whistler Wic-1229c on 2040-parts.com

GM posts wider loss, burns through $5.2 billion in cash

General Motors, battered by a global economic collapse and buoyed by U.S. rescue loans, posted its sixth straight quarterly loss and burned through $5.2 billion in cash as revenue shrank by more than a third. The net loss of $9.6 billion in the fourth quarter compares with a loss of $1.5 billion a year earlier.

Chrysler to build ZF's eight-speed transmission in Indiana

The Chrysler Group plans to spend $300 million to build a new eight-speed automatic transmission licensed from ZF Group, a transmission maker headquartered in Friedrichshafen, Germany. The investment will pay for installation of special tooling and equipment at Chrysler's Transmission Plant 1 and Kokomo Casting Plant in Indiana and help retain 1,200 jobs there, Chrysler said Wednesday. Production will start in 2013.

Reproducing reality – X-Rite’s Total Appearance Capture

Total Appearance Capture isn't some sinister new form of identity theft but a revolutionary method of digitizing physical models using a new scanning technology, with the ability to capture extraordinary detail and all input and output light. The system, from coatings color measurement experts X-Rite, combines color, texture, gloss and other surface characteristics into a digital material ‘description' that can be imported directly to computer-aided design programs. What sets it apart from previously available methods is its ability to collect information on complex materials such as textiles, leather, basketwork, stone, coatings and plated finishes, in a 3D scene lit by a virtual studio environment.