Yamaha Heavy Duty Trim Motor Arco 6260 on 2040-parts.com

2014 Skoda Yeti Facelift – now comes as Town or Country

The Skoda Yeti gets a facelift for 2014 – and a split personality The Skoda Yeti has been a big success for Skoda – and rightly so, it’s very able and decently priced – but it’s been around for a while and is ready for a facelift. So Skoda has done the usual facelift tweaks for the Yeti – which will be revealed in public at next month’s Frankfurt Motor Show – with new grill and lights at the front, titivated tailgate and lights at the back, some new colour options - Moon-White, Jungle-Green, Metal-Grey and Magnetic-Brown – and new alloys. Inside the tweaks are even less obvious with titivations for the steering wheel, dashboard trim and upholstery and the arrival of a rear view camera and automatic parking the main highlights.

Electric Ford Focus starts European production

The Electric Ford Focus (pictured) is now being built in Europe The electric Ford Focus is already in production, and on sale, in the USA, and now it’s gone in to production in Germany ahead of arriving with owners in July. So far, the Focus EV hasn’t been an overwhelming success in the US, with just over 700 sold in the first five months of 2013 but, even though Ford see the EV as a niche product, they’re still hoping to make a dent in sales of the Nissan LEAF in Europe. The Focus EV comes with an electric motor producing 143bhp and powered by a bank of lithium-ion batteries.

Driven: Honda FCX Clarity

It may be powered by a hydrogen fuel cell but the Honda FCX Clarity is no work-in-progress; its technology awkwardly shoehorned into an existing model. Nor is it a brittle concept without suspension banned from exceeding 30mph. It's a safety-tested four-seat executive sedan designed from scratch to accommodate hi-tech underpinnings.