Cummins 5.9 Diesel Engine Crankshaft 3944204 Refurbished / Machine Shop Fresh on 2040-parts.com

Will your next new car stop itself?

Last week in Park City, Utah, a group of us were discussing the chutzpah that some manufacturers have in charging hundreds of dollars for outboard mirrors that dip downward when the vehicle's placed in reverse. The consensus was, “Since the electric motors in the mirrors are already there, and the computers know the car's set to back up, it's only a line of code. A very expensive line of code.” The European Union seems to be thinking along the same lines.

Hot seats: from design to delivery [sponsored]

As the user demands on car interiors are increasingly influenced by their growing design consciousness, so suppliers like Lear strive to bring better-engineered seating to satisfy. 2013 was another big year for Lear, as Jeanette Puig-Pey, its global fabric & leather design manager, enthuses: "At our ‘Design2Perform' event we celebrated the unveiling of our brand new collection, with special emphasis on color and texture and our TeXstyle Enhance product, perfect for customization. Laser etching is part of this offering, it is exclusive to Lear Corporation and can be used to add refined design elements to cloth and leather." A mix of fabric and leather in seating is not new but is often seen by the consumer as a cheaper alternative to full leather.

Aston Martin DB9 1M: Aston’s Facebook celebration

To mark reaching one million followers on Facebook, Aston Martin invited its fans to help design a car – the Aston Martin DB9 1M. Just like every other car maker, Aston Martin is beginning to embrace the web as perhaps the best way to get their message across and showcase their products. Yesterday we had Aston Martin trumpeting its website traffic on the back of the launch of the new Vanquish, and now we get an Aston designed with the help of Aston’s Facebook Fans.