Snap On Tools Racing Baseball Cap on 2040-parts.com

Crunch watch Mar 09: the auto industry in crisis

By Ben Pulman and Tim Pollard Motor Industry 31 March 2009 13:48 Tuesday 31 March 2009• Porsche said that its earnings before tax rose to €7.3 billion in the six months to the end of January – including a €6.8bn windfall from its VW share options (Financial Times)• Fritz Henderson, GM's president and chief operating officer, will step up to replace Rick Wagoner, who was ousted on Sunday as CEO of General Motors (Financial Times)• President Obama is essentially CEO-in-chief of GM – despite not owning a single cent of stock, says Detroit News commentator (Detroit News)• German chancellor Angela Merkel gives assurances that any would-be investors in GM's European arm will be given state support. Opel is asking for €3.3 billion in aid – and up to 25,000 jobs in Germany depend on it, with up to 300,000 jobs across Europe including Saab and Vauxhall (BBC News)Monday 30 March 2009• General Motors' chief executive Rick Wagoner has been ordered to resign by US president Barack Obama with immediate effect. It's part of Obama's administration's critique of GM and Chrysler's turnaround plans – he's understood to be unhappy with the plans submitted (BBC News)• New GM non-executive chairman Kent Kresa has admitted that at the company's next general meeting it will have 'a majority of new directors' (General Motors)• Chrysler will receive US government aid for the next 30 days, but the Obama administration has said that if the company cannot secure a tie-up with the Fiat Group within that time period it will not receive any more money from the taxpayers and could go into liquidation.

MINI Coupe Concept Photo Image Gallery +Video

The MINI Coupe Concept photo gallery and video Well, BMW has gone a bit berserk on the photos they’ve sent us – plus a video of the Coupe – so we thought it was probably sensible to put this lot up separately from the main story and press release. It seems highly unlikely that with this much effort the MINI Coupe is going to stay a concept for very long. For us, it is the first sensible extension of the whole MINI concept and should be a big seller – but it won’t be cheap – think in the region of £30k.

McLaren MP4-12C – the website +video

McLaren has launched a new website concentrating on the new MP4-12C Which is actually a good website. It has reams of good information and lots of images. I wouldn’t try using it from a dial-up connection, as it’s heavy on flash and imagery, but if you have a half decent connection it’s worth a play.