1950 1951 Buick Fuel Oil Gauge - Original on 2040-parts.com

MINI Countryman Coupe to be the MINI Paceman after all

MINI has revealed that the MINI Paceman Concept which we thought was going to hit production as the MINI Countryman Coupe will be the Paceman after all. There was always little chance that the MINI Paceman – a two door Countryman Coupe first seen at Detroit last year – was doing anything other than heading for production. After all, making a coupe version of the Countryman is an obvious niche for MINI – that great seeker of niches – to extend the MINI franchise in to.

New BMW M3 and M4 revealed for 2014

This is it, folks – this is your early petrolheaded Christmas present: BMW has released full details of the new BMW M3 Saloon and M4 Coupe. And we do mean full details. Output of 431 turbocharged horsepower is the headline, but really it’s the extent of the engineering overhaul carried out by BMW’s M division that really stuns the senses here.

Better Place Electric Car visitor centre opens

Better Place have opened a visitor centre in Israel to demonstrate their battery swap technology for electric cars Last October we wrote about a start-up company in Israel – Better Place – that had a new way forward for electric cars by taking the purchase of battery packs out of the equation, and was developing a system for ‘Battery Swap’ stations where electric car owners could drive in and swap their battery pack for a fully-charged one in a few minutes. That story first brought to our attention our favourite quote of last year – by Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn – who said “A hybrid is like a mermaid: if you want a fish, you get a woman; if you want a woman, you get a fish.” Which probably explained why Nissan – and its partner Renault – got involved with Better Place. Better Place aims to address the main concerns of electric car drivers by making the battery packs in electric cars ‘swappable’.