Allstar Performance Weld-on Lower Trailing Arm Bracket P/n 99282 on 2040-parts.com

Jaguar XE Estate & Coupe “…a very difficult business case”

It’ll be tough to extend the Jaguar XE Range in to an Estate & Coupe We’ve banged on for years about Jaguar extending their saloon car range (well, the XJ and XF as that’s all they had until the XE arrived) to coupes and estates, at the very least. We know, for example, that the Jaguar XJ Coupe has been on the drawing board for as long as the current XJ, but Jaguar has failed to build it. Similarly, there have been rumblings about an XF Coupe for years, but that has come to nought too, although Jaguar did finally manage to launch the XF Sportbrake Estate to extend the XF range a little.

New Mercedes B-Class Electric Drive goes in to production

The first Mercedes B-Class ED (pictured) rolls off the production line in Rastatt With the BMW i3 grabbing headlines – and flying out of showrooms – as BMW’s first electric car, Mercedes need to play catch-up with a convincing EV of their own, and that’s the new B-Class Electric Drive – an EV version of the regular B-Class – which has now gone in to production in Germany. Built alongside regular ICE versions of the B-Class at Mercedes’ Rastatt Plant, the B-Class ED (Electric Drive) looks practically the same as its more conventionally powered siblings – although the front bumper does look a bit different – and has an electric motor good for 177 bhp and 250 lb/ft of torque, can manage a scoot to 62 mph in 7.9 seconds and has a range of up to 124 miles. The range – at least the quoted range – is a chunk better than the BMW i3′s and on a par with the latest Nissan LEAF, thanks to EV technology provided by Tesla, and the wrapping of an EV drivetrain in a conventional series production car could appeal to more buyers than the ‘statement’ design of the BMW i3.

New watch alert: Fiero

We've featured some pretty fancy lifestyle successories around here, but until today, we hadn't been able to find anything that captures the spirit of the mighty Pontiac Fiero. But today is a new day. Thanks to the miracles of modern shipping, we're able to order this little beauty straight from Kowloon, Hong Kong.