Tekonsha Prodigy Brake Controller on 2040-parts.com

First Sight: Mercedes-Benz SL

The new high-tech, low weight Mercedes SL roadster receives its official global unveil next week in Detroit but Car Design News got an early peek of the final production car and had a chat with its designers at Mercedes' US advanced design studio in Carlsbad, California back in November. "We want to get back to clean, long-lasting design," director of Mercedes global advanced design and SL project leader, Steffen Kohl told CDN at the exclusive preview of the sixth-generation model. "So the new SL is long, sleek and still full of tension in the feature lines but less wedgy." In a short presentation Kohl felt all SLs became successfully iconic in their times because they followed two key rules – ‘sensuality' and ‘cleanness' – but alluded that the first rule may have been lost in more recent eras.

See craftsmen build the Maserati Alfieri

At Geneva earlier this month, Maserati debuted the Alfieri concept, a love letter to Maserati's first 100 years and a preview of the next few years, if not the next 100. Here, design chief Lorenzo Ramaciotti shows how the Alfieri -- named after one of the five Maserati brothers -- was inspired by the 1954 Maserati A6GCS/53, as previously threatened, especially in the proportions. But like any car, the key is always in the proportions.

Toyota i-Road concept (2013) first official pictures

This is the Toyota i-Road, a tiny concept car that will be officially unveiled at the 2013 Geneva motor show tomorrow. It's a two-seater, three-wheeled electric city car that Toyota reckons is the future of urban motoring. Is the Toyota i-Road a potential Renault Twizy rival? If it does go into production, the pair could be pretty close.