Vibrant Performance 12676 Throttle Body Connector on 2040-parts.com

Webinars: Perceived Quality in the Digital Design World

Car Design News hosted a new webinar with Icona Solutions yesterday, June 8th. Focusing on perceived quality in the digital design world, Icona Solutions' Dr John Maxfield explained how the company's aesthetica software – which enables design teams to gain early insight and resolve fit and finish issues – can improve perceived quality and craftsmanship. Hosted by Dr John Maxfield, Technical Director and Founder of Icona Solutions Ltd, the webinar demonstrates how aesthetica helps designers produce realistic images of real world products, including materials / color / finishes, with targets to allow early perceived quality reviews.

BMW M3 coupe gets stripped down to go club racing

BMW's M division is back in the business of building specialty street-legal race cars with a new lightweight version of the M3 called the GTS. The lightweight coupe, set to go on sale in early 2010 at a yet-undisclosed price, was conceived as a limited-edition model primarily for club-based racing in much the same way that Porsche builds the 911 GT3 Clubsport. But in a clear effort to link its track-based activities with the production-car side of its business, BMW's M division is offering the new car with a homologation package that will allow customers to register the M3 GTS for street use.

Bench Racing: New crop of supercars

It's been a while since we've hypothetically raced a handful of cars around the office; long enough that an entirely new crop of supercars has arrived for us to chart, graph and dissect. Today we're zeroing in on the $1-$3 million price tag range, which fits the Ferrari LaFerrari, McLaren P1, Pagani Huayra and the Bugatti Veyron Super Sport. The first three fit neatly, pricewise, at about $1.3 million.