Yamaha Marine 90480-08005-00 90480-08005-00 Grommet on 2040-parts.com

Design-firm boss Sergio Pininfarina dies after long illness

Sergio Pininfarina, who ran the famous Italian automotive design company of the same name for 40 years, has died after a long illness. He was 85. Pininfarina had the last word on the company's design projects for almost 50 years.

Renault Twin’Run gets 316bhp & pays homage to the Renault 5 Turbo

The Twin’Run is an extreme version of the next Twingo and manages to pay homage to the old Renault 5, with a thumping great V6 bolted in the middle and pumping out 316bhp and 280lb/ft of torque, enough to get to 62mph in 4.5 seconds and on to 155mph. The Nissan-sourced V6 gets mated to a SADEV six-speed sequential gearbox and comes with a limited slip diff to stop the tyres burning off when the going gets brisk. As well as endowing the Twin’Run with lots of power, Renault has also kept weight down to 950kg by using a tubular chassis, glass-polyester composite for the bodywork, lumps of carbon fibre and not a hugely laden interior.

Special BMW M3 Competition Edition coupe gets Frozen Silver matte paint

Directly on the heels of SEMA, the matte capital of the world, BMW announced a special run of the 2012 BMW M3 Competition Edition coupe in Frozen Silver matte paint. And we mean extremely limited: just 40 cars celebrating 40 years of BMW racing in North America will be made. Each car will have the Frozen Silver paint, black hood intakes and dark chrome exterior trim.