Blue Blood, the “new luxury denim & fashion house” and Husqvarna, the “market-leading producers of extreme ‘Supermoto’ motorcycles” have teamed up to create a “flammable mix of superiour style, power and performance” in the form of a pair of customized, limited edition, co-branded motorcycles “set to hit the streets near you at around 100 mph”.
With a combination of motocross set-up, speed tires and Blue Blood style, these bikes are destined to become the stylish speedster’s choice for cross-town traffic.
The Ariel Atom is the only car to ever destroy Jeremy Clarkson’s face:
However, despite its looks, this car isn’t the Ariel Atom:
No, this car is a home-built Ariel Atom clone that’s the end result of a gearhead with a garage and a dream. (And 800+ hours of work.)
Featuring stainless panels from old appliances, black body panels from an ancient kayak and an old doghouse, a throttle pedal from salvaged parts that were the result of a dumpster dive at a local engineering firm, and the k20a3 engine out of a wrecked RSX, it’s also an eco-friendly car that shows that recycling can be quick too.
Specs come in at 4.5 seconds to 60, and 35+ MPG, so it’s not bad in the performance department either.
A home-built dream car pieced together from scraps lying around the house?
Dell’s new Studio Hybrid line of computers is a rather interesting offering.
Designed to be an “anywhere-you-want-it-desktop”, the pint-sized PC comes in six colors, as well as bamboo, features an ultra-compact design with Intel mobile technology performance, a slot-load DVD, HDMI, digital/analog TV tuner, and optional Blu-ray for home entertainment duties.
In addition, the Dell Hybrid helps to preserve the planet as Dell’s greenest and most power-efficient consumer desktop (75% less printed documentation, 70% less power usage, Energy Star 4.0 compliant, and packaging made form 95% recyclable materials).
A good-looking computer that’s good for the environment and performs too?
How do you take an already feather-light supercar and reduce the weight by more than 70 pounds?
Easy; just make it more environmentally friendly.
Lotus decided to make an Eco version of their venerable Elise, and in the process, managed to reduce the already svelte curb weight.
Changes include a collection of sustainable materials for the body and trim, including hemp, eco wool, sisal, and a new, high-tech, water-based paint that can be applied by hand and can still achieve the fantastic finish you’d expect from a car of this quality. The new pieces and parts manage to reduce the Elise’s environmental footprint throughout its lifetime, as well as limit the amount of energy used during its production.
In addition to the new materials, Lotus has also added a flexible solar panel to the roof that helps power the electric system (less strain on the engine means better efficiency) and added a green shift light (hopefully in addition to the regular, ‘you’re about to blow up your engine’ red shift light) that helps drivers achieve the maximum fuel efficiency while driving the car.
Thankfully the engine and chassis are still the same, and Elise has actually managed to improve the performance by reducing the weight, so you’re still getting one of the best handing cars on the market out of the deal, but if you’d like to save a little Earth while tearing up a little track, the Eco Elise might be just the car you need.
The Obsidian SG-One is in a class all its own, and is possibly (probably) one of the coolest custom cars I’ve ever seen.
What you see here started life as a 1967 Mustang, but didn’t stay that way for long.
The first to go was the engine, and it was quickly replaced with a 392 cubic inch V8 making 847.8 horsepower and 770 lbs. ft. of torque on 91-octane pump gas. Twin Rotrex C38-81 superchargers feed through twin air-to-air intercoolers, down through a custom aluminum intake, and past the Big Stuff 3 fuel injection system.
What’s the resulting performance?
0-60 in under three seconds, and an estimated top speed of over 210 MPH.
Power is then routed through a Tremec TKO 600 5-speed with Master Shift paddle shifters and a Mittler Brothers 9” rear end.
Chassis refinements include an integrated tubular chassis, 4-point hidden roll cage, redesigned shock towers and reinforced frame rails, and a full 4-piece belly pan.
Coil over suspension on all four corners keep the 18” and 20” wheels firmly planted, and 14” Brembo brakes slow everything down if needed.
The interior features a 2-seat conversion with heated Recaro seats, a 3,000 watt Kicker sound system including GPS navigation, XM radio, mobile wi-fi, and more. The hand crafted dash board, door panels, headliner, center console, and rear panels all fit like a glove, and the billet accessories are sprinkled throughout to keep everything sparkling.
Outside, a 2005 Mustang front end was grafted on, including custom headlights and turn signals, a custom hood vents the massive power plant, flared fenders tuck the wheels away, and custom billet grills and tail light panel finish off the look.
According to the current owner, over 15,000 hours of work went into creating this perfect pony, at a duplication cost of approximately $1.3 million. Sure, you could get a Bugatti Veyron for that kind of coin, but who wants something that 499 of your closest billionaire buddies have too?
Not I, said the oil tycoon.
Does the world need a million dollar mustang?
No, but I’ll bet it sure is glad it has one.
(Be sure to click through to the site for more information, since there was tons more facts, figures, and custom parts that I could have listed.)
When a car already has 1018 horsepower and runs on E85 ethanol, it’s hard to top it, but Koenigsegg has done just that with the CCX and CCXR Edition.
The aim of the Edition is to “deliver superior performance - on the track, in a straight line and on country roads - and to do so in style and comfort.”
Both are fitted with the 4.8L twin-supercharged engine, and have been track-tuned with modified shock absorbers, stiffer springs, anti-roll bars, reset dampers, and a lowered chassis.
The carbon fiber bodies have also been enhanced for additional downforce with an optimized rear wing, front winglets, and a larger front splitter and nolder, all left in raw carbon fiber form so that you can appreciate their beauty. And because it’s raw carbon fiber, “each individual section of carbon fibre bodywork has been painstakingly matched and then joined together inside out like a tailored suit, to create a stunning pinstripe effect. The process is so time-consuming that it takes almost twice as much time to create the clear-coated visible carbon body compared to the normal painted carbon CCX body.”
The interior features special anodized aluminum trim and a redesigned Koenigsegg Chronocluster and center console to “conform the Edition’s exclusive status.”
Want one?
Get in line, because only 14 of the CCX Editions will be made, though that’s more than enough when compared to the six CCXR Editions that will ever see the light of day.
It’s tough to beat the style and performance of a Classic Reflection Coachworks Corvette.
By starting with a C5 chassis, the CRC Corvette gives you all of the conveniences of a modern car; and by grafting on a carbon fiber body that is inspired by the 1962 Corvette, the CRC Corvette gives you the style that will turn heads and remind you of Detroit’s better days.
Each car is hand crafted and built to order, so you’ll always know that your Corvette is truly your Corvette.
All you need now is a sock-hop and a stoplight and you’ll be good to go.
If you haven’t already seen it, then fire up Fandango, find a theater that’s playing it near you, and go see Juno.
It’s that good.
The story is about Juno MacGuff, a “confidently frank teenage girl who calls the shots with a nonchalant cool and an effortless attitude as she journeys through an emotional nine-month adventure into adulthood”.
Ellen Page plays Juno, and lights up the screen with what I can easily imagine will be a multiple-award-winning performance, Her witty, fast paced dialogue creates a lovable character that you can’t help but root for, and she manages to both control her life with a tough exterior and search for meaning within a growing interior at the same time.
Michael Cera plays Bleeker (the father) and continues his recent climb up Hollywood’s star ladder. He isn’t in the film as much as I would have expected, but the scenes that he is in are filled with a great dialogue that lends itself well to the high-school theme. Both Juno and Bleeker are a mix of confidence and confusion, and their growing and changing relationship mirrors the growing and chancing that Juno’s body is going through.
Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner play the role of the adopting parents, and each deliver a stellar performance that adds another element to the film. Bateman struggles to figure out what type of person he wants to become as Garner struggles to become the person that she knows she wants to be, and neither over-sells their role.
Allison Janney and J.K. Simmons play the role of Juno’s parents, and are supportive in a way that is both enviable and believable.
For a movie that manages to make you feel good, it does deal with a rather heavy issue, and also runs through the full range of emotions. There are moments of pure comedy, moments of great emotion and connection, moments of truth and moments of powerful silence, and each pulls you in a different direction. However, the plot never takes you down an expected path, and in the end, you’ll want to cheer for a film that manages to define what a coming-of-age tale should be.
Steve Saleen started out like any other Mustang tuner, adding more horsepower, more handling, more good looks, and more sexy to an already potent platform. Since the mid ‘80s, he’s been testing, tuning and tweaking his cars to get every last bit of performance out of the blue oval.
Then, in 2000, Saleen did something that few others in the car world have been able to master: he designed and built his own car. The jump from bolting parts onto an existing car to designing your own car from the ground up is huge, but the S7 quickly dominated both the track and the street, proving that Americans can play the supercar game just as well as the Europeans can.
Saleen’s current line-up includes the S7 (with 1000 twin turboed horsepower), the S281 Mustang (including a 550 horsepower Extreme version), the S331 Sport Truck (including a 450 horsepower supercharged version), and the new Parnelli Jones limited edition collaboration Mustang. If it’s fast, and it’s American, chances are, it’s Saleen.
Mopar (a conjunction of MOtor and PARts) is the Chrysler Group’s parts and services division, and also responsible for occasionally acting as the brand’s aftermarket performance division. Their latest creation, debuted at the Detroit Auto Show, is a Dodge Viper SRT-10 with an attitude. Under the old mantra “there’s no replacement for displacement”, MOPAR found a monstorous 675 horsepower hiding within their 8.4-liter V10 thanks to better cooling, a cold-air intake, and a variety of other tweaks. In addition to the go fast good stuff, they added adjustable suspension, blacked-out alloy wheels wrapped in Michelin rubber, some nice carbon fiber body appendages, and painted the entire thing in anthracite-gray with a bold red stripe running down the passenger’s side. Venom never looked like so much fun.
