317bbhp Mazda RX7 Life with the L200 Strathycruise Accident Guide

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Track and Road Magazine

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KNOCKHILL REVIEW LING TIME PHOTOGRAPHER DEWARS CENTRE

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wELCOME

Article by Max Manfordmax.manford@tarmag.co.uk

Chief Editor

01

TARMAG

3

It’s Finally here! TarMag - Track and Road Magazine. I’m Max Manford, Chief Editor and I personally would like to welcome you! So what to expect from TarMag? Well all the latest motor-ing news, reviews including all aspects of the motoring industry from 4x4’s, modified cars, supercars and of course “general” motoring.

Topic of the month and every other month is Cars! We here at TarMag aim to set new standards in automotive journalism with an editorial style unique to TarMag. Our reviews cover every-thing you would expect from a Car Magazine but with so much more! We put the cars through our rigorous road tests, and re-port on the practical elements that you our readers want to read about. We also review Motoring industry business/websites and we ask the important questions that you want to know.

Topped with gadget reviews and manufacturer news. TarMag covers everything from the latest super cars to GPS satellite navigation systems. Being an online digital magazine, we will also be including video reviews.

Whether you work within the motoring industry, sales person, or a consumer, our news has got it covered. The mix of informa-tion provided combined with the talents of our editors and their drivers, make TarMag a worthwhile read! So are you ready to turn the page?

Feel free to email into to us any questions you may have! Thanks again.

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INDEX

THE TARMAG TEAMManaging Editor: Nicholas Bradford

Nicholas@tarmag.co.uk Tel : 0870-312-1827

Assistant Editor: Max Manford

Max@tarmag.co.uk Tel : 0870-312-1827

Adver tising & Marketing : David Daniels

D avid@tarmag.co.uk Tel : 0701-740-0827

Contributing Editors:

Nicholas Bradford, Ben Weston, Max Manford, David Daniels

General Enquiries:Tel : 0870-312-1827Fax: 0870-315-6827

info@tarmag.co.uk

Subscription and back issues contact

sub@tarmag.co.uk

Ta rMag -Enquiries199A Borough Road

MiddlesbroughTS4 2BN

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INDEX

Motoring News 7-11Spotted 13-15General Motoring 17-21Knockhil l 23-27Colin McRae Tribute 29-31Accident Guide 33-35Gadget Reviews 39-41Mitsubishi L200 43-47Fiat 500 Alpine Review 49-53Strathycruise 55-59Mazda RX-7 61-63Lamborghini 65-69Adam Russell 71-75Ling Time 77-81Dewars Centre 83-84Competit ion 86Wrecked Exotics 87-89

écurie25Supercar Club

écurie25 limited, 250 Old Street, London, EC1V 9DD. t: 020 7159 2543 e: info@ecurie25.co.uk w: ecurie25.co.uk

More supercars, more days, no mileage limit, & more membership options...

Want a closer look?We hold regular open evenings at our base on Old Street in the City. Alternatively you are welcome to book an appointment to view the fleet at a time convenient to you.

Please call or register on our website for more details.

We have recently added the following cars to the 19-strong fleet: Aston Martin DBS Porsche GT3 RS Maserati Quattroporte Bentley Flying Spur

Our membership plans and credits system have been updated to give members more days driving - specifically more weekends. To see exactly what you can expect as an écurie25 member, plan your membership year using the membership configurator at www.ecurie25.co.uk/configurator.

Membership provides an economical and stress free alternative to ownership. We provide members with an immaculate fleet of supercars, whilst taking care of all depreciation, maintenance, servicing and insurance.

Membership plans start at £5k per year plus £1,500 one-off joining fee. Payment plans also available. Fees are inclusive of VAT and insurance.

Models purchased include engine sizes of 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4 l itres and with Sport or Lounge specification interiors. All en-gines boast outstand-ing per formance and economy, coupled to ultra-clean green cre -dentials, as i l lustrated by the 1.2 Pop version, which scooped top honours in the Green Supermini category at the What Car? Green Awards held in London last month.

Of special interest to fleet buyers, residual value guides for the Fiat 500, (which has a starting price of just £8,100), have recently increased, due in part to the model’s huge success. Current es-timates rate the en-try level 500 1.2 Pop as having a retained value at 47 per cent after three years.

“ This business win is typical of the fleet in-terest being shown in the Fiat 500 right now by companies large and small,” says Fiat Auto Financial Ser-vices’ Business Finance Manager David Joyce. “ The retro-styling of the new 500, which has already captured the public ’s imagina-tion, is now fi ltering through to fleet users.”

Seventy two all-black Fiat 500 superminis have been acquired on contract hire by communications specialist Nokia, in a fleet deal that will see the distinctively liveried Fiats help kick-start a new high profile promotion by the phone manufac-turing giant.

This summer, Nokia is launching ‘Nokia Connectors’ sending teams of student brand ambassadors on to UK streets, parks, beaches and parties, to help the public unlock the full poten-tial from their phones. Based all over

the UK in 18 key cities and armed with Nokia handsets and Fiat 500s, the aim is for brand ambassadors to entertain and connect with potential consumers, particularly in relation to Nokia’s new 6220 phone. The vehicle purchasing brief was for a great looking car that fitted Nokia’s youthful brand image. The 500, currently Car of the Year 2008, is rapidly becom-ing a lifestyle must-have, and was selected over stiff opposition. The 500s will be driven on contract hire over the next three to six

Why have 1 Fiat when you can have 72!

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This Months NEWSAll the latest news and gossip in the motoring industry from TarMag.....

The “Quantum of Solace” special edition Ford Ka

The Name is KA, Ford Ka.....The “Quantum of Solace” special edition Ford Ka

“Quantum of Solace” the highly-an-ticipated new James Bone Adven-ture features a cameo appearance from the all-new Ford Ka. A special edition “Quantum of Solace” Ka has been created with metallic gold paint with excusive interior graph-ics and interior trim! Compact in size, great looks, lively dynamics and a fun personality - retaining all the qualities which made the Ka so popular.

A tremendously popular car amongst small car buyers, in total throughout its 12-year life, the Ka production has exceeded 1.4 mil-lion vehicles.

The new Ka is a perfect match for the films feisty leading lady Camille played by Olga Kyrtlen-ko - a woman on a mission who quickly becomes an unlikely ally for Bond! The new Ka continues the re-

lationship with Ford and the James Bond Films following the Latest Ford Mondeo which featured in the 2006 Blockbuster “Casino Royale”

Staring Daniel Craig as the legend-ary secret agent, James Bond “ Quantum of Solace” opens in the UK 31st October. We look forward to reviewing it in the November issue of TarMag.

The New Toyota AvensisAn all new, British-built, Toyota Avensis will make its world debut on 2 October at the fashionable Paris motor show.

Taking centre stage on the Toyota stand Avensis has a sleek design that reflects the car’s strong and dynamic character.

New Avensis is the third generation of the model to be built at the Burnaston plant in Derbyshire. Due to go on sale in January 2009 it features engines that are both more powerful and emit less CO2, a crucial factor in today’s new car market, and it retains the high qual-ity, refinement and equipment levels that are an established Avensis

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MEET THE FAN IN THE VAN!

Football fans across the country will have the opportunity to vent their views from the comfort of a British-built Vivaro Doublecab during the 2008-09 season, thanks to a tie-in between Vauxhall Commercial Vehicles and talkSPORT radio.

Towards the end of the 2008-09 season, a Vivaro similar to the ‘Fan in the Van’ one will be given away as part of a talkSPORT listener competition.talkSPORT’s Match Day Live programme is broadcast every Saturday during the football season, between 12.00pm and 5.00pm.

“F” Prefix Released DVLA Personalized Registrations is unlocking its safe, and releas-ing the F-Series Registrations.

Over 20,000 new F-Series plates will be available. F1, F2, F3 rac-ing series drivers and support-ers will be able to pick up such plates as “F1 DAD”, “F1 SON”, etc. The F-Series registration plates will start at £599 and you will be able to view the plates avail-able from Monday 8th Septem-ber at www.dvlaregistrations.co.uk, and available to purchase from Tuesday 7th October.

0 - 6 2 m p h i n 4 . 5 s e c o n d s , 5 . 0 - l i t r e V 1 0 b i -Tu r b o, h a s t o b e t h e a l l n e w A u d i R S 6 S a l o o n ! Av a i l a b l e i n c o n j u n c t i o n w i t h t h e A u d i R S 6 Av a n t w h i c h w a s l a u n c h e d a t t h e s t a r t o f 2 0 0 8 , t h e S a l o o n i s n o w o n s a l e p r i c e d a t £ 7 6 , 1 6 0 c o s t i n g £ 1 , 5 7 0 l e s s t h a n t h e e x i s t i n g Av a n t v e r s i o n a n d 0 . 0 1 m p h f a s t e r ( b u t w e a r e n o t c o u n t -i n g ? ) , a n d d e l i v e r i e s c o m m e n c i n g N o -v e m b e r.

To p s p e e d o f 1 5 5 m p h l i m i t e d , h o w e v e r i t c a n b e 1 7 5 m p h a s a n o p t i o n a l d e -r e s t r i c t i o n p a c k a g e ! S i x s p e e d t r i p t o n i c

a u t o m a t i c t r a n s m i s s i o n , a n d s u r p r i s i n g l y t h a n k s t o i t s F S I i n j e c t i o n e f f i c i e n c y i t w i l l a c h i e v e a r e a l w o r l d e c o n o m y f i g u r e o f 2 0 . 3 m p g. T h e R S 6 a l s o f e a t u r e s t h e A u d i L E D d a y t i m e r u n n i n g l i g h t s .

O n e o f t h e o t h e r o p t i o n s a v a i l a b l e i s t h e 3 D S a t e l l i t e N a v i g a t i o n s y s t e m w h i c h f e a -t u r e s a 4 0 G B H a r d D r i v e w h i c h t o s t o r e a l l y o u r f a v o r i t e m u s i c ! W h o n e e d s a n I p o d e h !

We a t Ta r M a g a r e b i g f a n s o f t h e A u d i R S s e r i e s , s o w e h o p e t o r e v i e w t h i s a s s o o n a s w e c a n g e t o u r h a n d s o n o n e ! ( H I N T

572 BHP 0-62MPH in 4.5 SecondsAUDI RS6 SALOON JOINS THE NEW AUDI A6 RANGE

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The Audi R8 - Race DevelopedFor the first t ime Audi Sports have developed a racing sports cars for i ts customers in the form of the 500bhp GT3 version of the Audi R8. Available from autumn 2009. In the mean time Audi AG customer programme, logistics and factory will be created over the next few months in Ingolstandt, Neckarsulm and Györ.

Due to the GT3 regulations, the Audi R8 will come as a typical GT rear-wheel drive with i ts newly developed six speed sequential gear box, with the suspension system keeping com-ponents from the production l ine R8.

TWINGO RENAULTSPORT 133 - THE NEW ENTRY POINT TO THE WORLD OF

RENAULTSPORT

Twingo Renaultsport 133 is the result of a dual challenge which sought to deliv-er a car with genuine sporting creden-tials at the affordable price of £11,550. It is a Renaultsport car through and through, and features the same ingre-dients that have helped forge the suc-cess of its larger siblings, the Clio and Mégane Renaultsport. These include specific styling, coupled with a chassis, engine and braking system engineered for a high standard of performance that is also suited to everyday use

First races planned for 2009 season Audi Race Developed version of the R8

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The Audi R8 AKA “R16” within Audi Sport and the first prototype successfully complet-ed a roll out into the hands of Audi Factory driver Frank Beila.

The Audi R8 conforms to the production-based GT3 regulations allowing the car to be in many national & international race series.

The Audi R8 (R16) will take part in i ts f irst test races scheduled for the 2009 season, and deliveries to customers commencing autumn 2009.

All retail customers who place an order for a Twingo Renaultsport 133 within the first 133 days of ordering opening will receive a voucher for a free place on a Renaultsport trackday in 2009 with driver tuition at either Brands Hatch, Oulton Park or Bedford Auto-drome.

You can find out more information by visiting your nearest Renault dealer, or by logging on to www.renaultsport.co.uk.

SpOttED

Article by Max Manford

Photograph’ by our readers

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SPOTTED

Spotted ?Seen a sweet ride, modified car, super-car recently, and by chance you took a

photo of it?

Well send it into to TarMagspotted@tarmag.co.uk

Each month we give away the best picture prize!

This month prize is some TarMag Goodies so get sending in your pics...

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Alex From London 3 ROllERS - TAkEN DORCHESTER HOTEl, lONDON

Tom From Oxford lAMbORGHINI SPOTTED - MARlOw, buCkS

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ASTON MARTIN - SPOTTED IN lONDONMike From Essex

Sunny From Middlesbrough MERCEDES SlR - TAkEN IN lONDON

GENEraL MOtOrING

Articles by Ben Weston

08

GENERAl

The Cars :Jaguar XKR-S

Vauxhall Insignia

The General Motoring section :This section of the magazine covers the latest in concept and production cars.

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T h e J a g u a r X K R - S o f 2 0 0 8S i n c e t h e I n d i a n a u t o m o t i v e g i a n t , Ta t a , b o u g h t J a g u a r f r o m F o r d , w e ’ v e s e e n a n e w f l a r e o f i n n o v a t i o n a n d ‘ B r i t i s h -n e s s ’ c o m i n g t h r o u g h i n t h e i r c a r s . F r o m t h e b r a n d n e w X F, t h e f o r t h c o m i n g X J , a n d n o w t h i s X K R - S , i t i s e v i d e n t t h a t t h e B i g C a t i s f i r m l y b a c k i n t h e g a m e . N o w y o u ’ d e x p e c t a J a g u a r X K R - S t o b e s t u n n i n g , b u t t h e m o d e l o n d i s p l a y a t t h e B r i t i s h M o t o r S h o w w a s o n a w h o l e n e w l e v e l f o r J a g u a r. I t w a s , q u i t e s i m p l y, t h e m o s t b e a u t i f u l c a r o f t h e w h o l e S h o w – a n o p i n i o n s h a r e d b y e v e r y o n e s t a n d -i n g a r o u n d m e . T h e S i n X K R - S s t a n d s f o r ‘ s u p e r c h a r g e d ’ – J a g u a r ’s p r e f e r r e d w a y o f t u r b o - c h a r g i n g t h e i r e n g i n e s . A s u p e r c h a r g e r s i t s o n t h e i n l e t m a n i f o l d a n d p r o v i d e s i n s t a n t t o r q u e b o o s t f r o m t h e b e g i n n i n g o f t h e r e v r a n g e a n d t h e f i g u r e s r e a l l y a r e q u i t e i m p r e s s i v e .Wi t h a 4 . 2 - l i t r e a l u m i n u m V 8 p u m p i n g o u t 4 2 0 b h p a n d 4 1 3 l b f t o f t o r q u e , y o u g e t f r o m 0 - 6 0 i n u n d e r 5 s e c o n d s a n d o n t o a t o p s p e e d o f 1 7 4 m p h . T h e b r a k e s h a v e b e e n u p - r a t e d f r o m t h e s t a n d a r d X K R w i t h A l c o n R P e r f o r m a n c e b r a k e s a n d t h e S u s p e n s i o n , d a m p e r s a n d a n t i - r o l l b a r h a v e

b e e n t w e a k e d w i t h a n e v e n m o r e s p o r t -i n g b e n d i n m i n d . T h e f i g u r e s a r e n ’ t m i n d - b l o w i n g b u t t h e n a g a i n t h e X K R - S i s d e s i g n e d t o b a l a n c e r a w s p e e d w i t h o n - r o a d c o m p o s u r e .T h e a l u m i n u m c h a s s i s h a s b e e n s t i f f -e n e d a n d t h e b o d y h a s b e e n t w e a k e d f o r a l e s s e r d r a g c o e f f i c i e n t w i t h s u b t l e c h a n g e s s u c h a s a r e v i s e d f r o n t a i r -s p l i t t e r , b e t t e r d i f f u s e r a n d n e w s p o i l e r. T h e X K R - S s i t s o n 2 0 ” Vo r t e x l i g h t -w e i g h t a l l o y w h e e l s a n d t h e r i d e h a s b e e n d r o p p e d 1 0 m m f r o m t h e X K R ’s . I n s i d e , i s p u r e l u x u r y o f c o u r s e ? P i a n o b l a c k l e a t h e r , t w i n - n e e d l e s t i t c h i n g a n d a 5 2 5 - w a t t B o w e r s & Wi l k i n s s u r r o u n d s o u n d s y s t e m a r e a l l t o b e e x p e c t e d .H o w e v e r , t h e e n g i n e , i n t e r i o r a n d e v e n d r i v e d y n a m i c s a r e n u l l a n d v o i d b e -c a u s e y o u ’ l l w a n t t o h o p i n t o b e d w i t h i t a n y w a y. I t ’s t h e a u t o m o t i v e e q u i v a -l e n t o f P a r i s H i l t o n – y o u r e a l l y d o n ’ t c a r e a b o u t t h e s u b s t a n c e b e c a u s e i t l o o k s s o g o o d . A l t h o u g h t h a t ’s n o t e n -t i r e l y f a i r b e c a u s e t h e J a g u a r r e a l l y d o e s h a v e t h e b r a i n s t o m a t c h . N o w t h a t ’s m y s o r t o f J a g u a r.

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V a u x h a l l ’s M o n d . . . s o r r y , I n s i g n i a .

L i k e a l l c a r l o v e r s , I w e n t t o t h e B r i t i s h M o t o r S h o w w h e r e I s a w s o m e , f r a n k l y, s t u n n i n g c a r s . T h i s m a y n o t s u r p r i s e y o u . A f t e r a l l , t h e y f e a t u r e d t h e g o rg e o u s J a g u a r X K R - S c o n c e p t a n d a s u r p r i s i n g l y u n - P e u g e o t 3 0 8 R C Z c o n c e p t t h a t , a g a i n , w a s t r u l y s t u n n i n g . H o w e v e r, y o u m a y b e s u r p r i s e d t o k n o w t h a t a m o n g t h e p l e t h -o r a o f c a r p o r n w a s t h e n e w Va u x h a l l I n s i g n i a , s e t t o r e p l a c e t h e s o r e t h u m b o f t h e Va u x h a l l f a m i l y, t h e Ve c t r a , i n 2 0 0 9 . B e f o r e y o u s t i f l e y o u r l a u g h t e r a n d t u r n t h e p a g e , h e a r m e o u t . Va u x h a l l i s n o t a b a d w o r d i n m o t o r i n g a n y m o r e . N o , r e -a l l y. T h e A s t r a i s a t r u e G o l f - c h a l l e n g i n g p o c k e t r o c k e t a n d t h e C o r s a a n d A g i l a a r e b o t h c l a s s - l e a d e r s a n d s o m e w h e r e t h e r e a b o u t s . T h e b l a c k s h e e p h a s l o n g b e e n t h e Ve c t r a – d a t e d , p o o r q u a l i t y a n d w i t h a r a n g e o f a s t h m a t i c e n g i n e s . T h e F o r d M o n d e o , e s p e c i a l l y i n i t s n e w g u i s e , p r o v e d a m u c h b e t t e r p r o p o s i t i o n i n t h e p r i c e r a n g e . H o w e v e r, t h e Va u x h a l l b a d g e c o m m a n d s a s m i d g e n m o r e r e s p e c t t h a n t h e B l u e O v a l w h i c h i s r e f l e c t e d i n t h e 5 1 , 0 0 0 s a l e s o f Ve c t r a s s i n c e t h e r e -l a u n c h o f t h e F o r d M o n d e o .B a c k t o b a s i c sF o r t h e f i r s t t i m e s i n c e t h e V X 2 2 0 , i t f e e l s l i k e t h i s Va u x h a l l w a s m a d e b y p e o -p l e w h o l o v e c a r s . A s a n y B e n t l e y o w n e r w i l l t e l l y o u , i t ’s t h e l i t t l e t h i n g s t h a t m a k e t h e d i f f e r e n c e . F o r e x a m p l e , a p u s h o f t h e S p o r t b u t t o n c h a n g e s t h e i n . . . .

s t r u m e n t , d a s h a n d c a b i n l i g h t i n g f r o m a s u b t l e w h i t e t o a s p o r t i n g r e d . W h y ? N o i d e a b u t i t d o s e n ’ t h a l f p u t y o u i n t h e m o o d f o r s o m e r i g h t - f o o t - f u n . O h y e s , a n d f o r t h o s e o f y o u w h o w a n t a f a s t d r i v e h o m e a f t e r d r o p p i n g t h e k i d s o f f a t s c h o o l , t h e r e ’s a S p o r t b u t t o n – a n d i t a c t u a l l y d o e s s o m e t h i n g ! O n m o d e l s f i t -t e d w i t h F l e x R i d e ( Va u x h a l l ’s n e w a l l -w h e e l - d r i v e t e c h n o l o g y ) 6 0 % o f t o r q u e i s s e n t t o t h e r e a r w h e e l s a n d t h e s u s -p e n s i o n i s s t i f f e n e d f o r b e t t e r h a n d l i n g d u r i n g h a r d a c c e l e r a t i o n a n d c o r n e r-i n g . E v e n o u t o f S p o r t m o d e , i t d e t e c t s w h i c h w h e e l s h a v e l i t t l e o r n o t r a c t i o n a n d d i v e r t s d r i v e t o t h e w h e e l s w i t h m o s t g r i p . W h a t d o e s t h a t m e a n ? B e t t e r h a n -d l i n g t h r o u g h c o r n e r s a n d l e s s r i s k o f d a n c i n g i n t o a d i t c h w h e n i t ’s s n o w i n g . O f c o u r s e , F l e x R i d e w o n ’ t b e a v a i l a b l e o n t h e b a s i c m o d e l s b u t I c a n ’ t e m p h a -s i s e e n o u g h h o w m u c h o f a c h a n g e t h i s i s o v e r t h e o l d Ve c t r a w h e r e t h i s j u s t w a s n ’ t a n o p t i o n . H e l l , i t ’s n o t e v e n a n o p t i o n o n t h e M o n d e o . O n e - n i l t o Va u x -h a l l .A s i s c o m m o n w i t h a l l n e w c a r s , t h e I n -s i g n i a c o m e s o v e r f l o w i n g w i t h t e c h n o l -o g y. F u l l y - s p e c k e d , y o u ’ l l g e t t h e a f o r e -m e n t i o n e d F l e x R i d e , A d a p t i v e L i g h t i n g t o l e t y o u s e e “ a r o u n d c o r n e r s ” w i t h i m p r o v e d v i s i b i l i t y a t n i g h t , S p e e d L i m i t R e c o g n i t i o n t h a t f l a s h e s u p t h e s p e e d o f t h e z o n e y o u ’ r e i n o n t h e d a s h c o m p u t e r i n c a s e y o u m i s s e d i t , C D m u l t i c h a n g e r s , s a t - n a v, t h e l i s t g o e s o n . I ’ v e y e t t o s e e h o w t h e A d a p t i v e L i g h t i n g w o r k s b u t I ’ m i n t e r e s t e d i n t h e s p e e d l i m i t r e c o g n i t i o n .

Many a t ime have I been in unknown ter-r i tory, not regis tered the speed l imit for one reason or another (usual ly because I’m looking at a map) and gone sai l ing past a camera, obl ivious to the speed l imit . You know, 60 in a 50, that sor t of thing. Eas-i ly done, but with a quick glance you’l l be able to see what l imit you’re in f rom the dash. Now that is useful , for me anyway.Getting inside the InsigniaJust as Ford elevated the Mondeo in to a new class of luxury and ref inement , so too has Vauxhal l with the Insignia . I t i s be-ing hai led as one of the best- looking cars of 2008 al though I’m not sure who exact ly came up with that . I could have even made i t up myself but i t cer ta inly seems t rue. I had a chance to s i t in var ious Insignias and the cabin is a t ruly nice place to be. The dash (which bears no resemblance to the Vectra’s) is a wrap-around, cosset ing and luxurious affair. The instruments are tact i le and the s teer ing wheel has been reshaped to fa l l bet ter in the hand. I t ’s just more ergonomic. I could go as far as say-ing the inter ior feels a l i t t le more sol id than a Mondeo’s a l though I’m not sure i t ’s qui te as intui t ive in terms of the posi t ion-ing of things – you feel a t home in the Mondeo

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right away, you just sor t of seem to know where everything is . The only thing that breaks the façade of luxury is the gr i ff in badge s i t t ing in the middle of the s teer-ing wheel . But hey, that’s been redesigned too. Behind the wheelWhere the Mondeo real ly shone was in the dr iving. The great range of potent and frugal Ford engines mixed with unbeat-able dr iving dynamics earned the Mondeo much praise and the Insignia wil l have a very hard t ime topping i t . For a s tar t , i t has a longer wheelbase than i t ’s predeces-sor with the wheels 50mm further apar t on each axle . This should make i t feel more grounded and bui lds on the Vectra’s a l ready-robust road holding. A cr i t ic ism of the Vectra was the amount of wind and road noise that leaked into the cabin and this has been sor ted too thanks to re tuned suspension bushes. Even bet ter, the Insig-nia was tuned on Bri t ish roads rather than perfect Bavarian Autobahns and should r ide more comfortably because of i t . The Insignia wil l launch with three petrols and two diesels , a l l of which are fas ter than their Mondeo counterpar ts a l-though the Insignia is s l ight ly heavier.

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The diesels are expected to be the big-gest sel lers as they were on the Vectra so i t seems odd to have more petrol opt ions avai lable . I ’m not a fan of GM diesel en-gines , they never seem to be as quiet or ref ined as the Ford, Honda and Peugeot lumps – especial ly the great HDI engines used in the Cooper D, 307, e tc . Aware of this , Vauxhal l are br inging two brand-new 2.0- l i t re turbo diesels to the par ty in 128bhp and 158bhp var iants , re turning 49mpg. That’s a lmost 20bhp more than Ford’s 2 .0- l i t re Duratorq engines and just as economical .In the petrol camp, there are two free-revving turbo V6s. A 2.8- l i t re V6 with automatic ’box s i ts a t the top of the range, offer ing up 256bhp – 36bhp more than the Mondeo’s top-of- the- l ine 2.5- l i t re V6. There’s a lso a 217bhp 2.0- l i t re engine which wil l appeal to those who don’t want an oi l -burner. I t provides 259lb f t of torque from just 2 ,000rpm and is avai lable r ight up to the top of the rev range. These V6s are good, sporty engines and wil l couple very wel l with Vauxhal l ’s a l l -wheel-dr ive technology but i t ’s a shame the 3.0- l i t re V6 from the Vectra isn’t making an ap-pearance. There’s a lso the basic 1 .8- l i t re , 138bhp petrol f rom the Vectra for base models – nothing to wri te home about but ref ined nonetheless .

Vauxhal l wil l launch more engines includ-ing those focused on emissions and econ-omy in 2009 and the diesels , which al-ready ful ly comply with next year ’s Euro 5 Emissions Regulat ions, are to be made even more eff ic ient to meet the s t r ic t re-quirements of the f i f ty U.S. s ta tes .Better than a Mondeo?And the mil l ion-dol lar quest ion – wil l i t dr ive as wel l as a Mondeo? Sorry to le t you down but I just don’t know. I t ’ l l be c lose, I can te l l you that much. I t might even be bet ter, but that’s a big s ta tement to make. On models without FlexRide, I can’t see the dr ive being a world apart f rom the current Vectra . The tweaked chassis , suspension and engines wil l prob-ably make i t a more enjoyable , dynamic dr ive but I doubt i t ’ l l s t ray in to Mondeo terr i tory. That’s not a bad thing – the Vec-tra wasn’t bad as i t i s . However, FlexRide ( i f executed properly) should pose a much bigger threat . Across the board, Vaux-hal l ’s engines are a bi t pokier and the two cars weigh almost the same. Add to this the subject ively bet ter inter ior of the In-s ignia and Ford cer ta inly have something to worry about – the Insignia real ly has completed Vauxhal l ’s ever-bet ter range very wel l indeed.Ben Weston

Providing Chauffeur Service of the highest

quality and reliability throughout Central Scotland.

Tel 01592 643260 www.businesslimos.co.uk

Executive Cars and Limos

Tel 01592 643260 www.businesslimos.co.uk

Weddings - GOLF OUTINGS - Product launches - Business Meetings

Birthdays & Special Occasions - Airport Transfer - Tours

wEEkEND rEvIEw

Article by Max Manford

Photography byDavid Daniels/ Adam Russell

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kNOCkHIll

The Scottish Tuning ShowKnockhill, Scotland

Sun August 24thFull Review

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K n o c k h i l l r a c i n g c i r c u i t w a s h o s t o f t h e S c o t t i s h M o d i f i e d S h o w o n t h e 2 6 t h o f A u g u s t 2 0 0 8 . T h e w e a t h e r o n t h e d a y w a s o k a y f o r S u n n y S c o t l a n d , p a t c h y r a i n , c l o u d s , a n d S u n ! A n d s t r a n g e l y I m a n a g e d t o g e t a s l i g h t s u n t a n ! A r o u n d 4 0 0 0 p e o p l e t u r n e d u p t o t h e e v e n t o n t h e S u n d a y .

W i t h o v e r 1 3 0 c a r s t a k i n g t o t h e t a c k o n t h e d i f f e r e n t e v e n t s f r o m d r i f t i n g , d r a g r a c i n g , a n d y o u r g e n e r a l r a c i n g k e p t t h e a u d i e n c e b u s y . T h e D r i f t -i n g p r o v e d m o s t p o p u l a r w i t h a B M W m a n a g i n g t o h a v e a b l o w o u t w i t h a b i g c h e e r f r o m t h e c r o w d s . Yo u c a n c h e c k o u t t h e b l o w o u t o n o u r y o u t u b e c h a n n e l a n d b e b o p a g e , a l o n g w i t h o t h e r t r a c k a c t i o n v i d e o s f r o m K n o c k -h i l l .S e v e r a l p a c k e d t r a d e s t a n d s , a n d l o t s o f s h o w c a r s a l l s p a r k l y a n d w e l l l o o k e d a f t e r m a d e t h e S c o t t i s h M o d i f i e d S h o w d a y w o r t h w h i l e ! J u s t o v e r 4 0 0 c a r s w e r e o n s h o w . T h e d a y d i d h o w e v e r s t a r t t o w i n d d o w n m i d a f -t e r n o o n h o w e v e r t h e t r a c k a c t i o n c o n t i n u e d u n t i l t h e v e r y e n d .

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T h e m a i n a w a r d o f “ C a r o f t h e D a y “ w e n t t o Wa r r e n G r a h a m w i t h h i s h i g h -l y m o d i f i e d P e u g o t 2 0 6 . We w o u l d l i k e t o t h a n k t h e f o l l o w -i n g p e o p l e f o r a g r e a t d a y o u t u p a t K n o c k h i l l R a c i n g C i r c u i t :

G e m m a @ K n o c k h i l l R a c i n g C i r c u i t , A d a m R u s s e l l o u r p h o t o g r a p h e r , S a m @ W i l d c a t s P R , S t a c y K r i s t i n a D a n -i e l l e @ S c o t i s h M o d i f i e r s & A d v a n c e d A u d i o S o u l t i o n s , K a y l e i g h & M e l @ F a l k i r k C r u i s e , J o h n @ A m e r i c a n C a r T r a v e l , G r a e m e @ E x e c u t i v e C a r s & L i m o ’ s . We h o p e t o m e e t u p w i t h y o u a l l s o o n ! N e x t m o n t h w e r e v i e w t h e K n o c k h i l l S u p e r c a r S u n d a y w h i c h t o o k p l a c e o n t h e 3 1 s t o f A u g u s t .

Check out al l the pictures and videos at our bebo page www.bebo.com/tarmagAnd for the latest videos check out www.youtube.com/tarmagazine

Telephone: 01698 304385 (office) Mobile: 07903 279509E-mail: actlimos@blueyonder.co.uk Post: 9 Hamilton Road, Larkhall, Lanarkshire ML9 1DB

Book now:0169830438507903279509

* Professional, Personal and reliable chauffeur limousine service * Uniformed drivers * Limousines for every special occasion * Perfect for Proms, Weddings, Birthdays, Anniversary, Concert, Sport Events, Kids Party, Hen & Stag party.

Call us now on: 01698 304385 / 07903 279509

Limo Hire: Lanarkshire, Glasgow and Edinburgh

Tribute to Colin McRae 5th August 1968 - 15th September 2007

Nearly a Year on, and 20 miles of Subaru’s.....? 29

T h e 3 0 t h o f S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 8 w a s h o s t t o t h e C o l i n M c R a e G a t h e r -i n g . T h e C o n v o y t r a v e l e d f r o m L a -n a r k w h i c h w a s C o l i n ’ s h o m e t o w n i n S c o t l a n d a n d w a s l e d b y C o l i n ’ s D a d J i m m y M c R a e . J i m m y w a s b e -h i n d t h e w h e e l o f C o l i n ’ s p e r s o n a l S e r i e s M c R a e C a r t o m a r k t h e o c c a -s i o n .

T h e c o n v o y w h i c h s t r e t c h e d n e a r l y o v e r 2 0 m i l e s t r a v e l l e d t h e f u l l 3 0 0 M i l e s f r o m L a n a r k t o B a n b u r y a l o n g

t h e w a y p i c k i n g u p m o r e c a r s t o t h e c o n v o y .

S u n d a y t h e 3 1 s t o f A u g u s t a r o u n d 1 3 0 0 c a r s g a t h e r e d a t P r o - D r i v e i n B a n b u r y b e f o r e h e a d i n g i n a 2 0 M i l e l o n g c o n v o y t o P r o d r i v e s t e s t t r a c k i n Wa r w i c k s h i r e . A n y -b o d y l a n d i n g a t B r i m i n g h a m A i r -p o r t s h o u l d o f b e e n a b l e t o s e e t h e h a l f m i l e l o n g w r i t i n g o f “ C O L I N M C R A E ” i n c a r s !

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The Life of Colin McRae , MBE born 5th August 1968 was The Scottish rally born driver from Lanark. Colin became the first Briton to win the World Rally Champion-ship Drivers’ Title. His Subaru won the World Rally Championship Constructors title three times in succession 1995-1997.

Four years continued with a spell at the Ford World Rally Sport Team which saw Colin win nine events! 2003 saw a move to Citroën however not winning any events Colin helped the team win the their first three consecutive manufacturers titles.

1998 saw the first ever Colin McRae 2.0 Rally game released by Codemasters, and to date new titles are still being released with the latest in 2007 “DiRT.” The Play-station 3 edition was released on Septem-ber 14th the day before Colin McRae’s Tragic Accident.

15th September 2007 - An AS350B2 Squir-rel Helicopter belonging to Colin crashed 1 mile north of Lanark close to the McRae home. The tragic accident took the life’s of Colin McRae, his five year old son Johnny, and two of the families friends; Greame Duncan and Johnny’s six year old friend, Ben Porcelli.

It shows still to-date that Colin McRae is a well missed Legend and our thoughts go out to his friends and family... . . . . . . .

aCS - aCCIDENt CLaIMS

Feature by Max Manford& ACS Claims Middlesbrough

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fEATuRE

Had a motoring accident.

We find out the facts from a Top Accident claims Company

Including there Guide on what to do after a Road Traffic Accident....

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Two of the most daunt ing exper iences in a dr ivers l i fe a re probably having an acc i -dent and then the resu l t ing a f te rmath of tha t acc ident . Deal ing wi th insurance com-panies i s never an easy task , a t the end of tha t day, i f the insurance company does not need to pay out or can f ind a way not to pay out then qui te s imply they wi l l no t pay out . This exper ience leaves a b i t te r fee l ing .

A c la ims management company such as ACS a im to take the s t ress and hass le ou t of the insurance c la im. Us ing our exper ienced so l ic i tors we dea l wi th the l i t iga-t ion f rom the s ta r t o f the c la im to the payout . We a lso provide f ree recovery of your vehic le and s tore i t a t our secure fac i l i ty g iv ing you peace of mind . In addi t ion to th i s se rv ice we provide a l l our non fau l t c la im cus tomers a cour tesy vehic le s imi la r to the i r own, so i f your be loved supercar i s involved in an acc ident res t assured we wi l l p rovide you wi th a s imi la r vehic le th roughout the dura t ion of the c la im. I f you or your passengers suffe red personal in jury dur ing the acc ident then we can a l so dea l wi th tha t , our c la im process i s s imple , we requi re you f i l l ou t a few s imple forms and we then handle the c la im f rom there .

We can dea l wi th a l l cor respondence , leav ing you f ree to ge t on wi th your da i ly l i fe , s t ress f ree . Unl ike o ther c la ims management companies and so l ic i tors we offer our c l ien ts 100% compensa t ion , which means you ge t a l l o f the money f rom any c la im you put th rough us . Our fees a re taken d i rec t ly f rom the insurance company so res t assured you ge t your fu l l compensa t ion .

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Are you a tax i dr iver? have you had an acc ident in your tax i? Having a road t ra ff ic acc ident in your personal vehic le i s one th ing however when your bus iness or your l ive l ihood i s a ffec ted tha t i s someth ing to ta l ly d i ffe ren t . ACS unders tand tha t when our c l ien t has an acc ident in the i r bus iness vehic le , namely a tax i tha t they need to be back on the road as soon as poss ib le . This i s why we provide rep lacement tax i vehic les to our tax i dr iver c l ien ts . This a l lows them to cont inue earn ing and not have the i r income affec ted too much. We provide rep lacement tax i ’s a l l a round the count ry so you can ge t in touch wi th us today and see i f we can he lp .

ACS Top Tips when your involved in an acc ident .

1. Check for any casua l t ies , in form Pol ice /Ambulance ( i f requi red)2 . Exchange de ta i l s wi th the th i rd par ty3 . Arrange for recovery of your vehic le ( i f requi red)4 . I f i t i s a non fau l t c la im ca l l ACS so we handle your c la im5. Awai t your rep lacement vehic le

Remember ACS covers a l l aspec ts of your c la im. We can recover your car, s tore i t , p rovide you wi th a rep lacement vehic le ( inc luding Taxi ’s for Taxi dr ivers ) and pursue your personal in jury c la im.

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SME Eurofinance Group Plc: Company Registration No 4472534The Nucleus Building, Brunel Way, Dartford, Kent, DA1 5GA

Tel: 01322 312123 Email: finance@smeeuro.com Web: www.smefinanceuk.com

Car Funding SolutionsSME Eurofinance provides finance for all new, used and classic vehicles.

We provide a full portfolio of financing products so that businesses can maximize their capi-tal allowance, tax and cash flow positions.

We can also provide facilities for directors / partners and key employees who want to have their vehicles outside of company car schemes.

We provide competitive finance solutions for most business assets in-cluding the following;

Brake Testers, Diagnostic Equipment, Diesel Testing Equipment, Gas & Smoke Analysers, Headlamp Aligners, MOT Bays, Workshop Packages, Bodyshop Spray Booths, Lifts & Ramps, Wheel Balancers, Compressors

For More details check out Tel: 01322 312123 Email: finance@smeeuro.com

www.smefinanceuk.com

• HIRE PURCHASE• LEASING• CONTRACT HIRE• PCP (PERSONAL CONTRACT PURCHASE)

Sat NagThe Sat Nag is the greatest in-car invention since the Sat Nav. Actually no, it’s better than a Sat Nav, and even if it’s guaranteed to get you nowhere fast, it’s one of those jokes that just keeps on giving. With such crackers as: ‘In 100 metres turn left. No right, err, no left. Sorry, I never can tell my left from my right.’, as well as ‘In 50 meters I’m going to put on my most annoying voice and say ‘Is your short cut really faster when we get stuck in traffic like this, well, is it darling?’’ and ‘In 100 meters I’m going to talk to you in that special voice, which should let you know you’ve upset me in some way that is bound to be your fault.’ There are loads of them, and the main reason they’re so darn funny is that (whilst ducking a flying shoe) they’re so accurate, we’ve all been there, and boy are we all going there again. every car should have one.

£7.99

iTripYou, your car, your music and the open road, there’s nothing better to clear your head! The iTrips are the ideal companions for your road trips, or even short journeys for that matter.

£29.95

LED Car SignIsn’t it strange how when you’re driving along it’s always everyone else who’s the idiot? Well the LED car sign let’s you express yourself in more efficient and most of the time a very much more considerate manner.

£24.99

Briefcase BBQThe BBQ is made from pressed steel, the ‘Briefcase’ folds out to provide a generous 48 x 35cm cooking area it and comes with a carry bag, so it’s a breeze to whisk off to your perfect BBQ spot.

£24.95

7’’ DVD TabletWatch movies, show slide shows of your photos, listen to music, watch TV, it’s all possible with the Xoro, making this one of the slickest portablemultimedia machines we’ve ever seen.

£159.00

iwant_tarmag_advert.indd 1 14/08/2008 16:50:43

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GaDGEtS

Feature by David Daniels

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REVIEwS

This month we Review :

Nokia E71Dads Taxi Cab

SatNagTOMTOM GO 930 Traffic

Got a product you want us to review, get intouch with us at:

david@tarmag.co.uk

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www.nokia.co.uk NOkIA E71

DADS CAb TAXI METER - Set the meter runningwww.gadgets.co.uk

Email made easy: The New Nokia E71

The New Nokia E71 has been designed for people who lead a mobile lifestyle and want quick and easy access to their personal and work email. The E71 offers all the latest multimedia features you can desire. Fully equipped to handle your personal and busi-ness emails the E71 comes with easy-to-use program. With reli-able real-time access to your email, calendar, contacts and tastes, you are also able to download attachments with your emails including Word files, Excel, PowerPoint and even PDF files.

With a stainless steel case, etched graphics and available in two colors - grey steel or white steel – the Nokia E71 bears the hallmarks of Nokia quality and craftsmanship. The cool metallic finish is complemented by the bright color display, which show-cases the Nokia E71 device’s brilliantly simple user interface. Designed for both one-handed and two-handed use, the Nokia E71 pays special attention to ergonomics, as evidenced by its narrow shape and specially designed keypad.

In addition to email and personal information management, the Nokia E71 support’s the latest Ovi services including maps, mu-sic and media sharing that power users expect from their device. This includes fast and seamless browsing with HSDPA, wireless LAN and 3G connectivity, Assisted GPS (A-GPS) and Nokia Maps for navigation, a music player with support for up to 8 GB expandable memory and a 3.2 megapixel autofocus camera.

The Nokia E71 is available Now!

You've spent the day slaving away in the garden, washing the car, at work, or doing something else suitably gruelling, and then comes the dread-ed "Dad, can I have a lift round to the shops please?" It 's guaranteed to come just as you've settled down in your favourite chair to watch your favourite TV show. You want to tell them they've got two legs and could walk, but what sort of parent would that make you? The way things are going it 'll soon be a genuine reason to ring Childline as well!

Set the meter running at the start of the journey, and upon arrival at their destination the kids will be given a receipt with an appropriate forfeit such as 'make dad a cup of tea', or 'tidy your room'. The Dads Cab Taxi Meter looks just like the real thing, and attaches easily to the dashboard. When not being used to measure mileage it also doubles as an alarm clock.

While it won't stop you feeling like a taxi service, it will add a bit of fun to your journeys, and if you should manage to get the odd cup of tea made for you as a thank-you all the better.

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www.iwantoneofthose.com SATNAG - the in-car gadget that getS you nowhere faSt.

www.tomtom.com TOMTOM GO 930 TRAffICOne of the latest TomTom’s is the GO 930 Traffic, one of the best GPS Devices on the market. Its IQ Routes™ technology calculates your routes based on the real aver-age speeds measured on roads. This will always provide you with the smartest route hour-by-hour, day-by-day, saving you time, money and fuel.

Its Advanced lane guidance gives you extra clarity when navigating difficult junctions always handy in and about towns you have never been/driven in before.

The TomTom Map Share™ technology allows you to make corrections to your own map and benefit from thousands of corrections made by TomTom users every day free of charge.Now with Voice address input, just tell the device the city, street and number you need to go to and let it do the rest, so now you finally have your chance of taking back to your satnav!

Of course the latest TomTom’s feature Hands-free calling which allows you to make and answer phone calls safely while driving, making you in control and in touch and that all important staying legal factor.

Always wanted to play the music on your TomTom through your speakers in your car, well now you can, thanks to its Built-in FM transmitter now allows you to play the music on your device wirelessly through your car stereo

The Sat Nag is the greatest in-car invention since the Sat Nav. Actually no, it's better than a Sat Nav, and even if it's guaranteed to get you nowhere fast, it's one of those jokes that just keeps on giving. Press the button on the front and a very well-recorded, patronis-ing woman's voice will come out with one of a host of hysterical Sat Nav-type commands. With such crack-ers as: "I know you're a man, but it's been 35 minutes now, so can you please admit you're lost and ask someone the way"; and "In 100 metres turn left. No right, err, no left. Sorry, I never can tell my left from my right", as well as "In 50 meters I'm going to put on my most annoying voice and say 'Is your short cut re-ally faster when we get stuck in traffic like this, well, is it darling?" and "In 100 meters I'm going to talk to you in that special voice, which should let you know you've upset me in some way that is bound to be your fault".

There are loads of them, and the main reason they're so darn funny is that (whilst ducking a flying shoe) they're so accurate, we've all been there, and boy are we all going there again. There are a few 'not in front of the children' comments, but none that are too offensive. This anti-compass has a holographic screen, high-lighting the important roads such as Whiny Lane, Backseat Drive and Earache Avenue, and will have you howling with laughter both at the idiosyncrasies of women in passenger seats and also how dumb men are behind the wheel - every car should have one.

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For A Quote

MItSubIShI L200

Article by Max Manford

Photography byDavid Daniels

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full REVIEw

The Car :Mitsubishi L200 Warrior Pick-up

The Spec : 08’ Plate - 2.5 Turbo Diesel Engine,

Armadillo Roll Top; Chrome Sports Bars; Checker Plate Load Liner

The TarMag Rating :Build Quality 8.5/10

Road Rating 7/10Preformance 8/10

Interior 8/10Overall Rating: 7/10

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T h e M i t s u b i s h i L 2 0 0 , i t ’s n o E v o - X h o w -e v e r t h e L 2 0 0 b l e w u s a w a y ! T h e l o o k s , b u i l d q u a l i t y , e n g i n e , e c o n o m y a n d r o a d p r e s e n c e w a s o u t s t a n d i n g . I t a r r i v e d o n a d a m p T h u r s d a y m o r n -i n g f o r o u r l o n g w e e k e n d r e v i e w . B i g t h a n k s t o t h e

d e l i v e r y d r i v e r a v e r y n i c e a n d i n f o r -m a t i v e c h a p .

T h e L 2 0 0 h a s b e e n o u t f o r a w h i l e n o w , 1 s t M a r c h 2 0 0 6 w a s w h e n t h e “ n e w ” s h a p e w a s l a u n c h e d , w i t h o v e r 5 3 , 0 0 0 p r e v i o u s m o d e l s s o l d s i n c e 1 9 9 8 , a n d t h e L 2 0 0 i s a p o p u l a r p i c k -u p w h e n i t c o m e s t o b o t h c o m m e r c i a l a n d p r i v a t e u s e ! T h e L 2 0 0 W a r r i o r i s a v a i l a b l e i n D r a m a t i c b l a c k , s i l v e r , g r e y a n d r e d p a i n t w o r k ; a l s o t h e c h r o m e s t y l i n g p a c k r e a l l y s e t s t h e c a r o f f w i t h d e t a i l i n g o n t h e w i n g m i r r o r s , s i d e -s t e p s , a n d r o l l b a r s . T h e h a n d y a r m a -d i l l o r o l l t o p c o v e r o v e r t h e r e a r l o a d -i n g b a y p r o v i d e s a d d i t i o n a l s e c u r i t y f o r a n y i t e m s s t o w e d .

I n t e r i o r. . . 8 / 1 0 R a t i n g

E l e c t r i c w i n d o w s a l l r o u n d i n c l u d -i n g a f u n k y r e a r o p e n i n g a n d c l o s i n g w i n d o w . E a s y t o r e a d i n s t r u m e n t s a n d d i a l s w i t h a t t e n t i o n t o d e t a i l o f t h e e l e c t r i c b l u e s t i t c h i n g o n t h e l e a t h e r s e a t s , a t n i g h t t h e d a s h b o a r d c o m e s a l i v e w i t h b l u e a n d r e d b a c k l i g h t i n g . E v e r y t h i n g i n s i d e t h e L 2 0 0 i s p l a c e d a n d b u i l t p e r f e c t l y . T h e S t e r e o s y s -t e m i s o f g r e a t q u a l i t y .

B u i l d Q u a l i t y . . . 8 . 5 / 1 0 R a t i n g

T h e n e w s h a p e h a s b e e n i n s p i r e d b y t h e D a k a r R a l l y w h i c h h a s n ’ t c o m -p r i s e d o n c o m f o r t , r e f i n e m e n t o r E n g i n e n o i s e w i t h i n t h e c a b i n i s n e a r n o n e x i s t e n t c o n s i d e r i n g t h e s i z e o f t h e 2 . 5 L D i e s e l e n g i n e ! I f I w a s t o b e h o n e s t t h e f r o n t s e a t s c o u l d h a v e a b i t m o r e b a c k s u p p o r t . B o t h t h e d r i v e r a n d p a s s e n g e r s e a t s o f f e r a n e x c e l l e n t c o m m a n d i n g v i e w o f t h e r o a d a h e a d a n d i t s s u r r o u n d i n g s . T h e o t h e r t h i n g w e l i k e d . . .

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w a s t h e s i d e s t e p s , i n o t h e r v e h i c l e s I h a v e o w n e d i n t h e p a s t t h e s i d e - s t e p s f e l t a s t h o u g h i f u s e d t h e y w o u l d b u c k -l e u n d e r t h e l o a d o f c l i m b i n g i n , b u t t h e s e o n e s w e r e g r e a t . T h e f e l t s a f e a n d s o l i d t o u s e .

P e r f o r m a n c e . . . 7 / 1 0 R a t i n g

W e h a d t h e W a r r i o r m o d e l , w h i c h w a s j u s t g r e a t , n o p r o b l e m s w i t h i t a t a l l . T h e a l l n e w 2 . 5 - L i t r e c o m m o n r a i l t u r -b o d i e s e l e n g i n e w h i c h h a s 1 3 4 b h p a s s t a n d a r d i t r e a l l y d o e s n o t n e e d m u c h m o r e t h a n t h a t h o w e v e r t h e A n i m a l m o d e l s a r e f i t t e d w i t h a r e v i s e d E C U t a k i n g t h i s p i c k - u p t o 1 6 5 b h p . I t h a n -d l e s t h e r o a d w e l l , r e s p o n s e i s e x c e l -l e n t i n t h r o u g h o u t t h e g e a r s e v e n i n 5 t h g e a r , a n d y o u d o n ’ t n e e d t o d r o p d o w n w h e n y o u w i s h t o o v e r t a k e . T h e n e w e n g i n e h a s t h e l a t e s t t e c h n o l o g y w h i c h d e l i v e r s 1 7 % m o r e h o r s e p o w e r , 3 0 % m o r e t o r q u e , 2 6 % i m p r o v e m e n t o n f u e l e c o n o m y t h a n i t s p r e d e c e s s o r .

O n t h e r o a d . . . 7 / 1 0 R a t i n g

S w i t c h i n g f r o m 2 w h e e l d r i v e t o 4 w h e e l d r i v e i s d o n e w i t h e a s e . T h e s u s p e n s i o n s y s t e m i s g r e a t , h a n d l e s b u m p s w e l l , t i g h t b e n d s w i t h n o r o l l -i n g o r h e s i t a t i o n . W e m a n a g e d t o a c h i e v e a b o u t 3 6 . 4 m i l e s t o t h e g a l l o n c o n s i d e r i n g i t ’s a 2 . 5 - L i t r e t u r b o d i e s e l w e f e l t t h i s w a s r e a l l y g o o d ! W e w o u l d e x p e c t a r o u n d 6 5 0 m i l e s f r o m a f u l l t a n k .

T h i s m a k e s i t g r e a t f o r t o w n d r i v i n g o r m o t o r w a y m i l e s b o t h c o m m e r c i a l a n d p e r s o n a l !

S u m m a r y . . . O v e r a l l R a t i n g 7 / 1 0

I w a s s a t t h i n k i n g w h y t h e s e M i t s u b i -s h i p i c k - u p s a r e s o p o p u l a r ? H a v i n g d r i v e n o n e , I n o w k n o w w h y ! F u r t h e r -m o r e b e c a u s e p i c k - u p s a r e c l a s s e d a s a l i g h t c o m m e r c i a l v e h i c l e a n y o n e w h o i s VAT r e g i s t e r e d c a n c l a i m t h e t a x b a c k , i n t h e d a y s o f t h e c r e d i t c r u n c h t h i s i s a n a d d e d b o n u s . R e -s i d u a l v a l u e s a l s o a r e e x t r e m e l y g o o d c o m p a r e d t o o t h e r b r a n d s .

O n t h e S u n d a y w e d e c i d e d t o d o o u r p h o t o s h o o t , w h e n w e l e f t i t w a s r a i n y , c l o u d y , a n d b y t h e t i m e w e g o t o n l o c a t i o n t h e s u n w a s s h i n i n g , w e c o u l d s e e b l u e s k i e s . T h e L 2 0 0 w a s g r e a t w i t h t h e c a m e r a ; i t l o v e d t h e c a m e r a j u s t a s m u c h a s i t l o v e d t h e p i c k - u p . O n e t h i n g w e n o t i c e d i s o t h e r M i t s u b i s h i L 2 0 0 ’s o w n e r s s e e m t o w a v e a t e a c h o t h e r , l e t e a c h o t h e r o u t a t j u n c t i o n s , e t c . . . T h e L 2 0 0 i s a b i g p i c k - u p a n d w h e r e v e r i t g o e s i t ’s n o t i c e d b y e v e r y o n e !

O v e r a l l t h e b u i l d q u a l i t y , p e r f o r -m a n c e , e c o n o m y , r e s i d u a l s a l l a d d u p t o m a k e t h e L 2 0 0 p i c k - u p a m u s t h a v e !

B y M a x M a n f o r d

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www.alpine-electronics.co.uk

Guide your Ride.PMD-B200P Portable Navigation System

4” Wide Touch Screen Display

Built-in Bluetooth for hands-free mobile phone operation

2D and 3D Map display

Split screen display

Built in TMC tuner to avoid traffic congestion

7 Digit UK postcode search

Slot for SD or MMC cards

Built in MP3 music player with Quick Search

Direct docking with the IVA-W205R/IVA-W505R

auDIO & vISuaL

Feature by David Daniels

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AlPINE DEMO

Alpine Demo Car :Fiat 500 Alpine Demo Car

Got a demo car you want us to review?emails us demo@tarmag.co.uk

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AlPINE ElECTRONICS EuROPE DEMO CAR

The HIFI power base for the speedy 100 hp mini is a PDX-5, the la tes t innovat ion in Alpine’s compact amplif ier ser ies . I ts r ich f ive channels del iver sonic accuracy and dr ive the Fiat’s ent i re mult imedia system. 4 x 75 wat ts (RMS) power two pairs of Al-pine SPX-17PRO component 2-way speakers whose special feature , a f requency diplex-er with phase correct ion, creates a convincing sound s tage in the vehicle . The PDX- 5’s f i f th (bass)

Compact dimensions, t rendy design, and plenty of power. No, we’re not ta lk-ing about the Fiat 500 this t ime, but about the innova-t ive technology inside the new Alpine demo car. But what’s so special about this MS Design-ref ined model (which, by the way, is num-ber 5 of a l imited edi t ion of 100)? Manfred Stengl and his team completely revamped the inter ior and instal led al l mult imedia components vis ibly and in the order of the s ignal path, thus present ing the s t ructure of the system in a compre-hensible manner.

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A MulTIMEDIA POwER HOuSEfIAT 500 CuP

Via an interface i t in tegrates the vehicle display and the s teer ing remote control thus faci l i ta t ing an ergonomic, safe , and convenient Moniceiver operat ion even i fthe dr iver manages an iPod with several gigabytes of music . But the IVA-W505Rmobile media s ta t ion does not only impress in terms of input . I ts output is remarkable as wel l . Among the highl ights is the upgrade opt ion for a lowcost a t tached PXA-H100 sound processor to del iver impressive IMPRINT sound qual i ty by ut i l iz ing sophis t i -cated sound technologies such as Audyssey’s MultEQ. I t is actual ly qui te s imple: All vehicle inter iors are different with regard to s ize , geometry, and mater ia ls . To produce qual i ty sound not only the s ize of a car mat ters .

Important are a lso the mater ia ls used such as fabr ic or leather, and how the seats an-other “acoust ic barr iers” are arranged. Unti l recent ly, these sound-impair ing factorscould be adjusted only with many hours of f ine- tuning and manual measuring by HIFIprofessionals . With IMPRINT Alpine now offers a device that automatical ly tunes thecar ’s inter ior sonic environment to perfect ion which not only reduces the ini t ia l systemsetup and professional f ine- tuning to less than a half hour but a lso provides as ignif icant ly enhanced sound s tage and tonal balance.

The Fiat’s e lectr ic system also includes s ta te-of- the-ar t micro processor e lectronics:With a special ly programmed PLC a vol tage monitor prevents total bat tery discharge.Manfred Stengl and his team instal led an AIV Green Power, a high capaci ty bat terywith a powerful cont inuous current supply. This manufacturer a lso suppl ied the ent i rewir ing, f iber glass mats , res ins , and f i l ler mater ia ls .

channel mobil izes 300 wat ts (RMS) that are channeled into a power eff ic ient 10” SWS-1043D subwoofer. For opt imal sound the vehicle body was f i t ted with Bimast Bomb mats f rom Standart-plast turning the Recaro Sports ter CS seats into relax recl iners .

In the front an IVA-W505R mobile media s ta t ion is ef-fect ively presented in the redesigned dashboard. With the large and contrast-r ich WVGA display the newAlpine 2 DIN device als provides an opt imal play-back platform for videos,whether on iPods or DVDs.

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SCOtLaNDS

Article by Rikki

Photography byRikki

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STRATHYCRuISE

The site :www.strathycruise.com

The Facts :Started 8 years ago

Over 18,000 Registered membersOver 1Million page views per month

We learn from Rikki about Strathycruise and how it all

started...

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w o r k e d o n a f e w s i t e s ( i n c l u d i n g o n e f o r t h e p i r a t e r a d i o s t a t i o n I w a s i n v o l v e d w i t h ) . S o i n t h e m i d d l e o f 2 0 0 0 I l a u n c h e d S t r a t h y c r u i s e , t h e n a m e r e l a t i n g t o t h e c r u i s e s c e n e a t S t r a t h c l y d e P a r k i n M o t h e r w e l l , n e a r G l a s g o w - t h e p l a c e I w o u l d h e a d t o e v e r y w e e k e n d t o s e e t h e m o d i f i e d c a r s a n d t o m e e t f r i e n d s . A s y o u ’ d e x -p e c t t h i n g s s t a r t e d o f f s l o w l y, t h e n a l o c a l n e w s p a p e r w e n t m e n t a l a n d r a n a s t o r y o n t h e c r u i s e ( a n d t h e s i t e ) o n t h e f r o n t p a g e - y o u j u s t c a n ’ t b u y t h a t k i n d o f p u b -l i c i t y : D

T h e s i t e g r e w f r o m t h e r e , n e w p e o p l e c a m e o n b o a r d , o l d e r o n e s l e f t a s t h e y t i r e d o f t h e s c e n e t h e n i n 2 0 0 1 t h e f i r s t F a s t & F u r i o u s f i l m c a m e o u t a n d e v e r y o n e a g e d 1 7 a n d u p w a n t e d i n o n i t . W i t h t h e m a g a z i n e s a l e s g o i n g t h r o u g h t h e r o o f , c o m p a -n i e s a p p e a r i n g e v e r y w h e r e s e l l i n g e v e r y t h i n g f r o m f u l l u n d e r c a r n e o n k i t s t o a l l o y s p o i l e r s t h i n g s w e r e g o i n g g r e a t a n d t h e s i t e g o t b u s i e r w e e k o n w e e k .

I n t h e m i d d l e o f 2 0 0 3 I g o t a p p r o a c h e d b y A u t o T r a d e r a s t h e y w e r e i n t e r e s t e d i n s t a r t i n g a m o d i f i e d c a r m a g a z i n e a s t h e y ’ d s e e n t h e v o l u m e o f c a r s a r o u n d t h a t h a d w h e e l s , k i t s a n d s o u n d s y s t e m s . M e a n d o n e o f t h e o t h e r g u y s w h o h e l p e d o u t c a m e o n b o a r d w i t h t h e m a t t h e t a i l e n d o f 2 0 0 3 a n d w o r k e d o n p r o d u c i n g a c a r m a g a -z i n e t h a t w o u l d t h e n b e c o m e k n o w n a s F a s t & M o d i f i e d . T h i n g s k i n d a p e a k e d w i t h t h e f i b r e g l a s s a n d f l i p p a i n t p e r i o d a t t h e s t a r t o f 2 0 0 5 a n d p e o p l e s t a r t e d r e f i n i n g w h a t t h e y d i d w i t h t h e i r c a r s . N o m o r e s i l l y a d d o n s “ j u s t b e c a u s e n o - o n e ’s d o n e i t b e f o r e m e ” . I e n d e d u p l e a v i n g t h e m a g a z i n e I s t a r t e d i n 2 0 0 6 , a l m o s t 3 y e a r s t o t h e d a y t h a t w e ’ d f i r s t t a l k e d a b o u t s t a r t i n g i t . E v e n t h o u g h t h e m a g a z i n e s a l e s w e r e d o w n a c r o s s t h e c o u n t r y ( M a x P o w e r d r o p p i n g f r o m o v e r 2 5 0 , 0 0 0 a m o n t h t o l e s s t h a n 7 0 , 0 0 0 ) a n d n o - o n e w a s i n t e r e s t e d i n 2 2 ” c h r o m e s , S t r a t h y c r u i s e s t a y e d b u s y. I s u p p o s e b e c a u s e i t ’ s f r e e o f c h a r g e a n d a d a p t s a s t h e m a r k e t c h a n g e s t h a t ’ s w h y i t ’ s a l w a y s g r o w n a n d g r o w n u n l i k e t h e m a g a z i n e s t h a t w e r e c o s t i n g n e a r l y £ 5 e v e r y m o n t h . B y t h i s t i m e R e v s m a g a n d J T u n e r h a d c l o s e d t h e i r d o o r s b u t w e k e p t o n k e e p i n g o n .

B a c k i n 2 0 0 0 w h e n I w a s j u s t g e t t i n g i n t o c a r s t h e r e w a s n ’ t m u c h i n t h e w a y o f i n f o o n l i n e , e s p e c i a l l y n o t w h e r e I l i v e d u p i n G l a s g o w. T h e r e w a s C r u i s e b o a r d ( w h i c h I t h i n k i s g o n e n o w ) f o r E n g l a n d b u t n o t a t h i n g u p h e r e . I ’ d b e e n i n t o c o m p u t e r s s i n c e I w a s a k i d a n d u s e d t h e m f o r e v e r y t h i n g f r o m g a m e s t o w r i t i n g m u -s i c , r e c o r d i n g m y D J m i x e s a n d d o i n g g r a p h i c d e s i g n , s o w h e n t h e n e t t o o k a h o l d o f t h e U K I g o t i n t o w e b d e s i g n a n d h a d a l r e a d y

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Loads of other cruise sites had started up in-between times. It was easy to register a domain name for £10, get some cheap hosting and throw up a copy of phpBB and start a forum. But most of these sites soon disap-peared as the owners weren’t usually in it for the right reasons. Some started them to be cool, most started them as a way of getting back at another site that had kicked them out. There were a lot of areas that splin-tered like this and at one point there were places that had more than 4 sites covering the same patch.

Though we’d been busy updating our site continually since 2000, at the start of last year I started work on a redesign. A new front page, a new events area and a general tidy up to reflect the current trends of web design. We’d had a news section since 2002 but updated this dramatically and it now lives on the front page of the site as a blog covering things we find interesting either to do with cars, modifying, motorsports or lo-cal events, gigs, nights out and funny vids and pics we find. The redesign was a welcome change and helped increase visitors yet again which was fantastic.

At the start of this year we started filming our videos in high definition. We’d got a Canon HD camcorder last year but the PC we were using at the time wasn’t up to the task so a big beefy system was custom built for us last year and we put it to good use right away. The most recent video we put online was covering the Scottish Modified Car Show in Edinburgh, a show where our display stand and PR girls picked up an award for best on show. They put a lot of effort in with a full digitally printed PVC banner, flyers and the girls had a costume style that no-one had tried before and was miles ahead of the usual outfits that have become com-mon place at shows and events over the last few years.

We also run features on site users cars though we’ve been so busy this year we haven’t covered as many as we’d like to. Since I’ve got a background in magazine’s behind me and still do freelance work for newspa-pers and mags I’ve got decent quality camera gear and the results using it are as good as if not better what you’d expect to find on websites costing millions! For our first car feature last year we shot a 360 degree rotation so visitors could see the car from every angle. Our next cars were also filmed and a short video fea-ture on each made which gets uploaded to the site, YouTube, Bebo and DailyMotion. Since most web upload areas are crumby for playback we use Daily Motion based in France to host our high definition videos for online streaming, plus we upload them to our site for people too.

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Of course girls go part and parcel with the car industry so we have an area on the site for photoshoots with girls and if we’re at shows where there are a LOT of girls (too many to mix into the main show report and gallery) we sometimes split the photos up and move them into the Babes area too. Again using decent equip-ment returns the results and when we do shoots we take the girls either to a professional studio with the right kind of lights and equipment or we choose locations that are a notch above what people expect. Time is an issue here too and this year we’ve been so busy with the events, site itself and cars that we’ve not managed to get any more girls booked - but we’ll be on the case with that in the next month or so!

For the future we’re always looking for new ways to expand the site. As much as it started as a cruise site its now grown into much more than that and although some locals have the perception that its full of “wee boys with Saxos and Corsas” that might have been the story half a decade ago but either those users have left or they’ve grown up and now drives Evo’s, Skylines and Subaru’s. We’ve got a mixed bag of users from young un’s who have just passed their test up to the big boys like Keith Cowie who holds the world 0-300kph record on street tyres. The modified car and cruise scene still gets a bad rep but the way I explain it to people is that just like you can have a football match with 50,000 people at it - you only hear about the 20 that are causing the bother. Is everyone who’s into football a hooligan? Our plans from here onward are to do a LOT more video work. YouTube and the like have really laid it out to people that the next phase of the web will be rich media. Why read text and look at small photos when you can watch better than TV quality video online.

We’re now more than 8 years in and still enjoying it. Things change, people grow up and move on but some stay and there’s always new faces getting into cars (just as we did and our dads did) so it will be a constant evolution. We’ve lasted this long and we’ve made some great friends along the way, who knows, we might even organise a massive party for our 10th birthday bash :D

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MODIfIED rEvIEw

Article by Max Manford

Photography byPhill Randal

27

MODIfIED RX7

The Car :Mazda RX7The Spec :

New blue print enginewater injection

apexi BNR33 fuel pumphydraulic handbrake

More details on the next page...

Fancy your car being featured ?email cars@tarmag.co.uk

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M e e t P h i l f r o m Wi l t s h i r e a m e m b e r o f w w w. s o u t h c e n t r a l c r u i s e r s . c o m , h e i s 2 3 y e a r s o l d , s i n g l e , a n d w e l l i n t o h i s m o t o r s . I n t h e p a s t P h i l h a s o w n e d a n o t h e r f e a t u r e c a r , a P e u g e o t 2 0 5 . H e c u r r e n t l y w o r k s f o r L o t u s a s a t e c h n i c i a n . H e s p e n t 3 y e a r s a t A u d i g o i n g t h r o u g h B t e c h a n d g o t a n a t i o n a l d i p l o m a i n m e -c h a n i c s . “ M y l i f e c o n s i s t s o f f i x i n g m y c a r , r a c i n g , d r i f t i n g , a n d k e e p i n g a l l o f m y m a t e ’s c a r s o n t h e r o a d , u p g r a d i n g a n d h e l p i n g t h e m o u t . ”

P h i l h a s o w n e d t h e R x 7 f o r 3 m o n t h s n o w, a n d h i s l u c k w i t h R x - 7 h a s n ’ t b e e n t h e b e s t . H e p u r c h a s e d a s t a n d a r d b l a c k R x - 7 w h i c h h e m a n a g e d t o b l o w t h e e n -g i n e , n e w e n g i n e f i t t e d b y R o k t e c k n i c s . T h e n w h i l s t d r i v i n g , u n f o r t u n a t e l y h i t a d i e s e l s p i l l a t 6 0 m p h w h i c h r e s u l t e d i n a v i s i t t o t h e s c r a p y a r d , h o w e v e r P h i l k e p t t h e e n g i n e a n d s u s p e n s i o n w h i c h h e t h e n t r a n s f e r r e d i n t o t h e n e w d r a g o n s h e l l w h i l s t a d d i n g e x t r a ’s i n c l u d i n g a r o l l c a g e , a n d m u c h m o r e .

T h e c a r i s c u r r e n t l y r u n n i n g a t 3 11 b h p , w i t h a r e c e n t r o l l i n g r o a d t e s t r e s u l t s o f a q u a r t e r m i l e a t 1 3 . 4 s e c o n d s . P h i l i s l o o k i n g a t g e t t i n g i n t o t h e R a c i n g c u p c a l l e d “ n i p p o n ” r u n b y D r a g o n R a c i n g n e x t y e a r ! We w i s h h i m a l l t h e b e s t w i t h t h a t !P h i l l w o u l d l i k e t o p e r s o n a l l y t h a n k . . . D r a g o n P e r f o r m a n c e , J a n s p e e d i n S a l i s -b u r y & S o u t h C e n t r a l C r u i s e r s .

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Spec: New blue print engineWater injectionapexi BNR33 fuel pumpHydraulic handbrakeFully seem welded chassis with foam Filled sills for added stiffnessDragon exhaust systemOlhins coilover kitFront strut brace

311 BHPMAZDA RX-7 Interior:

Sprayed in Porsche GT3 rs riviera blueVeilside body kit including wing mir-rors and rear spats, Scoot fibre glass bonnet, Carbon fibre rear wingVolk racing wheels in white and now glow in the dark.

I.C.E :Why bother?? Come on Phil!

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www.rioprestige.com0845 0095 911

LaMbOrGhINI Lp-560/4

Article by David Daniels

Photography byLamborghini

27

REVIEw

The Car :Lamborghini LP560-4

Fancy your car being featured ?email cars@tarmag.co.uk

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i n j e c t i o n s y s t e m , a n d t h e 2 0 K G w e i g h t r e d u c t i o n a l s o h e l p s p o w e r t o w e i g h t r a t i o .

S o w h a t e l s e h a v e L a m b o r g h i n i m a n a g e d t o d o w i t h t h i s L P 5 6 0 - 4 , w e l l t h e i r e n -g i n e e r s a t t h e S a n t ’ A g a t a B a s e d t e c h d e p a r t e m e n t h a v e i m p r o v e d t r a c t i o n , h a n -d l i n g , a n d s t a b i l i t y a t h i g h s p e e d w h i c h i s i m p r e s s i v e . T h e y h a v e r e - d e s i g n e d t h e f o u r w h e e l d r i v e t r a n s m i s s i o n , n e w s u s p e n s i o n , a n d o p t m i s i e d t h e a e r o d y -n a m i c s a l l c o n t r i b u t i n g t o t h e i m p r o v e m e n t s i n t h e v e h i c l e . Ye t a g a i n t h i s l a t -e s t L a m b o r g h i n i p r i z e s i t s s e l f a s a d a y t o d a y r o a d c a r , l o n g d i s t a n c e d r i v e s , a n d w h e n y o u m a g i c a l l y e n d u p o n a r a c e t r a c k i t s t i l l p e r f o r m s .

S o l e t ’ s g e t d o w n t o i t s l o o k s . Yo u h a v e t o s a y y o u w o u l d n ’ t c o m p l a i n i f y o u h a d o n e s i t t i n g o n y o u r d r i v e w a y , o r o u t s i d e y o u r w o r k ! T h e L P 5 6 0 - 4 h a s h a d a l l o t o f n e w d e s i g n w o r k d o n e , n e w f r o n t , n e w s p o i l e r , a n d t h e m a g i c a l d a y t i m e r u n n i n g l i g h t s . O f c o u r s e i f y o u w e r e n o t a w a r e 2 0 0 1 s a w t h e t a k e o v e r o f L a m -b o r g h i n i b y A u d i , s o t h e d a y t i m e l i g h t s , t o t h e S a t n a v a r e l o t s o f o t h e r c o m p o -n e n t s a n d p a r t s t h e L a m b o r g h i n i w e l l y o u c o u l d s a y i t ’ s b u i l t l i k e a n A u d i b u t I t ’ s N o t ! I t ’ s s t i l l a L a m b o r g h i n i .

W h e n i t c o m e s t o t h e i n t e r i o r , t h e i n t e r i o r i s a t a n e x t r e m e l y l o w h e i g h t , b u t w e l c o m e s p a s s e n g e r s w i t h a f a i r a m o u n t o f s p a c e . S p o r t s e a t s w h i c h h o l d y o u c o m f o r t a b l y a n d g i v e y o u t h e s u p p o r t y o u n e e d f o r l o n g a n d s h o r t j o u r n e y s . A n d t h e L a m b o r g h i n i m a n a g e s t o g i v e y o u a 1 1 0 L i t r e f r o n t t r u n k , s o r o o m f o r a f e w s h o p p i n g b a g s . T h e c e n t r e c o n s o l e b o a s t s a r e - d e s i g n w h i c h c o n s i s t o f n e w e l e -g a n t f l i p s w i t c h e s , i n c l u d i n g n o t 1 , b u t 7 r o u n d i n s t r u m e n t s i n t h e c o c k - p i t a n d

We a l l l o v e d t h e L a m b o r g h i n i G a l l a r d o , t h e S p y d e r , t h e S u -p e r l e g g e r a . . C o u l d t h e y d o a n y b e t t e r ? We l l t h e a n s w e r t o t h a t q u e s t i o n s i s Y E S .

T h i s n e w L a m b o r g h i n i L P 5 6 0 - 4 i s b i g g e r , b e t t e r , f a s t e r , a n d y e t m a n a g e s t o a c h i e v e 1 8 % b e t t e r f u e l a n d e m i s s i o n s t h a t i t s p r e -d e c e s s o r s .

2 0 0 3 s a w t h e l a u n c h o f t h e m o s t s u c c e s s f u l m o d e l t h a t h a s e v e r c o m e o f t h e L a m b o r g h i n i p r o -d u c t i o n l i n e , a r o u n d 7 1 0 0 G a l -l a r d o h a v e l e f t t h e S a n t ’ A g a t a B o l o g n e s e p r o d u c t i o n p l a n t s i n c e l a u n c h .

A t t h e h e a r t o f t h e G a l l a r d o L P 5 6 0 - 4 i s a a l l n e w 5 . 2 L i t r e V 1 0 e n g i n e . P r o d u c i n g i t , y i p y o u g u e s s e d i t 5 6 0 b h p . T h a t w i l l l a u n c h y o u 0 - 6 2 i n j u s t 3 . 7 s e c o n d s a n d a w h o p p i n g t o p s p e e d o f 2 0 2 m p h . S o h o w h a v e t h e y m a n a g e d t o r e d u c e t h e f u e l c o n s u m p t i o n a n d C O 2 e m i s s i o n s b y a s t a g g e r i n g 1 8 % . We l l “ I n -i e z z i o n D i r e t t a S t r a t i f i c a t a ” i s p a r t l y t h e a n s w e r , w h i c h i s t h e n e w e f f i c i e n t d i r e c t f u e l

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a n e w g r a p h i c a l f e a t u r e w h i c h p r o v i d e s t h e d r i v e r w i t h e s s e n t i a l i m p o r t a n t e n -g i n e d a t a , a n d a m u l t i f u n c t i o n a l d i s p l a y b e t w e e n t h e S p e e d o a n d r e v c o u n t e r .

L a m b o r g h i n i h a v e m a n a g e d t o k e e p i t s c u s t o m e r p e r s o n a l p r e f e r e n c e s a t b a y w h e n i t c o m e s t o g e a r c h a n g e s w h i c h i s o n e o f t h e m o s t e x c i t i n g t h i n g s a b o u t d r i v i n g a L P 5 6 0 - 4 . M a n u a l s i x s p e e d g e a r b o x v i a t h e s h o r t g e a r s t i c k , o r m y f a v o r i t e a n d t h e m a j o r i t y o f L a m b o r g h i n i ’ s c u s t o m e r s t h e e . g e a r ’ s p a d d l e - s h i f t s y s t e m l o c a t e d j u s t b e h i n d t h e s t e e r i n g w h e e l . T h e E - g e a r t r a n s m i s s i o n s y s -t e m h a s u n d e r g o n e a c o m p l e t e r e - d e s i g n a n d h a s i m p r o v e d h e a v i l y . T h e s y s t e m h a s b e e n r e d u c e d i n w r i g h t a n d m o r e i m p o r t a n t l y t h e g e a r c h a n g e t i m e h a s b e e n r e d u c e d b y a w h o p p i n g 4 0 % i n “ C O R S A ” m o d e . T h e C o r s a b a s i c a l l y t e l l s t h e e n g i n e t o o p t i m i z e a c c e l e r a t i o n a n d a l l o w s t h e L P 5 6 0 - 4 t o b e e n j o y e d . A u t o -m a t i c , N o r m a l , T h r u s t a n d S p o r t a t t h e o t h e r m o d e s y o u g e t t o p l a y w i t h .

U n f o r t u n a t e l y w e a t T a r M a g h a v e n ’ t b e e n a b l e t o p h y s i c a l l y d r i v e t h e c a r a s o f y e t , b u t h a v e b e e n p r o m i s e d a d e m o i n t h e n e a r f u t u r e w h i c h o f c o u r s e w e w i l l w r i t e u p , a n d h o p e f u l l y v i d e o r e v i e w t o o . B u t I ’ m s u r e t h i s w i l l m o r e t h a n p e r f o r m . O n e t h i n g t h a t w o r r i e s m e i s t h e t r e n d t h a t L a m b o r g h i n i f o l l o w s , w h i c h i s t o m a k e i t s c a r s b i g g e r a n d b e t t e r e a c h t i m e . L a m b o r g h i n i ’ s b i g g e r b r o t h e r t h e L P 6 4 0 s h o u l d b e w o r r i e d a s h i s l i t t l e b r o t h e r s h o u l d k e e p u p . W i l l w e s e e a L P 5 6 0 - 4 S u p e r l i g e r r a w h i c h w o u l d b a t t l e e v e n m o r e w i t h h i s b i g g e r b r o t h e r , w h o k n o w s ? T h e n e w c a r i s p r i c e d a t £ 1 4 7 , 3 3 0 . 0 0 o n t h e r o a d , i n c l u d -i n g N a v T r a k v e h i c l e t r a c k i n g s y s t e m a n d d e l i v e r y p a c k a g e . I n t e r e s t e d a n d w a n t m o r e d e t a i l s , w e l l c o n t a c t L a m b o r g h i n i w w w . l a m b o r g h i n i . c o . u k / a n d t e l l t h e m T a r M a g s e n t y o u !

0-62injust3.7Secondsandawhoppingtopspeedof202mph...

LavNav no longer means you or your sleeping partnerhave to suffer the onslaught of bright lights and noisyextractor fans when you pop out for your previouslydisruptive night-time toilet trips. LavNav gently andsilently lights the target area so long suffering wivesand girlfriends no longer have to wake up to wetseats and floors sprayed by partners attempting to‘navigate’ in the dark.

Women night-time users can also see if the seat isdown and so avoid the indignity of falling into thetoilet instead of sitting on it. LavNav is also veryhelpful for the elderly and those with prostateproblems.

Parents can also use LavNav as a fun way of toilettraining children.

The LavNav is a batteryoperated light sensor thateasily and adhesivelyattaches to the lid of thetoilet that incorporates anightlight, visualtargetingsystem andeffective“Put thedamned seatdown!”reminder.

LavNav turns on when you approach in the dark and offafter you leave so its batteries (2xAA) last a considerablewhile and the device is very energy efficient.

The LavNav is now available to purchase on-line fromwww.gadgets.co.uk priced £19.99. Delivery

.

LavNav is the latest offering from leading on-line retail gadgets maestros www.gadgets.co.uk.It’s a simple, indispensable device that assists those all-important night-time excursions to the toilet by lightingthe toilet basin on approach. By way of green and red light beams, it also lets the toilet user know whether theseat is up (red) and down (green).

Introducing

LAVNAVThe solution to midnight toilet traumas

Red means‘NO’...

...Green means ‘GO’!

aDaM ruSSELL

Article by David Daniels

Photography byAdam Russell

07

PHOTOGRAPHER

The Name :Adam Russell

Job :Automotive Photographer

Based :Scotland

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H o w d i d y o u g e t i n t o p h o t o g r a p h y ?

M y d a d s h o w e d m e t h e b a s i c s o n a n o l d f i l m S L R w h e n I w a s a r o u n d 6 o r 7 . I r e -a l l y e n j o y e d i t , h o w e v e r i t s l i p p e d t o t h e b a c k o f m y m i n d u n t i l I g o t m y h a n d s o n a s e m i - D S L R . S i n c e I g o t t h a t , e v e r y t h i n g f l o w e d b a c k a n d a c o l l e g e c o u r s e h e l p e d m e d e v e l o p m y t e c h n i c a l k n o w l e d g e .

H o w d i d y o u k n o w y o u w a n t e d t o b e a p r o f e s s i o n a l p h o t o g r a p h e r ?

I w a s t o l d w h e n I w a s y o u n g e r t h a t I h a d a n e y e f o r t a k i n g p h o t o s . I f o c u s e d m y a t -t e n t i o n o n s t u d y i n g a n d r e s e a r c h i n g t e c h -n i q u e s a n d h e r e I a m !

W h a t m a d e y o u c h o o s e a u t o m o t i v e p h o -t o g r a p h y c o m p a r e d t o l a n d s c a p e s o r w e d d i n g s ?

I s t a r t e d o f f t a k i n g p i c t u r e s o f m y m o -t o r b i k e w h e n s o m e o n e a s k e d m e t o t a k e s o m e p h o t o s o f t h e i r c a r . I r e a l l y e n j o y e d t h e p h o t o - s h o o t a n d w a s v e r y h a p p y w i t h t h e r e s u l t s , w h i c h l e d m e t o l o o k i n g i n t o t o d o i n g m o r e c a r . S i n c e t h e n I h a v e b e e n s h o o t i n g c a r s a n d o n m y c o n s t a n t h u n t f o r n e w l o c a t i o n s .

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I s t h e r e a n y o n e y o u l o o k u p t o f o r i n s p i r a t i o n f o r y o u r p h o t o g r a p h y ?

I h a v e a f e w p h o t o g r a p h e r s t h a t I a d m i r e f o r l a n d s c a p e s l i k e C o l i n P r i o r a n d C h a r l i e W a i t e b u t t h e m a i n a u t o m o t i v e p h o t o g r a p h e r w h o i m a g e s I e n j o y s t u d y i n g i s W e b b B l a n d ( b a s e d i n A m e r i c a . )

H a s a n y o n e h e l p e d y o u o n y o u r w a y ?

T h e N i s s a n 3 5 0 z o w n e r s c l u b ( w w w . 3 5 0 z - u k . c o m ) h a v e r e c e n t l y m a d e m e t h e i r r e s i -d e n t p h o t o g r a p h e r “ C h i e f S n a p p e r ” T h i s i s b e c a u s e I h a v e d o n e a l o t o f w o r k f o r t h e m a n d I h a v e t o t h a n k m y c l i e n t s f o r t h e i r f e e d b a c k o n m y i m a g e s a s i t h e l p s m e c o n t i n u e t o i m p r o v e .

W h a t i s t h e o d d e s t c a r y o u h a v e p h o t o g r a p h e d ?

I t w o u l d h a v e t o b e a C a t e r h a m 7 . T h e c a r i s s o b a s i c a s i t i s a t r a c k c a r y e t i t i s s o p o w e r f u l a n d e v e r y t h i n g i n t h e c a r h a s a p u r p o s e .

W h a t c a r s h a v e y o u p h o t o g r a p h e d ?

W e l l t o n a m e s o m e :

F e r r a r i F 4 3 0

A u d i R 8

L o t u s E l i s e

W h a t c a r w o u l d y o u l o v e t o p h o t o g r a p h ?

W e l l m y i d e a l c a r s t o d o a p h o t o - s h o o t w i t h w o u l d h a v e t o b e e i t h e r a L a m b o r g h i n i M u r c i e l a g o o r a 6 7 S h e l b y M u s t a n g .

I h a v e a l w a y s l o v e d t h e 6 7 M u s t a n g s i n c e I s a w i t o n “ G o n e I n 6 0 S e c o n d s ,” i t i s a t r u e A m e r i c a n m u s c l e c a r a n d t h i s m o d e l h a s j u s t t h e r i g h t r e l a t i o n b e t w e e n c u r v y a n d b o x y b o d y w o r k .

T h e L a m b o w o u l d h a v e t o b e e i t h e r o r a n g e o r w h i t e . I j u s t l o v e t h e w h o l e b o d y o f t h e c a r . T h e a m o u n t o f a n g l e s t h a t I c o u l d s h o o t w o u l d b e u n c o u n t a b l e . I t i s a b e a u t i f u l c a r .

73

H o w t o c o n t a c t A d a m :

E m a i l : a r p h o t o g r a p h s @ l i v e . c o m

P h o n e : 0 7 7 8 8 9 4 2 3 2 0

W e b s i t e : a r p h o t o g r a p h s . d e v i a n t a r t . c o m

LING tIME

Article by Max Manford

Photography byLing

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lINGSCARS

The Company :Lingscars.com

What do they do :Car Leasing

How do i contact them :Web: www.lingscars.com

Tel : 0191-460-9444

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Ling, can you please tell me a bit about your business, and your personal history.

I’m Ling,

I’m a self-made car-leasing magnate. Actually, I’m an im-migrant, female, Chinese female millionaire nutcase who runs LINGsCARS.com, the biggest and best car contract hire web-site in the UK. To give you an idea of the scale of my business, this year I will rent in excess of £40million of brand-new cars. All that business is done from my website.

Why should people lease a car rather than buy?

Leasing, or contract hire, sim-ply means “renting over a fixed term”. The term is usually 2 or 3 years.

The great thing about renting is that it fixes your costs, you know exactly how much the car will cost you, over that period, including the road tax. If you get a car by any other method, you usually take the residual risk… and as anyone with a big 4x4 has found out over the past few months, values have dropped by up to 25%, leaving many people with an overpriced lemon to sell.

Many people think they can buy and sell cars cheaper than renting them. Well, good luck to them. All my cars are brand-new, and I defy anyone to buy and then re-sell a new car in 2-years whilst spending less money than they would on my rentals.

Sure, you can run an old banger cheaper, but who wants an old banger? Er… me, I guess. I own a 1970 Zil 7.0 litre V8 6x6 nuclear missile truck, and a 1966 Route-master bus as well as an old Beijing Jeep.

Ling rents in excess of £40Million worth of Brand new cars.....

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And why should people go to Lingscars.com?

For the experience! My site is the best website in the UK, I think. It has been voted Top 100 in the world in FHM, Top 10 in Car, as well as being voted one of the 10 worst in the world. I guess that depends in you are an anal Mac developer or a normal human. I have won many awards, including Best Car Industry Website.

I really take my webpage seriously, even though it is completely nutty with more films and multimedia than YouTube. I even have a LingTube page, and completely blow Top Gear out of the water with my spoof “Chop Gear”. You take off in whatever direction interests you, from the starting point of my 800-car long index page. I take the ‘spider web’ concept quite seriously, too. Once you’re entangled, it takes a desperate effort of will to escape the cerebral attraction of uncharted territory. It’s like having an IV heroin drip via your computer monitor. Every page contains some ‘sticky’ feature that threatens to get you hooked. It’s fun. Why can’t selling or business be fun?

Behind the scenes, I have a built an industry-leading customer management system, where customers are walked through the supply process in a similarly crazy website, with a full conversation log, free noodles, cash bribes and a free toy car. On a serious note, I am the only UK car business to conduct all my business online, and all on a 256 bit secure server. I give the highest data security in the industry, everyone else relies on unprotected emails and fax, for the most sensitive personal of information.

Your website is very informative with lots of customer referrals, how many cars do you lease out a month? And year?

I lease about 2000 new cars a year, but it’s a moving target. My business grows between 50% and 100% every year, so managing the growth is difficult. I have 1,000 attributed customer letters and an interactive customer map. Even the power of Google Maps is not enough to display all my push-pins on my map. My customers just love my service. There has to be meat and potatoes behind the scenes.

Has featuring on bbc1 Dragons Den affected you and your business?

Yes, Dragons’ Den was tremendously important to me. I gained loads of publicity, but more importantly two of the Dragons (Bannatyne and Farleigh) offered investment. They saw my business potential. I immediately turned them down and they came back with a better offer! That is almost unheard of in Dragons’ Den. I turned down the second offer too.

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Is the credit crunch affecting you and your business?

The credit crunch is not affecting me one bit. I think a lot of this is self-induced paranoia by weak-willed people and businesses. Every single month this year has been significantly up on 2007, and at the end of July I was about £90,000 in revenue ahead, year on year. One reason for this is that term-rental is like a fixed mortgage rate - it is very attractive to have fixed costs when the world around you is in turmoil. Another good reason is that providing the best service in the industry helps, too, along with the highest efficiency and lowest overheads which mean that I can offer the lowest prices in the market, more profitably than any other company.

Lingsmobiles.com your latest venture, can you tell us more about it?

I have taken the opportunity to set up an affiliate mobile phone site, as it is a great fit with my car site. Unlike LINGsCARS, LINGsMOBILES is unmanned and operates automatically. The cars will always be my main business, but the mobile side is pure profit and gives me some opportunity to cross-sell. I have many more ideas in the pot, just ready to unleash on the UK.

How do you answer critcisms about your “crazy” website?

So many other websites follow strict unwritten rules about layout. They say, “It must be clear!” Really?

Subheadings like; “Home” “Contact Us” are almost uniformly boring, but really human beings and the human mind do not operate in that way. Look at your own web-surfing habits. The human mind wants stimulation, not commu-nist era conformity plus a logo.

I aim to polarise visitors, some love my site, some hate it, so what? Better than being boring. My latest adventure becoming the sponsor of Fulchester United in VIZ magazine and playing on the “Kung Fu Panda” film with my own version based on my free noodle brand - “FUKU Panda” is a very good illustration. I hold the Billy-The-Fish team to ransom with a Chinese nuclear missile. Why not? Buy VIZ and read it! Gotta have fun!

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81

DEwarS CENtrE

Article by Dewars Centre

Photography byDewars Centre

07

INDOOR SHOw

The Show :Dwars Centre, Perth

The Date :17th August 2008

The Details :In-door car show

Over 90 Cars

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84

INDOOR CAR SHOWCars Arriving from All over Scotland making their way to a new event and venue in Perth - Sunday 17th Aug

The Dewars Centre was host to 90 cars rolling through its doors on Sunday morning for the Modified Performance indoor show. With club displays on show, a couple of local traders, and a few individual cars including the Ferrari 355 the show was set. From a classic Mini to a 700bhp Impreza, this event was out to cater for everyone. Clubs displays reaching from groups of 4 up to 14 seen that both halls were full. The show came about when Dewars had to ‘pull the plug’ on its summer ice skating, due to technical problems with its refrigera-tion plant. With the ice hall now empty for summer, it was up to staff for suggestions on how to bring in a little revenue. And low and behold the ‘petrol heads’ in the ice staff straight away wanted a car show. With a presentation put to management, the go ahead was given. With only 6weeks to plan the event, get the cars, mark out the halls, get the traders, sort out the staffing, get the catering, and advertise. This was going to be no easy walk in the park.Adverts were made, catering was sorted, staff for the day had been arranged, a couple of local traders took interest, but where was the interest from the car owners? Panic. They couldn’t fully advertise until they were sure they definitely had a certain amount of cars on display.Forums were targeted time and time again with little response. Doubts were beginning to concern. Finally, a booking of 7 cars came through which set the ball rolling. Forum responses grew, and booking were made quickly there after. Relief, and out went the adverts around cruises, shows, and local newspapers.Starting at 10am the event rolled through the day to 4pm when the ‘Car of the Show’ was presented. The award went to Phil from the Aberdeen Cruising stand with his VW Corrado VR6 Super-charged show winner. The tastefully modified car took a ‘less is more’ approach with subtle styling, a cracking set of deep dished RH rims, and a lush red leather interior.Dewars have announced that this will be a yearly event and are looking into ways on how to improve from the recent show. Ideas such as a ‘Drivers Lounge’ in one of their function rooms seems to be a popular choice, along with an award for Club display too and a lot more advertising. If you attended the show drop them a line at DewarsEvents@hotmail.com and give an input of what you’d like to see different next year. Remember to keep an eye out for next year’s date!

COMPETITION

COMPETITION

86

Thie Month we have teamed up with FLI to give away this FLI Trap 12 Twin enclosure.

All you have to do to get a chance to win thie amazing pr ize is answer this s imple quest ion!

How much faster is the New Audi RS6 Saloon compared to the Avant?

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comp@tarmag.co.uk

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Competi t ionTarMag199a Borough RoadMiddlesbroughTS4 3BN

Competi t ion Closes 25th September 2008 and the winner wil l be announced in next month’s issue.

wrECkED EXOtICS

Article Max Manford

Photography fromWrecked Exotics

07

REVIEw

Wrecked Exotics :We all love fast, expensive cars, but

they crash just as easily as normal cars. The Website :

www.wreckedexotics.con

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wrECkED EXOtICS

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Q: Can you tell us why wreckedexotics.com started?

I´ve always been fascinated with car crashes since I was a little kid and my other love has always been exotic cars. Back then, I would have my parents buy matchbox cars so I could crush them with rocks.

So once the internet came along, one of the first things I searched for were wrecked cars. I was disappointed with the results so I decided to start WreckedExotics knowing that there had to be not only other crash fanatics, but crash fanatics who want to see wrecked exotic cars. The site was launched in February 2002.

WreckedExotics now attracts about 400,000 visi-tors per month from all over the world and some of the fans are just as crazy as I am.

Q:Whereiswreckedexcotics.combasedoutoftoday?Bay area, California

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Q: How many cars are featured on your wreckedexot-ics.com?

There are over 10,000 photos on the site, not sure as to the exact number of individual cars because sometimes there is more than 1 picture of the same car.

Q:Whosendsinthepictures?

Mostly bystanders or the owners of the car send the picture/s. I´ve had a few people submit photos with a note saying how they´ve been a fan for a long time and never thought they´d see their car on the site.It could happen to anybody.

Q: Do you take 'entries' from other countries?

Yes, about 60% of the photos are from outside the United States. Many from Germany, Belgium, UK. There was even a Ferrari crash in India, and they don´t have many Ferrari´s there.

Ifyouwanttofindoutmore,ortoseemorepictures,check out www.crashexotics.com

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