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German Car Blog, Performance, Tuning, Motorsport, and Modification News
Published on 10-16-2011 06:27 AM
Despite a promising weekend for Mercedes GP, the team couldn't show it where is counts, the race. Rosberg could only manage to claim eighth place, after battling it out with Jenson Button and the Ferrari's. In the end, he's tires gave out and was passed by Torro Rosso's Alguersuari on the last lap of the race. Michael had an unfortunate race and had to retire after Ranault's Vitaly Petrov completely over-braked and took out Schumacher on turn 3. Petrov and Alonso were battling for position after the first pitstops and both outbraked themselves. Alonso was on the outside and went off the track, but Petrov on the inside, ran into Schumacher, destroying his rear wing and puncturing his rear tire.
...Published on 10-15-2011 11:50 PM
Renntech is branching out to other markets from their traditional Mercedes tuning and they have several ECU tunes now available for BMW vehicles. The Renntech 335 diesel tune puts down an impressive 311 horsepower to the wheels along with a tremendous 432 wheel torque. The ECU has to be sent in for the flash unless one is local. A 24 month warranty is also included in the $1100 price. This tune should be applicable to the X5 diesel as well in the United States.
...Published on 10-15-2011 08:21 PM
This simply has to be seen to be believed. A Cayman owner in the Washington area decided to modify his car. We are all for that and all for the awesome Techart widebody kit he did which costs a pretty penny. It is the paintjob after the kit was installed that makes us scratch our heads. The high quality air brush paint job cost about $15,000 but is completely out of place on a Porsche Cayman. It looks like it should be on a Hot Rod or Sand Rail of some sort, not a Porsche. Well, it's different, that is for sure.
...Published on 10-15-2011 08:31 AM
Mercedes GP took a very strategic approach to the Korean weekend. They spent all practice sessions on finding the right setup for race conditions. When qualifying rolled around, both drivers chose to do only one run in each of the qualifying periods in order to save tires for the race. Unfortunatly because of that Schumacher after complaints of vibrations in the car could ony manage 9th before dropping to 12th at the end of Q2. Nico Rosberg on the other hand made it through all three sessions and finished qualifying in 7th place.
...Published on 10-14-2011 06:41 PM
Well here it is, the new 2012 4 door F30 3 series. Not really all that much different externally with BMW playing it extremely safe. The styling envelope is not being pushed with the 3 taking cues from the F10 5 series for the headlights and the rear taillight design being as benign as possible. The interior is also a very minor update on the E90 with the BMW switchgear and gear lever that we have all grown accustomed to.
...Published on 10-13-2011 11:17 PM
As you know, Audi updated the RS5 for 2013. These changes include styling differences such as the front and rear lights. The engine also received a bump up to 450 horsepower which is mated to a dual clutch transmission. These changes will all carry over to a convertible version of the car which you can see was spotted testing below with basically no camouflage except an S5 badge instead of RS5.
...Published on 10-13-2011 08:40 PM
As many of you expected, Renntech is now a vendor on BenzBoost and the entire Boost Network of sites. We wish to welcome Renntech and thank them for their positive and professional approach. Renntech was established in 1989 by Hartmut Feyhl and since then has evolved into one of the premier Mercedes tuning options in the United States. Renntech offers forced induction, body pieces, intakes, exhausts, tuning, you name it. Renntech is also expanding into other markets beyond Mercedes offering Porsche parts and tuning as well as the same for Audi. The Renntech website is http://www.renntechmercedes.com and can also be reached by contacting @mark@renntech here on the forum.
...Published on 10-13-2011 12:51 AM
We have reported several times that Audi was contemplating releasing a higher performance version of the Q5. These rumors died down a bit after the initial testing as Audi seemed to be contemplating the idea. Well, the car was caught out testing again with some revisions so it appears the Q5 S is the real deal. Expect to see a version of the B8 S4's 3.0 TFSI supercharged V6 under the hood. Whether the motor will be mated to a DSG or automatic is anyone's guess but for an SUV an automatic makes more sense especially if one is to actually use it to tow. We think this model is a great move on Audi's part.
...Published on 10-12-2011 11:47 PM
The Cayman R with PDK is one very quick little vehicle. How quick? Well, how does 0-60 in 4.0 seconds flat sound? How about the 1/4 mile in 12.5@110? That is pretty darn quick. Insideline loved the car and it is hard not to see why. Great steering feel, low weight, awesome handling, and as they put it, "911-threatening acceleration with PDK." We want to remind you that Autocar claimed the BMW 1M "crushes" the Cayman in a straightline. Uh, it is actually the other way around.
...Published on 10-12-2011 07:28 PM
We are sorry it has come to this but we can no longer have Modern Horsepower (MHP) advertising on this network. Andrew Cluck simply has abused the goodwill here and worn out his welcome (again). As many of you suspected, Andy was using multiple accounts to bash the competition hoping to prop up MHP in this manner. Yes, the user Jbond was Andy and the staff bit their lips as much as humanly possible even though that is not part of the vendor agreement. We simply do not condone attacking Renntech while hiding behind multiple accounts and this is why the thread was not moderated to protect MHP. Andy created that situation and we were not going to allow him to have vendor privileges in a thread the he did not have the courage to make from his vendor name.
...Published on 10-12-2011 02:25 PM
For those of you who do not remember, Mercedes teased a "Shooting Brake" CLS concept back in 2010. Basically, this is just a wagon based on the W218 CLS. It will be entering production and it will be in showrooms next year although there is no word on if it will come to the United States where wagons are about as popular as using the words "Shooting Brake" to describe a car. Expect an AMG version of the vehicle as well.
...Published on 10-12-2011 06:51 AM
You may remember that AutoExpress drag raced the 1M against the DSG RS3 a few months back. In that comparison, the Audi won by virtue of its dual clutch transmission and all wheel drive launch although the 1M had the higher trap speed. This time both cars are taken around a road course and the 1M just flat out crushes the Audi by almost 2 seconds on what is a fairly short track. The driver mentions the Audi is heavier and more of a car for beginners with understeer versus the 1M which is more nimble and often requires the throttle to correct the tail stepping out. Check out the video below.
...Published on 10-12-2011 04:27 AM
This weekend, Korea will host round 16 of the 2011 Formula 1 World Championship. The Korean International circuit will host it's second grand prix after debuting in 2010. Last year's race was full of drama, delayed by a downpour, started, stopped and then re-started behind the safety car after a 48 minute wait before ending almost in the twilight with Fernando Alonso taking the win after Vettel suffered an engine failure with just nine laps left in the race. Last year saw the early retirement of Nico Rosberg after Red Bull's Mark Webber lost control of his car, hit the wall and took Nico out. For Michael it was a great race that saw him finish in 4th place, his best result last year after a difficult comeback year. ...Published on 10-11-2011 02:43 PM
A N55 355i Owner was kind enough to stop by last week for some testing of a prototype unit of the cp-e N55 downpipe. The day went perfectly for such testing. The part was designed and built completely from computer data, without any fabrication on the car. The part was already ready without being in any vehicle prior. This was a true testament to doing CAD development in the most effecient way possible. Fitment was dead on, lining up with brackets, flanges and sensors flawlessly. Performance was to our satisfaction as well. Dyno charts below.
...Published on 10-11-2011 09:41 AM
This advertisement is just kind of weird, no other way to put it. The A6 Avant is not available for sale in the USA and maybe that is a good thing if this is how Audi plans to advertise it. The commercial shows off a hummingbird flying around to opera music while sipping on fuel and apparently tripping out. Hey, we didn't make it up, Audi did. The ad concludes with Audi stating they are focusing on lightweight technology and hummingbirds are pretty light so that is the connection apparently. Europeans will probably dig it.
...Published on 10-11-2011 06:40 AM
So, what is with all this talk about the Chinese buying up luxury cars left and right? Turns out China, just like everyone else, has cars sitting on dealer lots with dealers willing to discount BMW's up to 19% as reported by Businessweek. Growth is definitely slowing down for the luxury automakers in China but BMW believes growth is sustainable. A Chinese BMW representative stated, “It is predictable that the Chinese car market will keep growing at a comparatively lower rate. BMW has maintained a strong and sustainable growth.” May we have some special editions in the USA now BMW?
...Published on 10-11-2011 02:54 AM
Congratulations to APR who continues to do great things at the drag strip. The vehicle here is a 2010 B8 S4 with DSG and 5,380 miles. Mods are the APR Stage 2+ with 100 octane, 1/8 tank of gas, Miltek exhaust, spare removed, and a larger heat exchanger. The car was launched without launch control yet produced an astounding 1.67 60 foot. Obviously with the car being all wheel drive it makes it rather easy to put the power down. Trap speed is a respectable 115 but we expect to see much more out of the B8's as more owners mod and get out to the strip.
...Published on 10-11-2011 12:34 AM
We all know the Mercedes M275 twin turbo V12 responds VERY well to tuning. Eurocharged did an absolutely awesome job with a 6.0 liter version of the motor in a W221 S65 AMG squeezing out an additional 79 wheel horsepower and 100 wheel torque. This was done on a Dyno Dynamics which for the most part is much stingier on stock settings than the dynojets everyone is used to. For more information or how to purchase this tune, please contact Eurocharged.
...Published on 10-11-2011 12:03 AM
This is the first body kit Duke Dynamics had done for a Porsche model. You might remember that they mostly do BMW work but they are expanding into other markets. The kit is not overly aggressive and looks pretty good. Fitment seems spot on and it adds a nice level of aggression to the Cayman without being over the top. These are all bolt on body pieces and you can expect more Porsche body kits from Duke Dynamics in the future.
...Published on 10-10-2011 06:44 AM
All chrome paint jobs are tacky. Yes, tacky even if an OEM does it. However, that does not mean we do not want to see it. BMW for whatever reason decided to create a Chrome Bullet M3 with chrome paint obviously as well as M color accents. BMW uploaded the photos of the car to their M Facebook page without much supplementary info but from what we can gather this is just a one off showcar. Cool to see, but BMW's chrome shadow paint job on the E46 M3 concept was just plain better than this as it wasn't so ostentatious, looked great, and actually could be pulled off in public.
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