Ferrari Takes Fx to New Technological Heights
Italian car maker Ferrari will launch a successor to its exotic F50 next year and is showing a “design prototype,” called the FX, that it says provides a pretty good idea of what the finished car will look like.
The production model is scheduled to be unwrapped at the Paris Auto Show in September. Ferrari is expected to make about 350 a year, and buyers should expect to pay about $450,000 a car.
The car will take Ferrari’s most advanced, Formula 1-derived technologies off the track and put them on the road. They include a 650-horsepower V-12 engine, a clutchless Formula 1-type transmission, composite brake discs, traction control and electronically controlled shock absorbers.
Top speed is expected to be about 215 mph--with zero to 60 acceleration under four seconds--plenty quick to get you up steep freeway onramps and merged into rush-hour traffic.
The prototype was unveiled last week at a design exhibit at the Tokyo Museum of Contemporary Art.
Mercedes to Launch Super-Luxury Maybach
In its relentless search for profit, luxury-car maker Mercedes-Benz has extended its reach down into the middle classes with vehicles such as the C230 Coupe, which sells for a mere $25,000.
Now it’s going in the other direction with an entry in what it calls the super-luxury market.
It won’t be a Mercedes, though, but a Maybach--resurrection of a name that was synonymous with chauffeurs and champagne in the Europe of the roaring 1920s and dangerous ‘30s.
It has been 61 years since Maybach Manufaktur quit building cars, but Mercedes--whose founder, Gottleib Daimler, was friend and mentor to Wilhelm Maybach-- has never forgotten. It was Maybach, after all, who designed the first Mercedes, named after the car buyer’s daughter, for Daimler in 1901.
Wilhelm and son Karl later started a business making engines for the famed Zepplin airships, and in 1919 Karl Maybach began building the luxury cars that bore his name.
They ranged from two-seat roadsters to posh limousines. The biggest, called the Zepplin, was 18 feet long and powered by a 12-cylinder engine.
The new Maybach, scheduled to be launched in Europe this fall and in the U.S. in spring 2003, will use a 550-horsepower, twin-turbocharged V-12 engine. Each car will be built to order, and DaimlerChrysler plans to offer a huge palette of luxury interior appointments, including a number of high-tech touches such as a wireless fax and an e-mail-capable integrated phone for the traveling business executive.
There will be two versions, a regular-length sedan at 18.8 feet in length and a stretch sedan at 20.2 feet.
Mercedes hasn’t said anything out loud about pricing, but expect it to start in the low $300,000s.
The production version will be unveiled at the Paris show this fall.
Volkswagen’s Touareg SUV Coming to U.S.
Then there’s Volkswagen, which brings the Touareg, its version of Porsche’s Cayenne super-sport utility vehicle (Highway 1, March 6, 2002), to market in the U.S. next year.
The Touareg shares the Porsche’s platform (as will a new Audi, based on the Magellan concept, which probably will be introduced as an ’05 model).
It will have features such as full-time four-wheel drive, air springs, electronically controlled shocks and engines ranging from a base 225-horsepower V6 to a 395-horsepower W-12--think of a pair of V-6s mounted side by side.
A trailer-hauling V-10 diesel with about 550 pounds-feet of torque and 310 horsepower also is on the list.
Transmissions will be six-speed, manual or automatic.
Price tags probably will range from the low $30,000s to the mid-$60,000s.
