It’s that time of the year again when car companies want to make the festive season a more joyful one for you with money-saving offers if you plan on getting a new vehicle. Thanks to the coming of the Year of the Rat in conjunction with the Chinese New Year, Sime Darby Auto ConneXion (SDAC), which represents Ford in Malaysia, has attractive prosperity deals for the Ranger Raptor and Ranger WildTrak.
Until January 31, 2020, customers who purchase a Ford Ranger WildTrak or Ranger Raptor won’t have to pay for scheduled maintenance for the first 2 years (or maximum of 40,000 kms). Ang Pao worth RM2,000 and an exclusive Ford Performance Golf Umbrella are also included in the promotion.
Ford Ranger Raptor
During the same promotion period, the Ranger WildTrak will cost RM3,000 less with the cash rebate SDAC is offering. This can offset the downpayment, reducing the amount of the hire-purchase loan and therefore the monthly instalments.
Benchmark for pick-up trucks
Since being originally launched in the late 1990s, the Ranger has been a benchmark in the pick-up truck segment. Besides inspiring a trend to depart from the boring old utilitarian design, the Ranger also introduced, many class-leading safety features showing that Ford cared about the lives of its customers.
Ford Ranger Wildtrak
With the latest Ranger WildTrak, there are smart safety technologies which are on par with passenger cars. And of course, ‘Built Ford Tough’ capabilities ensure that the vehicle can take on any kind of terrain and provide many years of reliable service to its owner.
The Ranger Raptor – Malaysia’s first and only performance pick-up – will get the adrenalin gushing. It has Ford’s Performance DNA and features like the Terrain Management System, a huge Bash Plate underneath to protect against impacts and FOX Racing Shox dampers that will soak up the shocks from jumps.
Both variants, as with the rest of the Ranger line-up, come with a full manufacturer’s warranty of 3 years or maximum of 100,000 kms.
For more information the Rangers available in Malaysia, visit www.sdacford.com.my.
It’s not so long ago that the safety provisions in cars – even those at the top end of the market – did little except provide protection when an accident had happened. Passive safety features, such as seatbelts, airbags and a strong body construction were the key elements. The thinking then was to provide as much protection as possible to minimise the injurious effects of the accident.
When it came to avoiding an accident, the active safety features like ABS and vehicle stability systems helped the driver to retain a degree of control. Instead of ending up in a drain or against a tree, such systems corrected the movements of the car to try to stay on course.
Today, cars have systems that are able to recognise the risk of an accident, alert the driver to the hazard and, if necessary, intervene automatically to prevent a collision, or reduce the consequence it there is an impact. Such systems often begin at the upper end of the market, so it’s not surprising that Lexus has been a pioneer in the field. Its investment in the research, development and deployment of sophisticated new technologies is central to the brand’s goal of securing a future where there are no road accidents.
When the original LS 400 was launched 30 years ago, it was the first car in the world to feature an SRS (Supplementary Restraint System) airbag integrated into the steering wheel – the precursor of multiple airbag systems designed to give effective protection to everyone inside the car. This led to world’s first dual-chamber passenger airbag, fitted to the second generation IS 200 in 2005. Its unique structure greatly improved protection for the neck and shoulders.
Today, Lexus models can feature as many 10 different airbags around the cabin, including knee, side and curtain shield systems and front airbags that activate in line with the severity of the impact.
The behind-the-scenes work at Lexus to improve and devise new safety systems doesn’t just focus on cars and how they are driven. It goes further to analyse and understand the human body and how people react physically in the moments before an impact.
The key to this research is THUMS – Total Human Model for Safety – a computerised crash test system that replicates the not just the size and shape of the human body, but also the position, density and vulnerability of its internal muscles, bones and organs. It’s adaptable for different ages, too, with virtual modelling of infants, older people and even pregnant women. THUMS’s digital mapping can track the properties of around 20 million points on and inside the human body.
THUMS can obtain extremely detailed information about the human body during an accident using advanced digital mapping.
In 2015, Lexus bundled its principal new safety features in a new package called Lexus Safety System +, revealed for the first time on the fourth generation RX SUV. This was the start of a worldwide roll-out of the safety system with its wide-ranging availability demonstrating Lexus’ belief that, to be effective in reducing accidents and injuries, new safety technologies need to be provided on as many vehicles as possible. Democratising cutting-edge safety technology means these features cannot be restricted to the high-grade models only but are offered on entry and core vehicles.
A Lexus vehicle with a variety of sensors carrying out tests for autonomous operation.
Over the past 4 years, Lexus has improved the scope and the functionality of its safety these systems, enhancing their capabilities. In 2017, the launch of the all-new LS 500h flagship sedan marked a significant leap forward in safety with the debut of Lexus Safety System + A. This cutting-edge portfolio included a series of world-first features, with a level of driver assistance that propelled our progress towards future automated driving systems. Although not formally classified, Lexus Safety System + A meets the criteria for SAE Level 2+ automation – the industry standard for automated driving capability.
Future automated driving systems will have an important impact on road safety, having the potential to reduce the number of traffic injuries and fatalities, while also easing congestion (which helps the environment) and enabling older and disabled people to enjoy mobility.
Car races are decided on the track. That will continue to be the case for some time to come. But virtual racing contests are also on the rise as eSports gain popularity all over the world and have the support of some carmakers. For some time now, eSport tournaments have been drawing huge crowds – but are these competitions really sports? “Of course they are,” said Niklas Krellenberg, one of Germany’s top professional racing gamers. “I do more than sports shooters, for example.”
Athletic associations are beginning to share this view. In 2022, eSports will be a medal event at the Asian Games, and the International Olympic Committee is considering whether to include them at the Summer Games in Paris in 2024.
2.2 billion competitors worldwide
This is hardly surprising. Worldwide sales of computer games exceeded one hundred billion US dollars in 2016 – more than the global film and music industries combined. Some 2.2 billion people compete regularly in these games. The best of them can live off the sport – quite well, in fact. They’re organized in professional teams, draw set salaries, and win high levels of prize money. Tournaments for League of Legends, a role-playing team game, can award millions of dollars to the winners.
Even soccer clubs like VfL Wolfsburg in Germany have begun to add eSport teams to their organizations. “We want to reach young people with our programs,” explained Tim Schumacher, the club’s General Manager, noting that it became the world’s first soccer club to offer contracts to eSport players. And of course, there’s also a strong interest in ‘developing new marketing fields’.
New model presentation at a gaming fair?
In mid-2017, Porsche and Microsoft invited the best e-racers from an online contest to enter a 24-hour race in Le Mans. The contestants vied for their own Le Mans laurels on their Xbox consoles – in a sixth classification – and took part in the official awards ceremony. One week earlier, Microsoft had presented – to a crowd of gamers – the most powerful 911 in history, the GT2 RS, at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles. “The gaming sector means a lot to us, because it enables us to provide an emotional and interactive brand experience to a young and extensive target group,” explained Sebastian Hornung, Porsche’s Director of Branded Entertainment.
Instead of a traditional debut to car enthusiasts at a motorshow, the GT2 RS was first shown to gamers in 2017 at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles.
“Awakening and promoting interest in motorsports and conveying the excitement of the racetrack – you can do that really well in the virtual world,” he added. Last year alone, Hornung and his team put considerable effort into preparing multiple Porsche models for use in a wide range of games. “The entire process – including taking photos and possibly laser measurements, providing the technical data, and producing a digital copy for the game – takes around 6 months for each individual model,” he revealed.
How real are these simulators?
The result is a virtual experience that is astonishingly close to driving a real Porsche. “It’s awfully similar to the real thing,” confirmed test driver Lars Kern as he raced his GT2 RS around the Nordschleife in Forza Motorsport 7. “It feels extremely realistic.”
The simulator at Porsche which uses powerful supercomputers helps engineers in their development work.
Kern is a test and development driver at Porsche who spent many years as a race-car driver. In 2017, he drove a 911 GT2 RS to a new record for road-authorized sportscars on the Nordschleife. He’s also very good at transferring his skills to a racing simulator, thanks to the steering wheel and the software’s high degree of realism. But even for someone with his level of experience, driving without a steering wheel is a completely different story. A small controller with a dozen buttons but no pedals and no feel for the car. “I’m slightly out of my depth,” conceded Kern.
World rally champion on the Xbox
The contestants are another story in the world of eSports. Krellenberg, 27, is already a world rally champion on the Xbox gaming console. He steers his Porsche confidently across the screen through the virtual curves of the legendary racecourse in the Eifel region. The controller is for him what the steering wheel is for Kern—an extension of his arms.
Like Kern, Krellenberg knows the braking points on countless racetracks and the weaknesses of his rivals and challengers. He knows which cars will respond in which ways to strong steering actions. And when he races, he switches off the traction control and ABS.
Niklas Krellenberg is one of Germany’s top professional racing gamers.
You may imagine that Krellenberg has a real sportscar as well but he seldom sits behind a real steering wheel in an actual car. He uses public transportation for the short commute to his university; if he needs a car in his hometown of Magdeburg, he borrows his parents’ wheels.
Krellenberg is a new type of athlete. He doesn’t lift weights or send balls of any type flying across a court. Soccer players have amazing legs; race-car drivers are said to require extraordinary muscles in their buttocks. For gamers like Krellenberg, the eyes and hands are what count. Their fingers can perform up to5 actions per minute.
eSports gaining in relevance
Digital developments and rapidly accelerating process speeds have brought virtual racing to the attention of the traditional racing scene. “The lines between the two fields are starting to blur,” observed Frank-Steffen Walliser, Porsche’s Motorsports Director. “eSports are gaining in relevance, and we’re interested in this development and want to help shape it.”
Digital developments have brought virtual racing to the attention of the traditional racing scene
After all, virtual processes are an integral part of making cars. Simulators are used every day to tune them, and computers are absolutely essential development aids. What’s new are the possibilities for training drivers. How can young talent be encouraged? Console games can help address this question, said Walliser, because ‘many e-racers have acquired a very good foundation’.
Despite major advances in virtual racing, everyone recognizes that they’re different from racing in the real world. “The sense of speed isn’t the same; you can’t compare it with accelerating a real car,” said Kern. “It’s difficult to convey that type of sensation in a virtual setting. The textures, spatial relations, and smells of a race car also play very special roles. Which is why classic motorsports will continue. But in the future, it’ll be side by side with virtual motorsports.”
Since 1991, Swiss company Rinspeed has been presenting new ideas for the transport of people and goods in the world of tomorrow. The most recent have been the Snap and the microSNAP which were displayed at the CES event in Las Vegas in the past 2 years. These are vehicles whose chassis and bodies go their own ways; with the revolutionary separation of the two vehicle components, Rinspeed confronts the increasingly diverging life cycles of hardware and software.
The ideas are modular mobility systems and in order to make economic sense, they must gain broad acceptance. That is precisely where Rinspeed is now once more taking a crucial step ahead with its 26th concept car – the MetroSnap. This is a simple, fast, safe and inexpensive swapping system for the vehicle bodies for which the Swiss company has filed for patent protection.
Modular vehicles can help solve many of the problems and questions posed by modern mobility. Due to the flexible use of different vehicle bodies, these vehicles not only reduce the number of tremendously expensive and systemically short-lived automated vehicles, they also satisfy – depending on the time of day and current needs – the different transport requirements of people and goods.
Thanks to the unique swapping system – inspired by aviation, and tried and tested there around the world in all weather conditions – entirely new applications become possible. Among other things, the desired service now comes to the customer quickly and simply, regardless where he or she may be at the time – at home or at work.
This can be customer-accessible parcel stations that are dropped off in the customer’s neighbourhood for a certain period. Even combinations with a ‘corner health food shop’ are conceivable. Limited business hours, long drives and the endless and unpopular courier caravans are thus things of the past.
Quite as an aside: no more unattended packages, no more thefts and failed delivery attempts – and no more associated pollution and traffic burden. And the really great thing about it is this innovative way of getting parcels to the customer faster and easier can already be used today with a human driver. Parcel stations on wheels, right around the corner.
Because the batteries are split up between the Pod (vehicle body) and the Skateboard (chassis), the vehicle does not need to be parked for charging. The charging process takes place without wasted time while cleaning or loading the Pod in a process referred to as ‘Hot Swap’. The swapping of the vehicle bodies, including the batteries, takes place in a matter of seconds and the vehicle is ready to go almost as quickly as a racing car after a pit stop.
The unique MetroSnap EV concept, which fuses together smart city, supply chain and passenger transport, is meeting with very strong interest in the industry even before its actual premiere. It is full of technical and visual treats contributed by a reputable network of companies from around the world.
The 2020 Dakar Rally will take place on the Arabian Peninsula for the first time from tomorrow (January 5) till January 17. Among the entries are a total of nine MINI racing cars, of which two are Dakar icons in the MINI JCW buggy.
Dakar record winner Frenchman Stephane Peterhansel and co-driver Paulo Fiuza are aiming for his 14th overall Dakar success. The two-time winner and former World Rally Champion Carlos Sainz will also be in the further developed MINI JCW buggy and the support of MINI Motorsport partner X-raid.
The 2020 Dakar Rally will have 12 competitive stages which will total around 5,000 kms through desert. The event will cover some 7,500 kms from Jeddah via the Saudi Arabian capital, Riyadh, to Al-Quiddia.
“After many years in South America, 2020 will see us not only go to a completely new region but also ‘back to the ‘roots’ again. Long special tests, many kilometres and lots of new experiences: that’s what awaits us in Saudi Arabia. It will be a tough Dakar for sure, and hopefully our MINI vehicles will prove their reliability as always,” said Sainz.
“It will be a new challenge for everyone. A few weeks ago, I saw new landscapes and completely different routes in the small Baja around Riyadh, very quickly, but beautiful. I look forward to it!” said Peterhansel.
Peterhansel has an amazing record of winning the Dakar 13 times – 6 times on a motorcycle and 7 times in 4-wheelers. This includes the first joint victory of MINI and X-raid 2012 in MINI ALL4 Racing and the title defence the following year. He actually wanted to contest the Dakar 2020 for the first time with his wife, Andrea, who had previously been a successful rally driver. She had earlier navigated her husband to the FIA World Cup title for cross-country rallies in 2019.
Two other MINI JCW rallycars will be used by X-raid driver Vladimir Vasilyev with Vitaly Yevtyekhov and Saudi Arabian hero Yasir Seaidan with co-driver Alexey Kuzmich. Outside the X-raid team, Denis Krotov/Dmitry Tsyro and Vaidotas Zala/Saulius Jurgelenas will be working hard to finish with good results in their MINI JCW Rallycars.
The 2020 Dakar Rally is running for the first time in Saudi Arabia. It will have 12 competitive stages which will total around 5,000 kms through desert. The event will cover some 7,500 kms from Jeddah via the Saudi Arabian capital, Riyadh, to Al-Quiddia.
Lamborghini starts off the new year with the announcement of the Huracan EVO Rear-Wheel Drive (RWD), a model it has developed for purists. Despite blistering performance numbers, Lamborghini says the Huracan EVO RWD is not focused on straight-line speeds or lap records: it proclaims its designation as an instinctive driver’s car.
“The Huracan EVO rear-wheel drive puts the car in the driver’s hands: the driving experience is delivered by the hardware,” said Stefano Domenicali, Chairman & CEO of Automobili Lamborghini. “This car reminds the driver of Lamborghini’s pure engineering origins: the driver is at the centre of the Huracán EVO RWD’s performance, with unfiltered feedback and an emotive and more engaging driving experience controlled by the driver.”
He explained that the supercar’s performance relies on the harmony between man and machine.: “Driving skills and the Huracan EVO’s RWD mechanics deliver perfectly balanced dynamics, physical feedback and a pure performance. The Huracán EVO RWD enhances the V10 Huracán line-up with a model appealing to brand newcomers as well as those seeking sublime driving fun,” said Domenicali.
The Huracan EVO RWD delivers 610 bhp of power at 8000 rpm and 560 Nm of torque at 6500 rpm. Weighing just 1,389 kgs, this output enables a claimed top speed of 325 km/h with 100 km/h reached just 3.3 seconds after take-off.
The V10 engine delivers more than just power to the rear-wheel drive set-up: the sound of the naturally aspirated powerplant combines with the specially tuned traction control system to deliver the most emotive, fun-to-drive experience in both dry and wet conditions, and even snow.
New Performance Traction Control System
The new Performance Traction Control System (P-TCS) is calibrated specifically for rear-wheel drive, delivering torque even during the phase where the car is realigning following drifting or side-slipping. Whereas a ‘normal’ traction control system delivers a sharp decoupling, waiting for a car to become completely stable before delivering torque again, the P-TCS car delivers torque in advance, avoiding a harsh torque cut and assuring better traction when exiting a corner.
The P-TCS intervention is calibrated according to the Huracan EVO RWD’s driving modes, selected via the steering wheel’s ANIMA button (Adaptive Network Intelligent Management: ‘soul’ in Italian). In STRADA, the P-TCS minimizes rear wheel slippage to ensure stability and safety in all conditions: with a more proactive strategy P-TCS manages torque delivery on low-adhesion surfaces.
In SPORT mode, the P-TCS maximizes the fun-to-drive experience: the rear wheels can slide and skate during acceleration, for easy drifting fun without compromising safety. The system recognizes conditions where the angle of oversteer increases rapidly and limits torque delivery to the rear wheels, allowing the driver to perfectly control and stabilize the car.
In CORSA, the P-TCS is calibrated to achieve the rear-wheel slip that optimizes the car’s traction and agility when exiting a corner, allowing the driver to maximize performance. The P-TCS improves smoothness of intervention by 30% compared to the previous Huracán RWD model; improves corner-exit traction by 20% and enhances oversteer by 30%.
The hybrid chassis integrates lightweight aluminium and carbonfibre with an aluminium and thermoplastic resin body. The Huracan EVO RWD sits on double wishbone suspension with overlapped quadrilaterals and passive shock absorbers and has front/rear weight distribution of 40:60.
The electro-mechanical, servo-assisted Lamborghini Dynamic Steering (LDS) is tuned specifically for this car, ensuring maximum feedback. The7-speed dual clutch gearbox is said to give the fastest gear changes, with launch control for maximum acceleration from a standing start. The 19-inch Kari rims with specially-developed Pirelli P Zero tyres are fitted with ventilated and cross-drilled steel brakes. As an option 20-inch rims and carbo-ceramic brakes are available.
Huracan EVO RWD (left) and the Huracan EVO.
Fresh design
The Huracán EVO RWD continues the V10 Lamborghini’s design language with new front and rear features, clearly differentiating it from its 4WD stablemate. The RWD version is characterized by a sculpted, purposeful persona, complemented by a new front splitter and vertical fins within the larger, framed front air intakes. The rear bumper in high gloss black incorporates a new diffuser unique to the Huracán EVO RWD.
Inside, the cockpit features an HMI 8.4-inch touchscreen in the centre console of the car, controlling all aspects of the car’s functions as well as managing full connectivity such as telephone calls, internet access, and including Apple CarPlay.
Both inside and out, Lamborghini’s Ad Personam program provides many options for colour and trim personalization. In order to emphasize the shape of the car, the new colour known as Giallo Belenus (yellow) has been developed together with a dedicated leather and Alcantara colour for the interior trim, matching the new exterior paint.
The first customers will take delivery of the new Lamborghini during this quarter and for those who are buying it in the UK, the price is 137,000 Pounds, equivalent to around RM735,580.
