Car Throttle

Ah Caterham, how do I love thee ... look, these cars are great, in my opinion. Sure, they're not for everybody. A car with no heater, no real roof to speak of and where even paint is a cost extra option will not appeal to your "average car buyer". Ah well, their loss. For me, these cars are great. I love the minimalism of them. And the performance. And it seems that Caterham has decided to roll out three new models at this year's Tokyo Motor Show. Caterhams are very popular in Japan. I'm not really sure why, but I figure it's the same reason I love them. Plus, since you can still buy them as kits, that leans towards the strong tinkerer/hobbyist streak that the

Oh please oh please oh please ... if anyone can make an EV sportscar, Caterham can. Sure, it might seem sort of an odd idea, even a bit of a stretch, even blasphemous to some, but from an engineering standpoint, it sounds like a good starting point. For starters, Caterhams are light, so the addition of heavy batteries will add up to less, over-all then if you put them in a more conventional ride. Yes, adding weight for whatever reason goes against what Colin Chapman, and the evergreen Lotus 7 stands for, but hey, why NOT make an EV 7? Not only is their less weight to start with, but if you've ever taken the hood off a 7, you'll notice there's a lot of room

The dire global economy has resulted in many global automakers pulling out of the Tokyo Auto Show. This has proved to be a boon to home country manufacturers like Honda, Subaru, Nissan and Toyota who have the show all to themselves. There's no doubt who this show was all about though - clearly it has been Toyota. The company was eager to show off a different, performance-centric side with the Toyota FT-86 Concept and the Lexus LFA (no longer titled LF-A with a hyphen, Lexus says). Is the LFA everything it has been heralded to be - will it inject excitement into Lexus? Let's find out! After what seems like an incredibly long wait, starting with the original LF-A Concept in 2005, following with the second in 2007 and

A while back I covered the unconventional Nissan Glider, a 1 + 1 EV that leans into turns like a motorcycle that would be making its debut at the upcoming Tokyo Motor Show. There's always lots of crazy stuff at car shows, and the craziest always seems to pop up at Tokyo, so the Nissan Land Glider wasn't that much of a surprise. What is surprising is the rumors that Nissan will actually produce the car and bring it to America badged as an Infiniti. At just 47 inches wide, the Land Glider could be seen as helping with congestion, and as a pure EV, it helps with pollution. As odd of a car as it is, from the get go, Nissan said the Land Glider

Since it's almost been a whole month since the last one, it's high time that Lotus introduced another slightly different variant of the Elise/Exige.  Mustangitis aside, I (generally speaking) love the Elise/Exige, and when "special edition" means "flat black paint," I extra love the Exige.  That's a whole lot of love. This one'll either be called Scura or Stealth, depending on the language spoken in your market.  Scura, by the way, is Italian for "Darkness," and suits the Scura to a T.  This thing is blacker than a coal mine at midnight during an ink flood.  "All murdered out" is how I'd describe the Scura's darkness, but it's not cheap rattle-can flat black! Just gaze in amazement at how deep and soft that paint looks.  Lotus

Subaru's main introduction at the Tokyo Motor Show was the Hybrid Tourer Concept. As it's name implies, the car is a hybrid, meant to signal the brand's intention to incorporate the technology into it's lineup without compromising traditional brand traits. That's a tall order, but they seem to have succeeded. The styling doesn't offer anything groundbreaking, but is a further evolution of Subaru's design language. I must say I do like it better than the recently introduced Subaru Legacy, and much more so than the current Impreza. Hopefully the clean, modern look of the Hybrid Tourer Concept will carry over. When Subaru introduced the concept, there wasn't many pictures available. Now they've opted to release more of them that give us a better idea of what the

The Tokyo Motor Show has a rep from bringing out the goofy in Japanese manufacturers (and if you think about it, they can get uber-goofy without trying very hard). And this year's best case in point (so far) might just be the Nissan Land Glider Concept. Sure, it's a concept, but there have been odd rumblings that Nissan is looking to this thing as some sort of touchstone for a future vehicle. The Japanese automaker will debut the new Land Glider concept which Nissan intends to be an urban runabout. The tandem two-seat Land Glider is fully electric and, as even Ray Charles could see, is extremely narrow. Nissan did this as a means of easing congestion in dense city centers and make it easier

For a while, Toyota seemed unstoppable, with it's cars garnering quality accolades and the sales increasing to a point where it has overtook General Motors as the world's largest automaker. Toyota President Akio Toyoda has made some interesting comments lately, saying that Toyota is in a state of decline and needs to excitement to help pull them out of it. Is the sky falling? No, but there are things that need to be fixed. Toyota is in desperate need of excitement and design injected into it's products. Toyota's effort to connect with a younger demographic through Scion hasn't fared very well (or as well as the company hoped). The FT-86 is the company's attempt to do that for the Toyota brand. The FT-86 was designed at Toyota's

The Subaru WRX in it’s last generation was a pretty universally loved car, with unforgettable round headlights and excellent performance for the money. It seems as if the car has lost a bit of it's mojo and character since those days, but performance has only continued to get better. At Tokyo 2009, along with a new concept, Subaru has saw fit to introduce a new package for the WRX STI lineup, dubbed the Carbon. At first you might think it has something to with the environment, but no - carbon in the name WRX STI Carbon is for carbon fiber, not the type of C02 emissions from cars that everyone is convinced is killing the planet. And if you know about carbon fiber, you’ll know it is

I've been waiting for this one for a while now. There's been a severe market shortage of small, fuel-efficient, genuinely fun-t0-drive two-seat coupes, pretty much since Honda dropped the CR-X and replaced it with the useless del Sol.  It's of no surprise, then, that it would be Honda to pick up the mantle of the tiny two-seat pocket rocket with a modern interpretation of the beloved CR-X. And you can't say the time isn't right for such a car.  These days, everyone's concerned with efficiency, but that doesn't mean people don't still care about fun.  This strategy is the whole reason that Honda sold every CR-X they could import in the '80's, even with the ridiculous Honda dealer price gouging that was routine back when there was