By now, you should know that we are not big fans of change just for the sake of change, but for changes that bring meaningful improvements.
On that note, following last year's adoption of the Disqus commenting system, we have now updated to the overhauled 2012 platform that was officially released on June 13.
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We also played along with MINI's "ingenious" Camper trailer and optional roof tent creations, and the $236,000 Cooper Yachtsman amphibious vehicle, as well as Planet Subaru's, blazingly fast solar-powered Tribeca crossover.
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Sure there are many other notable steering wheel, pedal and shifter sets, namely from Fanatec and Thrustmaster, but the G27 is perhaps the best bang for your money as you can often find it in the US$210-$230 region, occasionally even less.
Upon receiving the G27, that little tuning voice in my head told me that I should customize the stock steering wheel and shifter.
You can find plenty of modifications for the G27 online (GTPlanet is a good place to start) with aftermarket steering wheels and shifters (i.e. Momo or Sparco), but I wanted something different and at the same time, more economical with the ability to easily reverse the mods without damaging the device.
So, after shopping around at eBay, I decided to go with a BMW theme for both the steering wheel and the gear knob.
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The outgoing Fusion was the first model to feature Ford’s then-new five-bar grille, which was later adopted by the rest of its U.S. range. Likewise, its successor is the model that introduces the next evolution of Ford's design language previewed by the Frankfurt Motor Show Evos concept.
It is distinguished by the slim headlights and the hexagonal, Aston Martin-like front grille, while the bodywork looks like a sportier, tauter evolution of the European Mondeo.
“The previous Fusion was an easy purchase for a customer to rationalize”, said Chris Hamilton, chief exterior designer. “Our design goal for the new car was to give the mainstream sedan buyer a top-drawer visual experience, adding some emotional appeal to an already sensible choice.”
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This year's list includes a wide variety of offbeat news and videos ranging from fancy replicas to crazy accidents and barely dressed female dancers.
So join us for a look back at the most read articles in this segment right after the break. And just in case you missed out, click here for the Top 10 Scoops and here for the Top 10 New Car stories of 2011.
To be honest, while we expected certain cars like the brand-new Volkswagen Beetle and BMW 3-Series sedan to make it on the top 10 list, some of the vehicles and especially the most read single post on a new vehicle even surprised us.
Just goes to show you than you can never be 100 percent sure what kind of stories/vehicles will prove to be the most popular. Curious to find out which new model gathered the most views this year? Sure you are, so just hop over the break and let the countdown on the most read "New Car" stories of 2011 begin…
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Over the course of the year, we brought you close to 300 scoop stories (285 to be precise) but for one reason or the other, these ten articles captured your attention the most.
In the list that follows after the break, you'll find a picture and a link to each story starting from number 10 and climbing to the most popular scoop of 2011. Enjoy!
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Being a joyous time of celebration, some folks may overindulge during the holidays, in which case we hope that you'll forget about driving altogether and have someone else deliver you back home.
We'll be taking some time off to spend the day with our families and friends, but not without programming some select news for today and tomorrow before we return to our normal daily schedule on Tuesday, December 27, as we get ready for the next round of car shows starting with the Detroit Auto Show in the second week of January.
Vroomy wishes to all, and hope you enjoy the Santa Claus videos after the jump!
In lieu of a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, we plan to take half the day off (okay, maybe a bit more) but we will resume our regular coverage of the daily automotive news and then some more on Friday, November 25.
We’ll send you off with the sounds of happiness: a compilation of new and old V12-powered Lamborghinis, which you can check out in the video after the break.
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If our memory serves us right, there were about 2,800 votes last night with the Mazda CX-5 leading the pack, but dropped to around 1,690 in the morning and have being going up and down ever since.
Obviously, there's a bug somewhere, but being that the gadget used for the poll is an official Google widget, there's really nothing we can do about it from our side, so we've decided to remove it.
We hope you accept our apologies for the glitch and promise to head over to one of Google’s official forums to write a heated message to someone who may or may not escalate the problem to a Google employee and cross our fingers that he or she will read it in six business days and find the time to respond in a timely manner - if you've ever dealt with Google, you probably know what we mean…
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For those of you unfamiliar with Disqus, it is a popular commenting platform for websites that provides readers with a variety of options for commenting and participating in conversations in a more active way. Other sites currently using Disqus include Time Magazine, CNN, Engadget and the UK’s Daily Telegraph.
Among other features, readers can spiff up their posts with videos and photos, reply to other comments directly, rate and flag users, have their own avatar (no, we’re not giving away blue-hued bomb shells from the planet Pandora) and some more.
We’ve opted to allow you to comment either as a guest by providing an email and a name or nickname, or if you prefer, by using your account on Disqus, Google, Twitter, Facebook, Yahoo or OpenID.
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This time, we focused clearly on the design aspect tweaking and updating the styling after taking into consideration your constructive criticism and ideas. Changes include but are not limited to the larger and more prominent Carscoop logo, the font choices throughout the site and the more compact sidebar sections.
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That said, we are no strangers to the mommy-blogger-type approach from marketing companies representing major automotive brands, but we never cease to be amazed. This time we were approached by a social media agency called Knallgrau on behalf of GM’s European Opel unit. When we received the first email, we believed it was a media / press invitation but upon our request for additional information, we discovered that wasn’t the case.
In a similar fashion to the Ford incident, the agency asked if we wanted to write about the new Astra GTC and participate in a type of contest, the winners of which will be invited to the official unveiling of the three-door hatchback at Opel’s headquarters in Rüsselsheim, Germany.
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Think of Carscoop Version 5.0 as something like a new Porsche; while the looks remain the same (to the previous Version 4.3), everything else is new or revamped. In our case, this should translate to a better experience on most modern browsers and more importantly, faster speeds regardless the connection.
For the truly live updates, simply check out the window (unlike Tokyo, uploads should be much more fluid), while higher-res "live" photos will appear as soon as we manage to peel ourselves away from the metal and get plugged back into the computer. Also like Tokyo, we'll be doing our best to keep up with comments and requests, so feel free to get involved as we take you along with us.
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Other automotive-related April Fool’s Day jokes found around the net include: Autoblog’s Honda Accord Crossdressed Cabriolet; Pickuptruck’s 2012 Cadillac DRW Platinum Heavy-Duty Pickup; BMW’s costly M3 Pickup Truck (the joke here is that it won’t enter production because the ute is real); and Jalopnik’s announcement that AOL’s new empress, Arianna Huffington, bought the site and merged it with Autoblog to create Autoblognik.
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