Author Archives: Rob Auchterlonie

THE push is on to make the world a cleaner place – but the good old internal combustion engine is going to be plying its trade for some time yet.

That’s Mazda’s summing of the current situation, and they believe that until more renewable energy sources replace dirtier forms of fossil fuel and until charging times and charging infrastructure have dramatically improved, the engine as we know it will still be playing a major role for the next decade.

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FOR all the knockers who smugly spout the line that French cars are all style and no build quality, here’s a bit of advice: bite hard and swallow.

There’s no denying the all new Peugeot 508 SW is a very smartly styled estate car – something the French have proved quite adept at over the years, although on the debit side there have been the occasional howlers along the way.

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MORE than 1.3 miilion motorists can’t be wrong, so you’re very unlikely to be buying a pig in a poke with Kia’s latest model.

I’ve always been a big fan of the Ceed. Now we can proceed on to look at the ProCeed, a new model which just serves to increase the admiration, with its low, sleek look and Panamera-like rear end treatment.

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A CAR for active lifestyles – or a van with a few more windows and extra seats?

Whatever shade of contact lenses you’re viewing it through, you can’t escape the fact Vauxhall’s Combo Life is probably one of the most practical vehicles you can buy if your family is larger than the UK norm.

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THEY say you’re safer in a modern day Volvo than going for a walk with the Green Cross Code man.

Very reassuring when the standard of everyday driving seems to be on the wane. And more so when the car you’re sampling is Volvo’s new XC40.

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LOOKS like our chums across the channel have had another one of those extended lunches swilling Ricard and smoking some exotic substances.

How else would they come up with something as wayward on the inside as the DS3 Crosshatch, something so completely opposite to the more restful and sometimes staid interiors we enjoy on a majority of cars these days.

Over the decades the French have been noted for coming up with some leftfield ideas and designs, and this one is no different.

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IN profile it might look as if someone big and heavy has sat on the rear of the roof but the Range Rover Evoque is a real deal style icon.

Its falling roofline and rising beltline gives it an aggressive, almost-coupe like appearance but it’s unmistakably a Range Rover. There are Velar touches to the latest variant – the slimmer front lights and the flush fitting door handles, and the odd bit of contrasting rose gold trim front and rear.

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SOMEONE, somewhere is going to be the lucky owner of a very exclusive car this summer.

What is officially the 100,000th Lotus car to be produced has a very special link with the late, great Jim Clark, the Scottish farmer who took the Formula One world by storm in the 1960s.

The trust that runs the museum that bears his name in the sleepy Scottish border town of Duns has been given a Lotus Evora GT410 Sport in ‘Clark’ colours – red with a silver roof and tartan seats to match the Elan he drove in the 60s – to help fund the new museum that was due to open in July. And it’s been signed by all 20 F1 drivers from this season.

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