Green Light for Sexy New Car Show

Cool, it's worth a visit to the Eden project anyway, but cars as well! (Of course, I'll go in comfort)

wow what a wonderful sexy car please send more details about the car

http://www.caterham.co.uk/

here is the standard "sexy" car

It is also known as a Lotus 7

there are have been versions in production for at least 50 years and they are produced in many countries - and they are a great deal of FUN!

I figured someone would make an electric one, not take the windshield off!

What a pity that the article on green and sexy cars focused entirely on cars for racing - which cannot really be seen as the most environmentally friendly of hobbies.

Where were the low cost eco cars for the third world, and where were the eco prototypes from the major companies who can actually design an aerodynamic car for passenger carrying instead of downforce!

Until manufacturers build "green" cars people WANT to drive, the whole eco movement won't gain any traction. Who wouldn't WANT to drive a sexy racecar? Part of the unappeal of eco cars in the past has been their performance. I say bravo for making eco cars sexy, fast and fun.

Is this green & sexy enough?

Green, yes............

Yes a great example.

The Citroen DS was a big car with a very good drag factor which is not matched to this day by most production cars.

With new engine and transmission technologies, the DS could make a real contribution to our lives.

It's a shame they never got the "flat 6" working to put in it, though - it had to make do with a modified Traction Avant unit.

Maybe they should have merged with Alfa Romeo, after all the flat four engines in Alfa cars were probably the best things about them!

I looked up the DS drag figures and the 1955 DS sloon had a C_d of 0.36 which is good even by today's standards for production cars.

It is notable that since the Audi 100 in 1983 - 0.30 - the C_d figures, and worse, the C_dA numbers, have been getting significantly worse on most cars due to the larger Areas and greater importance of " styling". Most production car spoilers make the C_d figure HIGHER ! and are only there for styling!

A Mercedes A class still only achieves C_d of 0.32

Clearly Marketing departments have other priorities than best fuel eceonomy...!

The flat 4 in the Citroen GS was a stunner - I got well over 100mph, and mid-thirties mpg with a Weber 30 carb (standard).

This engine was a development of the 2CV twin, just with double the cylinders, and a distributer added. If later advances of electronics had allowed the use of the "wasted spark" of the 2CV (and later the CX engines with "IE" systems), then both performance and economy would have been even better. It is possible that the "6" had far too much performance for its time.

As for drag factors, the CX saloon was the most aerodynamic production car of its time - helped by the concave rear window.

The figures I have give the 1974 CX a C_d of 0.36, but the 1970 SM model - which was a model I thought looked cool at the time and of the DS classic calibre had a C_d of 0.33, but a larger cross sectional area so probably a worse C_dA.

As you say, some later engine and drive technology - common rail Volkswagen diesel and 6 speed box - could make it a really great car.

I find that the VW PD diesels give better real life econony than the otherwise excellent Citroen HDi engines, which are a bit thirsty in real life.

A lot depends on the way the cars are driven - My XM 2.5TD is currently getting upper 30's mpg - but is only ever driven short distances, or long trips fully laden (including roof rack). And it only covered 4k miles last year.

Mercedes vans (410, 100HP) got ~45mpg if driven gently, but when pushed this dropped to low 30's.

The "best" point of the air-cooled engines was that fuel comsumption did not suffer at high speed - handy if driving across Europe - it stayed in the upper 30's from steady 55 to ? (the GS speedo only registered to 100 [at 4 o'clock], but the needle would go right round to the stop [8 o'clock], if given enough time). This is probably due to not having to push water around the engine block when rotating at 8k+ revs.

And no need to worry about a blow-out, as the ads about stopping in a straight line are correct - even applies to the CX estate. (Got the T-shirt for both) first thing the driver knows about a blow-out is a little roughness in the steering - or bits of tyre flying past the window!