New American Turbine Short Droop Jetboat R6101 on 2040-parts.com

'27% would drive into floodwater'

A DEVIL-MAY-CARE attitude amongst drivers is commonplace when it comes to flooded roads, according to a survey. Nearly 2% would ignore a road-closed sign, while 42% would blindly follow the vehicle in front if it managed to cross a flooded road successfully, the poll shows. Around a quarter of drivers (27%) would attempt to go through moving floodwater nearly 12in (30cm) deep, according to the Populus survey conducted for the Environment Agency and the AA.

New December 2008 issue on sale today

By Tim Pollard 29 October 2008 14:46 The new December 2008 issue of CAR Magazine goes on sale today – read on for a guided tour around the pick of our stories, drives and features. Edited highlights include: • CAR is first to drive new Merc SL65 Black Series• Big tests of new Ford Ka and Vauxhall Insignia • The definitive road test verdict on Ferrari’s California: 3000 words, ten pages• We ask the A-list industry chiefs how they’ll survive the crunch• Colin McRae’s tribute one year after his death• Bond special: CAR drives 007’s DBS on location• PLUS! The worst Bond cars ever• The Swiss graveyard for amazing cars• We gatecrash the new Bugatti Grand Sport launch• Mark Walton revisits the Bugatti Veyron supercar• Adventure 1: to Mongolia by Land Rover• Adventure 2: from Boston to California (the British ones) by Dodge Challenger• First drives of new Megane, Q7 V12, Infinitis, Cayman, Twingo, 500, 7-series, RS6• Life with our Lexus IS-F, Caterham, Kuga, Mini, C-class, Bentley Conti• Ferrari 250 GTO, a celebration.

Contest: Volkswagen Slipstream wins 2007 LA Design Challenge

Volkswagen's Slipstream concept has won the fourth annual Design Challenge competition, part of the Design Los Angeles automobile designer's conference. The award was presented during the second press day of the 2007 Los Angeles Auto Show.  The theme of this year's competition, RoboCar of 2057, asked eight automotive design studios in California to form their vision of the future by depicting a vehicle that incorporates artificial intelligence engineered to make life easier and more attractive to consumers 50 years from now. Designers entered two-dimensional renderings and concept descriptions predicting how the rapidly advancing field of artificial intelligence will integrate into the automobile to make life safer, more practical and attractive, and the entries were judged by multi-discipline design professionals who selected the winner based on its originality of creative concept, integration of robotics and level of adaptation to a variety of environmental conditions and consumer needs.