1999 Audi A4 Quattro 2.8l No Reserve on 2040-cars

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Justin Bell laps Willow Springs... in the dark... using only night vision

Night vision has made its way into quite a few luxury cars as a night-driving safety feature, but eBay Motors wanted to see if the technology could be used to actually drive the car. Former racer and World's Faster Car Show host Justin Bell grabbed the keys to an Audi A7 and headed to Willow Springs Raceway to find out.
As if driving in the dark of the desert night wasn't hard enough, the car's windshield and side windows were blacked out, so Bell's driving relied completely on the three-inch night vision display located in the gauge cluster. In addition to navigating the track, his producers also threw in a few surprises for Bell on the track. We don't want to spoil too much for you, but based on the speeds exhibited in the video, we don't think 24-hour endurance races will be adding this tech any time soon; that being said, he probably drove the car faster and better than we could have.
Scroll down to watch how Bell does lapping the track using only the car's night vision.

MotorWeek revisits Audi's iconic Quattro

The Subaru WRX, Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution and just about every other all-wheel-drive performance car owes something to the legendary Audi Quattro, a model that was far more successful on the motorsports scene than it was in the showroom. Despite its modest sales, the UrQuattro still looms large in automotive lore, and indeed, in Audi's own sense of self. Considering the brand's semi-regular flirtation with the idea of a reborn Quattro, MotorWeek must have figured it'd be a good idea to revisit the original by digging up this archival review.
While time has the ability to cover up the warts of iconic automobiles, it should be noted that Motor Week host John Davis had more than a few critiques for the all-wheel-drive, turbocharged coupe.
Davis calls the Quattro's slalom handling "a disappointment," citing the overpowered engine and slow steering, and he had some unkind words for the brakes, as well. For our part, we're kind of wowed by the amount of ship-like body motion during testing, yet that sort of bobbing was certainly par for the course back in the early '80s.

Despite premium carmakers going downmarket, luxury auto sales stick at 10-11%

According to research conducted by global information company IHS Automotive, the leporine birthing of new models by luxury manufacturers over the past six years hasn't increased their market share in the US. Even as car sales reached 15.6 million units, IHS says what's happened instead is that luxury buyers are merely moving from one brand to another, moving from larger luxury vehicles into hot segments like compact luxury crossovers or leaving the market at the same rate as other buyers enter.
Whether broken out by makes or by segment, market share has rollercoastered inside a narrow band from 10.5 to 11.5 percent since "at least" 2008. Closer investigation reveals the shifting boundaries in the aspirational pond, with brands like Mercedes-Benz and Audi gaining territory as Lexus and Lincoln lost it, and Saab and Hummer were buried, dead, under it. One neat note is that Tesla has gone from a share of zip to .12 percent.
The subcompact and compact crossover segments show growth, with those little high-riders jumping from .3 percent to 1.16 percent of overall industry sales. Their rise, though, is concomitant with the decline of four other segments: compact and midsize cars and fullsize cars and SUVs. We think the next few years that will tell if the small-car expansion can overcome the large-car retraction, with a phalanx of smaller offerings like the CLA only recently hitting the market and others like the GLA, Macan and Q1 doing so in the near future.