2007 Volkswagen Gti 4-door on 2040-cars

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Volkswagen Golf R 400 Concept is a 201-mph hot hatch

This, friends, is what happens when you shoehorn 395 horsepower into a Golf. You get a three-door hatch that will happily scurry to 62 miles per hour in 3.9 seconds and on to a top speed of 201 mph. Oh yes, we like you, Golf R 400 Concept.
As we explained in our original post, the R 400 is the long-awaited successor to bonkers Golf creations like the GTI W12 from 2007 and, more recently, the Design Vision GTI. It's powered by the same 2.0-liter, turbocharged four-cylinder found in a number of Volkswagen (and Audi, SEAT and Skoda) products, although it's been heavily massaged to pump out 332 pound-feet of torque along side its amplified horsepower.
Naturally, it's been lowered and now rides on 19-inch wheels. Outside of those changes, though, mums the word on suspension and chassis enhancements. While this is a bummer, the striking looks of the Golf R 400 more than make up for it.

Peugeot will prove it doesn't offer cheater diesels

Our diesels are clean, really. That's the message from French automaker PSA/Peugeot-Citroen as it plans to go on the offensive in response to Volkswagen's diesel-emissions scandal. PSA will go out of its way to prove its diesels are as clean as advertised. The company is looking at disclosing "real-world" fuel-economy statistics as soon as next spring and will use an independent entity to vet the numbers, Automotive News Europe says, citing comments that PSA/Peugeot-Citroen financial chief Jean-Baptiste de Chatillon made to reporters this week. Such efforts may be vital, since roughly two-thirds of the vehicles Peugeot-Citroen sells in Europe are powered by a diesel engine. Last month, VW admitted that as many as 11 million of its diesel-powered vehicles were programmed with software designed to cheat emissions-testing systems. The news shook up the industry, especially companies that sell a good chunk of diesels. The EU itself may start instituting "real world" fuel-economy and emissions testing as soon as 2017. French regulators have said they may eliminate diesel-fuel subsidies that currently make diesel fuel cheaper to customers than gas. That adjustment may occur as soon as next year, since it's been pushed up in response to the VW scandal. Peugeot-Citron continues to reiterate that it has never installed software that was designed to cheat emissions-testing systems. Additionally, the automaker was more than a decade ahead of European Union mandates for engine components designed to cut soot emissions, so the company is hoping its track record makes a difference. It wants to be perfectly clear about that. News Source: Automotive News Europe-sub.req.Image Credit: Cletus Awreetus/Flickr Green Volkswagen Citroen Peugeot Diesel Vehicles vw diesel scandal France psa peugeot citroen

Last VW bus ever made arrives at final destination

A Brazilian politician tried to save it, unsuccessfully, so the final Last Edition Volkswagen Type 2 Kombi was produced on December 20, 2013 and now resides in a vintage museum at Volkswagen's Commercial Vehicles HQ in Hanover, Germany.
The Volkswagen Microbus was built for 56 years, starting in September 1957. Brazil was the last country still assembling it, but new safety regulations in the country requiring airbags and ABS on all cars spelled the end. When that politician introduced a bill that would pardon only the 'Bus from a death sentence, it couldn't garner the required number of votes for passage. The South American country takes the Kombi production title, though, with 1.5 million of the 3.5 million total made in the home of Copacabana beach and the girl from Ipanema.
The VW Bus is dead. Now perhaps we can turn our attentions to the still-not-totally-settled matter of the Bulli...