Bugatti Veyron L’Or Blanc (2011) first official pictures

Another week, another special edition Veyron – and this one’s made from porcelain. Sort of.

Bugatti has announced a partnership with Königliche Porzellan-Manufatur of Berlin, a German porcelain specialist whose ceramic trim adorns much of the new Bugatti Veyron L’Or Blanc.

Porcelain? So my new Bugatti Veyron is a toilet on wheels!

Hardly. The new L’Or Blanc – that’s white gold in French – is based on the Grand Sport and uses porcelain in seven locations around the car.

There’s even a dish in the centre console that can be used as a caviar tray. Bugatti certainly knows its market.

How much is the new Bugatti Veyron L’Or Blanc?

A very cool £1.5 million. And they’re only building one L’Or Blanc, so you’ll have to hurry. It’s not been sold yet. But don’t worry, despite the odd materials, it’ll still hit 253mph.

‘The L’Or Blanc is evidence of the capabilities of the craftsmen at both brands,’ says Achim Anscheidt, Bugatti’s director of design.

We presume the porcelain trim will be very practical, with excellent wipe-clean properties and water resistance as standard.

Would you have to be potty to buy one?

Well, all standard Veyron coupes have been sold, but you can still order one of the last Grand Sport roadsters or a tweaked-up Super Sport.

And by the sounds of the new Veyron L’Or Blanc, there will be one or two new special editions still to come. The mind boggles what might arrive next.

Mini John Cooper Works WRC: the roll cage in detail

Mini claims it’s created the safest WRC car ever – with a little help from Prodrive. And to prove the point, they’ve opened up the Mini Countryman WRC’s innards and spilled some of the secrets of its rollcage.

The Countryman racer is stripped and fitted with a new type of rollcage designed by Prodrive. Its beams curve outwards and the Banbury engineers say it has been designed to withstand impacts much better than the straight crossbeams used in most WRC cars.

What’s different on the Mini Countryman WRC’s rollcage?

It’s all about the curvature of the rollcage members. Prodrive says it’s like curved body panels being stronger than flat ones; the slightly bowed bars of the rollcage give it extra strength, and the loads are fed into welds in a controlled direction to reduce the risk of rollcage failure by tearing.

The new Prodrive rollcage design also increases interior space – always welcome in a Mini – and has better crumple properties in a crash.

‘The Eureka moment was the redesign of the side impact protection bars, routing them farther away from each crew member and subtly changing their shape,’ said Dave Wilcock, Mini WRC’s tech director. ‘In an impact, this brings the structure into play much sooner, allowing softer materials to be specified to safely decelerate the crew over a much longer period of time.’

The new door beams are welded through the Mini Countryman WRC’s B-pillars to strengthen the shell too.

Why is it needed?

A side impact is the most dangerous type of shunt – not just in rallying. There is little room between the impact and the driver/navigator, so whatever hits the car could hit them too.

Prodrive subjected more than 50 rollcage samples to limit-finding tests to find a design that worked best. The company says the result is strong enough for the FIA to consider making such a cage mandatory in future designs.

Audi RS5 (2011) long-term test review

Converted to the RS5 cause – 27 June 2011

What on earth is Ben Pulman and the rest of the office on? Glance through the comments below and you'd think none of us like the Audi RS5. Nothing could be further from the truth. Fact is, the RS5 has rather split opinion. Those with the words 'road tester' somewhere on their CVs tend to prefer the BMW M3 but many of the rest of us actually have a big soft spot for the fast Audi.

In the real world, the extra clarity of the BMW's steering, the ability to slip-slide your way through rounadabouts, is rarely much use. In fact having just covered 500 miles in the RS5 this weekend, I think I prefer the more grown-up nature of the RS5. I'm not alone; managing ed Greg Fountain and I had a pow-wow on this very topic the other day.

The Audi RS5 is such a complete package. It helps that the Audi A5 donor car is one of the best-looking mainstream cars on sale today. Modded every so subtly by the Quattro Gmbh boys, it looks ever so svelte and purposeful. Inside – a killer blow this – it's miles better than the ageing M3's plasticky, dated cabin. It's well equipped, comfortable and I disagree with Ben's comments below about the switchgear being confusing. Spend some time in the RS5 and it all begins to click.

That 4.2 nat-asp engine is a belter, with a real character overload as the revs climb. Powerful brakes, rapid-shift twin-clutch S tronic 'box, and steering with meaty weighting add up to make this an entertaining package. The minority who indulge in tail-out antics on the public road may prefer the adjustability of the M3, but – trust me – most people, most of the time will benefit more from the peerless traction of the Quattro four-wheel drive. Both at this time of year when the roads are baking and especially come winter time when temperatures plunge.

It's that all-rounder spirit than I like. The boot's massive and it made very good weekend away transport. The only real fly in the ointment is the wanton thirst of that V8 and the adaptive damper settings which jiggle annoyingly in anything other than Comfort mode.

Alfa Romeo Giulietta Cloverleaf (2011) long-test test review

After seven months of sensible, practical, mini-MPV Meriva long-term ownership, I’m about to enter a very different world. Out with the perfunctory, in with the passion: I'm about to run an Alfa Romeo.

And after speccing up my new Alfa Romeo Giulietta Cloverleaf (can we drop the Romeo from now on in these blogs? Yeah? Thanks), the very next day I drove past my local Alfa dealership and began wondering if it was a place I’d become well acquainted with.

There are two clichés associated with Alfa Romeos. One, that you can’t consider yourself a proper petrolhead until you’ve owned one and two, that the Alfa dealer network has a reputation that would even make Gerald Ratner blush. The first? Well, as I won’t technically own the Giulietta, I might have to make a bid for Phil McNamara’s GTV. And secondly, modern car dealerships are surely less likely to get away with poor service in the digital age, aren’t they?

In the meantime, my Alfa (Romeo) recently arrived, so that spec…

Alfa Romeo Giulietta Cloverleaf OTR price: £24,995

Rear parking sensors and multifunctional display: £260

Antracite Grey metallic paint: £510

Bi-Xenon headlights with headlight washer system: £715

Sports leather upholstery with (deep breath) height adjustable passenger seat, rear armrest with storage compartment & third rear head restraint, electrically adjustable, heated front seats with memory’s on driver’s side and electric lumbar adjustment on driver and passenger seats: £2,680

Electrically folding wing mirrors: £160

Radio NAV satellite navigation system with TMC PRO and 6.5" colour display with European maps on SD card: £1230

Total: £30,550

Georg Kacher: supercar summit counterpoint

Here is my ranking: Ferrari 1st, in its slipstream the McLaren. Then a break. Next, the Audi, followed by the Porsche. Then an even longer break. Eventually, the SLS appears, with the Lamborghini trailing not far behind. Let me explain...

The Performante is everything you expect from the brand. Street cred, noise and, true to the badge, performance. But I am not Jimmy the Rubber Man who comfortably fits into a suitcase, so if I wanted physical torture I would rather visit Samatha in her bondage den.

The SLS is a better car than most of my colleagues think. A much better car, in fact. Consider the V8 grunt, a chassis as game for hooliganism as the C63 AMG, plus the crowd-stopping effect of those gullwing doors. But then the Merc is the only softcore supercar in this lot, ideal for feisty fortune-seekers, less so for purveyors of ultimate sharpness and total response.

The GT2 RS scares me. This Porsche is a clear case of the car's talents exceeding the driver's talents. Especially when you throw in the zero-tolerance Cup tyres and the one-size-fits-all-but-me bucket seats. Having watched Walter Röhrl tame this beast like only he can, I almost enrolled in a pottery course and forgot fast driving for the rest of my life.

For the money, nothing beats the R8. Except perhaps the V8-engined version which is an even shrewder used-car bargain. Our test car epitomized the best of the breed - manual gearbox and steel brakes. This is a truly involving piece of kit, putty in the palms of even less talented pilots, fluent and flawless if not exorbitantly fast. You can't go wrong with the Audi. But you can reach for something even better.

The MP4 puzzled me. I have now driven five different McLarens, and they all varied in character and ability. Best of the lot were the silver and black pre-production cars with steel brakes that Chris Chilton and I tested at Portimao. Worst of the lot was our orange metallic track car. Its suspension was too soft, it felt loose and woolly albeit at a very high level, and the brakes tended to ABS-S-S-S themselves and me into the next available gravel trap. The solid orange road car was a much more convincing specimen. Again, the carbon brakes left something to be desired (mushy pedal, difficult to modulate, noisy), the Brake Steer feature was momentarily counter-productive on rough roads (it pulled the car's rear end briefly to the left or the right in a misjudged attempt to correct the course), and the beautifully strong and torquey engine sounded shamefully annonymous and un-special. But the steering, the chassis and the controls are spot-on, suspension compliance is second to none, and the handling is both spicy and sane.

So it's the Ferrari, again. With under 2k miles under its belt, the 458 was wonderfully tight, perfectly progressive and eerily involving. The steering is even quicker than the direction-finder of the MP4, the steering-wheel sets a pattern the others are bound to follow (the Manettino is so much more intuitive than the Macca's driving dynamics controls), the brakes are sensational, and the engine-gearbox combination hammers home that goose-pimple-growing King of the Road message loud and clear. Despite the stunning velocity, grip, roadholding and stability, there is a confidence-inspiring lightness and poise to the way the Italia dances round bends, dives into dips and flies over crests. Going really fast has rarely felt easier, safer, more reassuring. Instead of shelling out £70k for gaudy options, I would rather go for a no-frills base car and spend a few extra grand to jump the queue.

Lamborghini Gallardo LP570-4 Spyder Performante (2010) CAR review

This is the (deep breath) Lamborghini Gallardo LP570-4 Spyder Performante. Think of it as a drop-top version of the Gallardo Superleggera, with the same weight-saving measures and the same 562bhp V10 engine. And with the Murcielago now dead, it’s the most expensive Lamborghini currently on sale. Read on for CAR’s first drive review of the new Lamborghini Performante.

How do you turn a Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera into a Lamborghini Gallardo LP570-4 Spyder Performante?

Cut the roof off and reinforce it, for a start. The basis for the Performante is the LP560-4 Spyder, which is a hefty 140kg heavier than the equivalent coupe thanks to lots of stiffening around the sills and floor. Add (or rather subtract) the Superleggera weight savings and you end with a Performante that weighs 1485kg, 145kg more than the Superleggera, and still 75kg more the a normal Gallardo coupe, but 65kg less than its lesser Spyder sibling. Thank carbonfibre, which is used for the side sills, diffuser, rear spoiler, door mirror casings, parts of the flat underbody, the huge rear clamshell engine cover, the transmission tunnel cover, the door panels, and the shells of the manually adjustable sports seats.

A set of lightweight 19in alloys save another 13kg, and Alcantara trims helps trims yet more kilos; the only Superleggera savings the Performante doesn’t benefit from are the polycarbonate rear and side windows. The engine, thanks to ECU tweaks, receives an extra 10bhp, taking the total to 562bhp at 8000rpm. And the weight savings mean the Performante is one-tenth quicker to 62mph, 3g/km cleaner, and 0.6mpg more efficient.

Why are we worrying about fuel economy on a supercar?

We’re not. So let’s get on with how the Performante drives, which is wonderfully. Okay, around town it’s not absolutely wonderful, and the suspension is too stiff – the front axle especially spends too much time bouncing up and down. But it does a pretty good job of posing (like first gear at 6500rpm for mile after mile), and because it’s a Lambo and not a Ferrari everyone loves it.

It’s even better away from the crowds, with sublimely quick steering that fills you with confidence to chuck the Performante into corners. There’s brilliant body control too, and one amazing engine. The 5.2-litre V10, hooked up to four-wheel drive, absolutely flings the Performante down the road, bellowing and barking behind you – it’s even louder and more glorious with the roof down. We may also curse the automated manual E-gear transmission for its slow changes around town in the Auto mode, but take control yourself with long steering column-mounted paddles and the shifts are quicker. There’s still a pause as each gear engages, but the little thump in the back adds to the experience, and the pause is a welcome break before your constant collision course with the next corner begins again.

Downsides? The packaging still leaves a lot to be desired – it’s cramped with the roof down, there’s nowhere to put anything, and the fixed-back seats are far from the last word in comfort, or support. And the optional carbon-ceramic brakes still have a few inches of dead travel before the calipers grip the discs, so you first few dabs of the brake pedal make you look like a learner. Thankfully they’re good enough to be forgotten about as the pace increases.

Verdict

The Performante is what Lamborghini does best: a loud, extrovert and over-the-top supercar that everyone looks at, everyone loves, and really delivers dynamically. You will, of course, lose a little of the Superleggera’s upmost ability, but the upshot is a more amazing and interactive car.

Supercar gallery: behind the scenes of McLaren test

In the July 2011 issue of CAR Magazine, we simply had to find out how good the new McLaren MP4-12C is. So we pit it against the Ferrari 458 Italia, Porsche 911 GT2 RS, the Lambo Performante, Audi's R8 V10 and the Merc SLS AMG. It was an epic two days - on road and track. Don't miss the amazing 20-page story in the July issue, on sale now. Click here for a free digital preview and enjoy a quick look behind the scenes in our supercar gallery below.

Day 1: Rockingham circuit, Northamptonshire

Being a CAR journalist isn't all glamour, you know. We have to clean the cars too. Former Stig Ben Collins (left) and editor Phil McNamara (middle) watch as Greg Fountain polishes the Ferrari 458 Italia's windscreen.

Rockingham race track in Corby. More car cleaning as we prepare to time six supercars against the clock.

CAR Magazine's road test editor Ben Barry and Ben Collins look forward to driving the McLaren MP4-12C.

Vbox timing and video equipment gets set up ready to time and film hot laps. Watch the videos on track here.

Ben Collins poses for the paps. No more white lids here.

The men who make CAR Magazine look great: graphic designers/colouring in specialists Andy Franklin (left) and Alex Tapley. Note facial hair compulsory on the art desk

Lining up for photographs. The SLS is ahead by a nose.

That's what a McLaren tool kit looks like. Impressive bit of kit! Sadly called into action soon after this photo was taken...

Ben Barry takes notes after driving the McLaren MP4-12C on track.

Uh-oh. It's not all plain sailing in the McLaren camp as the MP4-12C has to come in moments after its hot laps. A puff of smoke and wobbly handling indicate all is not well with the 12C's suspension.

Four wheels always better than two around these parts.

Ben Barry has some fun, this way...

...and that way

The results are in.... the CAR team gathers around while Ben Barry reveals to Ben Collins how fast his timed laps were in each supercar. Ferrari 458 first, followed by Porsche GT2 RS, McLaren MP4-12C, Lamborghini Gallardo Performante, Audi R8 V10 and Merc SLS.

---

Day 2: McLaren MP4-12C and five supercars head to Wales

'Let's find the wiggliest bit of tarmac on the map and head there...'

'The button, Ben, press the button! Call yourself a car journo!' Georg Kacher leans on a quarter century of experience writing about cars to instruct Ben Pulman in the Lambo Performante.

Turns out Kacher is merely trying to remove some bird poo from the Gallardo's screen. Onlooking Pulman tries out his latest dance moves.

Hmmm. I wonder why a mobile speed camera van was dispatched to watch as CAR test six of the fastest supercars on the planet.

'Yes officer, I have my driving licence...'

Numerous visits to the petrol station required. We qualified for a lifetime's supply of AA road maps, seven cuddly teddies and a trip to the North Sea oil reserves after 48 hours in this lot.

Doubly expensive when you remember these cars sup from the 98 pump.

Breathe in! Welsh roads call for the occasional avoidance manoeuvre.

Three of CAR's Bens: that's Pulman (left), Whitworth (second right) and Barry (far right). Associate editor Tim Pollard watches Pulman's next dance steps.

We should have started charging £1 for each pose.

The CAR team in a layby in Snowdonia. A few days lasered into our collective memories.

Dinner is served. Your waiter this evening will be the loud and broody Lamborghini Performante Spyder.

Look it's me - a framed photograph of the CAR team in our favourite Chinese restaurant in Betws-y-Coed. Surreal, but true.