Fangs for the Venom
Texas-based John Hennessey has set out to prove you can never have too much of a good thing — and that sanity is probably overrated — with his latest version of the already-mental Hennessey Venom GT.
The Venom could probably happen only in Texas by being a tiny, tiny car with a thoroughly massive engine jammed into it, namely a Lotus Exige with a 7.0-litre twin turbo V8.
It produces a thoroughly startling 928kW of power, and can push the tiny Exige body well past 400km/h (unofficially 435.31km/h). It is also the world’s fastest production car for the 0-300km/h sprint.
But this is not enough for Hennessey. No, he is now producing a final run of the cars for people who might have thought, “Hmmm, 928kW is not quite enough”. Actually, that sort of person is more likely to be shouting that out while sitting at the top of a clock tower somewhere, cradling a high-powered rifle and wearing a suit made out of his neighbours.
For that sort of person, Hennessey is producing a 1082kW version of the Venom. Why? Probably because it’s TEXAS! That’s why.
The big turbo V8 now runs on E85 fuel, allowing the boost to be cranked up to 26psi, which will now power the Venom to 100km/h in 2.4 seconds and top speed of around 450km/h.
Seems more than reasonable.
We are the world
■American man Joel Ramer had a very bad day a while ago. It started out as a pleasant bit of off-roading with his girlfriend, but they wandered into an area they shouldn’t have been. Getting stuck in a mud pit on private property, Joel couldn’t get his Jeep out, so called for a tow. Not only did the company damage his Jeep, it charged him US$48,000 ($71,600) for the tow. His insurance is refusing cover and to top it off, Ramer was arrested for trespassing.
■In a surprising turn of events, Chewbacca was arrested after driving Darth Vader to the polls during an election in Ukraine. It seems that the man in the Chewbacca costume didn’t have identification papers and was taken into custody when he created a “disturbance” at the polling place.
Lowride in style
The Sema show took place last weekend and, although it is usually where the cry: “Oh God, my eyes!” is heard often, Scion took the usual poor taste and unnecessary excess to a new extreme with a brilliant nudge at the US car customising scene.
American restaurateur and creator of TV sitcom Fresh Off The Boat, Eddie Huang, and Scion produced a fantastic lowrider version of the badly proportioned Scion iA sedan.
Being the awkward sedan-version of the last-generation Mazda2, got the poor iA off to an unfortunate start, but the lowrider version, with wire wheels, a chain-link steering wheel and more gold trim than is necessary, takes those proportions and turns them into something wonderfully awful — but also horrifyingly great.
Supercar creator by night
A cardboard spoiler and grille turn an ordinary car into a supercar.
Around the time most people are sleeping, Dutch artist Max Siedentopf is heading out to create works of art. Armed with cardboard and masking tape, Max prowls the streets of Amsterdam converting ordinary cars into supercars.
Well, sort of. Max calls his project “Slapdash supercars” because sticking bits of cardboard to a Nissan Micra makes for a crap supercar, however quirky and fun the idea is.
Max doesn’t know who the owners are and often has to work quickly to create his be-winged cardboard masterpieces before someone spots him.
Once he has finished, he snaps a photo of his creation and then disappears into the night leaving what will no doubt be a confused car owner in the morning.
In an interview with Vice.com, Max, when asked why he does it, said: “Individuality, self-expression, and status are more important than ever these days. But for some reason you see that things as ordinary as cars are getting personalised less and less, while it could be a strange but great form of self-expression.
“I thought I'd do people a favour by giving them a custom-made supercar.” Now, I don’t know about you, but The Good Oil would be particularly thrilled to come out one morning and find something like this in front of our house.
GT ramps up the reality
Big things are planned for the next instalment of racing video game series Gran Turismo, with its first appearance on the PlayStation 4.
Developer Polyphony Digital has announced that not only will Gran Turismo Sport be backed up by two FIA-sanctioned online championships, it will also take the series into the world of virtual reality by being available for PlayStation VR.
The two championships are the Nations Cup and the Manufacturers Cup, which allow drivers to either represent their country or their favourite manufacturer. Actual, real-world prizes are awarded at a prizegiving ceremony.
Hello future, The Good Oil rather likes the idea of you!
Number Crunching
12 GAMES
Number of instalments of the Gran Turismo series.
1 STREET
The Bathurst street named after the game.
18 DRIVERS
who have graduated from the GT Academy.
72.6m UNITS
The number of GT games sold, making it the highest-selling PlayStation exclusive game.