Nicol Louw

Direct-injection petrol technology means better performance and efficiency. But there's a dark side... Black grimy sludge. From the outside, the gasoline-direct-injection (GDI) engine appears shiny but it hides a dirty secret: severe carbon fouling of the intake ports and valves. It can be compared ...

That the national lockdown is set to be downgraded from level five to level four on Friday 1 May 2020 represents only a faint light at the end of the tunnel for the crucial automotive sector. Manufacturing can start to ramp up again but dealerships must remain shut until level three is announced. This ...

Kawasaki is known for creating seriously fast bikes. The legendary ZZR1100 started the top-speed war among Japanese manufacturers in the 1990s, with Honda countering with its CBR1000XX Blackbird and Suzuki the GSX1300R Hayabusa.  More recently, Kenan Sofuoglu aboard a Kawasaki Ninja H2R superbike ...

You pay dearly for your fuel (or electricity, in case of an EV) but where does all the energy go? Motoring is all about an energy balance. Without energy, a vehicle is just a static display and not the mode of transport (or fun driving machine) it was designed to be. It takes energy from the battery ...

Lithium-ion batteries attract all the headlines, but the humble lead-acid type still has an important role to play today… and tomorrow. Two thousand. According to Kelvin Naidoo, group technical executive at AutoX, that’s how many times a vehicle engine is started every minute in South Africa. ...

Almost 4 000 km is a tough initiation stint for any vehicle. But that's exactly what the Kia Sportage faced only two days after arrived at the CAR offices. The reason? My midyear family holiday trip, this time to the picturesque Drakensberg region. The Sportage range was updated in 2018, which saw ...

LOS ANGELES – Want to see a group of motoring journalists act like a bunch of excited school kids? Just lead them into an underground garage crammed full of Shelby Mustangs... While we were in LA for the launch of the electric version of the storied nameplate (called the Mach-E), Ford saw fit ...

PORT ELIZABETH – Do you feel like you're always just missing the cut? Trying to reach the points goal on some reward programme, earning enough to qualify for that mortgage on your dream home, or being able to afford that special edition double cab bakkie? Now, thanks to some clever marketing from ...

Traffic congestion and convenience considerations heavily favour an automatic transmission when shopping for a new vehicle. Modern autos are a far cry from those sluggish units of yesteryear and, in most cases, outperform manual transmissions in terms of performance and fuel consumption. Therefore, a ...