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Now Zoe Is In Trouble.
Just a few weeks ago we wrote about the trouble that manufacturers can get into when naming their new cars. We related the problems that Audi had in France when launching their new electric car the ‘e-tron’. Well, purely coincidentally, a French court has had to rule on another manufacturer’s name for their new electric car. This time it’s Renault, who have called their electric prototype the ‘Zoe”, a sort of play on words for Zero Emissions ( or, for classical scholars, a Greek word meaning ‘life’).
Sounds innocuous doesn’t it? Well, not to a Parisian family who have the surname Renault and who have two children within the family named ‘Zoe’.
They took the car company to court in an attempt to prevent them naming their car ‘Zoe’.
They lost the case, but not without their defense council making an impassioned plea on their behalf in court that must have had all court officials rocking with laughter. He pleaded that his clients, and all other Zoe’s around the world, would be subjected to ridicule as they grew older by being the target of such quips as ‘ Can I see your airbags?’ or ‘Can I shine your bumper?’ etc.etc.
The judge disagreed, so Renault can name their car ‘Zoe’ and all the Zoe’s of this world can brace themselves for a future onslaught.
Cash For Clunkers Destined For Scrapheap?
The Government has announced it will delay the introduction of the ‘Cash for Clunkers’ scheme (officially called The Cleaner Car Rebate) by six months, to June 2011.
We’re not surprised and indicated our doubts when the Gillard Government was narrowly re-elected and we dealt with this issue in some detail.
In fact the scheme has come in for substantial criticism since Prime Minister Gillard announced it as a vote winning carrot last July. She promised a $2000 rebate for people who update their pre 1995 car by purchasing a new, lower emission, fuel efficient vehicle. $400m was to be set aside, and this was expected to get 200,000 old cars off the road.
However it has been heavily criticised because: only three local cars would qualify (the rest would be imports): it is very expensive for the benefits it delivers:it simply brings forward intended purchases, and it could be subjected to huge rorts ( as demonstrated in the Obama Cash For Clunkers effort in the USA).
After the aptly named Federal Industry Minister Kim Carr announced the delay Opposition Leader Tony Abbott entered the debate labelling the scheme ” a thought bubble” and said that if the Government is looking to save money ‘cash for clunkers’ should be the first to go.
So the message is clear:- if you own a clunker and are looking to update don’t hold your breath waiting for the ‘cash for clunkers’ scheme to help you, it may never happen.
Mrs Benz
October the 25th is Pink Ribbon Day and the street appeal is being launched at the time of writing. While pink cars are never going to be popular (see some of my previous posts), this breast cancer awareness campaign seems like a good excuse to celebrate one of the great women of motoring history.
The woman is, of course, Bertha Benz, and without her, the car might never have existed. Bertha was born in 1849. In 1886, she was a typical Victorian housewife in Mannheim, Germany, busy supporting her husband, Dr Carl Benz, and raising her four children. Dr Carl was facing a few problems with his newly patented invention. Nobody wanted it, preferring steam trains and horses. Some people even thought that this noisy contraption that moved by some mysterious means was powered by black magic. They say that behind every great man is a great woman, and it was time for the great woman to step in.
In 1888, Bertha Benz stepped in and decided to load the family into the car and visit her mother. This sounds like such an ordinary activity but in Bertha’s day, it was revolutionary. This was the Victorian era, before women got the vote – when women were considered “the weaker sex” and were encumbered by a multitude of corsets and petticoats. Bertha’s mother lived 106 km away in Pforzheim, and the motor-car had never been tested over these distances. Bertha didn’t tell her plans to Carl, but planned the journey in secret with her older two sons, leaving early in the morning before Carl woke up. Presumably the other children were left with the nanny (she had four children at this stage; the fifth came along a few years later.
The journey was a success and proved to the world that the motor car was useful and could be driven by anybody – even a woman. Bertha had obviously picked up a thing or three from her husband’s workshop, as she was able to use items of her clothing to make a few repairs. A long, thin hatpin was used to unclog a blocked fuel line and the broken ignition was fixed with a garter. However, a blacksmith had to be called on for a chain for the gearbox, and a shoemaker provided some leather bits for the brake blocks. And Bertha had to stop for petrol. While bowsers hadn’t been invented, petrol was used medicinally – it was used as a treatment for headlice, which is not recommended today! – so she was able to pick up what she needed at a couple of chemist’s shop.
Bertha’s trip garnered a lot of press publicity and the popularity of the car was secured. Carl Benz was also able to draw on Bertha’s extensive test drive to make some improvements, especially to the gearing system for hill driving.
Today, the Bertha Benz Memorial Route is one of the more pleasant, if obscure, motoring pilgrimages to make in Germany, although most petrol-head tourists prefer the Autobahns and the Nürburgring, rather than this more leisurely route in the Black Forest region. And in the pioneering spirit of Carl and Bertha Benz, the Bertha Benz Challenge has been established as a rally, following Bertha’s original route, open for alternative drive systems only (hybrid, electric, hydrogen, fuel cell) to demonstrate, as Bertha did, that good new ideas shouldn’t stay on the demo floor but should be used on the road. This is planned for 2011, in conjunction with the Frankfurt Motor Show and is part of the celebrations for the 125th anniversary of Carl Benz’s patent.
Benzene, which is added to petrol to raise the octane level and prevent knocking, is not named after Carl and Bertha Benz, in spite of the similar name. It’s derived from gum benzoin, which it was first derived from.
007 Car Sells For $4.5m Plus Bonus
The 1964 Aston Martin DB5 car driven by Sean Connery in the James Bond movies Goldfinger and Thunderball has sold at auction in London, England for $4.5 million
James Bond's Aston Martin DB5
It still has its original “Q Branch” gadgets and they still work-of sorts. Live bullets were never on the machine gun menu.
But the new owner, American business man Harry Yeaggy, also gets an extra bonus for his $4.5m. He receives a seven night stay for ten nights for ten guests at the re-launched ‘GoldenEye Resort’ in Jamaica, where Ian Flemming wrote all 14 James Bond novels. (We are told that Pussy Galore is not at the resort….errrr…..should I re-phrase that???)
The car’s previous owner purchased the car from the Aston Martin Lagonda factory in 1969 for just $12,000.
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