South Florida's concentration of wealth and climate-on-steroids weather patterns makes it good practice for both Revelations and Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome. Ft. Lauderdale's RoboVault, opened earlier this year, casts itself as protection for the locals' valuable baubles both from sticky fingers and Mother Nature's bad days.

RoboVault is a wholly enclosed robotic retrieval and storage system much like you'd find at most shipping ports, without the bilge pumps and catcalls. Drive inside the concrete-and-steel-reinforced building that can withstand Category 5 hurricanes and 200-mph winds, and place your car on the pallet. Once the system has identified you with retinal scanning, heartbeat detection, and biometric recognition an automated arm will remove your vehicle to your assigned container.

RoboVault also houses a climate-controlled wine cellar for 4,000 bottles, and safe deposit boxes. Another touch: a business center and wine-tasting lounge if you've parked your car before heading to the airport and have time to spare, and a valet service that will retrieve your car if you call ahead.

When the region is tested by the inevitable hurricane, a large scale power outage will be neutralized by RoboVault's back-up generator. It maintains 100% of the building's electrical operations for two weeks, including the motion detectors and infrared alarms, so there'll be no Die Hard antics here. Tucked in its steel mesh unit, your Ferrari will be prepared for the Second Coming, and that might make the Rapture all the more rapturous.

[Source: MotoBullet]

The Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG is nothing if not an exciting car to drive, and the German automaker is reportedly hard at work making sure that the upcoming electric version of the supercar generates the same kind of reaction from its occupants. In an interview with Autocar in the U.K., AMG head Volker Mornhinweg assures that the car is now testing on the road and will hit all of its targeted performance objectives.

The electric MB SLS AMG will sport four individual electric motors that spin out 525 horsepower and 649 lb-ft of torque through all four wheels. That's enough grunt to push the gullwinged-supercar from naught to 60 in 4.0 seconds. Three separate lithium ion battery packs will assure a range of 110 miles, though all those cells will push weight all the way up to a hefty 4,100 pounds – a full 500 pounds more than the gas-powered version.

If you're worried that all those extra pounds will make for a boring drive, don't be. "Effectively being four-wheel-drive does alter its character, but our torque vectoring systems give us opportunities to make it as good," affirms Mornhinweg. "It's important to get the emotional level of an EV right and we have some solutions." We'll have to wait until 2013 to find out for ourselves, at which time the SLS EV will hit the market, possibly for lease only with an unknown asking price.



[Source: Autocar]

If you're looking for the world's fastest car, this very well could be it. It's called the GT9-R, and it's the latest product from Porsche tuners extraordinaire 9ff. Although based loosely on a Porsche 911, little of the end product is shared with the existing sportscar. Instead the GT9-R packs as much as 1120 horsepower in a lightweight custom body for a top speed in excess of 414 km/h (257 mph), making it arguably the fastest car in the world – faster even than the Bugatti Veyron.

Although intended for use on a race track, the GT9-R (like the marginally less extreme GT9 before it) is fully street legal (in Europe, at least), and is available in 750 and 987 horsepower guises as well. Only twenty will be made at an undisclosed price, but considering the "base" GT9 cost half a million euros, make sure you've got enough left over for gas and tires.

Throughout its sixty-two year history, Ferrari has always been willing to give special treatment to certain customers. What does it take to be considered such a special customer? First off you must have an exceptionally fat checkbook. That much is a given since large wads of cash at just the entry point even for a standard Ferrari. However, if you are a long-time customer that has bought numerous examples over the years, the mechanical chefs at Maranello are willing to produce dishes not found on the menu. Over the years the Sultan of Brunei has purchased a array of Ferraris found nowhere else in nature.

Another such special customer is Edward Walson whose father John invented cable TV. Walson was infatuated with a previous custom Ferrari built for the 1968 Fellini film, Toby Dammit. The Ferrari P540 Superfast Aperta is based on the chassis of a 599 GTB Fiorano and took 14 months to complete. The P540 is completely road legal and is powered by a 612 hp 6.0-liter V12 engine. Extensive use of carbon fiber allowed the Special Projects engineers to keep weight gain down to only 44 pounds in spite of having to strengthen the open top car. No mention is made of cost, but if you have to ask ...


[Source: Ferrari]

It's unlikely that Moto Guzzi is the first brand you think of when talk turns to Italian motorcycles, but the Mandello del Lario-based manufacturer has a long history of producing desirable V-twin-powered machines and still offers a number of interesting models to consider. Chief among them is the latest version of the Griso seen here.

The most noticeable feature that sets Guzzi's new Griso 8V SE apart from its standard siblings are the classically Italian paint colors: either Tenni green or Rosso Mandello red with a blacked-out powertrain. A nicely stitched leather seat and wire-spoked wheels round out the visual modifications.

Just as importantly, though, the Griso 8V SE manages to boost torque output by five lb-ft to 85, though horsepower remains steady at 110. That extra power comes courtesy of revised cam profiles and fuel injectors along with a larger airbox that help Moto Guzzi's eight-valve Quattrovalvole breathe a bit better. Check out our high-res gallery below and make the jump for the official press release.



[Source: Moto Guzzi via Hell For Leather]

As far as we're concerned, there will always be a market for sporty vintage-styled machinery like the Triumph Thruxton. After all, not everyone needs 150 horsepower and 200 mile-per-hour top speeds to have a good time on two wheels, and few motorcycles possess the kind of style that Hinckley bakes into its line of modern classics.

This is especially true of the new 2010 Thruxton SE, which gets a Crystal White paint job on the tins with a single red stripe and a matching red powdercoated frame. Completing the package is a small flyscreen, black engine cases and a smattering of appropriate decals.

There aren't any changes to the sportiest Bonnie's 865cc parallel-twin powerplant, which puts out a claimed 68 horsepower and 51 lb-ft of torque. While we'd gladly take at least a little power boost, if we were in the market for such a bike the Thruxton SE would certainly be on our short list.



[Source: Triumph via Hell for Leather]

Ever meet a pair of siblings and notice one excels at everything and the other's a bit of a deadbeat? That's Aston Martin Lagonda Limited. If you're wondering what the Lagonda part is for, you're on the right track. It forms the full name of the company best known for producing James Bond's automobile of choice, but while Aston Martins are some of the most beautiful and successful sportscars on the road or track, Lagonda is considerably less so.

The automotive marque originally founded in 1906 was acquired by Aston Martin in 1947, and though Aston's tried at several intervals to revitalize its sister brand, not much good has ever come from it. Most recently, the company announced the rebirth of Lagonda, unveiling the concept car you see above at the 2009 Geneva auto show. It was supposed to be a luxurious crossover, based on the Mercedes GL-Class and powered by a V12 engine. Reception was rather cold, and Aston pulled the concept after the first day. But now it's back, courtesy of a new batch of photos released by Aston Martin's PR department. What they're up to – and why they've brought the one project that failed back to light – is beyond us, but you can have a look for yourself in the fresh gallery below.

As if the Brera coupe couldn't get any more stylish, Alfa Romeo has teamed up with fashion house Italia Independent for a special edition.

The Alfa Romeo Brera Italia Independent gets a special titanium paintjob, 18" turbine-style black rims, red brake calipers and an aluminum fuel cap. Inside the interior is decked out in black leather with red top stitching, carbon fiber trim and the requisite Italia Independent logos.

All this comes at a price, however: €29,700 (the equivalent of about $41k) with the 185hp 2.2-liter four, or €38,850 ($57k) for the 260hp 3.2-liter V6, available with front- or all-wheel-drive.

Aston Martin's V8 Vantage is already deemed one of the most proportionally perfect sportscars on the market, so the British automaker would be wise not to mess with it too much. Fortunately they've kept the revisions mild as reports surface of an update for the 2010 model year.

The 2010 Aston Martin V8 Vantage benefits from new tail-lights, side sills and mess inserts for the exterior vents, plus a new list of optional equipment: 19" forged aluminum alloy ten-spoke wheels, lightweight carbon-kevlar seats and a 1000-watt Bang & Olufsen stereo system.

They've also cut the car's carbon emissions (down to 315 g/km for the manual transmission and 300 for the Sportshift), and the order books are reportedly open now ahead of deliveries beginning early in the new year.

Keeping your eyes on the road is of the utmost importance no matter what kind of vehicle you are piloting. To that end, automakers all over the world have experimented with heads-up displays that show such vital information as your speed and navigation directions right on the windshield in front of the driver.

Now, a company called Recon Instruments is extending similar technology to the two-wheeled world with a new technology that flashes the same kind of information right on a pair of goggles. The goggles were originally designed for ski, snowboard and snowmobile applications, but Recon envisions its technology being used in all kinds of sports, from mountain biking and motorcycle touring to kite surfing and scuba diving.

Recon expects to begin shipping its goggles in the Fall of 2010 for between $350 and $450 and is now accepting preorders.

[Source: Recon Instruments via Motorbiker.org]

Lying somewhere in the thin-and-light category between the well-defined netbook and the traditional full-featured notebook is the new Acer Ferrari One. The latest installation of the successful partnership between the famous Italian supercar manufacturer and Acer America, there isn't really anything exceptional about the computer other than the bright red color and matching Prancing Horse badge on the lid.

Still, it's a well-equipped 3.31-pound laptop with (take a deep breathe) an AMD Athlon 64 X2 dual-core processor, ATI Radeon HD 3200 graphics, 4GB of DDR2 667MHz system memory, a 250 GB hard disk, an 11.6-inch HD widescreen display and Windows 7 Home Premium.

If the lure of the latest Ferrari-badged Acer is too much for you to handle, the Ferrari One notebook is available now with a starting price one cent shy of $600. Feel free to peruse the official press release after the break.

[Source: Acer via Engadget]

Some look at a Ferrari and see the be-all-and-end-all of automotive perfection. Others see room for improvement. For the latter group, there's a variety of aftermarket tuners happy to oblige, and one of them is called Novitec Rosso.

The Dutch tuning garage recently graced us with its own take on the 599 GTB Fiorano, and has now turned its attention to its kid brother, the Ferrari California. Starting with the stock V8 convertible, Novitec has revised the engine management module to boost power up to an even 500hp, fitted a carbon-fiber aerodynamic kit, 22-inch modular wheels with Pirelli tires, an adjustable suspension system and a wide array of interior customization options. Pricing depends entirely on the buyer, but when you're talking about a Ferrari – a convertible one, no less – the sky really is the limit.

Between Panerai and Ferrari, Breitling and Bentley and the countless other watchmaker-automaker collaborations, few are as convincing as Jaeger-LeCoultre and Aston Martin. The former's timepieces are every bit as alluring and finely-crafted as the latter's sportscars, but this has to be the finest yet.

The second of two special edition racing chronographs, the Jaeger-LeCoultre AMVOX2 Chronograph Racing Paris honors Aston's considerable Le Mans racing prowess. It features JLC's own 751E movement, just five and a half millimeters thick and an innovative system that allows the wearer to lock and unlock the doors of an Aston sportscar right from the watch itself. Pretty trick, and while there are many editions of the AMVOX2 available, only 24 examples of this particular one will be produced, available exclusively from the Jaeger-LeCoultre boutique on Place Vendome in Paris.

Art Basel isn't the only thing taking Miami by storm - dashing designer Duncan Quinn has opened a limited edition pop-up shop in the city's design district that's a shrine to gentlemanly pursuits and fine tailoring. In addition to his full range of Savile Row-inspired menswear the British-born bon vivant's 6,000-sq.-ft. space features a full-sized indoor croquet pitch; a 1962 Maserati 3500GT, one of only 359 made, specially ordered and owned by famed Formula One driver Peter Revson; and a killer collection of vintage Ducati motorbikes, including a 450 Desmo from the 70's, a 350 Desmo, built in 1969 and a 1985 F1 prototype.

There are also limited edition croquet shirts and t-shirts exclusive to the venue; a bespoke lounge with Dormeuil fabrics; an installation of Ruby couture motorcycle helmets from France; Hendrick's Gin cocktails; and more. Famed shoe designer Christian Louboutin, who has his own op-up shop down the block, was their first customer, coming in to buy an outfit for his own opening, while Birmingham band The Twang, who opened the Glastonbury Festival in front of 500,000 people, played a one-off show for the DQ faithful there on Friday night. The shop will be open until Dec. 12th, then once a month for dinners and tastings and otherwise by appointment.

Audi may not be positioning itself as a "green brand," but it's still putting a rather big toe into the environmentally-friendly waters of electric sportscars with its R8-based e-tron, which is reportedly headed for production in 2012.

As a refresher – as if you needed one – the e-tron debuted as a concept at the Frankfurt Motor Show in September with some truly impressive statistics: four separate electric motors with 230 kW (313 horsepower) and 4,500 Nm (3,319.03 pound-feet) of torque (sort of), which is enough to push it to 62 mph in a mere 4.8 seconds.

So, um... want one? The line forms at the rear, and you'd better not dawdle as Audi says its only planning to build 1,000 of them. Naturally, pricing has yet to be set, but it's reportedly expected to be "above R8 levels." Regardless, with all those lithium ion batteries and their associated electronic gadgetry, we don't imagine that Audi plans to make much of a profit when it finally goes on sale in two years.



[Source: Autocar]