Bugatti Removes “Rape Yellow” From Color Options

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Fast. Cool. Sleek. Advertisers spend a lot of time and money trying to plant buzz words into your head when selling you a product like an expensive car. “Rape,” for obvious reasons, has never been at the top of the list. Thanks to a little linguistic misunderstanding, however, the word has come to be associated with the Bugatti Veyron.

On Bugatti’s site, the company offers a number of customizable features for the top of the line roadster, including color choice. Until this week, one of the choices was the decidedly un-Crayola-friendly “Rape Yellow.”

The name was the result of an unfortunate mistranslation of a color derived from the rapeseed plant. The issue was brought to the attention of the French car manufacturer, which quickly–and embarrassedly–apologized.

“Although based upon the French name for the rapeseed plant, the translation is one that should have been given more thought from our side,” wrote John Hill, the carmaker’s U.S. director marketing. “We are thankful that it was brought to our attention and you will find that the name for this color has already been revised on our site.”

“Rape Yellow” has since been changed to “Traffic Yellow.”

Nissan Leaf Delivered to First Customer

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A driver is San Francisco is now the world’s first owner of Nissan’s new electric car, the Leaf. The U.S. delivery came days before the car’s Japanese launch. Nissan last night called it “the first delivery of an affordable, mass-market, all-electric car since the first days of the automotive era.”

The lucky owner is one Olivier Chalouhi, a Bay Area-based technology entrepreneur. Chalouhi seems pretty satisfied with his purchase thus far, telling the press, “It’s great on the highway. When you accelerate, it sounds like you have a jet engine or a turbine under the hood… You have to hear it–it’s very futuristic.”

The five-seater goes on sale in Japan on December 20th. Here in the U.S., pre-orders have already old out. More of those vehicles will be delivered this week in California, Arizon, Oregon, and Washington state.

Is MyFord Touch a Safety Hazard (to Already Inattentive Drivers)?

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MyFord Touch, the extension of Ford Sync to an 8-inch LCD touchscreen with control of phone, audio, navigation, and climate control, was intended to make life easier and less distracting for drivers and front seat passengers. Now comes a story in industry bible Automotive News that says “some industry safety experts are unconvinced” whether the Ford and Lincoln touchscreens are easier and less distracting.

Ward’s 10 Best Engines Includes 2 Electric Motors for 2011

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For the first time ever, two of the world’s top car engines are electric motors, on the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid and on the all-electric Nissan Leaf. They’re on the 2011 edition of Ward’s 10 Best Engines, awarded annually to the most technically advanced automotive powerplants. As proof of how rapidly car propulsion technology changes: Only two of the engines are carryovers from the 2010 winners, two are heavily modified repeaters, and six are new.

Car Gift: Bluetooth Hands-Free Adapter

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Hands-free is the law in most states and the law of common sense everywhere. If your car doesn’t come with Bluetooth, or if the dealer retrofit price is too costly, get your own in-car Bluetooth in-car speakerphone such as the Plantronics K100, $65 street. It has dual microphones, noise reduction, voice alerts. It clips to the sun visor and unlike some portable in-car Bluetooth speakers, doesn’t slide around when you push one of the buttons.

Car Gift: Car AC Power Supplies Cost Less, Include USB

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For as little as $30, you can equip your car with the 120-volt power that should have come standard. Get the Kensington Power Inverter with USB Power Port, $35 street, if you want compact size and convenience. It provides 75 watts of AC power (90 watts peak) plus a USB jack for phone or iPod charging. The Kensington inverter plugs directly into the car’s 12-volt socket (no power cable) and is so small and light (0.3 pounds) that it will barely be noticed in a business traveler’s carry-on bag.

Car Gift: LED Flashlights for the Glovebox

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For times when you really need a flashlight in the car, you should have a small, powerful LED flashlight with long-lasting lithium batteries. Example: The Duracell Daylite CR123 LED Flashlight, $27 street (above left in photo), puts out a tremendous amount of light, runs for a long time, and it’s just six inches long. You’ll trade in your car before the batteries die from old age (10-15 years). A similar Duracell Daylite flashlight using two AA cells will be a couple dollars cheaper.

Car Gift: Valentine One Radar Detector Evens the Odds

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Speeding tickets are about revenue, not safety. (That was probably among the Wikileaks the government considers confidential.) You can protect yourself, some, with most any radar detector. The gold standard among radar detectors has long been the Valentine One. Valentine Research does the best job of sniffing out radar and provides the most intelligent warnings. The Valentine One uses front-side-rear warning arrows to show the location of the signals

Car Gift: CarMD Details What the Check Engine Light Hints At

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You can pay your dealer as much as $100 to tell you what the Check Engine light means each time it comes on, or you can buy a handheld diagnostics tool such as CarMD for about the same price ($120 direct) that plugs into your car for a quick good-not good indication, then into your computer for a detailed rundown of what’s wrong, time after time. CarMD works on up to three cars, does more emissions and safety checks than earlier models, handles hybrids, and the site provides more how-to-maintain-your-car info to keep you involved in between plug-in diagnoses.

Gran Turismo 5 for PS3: Hands-On

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Gran Turismo is one of the premier titles in the Sony PlayStation stable. It’s existed on every one of the PlayStation platforms, from the original PlayStation to the PSP to the latest version on the PS3. It is the poker of racing simulation games, since it’s easy to pick up in minutes, yet it’s so deep that it will reward hours of gameplay. Usually the second question out of gamers’ mouths after Sony announces a new PlayStation is “When will Gran Turismo appear on this platform?”

It took a while to program the new version, which is why there was an almost six-year gap between Gran Turismo 4 on the PS2 to Gran Turismo 5 on the PS3. Though hardcore fans have been chomping at the bit, the game is worth the wait. The gameplay instantly feels like Gran Tursimo, rather than the arcade-like driving on the Project Gotham racing series on the Xbox. If you’ve played before, you can pick it up almost from muscle memory. If you’ve never played before, it’s still easy to learn.

The game comes with over 1,000 cars, including a variety for makes and models from the lowly Fiat 500 and to multi-million dollar supercars like the Bugatti Veyron and McLaren F1. True-blue racecars appear, from Formula One to WRC Rally racers to NASCAR (WRC and NASCAR are new for GT5). Notable cars include the Tesla Roadster (an electric-only supercar), The GT by Citroën (a real concept car initially created for Gran Turismo 5 Prologue), and the Mercedes SLS AMG (The gull-winged car on the cover). You’ll be able to drive more modest, everyday cars like the Toyota Prius, Honda Fit, and the Scion xB as well.

Car models are beautiful, and they reflect the environment, adding to the realism. If you choose one of the Premium models (roughly 20% of the cars), then the interior view will include cockpit details like working mirrors, tachometer, and speedometer in the car’s instrument cluster. The illusion of being in the car extends to snow or rain hitting the windshield at speed. You’ll actually need to use the windshield wipers to avoid being blinded.