New Car Quotes, Buy Used Cars, Auto Reviews and Prices.

New photos of the Skoda Superb

One of the premieres at the Geneva Motor Show, will be the new Skoda Superb. We’ve already written about this car (check out the previous post here) and now Skoda released two more photos of the Passat-looking Superb, which will be the Czech’s producer’s flagship.

(more…)

(Via Auto Unleashed.)

Skoda Superb pre-Geneva preview photos

Click to enlarge

The new Skoda Superb will be unveiled at the 2008 Geneva Motor Show, but here are some details released before the event. The new Superb will have a new feature called the Twindoor, which is basically both a sedan and a hatchback’s boot-opening mechanism both rolled into one. Twindoor allows the boot lid to be opened like a sedan - only the bootlid swings open, or like a hatchback where the rear window also tilts open together for full access to the 565 liter luggage space.

Six engine options will be available, divided equally into petrol or diesel powered options. The baseline engines will be the 122 horsepower 1.4 liter TSI engine and the 158 horsepower 1.8 liter TSI engine, while the top of the range petrol engine will be the 3.6 liter FSI V6 putting out a healthy 256 horsepower.

Oil burner options include a 1.9 TDI PD DPF with 103 horsepower, a 2.0 TDI PD DPF engine with 138 horsepower, and finally a new 2.0 TDI CR DPF which features common rail injection, producing 168 horsepower.

More photos including an interior shot after the jump.

Click to enlarge

(Via Paul Tan's Raves and Rants on the Automotive Industry.)

Czech Up: Skoda plans its own VW Up! derivative

The Skoda Fabia (not sold in America) is pretty small. It's based on the Volkswagen Polo platform (also not sold in America). But Skoda chairman Reinhard Jung wants an even smaller car based on the upcoming production version of the VW up! concept, and that also won't be sold here in all likelihood. Where it will, however, is in Russia, India and China.

These rapidly growing markets where Western automakers have been undertaking an equally rapid expansion via joint ventures with local companies are where Skoda wants to expand production. Currently the Czech subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group produces about 60,000 vehicles each year between the three enormous countries, which it plans to double to 120,000 units annually over the course of 2008. But by 2010, Skoda is targeting annual production of 350,000 in those markets.

Volkswagen has shown several concepts that preview a small car range, including the original two-door Up! in Frankfurt, the Space Up! van in Tokyo, and the Space Up! Blue in Los Angeles. Earlier reports suggested that the van derivative could make it to the US market, while Skoda as well as SEAT derivatives will be manufactured around the world for global sale.

(Via Autoblog.)

Press invited to Death Valley

There is no way to keep a new car hidden for long, and Skoda knows it. So, instead of letting us put the clues together like a connect-the-dots drawing, Skoda invited a select group of press representatives to take part in hot weather testing in the American Death Valley desert.

The journalists were presented with the next generation Skoda Superb powered by the 1.8 TSI/118 kW (160 bhp) engine and was only lightly camouflaged. One of the new technologies in the 2009 Skoda Superb is AFS (Adaptive Frontlight System) for the bi-xenon headlights. AFS has four modes of lighting, namely: Intercity (0-15km/h and 50-90km/h; regular dipped lights), City (15-50km/h; shorter but wider beam), Highway (90+km/h; wider and longer beam) and Rain (during low visibility; lower and wider beam).

Dr. Eckhard Scholz, Skoda Board of Directors said, “The New Superb is an exceptional car and brings a number of technical refinements and interesting solutions. That’s why we selected this untraditional form of presentation.” Further details will be revealed closer to the 2009 Skoda Superb world debut at the 2008 Geneva Motor Show next spring.