Nother CarGuy

Mazda has sent out invitations to the motoring press for the  New York Auto Show  in which they’re announcing a world premiere without naming it yet. British magazine  Autocar  received one of those invites and it believes it could be the hard-top version of the  new-generation MX-5 , called the MX-5 Roadster Coupé in Europe and the PRHT for Power Retractable Hard Top in North America, as the card included a folded paper message that read, “Help us blow the lid off at the New York Auto Show”.  First introduced in the third iteration (NC) of the  MX-5 Miata series  about eight months after it went on sale in 2006, the retractable hardtop model became an instant hit, making up more than half of all sales in the US, and over 80 percent in Britain.  For the  fourth-generation of the MX-5 Miata , Mazda will likely keep the same folding metal roof formula, albeit with a lighter and more compact mechanism, offering the same 2.0-liter four-cy...

The  new 718 Boxster  will be joined by a second world premiere from Porsche at the  Geneva Motor Show next  week, one that the company simply describes as a “a strictly limited-edition vehicle”. Porsche wouldn’t give out any other details on the surprise car, but we’ve heard from multiple sources that it’s going to be  the new 911 R , a back-to-basics performance version derived from the GT3 and GT3 RS without some of their crazy aerodynamic addenda, but more crucially, with a seven speed manual gearbox.  We’ll remind you that both the 911 GT3 and its  even more hardcore GT3 RS sibling  can only be had with Porsche’s PDK dual-clutch automatic transmission.  While some sources say that the 911 R will get a slightly de-tuned version of the GT3’s normally aspirated 3.8-liter flat-six with around 450hp instead of 468hp (475PS), others claim that Porsche may just give it the GT3 RS’ naturally-aspirated 493hp (500PS) 4.0-liter flat-six.  ...