While it’s not exactly enough to turn Formula One green, the racing league at least looks to be taking some steps in that direction, with it now announcing that it plans to phase in a new hybrid transmission system starting in 2009. Unlike hybrid systems found in regular cars, however, the so-called Kinet……

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Almost every solar-powered car we’ve seen has been incredibly goofy-looking, but we’d bet we could learn to overlook external appearances if we had a sunshine whip to call our own — especially if we had to build it ourselves as well. That’s the promise behind Art Haines’ SUNN solar car kit, which’ll let you build your very own DOT-approved electric car using only standard hand tools. Completed, the car can hit 35MPH and has a range of 20 miles before the batteries give out and you’ve got to take a little solar siesta (or find a plug outlet.) Five of the kits have already been sold, including …

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The Trev look might be a bit love-it-or-hate-it, but there’s no arguing with the specs: 0 to 60 in about 10 seconds, top speed of 75 mph, and a range of 100 miles per charge. Trev is being built by staff and students at the University of South Australia, and costs less than an Australian dollar per 100km to run — about 86 cents for every 62 miles. The car seats two comfortably in tandem, with room for a pair of overnight bags. No word on a production version….

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Flying cars have been doing this whole vaporware thing long before Duke Nukem Forever was even a twinkle in 3D Realms’ eye. That’s why it’s practically absurd to assume anything at all will come from this new X-Hawk flying car, whose inventor, Rafi Yoeli, the founder of Urban Aeronautics, claims could ready for the market by 2010. The project has been in the works for years already, but Rafi recently managed to get a rudimentary prototype to fly a few feet off the ground, and has sparked some interest from Textron’s Bell Helicopters for potential partnership. Two main things set the X-Hawk ap…

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Adding its name to the ever-growing list of all-electric cars that never seem to seep onto lots is Lightning, which is apparently developing a 700bhp whip that unashamedly rips styling cues from quintessential British cars of the past and present. Designed to “compete with premium market sport cars,” the GT is hoping to “combine high performance electric motive power with an advanced regenerative energy system that recharges the car’s batteries under braking by capturing lost friction energy.” Additionally, motorists can expect a sub-four second 0-60 time, and better yet, just a ten minute cha…

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Gamers and art fans got hot under the collar this week over the debut of free ICA culture videos earlier this week. Which begs the question: are they any good? We had a watch

The PSP, it turns out, is not just a corking way of carjacking strangers on the street and humiliating your friends in public places: it’s now also the perfect vehicle for avant garde culture vultures.Earlier this week, London’s ICA – the gallery that puts on the modern art show Becks Futures each year – released the ICA Show, a ten minute free video available for download on www.yourpsp.com.It’s the first episode of a series of twelve, with new instalments planned once a fortnight. So, should you shoot your browser over to Sony’s site to get downloading?If you like eye candy and froth, th…

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From the same company that let consumers create their own ads belittling it as an eco-terrorist and worse, comes a new promotional stunt that earns one lucky winner the right to drive home in a vehicle that’s been scratched up by several thousand fellow contestants. Billed as the “world’s first ever Scratch Car-d,” the specific Captiva that Chevrolet gave away in the UK’s Covent Garden this morning spent two months getting coated with the same silver latex used to make instant-win lottery tickets, which was then divided up into 16,995 tiny boxes to reflect the Captiva’s price in pounds sterlin…

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Sat-nav systems such as the TomTom Go are being caught in the blast of an RAC survey that blames confusing road signs and in-car entertainment for motoring accidents. But, gadget fans, it\’s not our fault

Confusing road signs are causing accidents, according to an RAC survey – and driver-distracting, in-car entertainment and sat-nav systems aren’t helping, it says.Road-safety activists have acted swiftly following the release of the survey, suggesting that navigation devices actually add to the number of information inputs a driver has to deal with.Not true, we say. A well-designed sat-nav system should have you so well informed about your next manoeuvre that, in the last few hundred yards before a major junction, the driver’s free to observe warning signs and judge potential hazards, instead…

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The first commercial car to be powered by compressed air could be about to hit the production lines, as Indian automaker Tata Motors prepares to build ex-Formula One engineer Guy Nègre’s design. We’re not certain if it’s the same air car that we hit just under three years ago, but if it is, it’s about time! The City Cat runs on nothing but compressed air — which can be refueled at “air stations,” and overnight using a built-in compressor — with a not too shabby top speed of 68MPH and a range of 125 miles. The Air Car designers are working on a hybrid version that can compress air whil…

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To test Orange\’s new snow sports phone, we took it all the way to Tignes in the French alps. Did it have what it takes to survive the slopes?

We ask you: what exactly is a snow-mobile? To those of you who wryly answered ‘a small powered vehicle for traversing snow’, we salute you, but you’re wrong. In Stuff land, it’s a Samsung X660 sold with a snow sport mag (Slide) and discount vouchers for gear shops (Ellis Brigham).The exciting snow stuff, however, comes on Orange World, which anyone on Orange can revel in. We’ll come to that in a minute. First, to the phone itself, which we took all the way to Tignes in the French alps to test.If you read our launch story, you’ll know this clamshell’s a rudimentary creature: the camera’s a 0….

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