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Mitsubishi celebrates 40 years in UK with Evo festooned with aftermarket bits

Mitsubishi has an anniversary to celebrate. It has been selling cars in the UK for the last 40 years, and in recognition it is launching the Lancer Evolution X FQ-440 MR special edition with some real performance upgrades from top aftermarket companies. The models will be limited to 40 units in Frost White and priced at £50,000 each.
The special Evo uses a tweaked ECU to boost power to 440 horsepower and 412 pound-feet of torque with a six-speed, twin-clutch Sports Shift Transmission, and the engine receives a long list of augmentations with an intake, intercooler piping and tubular manifold from Janspeed, plus motorsport-specification, high-flow fuel injectors. To keep up with the acceleration, it gets six-piston front brake calipers and upgraded rear brakes behind 18-inch BBS forged alloy wheels. The suspension is lowered by 35 millimeters (1.378 inches) in the front and 30mm (1.181 inches) in the rear with Eibach coil springs.
The interior gets improvements to fit the performance upgrades. Leather-covered Recaro seats are found up front, along with an eight-speaker, Rockford Fosgate audio setup complete with a subwoofer. Navigation is standard with a seven-inch LCD touchscreen. The special edition definitely won't be making it to the US, but it's nice to see Mitsubishi commemorating itself with a performance model. Scroll down to get the full specs in the press release.

Mitsubishi boss labels French minister a "retard" for "ruining the lives of motorists" [UPDATE]

Arnaud Montebourg (pictured), French Minister of Industrial Recovery, was recently the target of a rather despicable slur at the hands of Mitsubishi France's leader, Jean-Claude Debard.
Frustrated by Montebourg's attempts to encourage the purchase of lower emitting vehicles and discourage use of high-emission vehicles - by way of tax breaks and tax hikes, respectively - Debard reportedly used the occasion of a new product launch to call the minister "stupid," a "mental case" and a "retard" before members of the media. Here's the full quote, as reported by the French newspaper La Provence by way of The Telegraph:
"This mental case, this retard, increases ecological taxes, reduces the speed motorists can go on Paris' ring road and ruins the life of motorists from all social origins all suffer as a result of him. He is stupid and understands nothing, you can quote me on that."

Mitsubishi developing new standalone hybrid Evo successor

Mention the name Mitsubishi to different people and you'll likely get two startling different images. Environmentalists will focus on the company's strides in developing EVs, while performance enthusiasts will point you toward the Lancer Evolution. The prevailing wisdom was that Mitsubishi would cancel the latter to concentrate on the former, but the latest intel suggests that the two will be reconciled with a new Evo around the corner.
Although Mitsubishi is reportedly working to streamline its lineup from 23 models on 12 different platforms to 13 models on 7 by 2016, the next Evo will stand as an exception. Like Subaru did with the formerly Impreza-based WRX (or for that matter Nissan with the formerly Skyline-based GT-R), the new Evo won't have anything to do with the next Lancer, which itself will be based on a Renault-Nissan platform.
On that unique platform, Mitsubishi is likely to install a small direct-injection turbo engine (potentially a diesel) that could be based on the 1.1-liter, three-cylinder turbo engine in the XR-PHEV concept we saw in Tokyo, supplemented by small electric motors with lightweight batteries and driving all four wheels through an enhanced version of the company's Super All-Wheel Control system. As to whether the Evo name will carry over, that remains to be seen, but if these reports prove accurate, its spirit could very much live on.