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Spyker C8 Aileron to come back with supercharged power?

The new B6 Venator wasn't the only vehicle on display at the Spyker booth at the 2013 Geneva Motor Show. The company still has its C8 Aileron on offer, and Road & Track has word of a potential powerplant upgrade for the long-running machine.
Since its introduction in the year 2000, the C8 has used a 4.2-liter V8 engine sourced from Audi, which, in base form, offers up 400 horsepower. Though it's a great powerpant, that's simply not enough power in this day and age - after all, if a car is going to be called super, it needs to offer more ponies than something as mundane as the Ford Mustang GT.
According to R&T, John Walton, Chief Commercial Officer at Spyker, indicated that a new engine supplier may be in the works. "[The Audi-sourced V8] really hasn't got enough bang for the buck. To be honest, every supercar needs to have something that begins with a '5' today. That's why we're supercharging the car in the future, which will take it to over 500-hp," said Walton.

Audi A3 outselling Mercedes CLA 2 to 1 in its first 3 months on sale

The Audi A3 is on fire in US showrooms. Not literally of course, that would be horrible, and the situation we're referring to is a good thing indeed, as the Four Rings has a serious hit on its hands with the compact luxury sedan. Looking at just its first three months on the market, the entry-level model is outselling the Mercedes-Benz CLA-Class by nearly two to one.
The CLA was one of the hottest new cars of last year. Mercedes even called it the company's best launch in 20 years, but it sees as if that early sales performance has not been sustainable. According to Bloomberg, the CLA has seen its sales drop year-over-year in seven of the last eight months, and the new A3 came at just the right time to fill that void.
In June, Mercedes shifted 1,658 CLAs in the US, compared to 2,452 for the A3. The Merc has sold more units so far this year but only because the Audi sedan has only been on sale for three full months. With the two cars being relatively comparable as compact, front-wheel-drive, German luxury sedans, it appears buyers prefer the Four Rings over the Mercedes star, so far at least.

Audi wiring cars with cameras to see how ferret-like creatures tear them apart

In this German-language video, we see a batch of Audi engineers wiring up an A3 Cabriolet with a network of small cameras. The goal? To help identify where and how stone martens - small, ferret-like animals - attack cars. The idea is to observe the animals' behavior around the vehicles, see where they go, what they chew on, and work to develop solutions.
So why go to all this trouble? Cars and trucks are easily the single-most complex consumer good, and they're subject to the widest variety of conditions, regulations and usage cases that one could possibly imagine. They also come with very high consumer expectations for reliability. Thus, it's up to automakers to vet their vehicles for just about every possible scenario and threat - including weasels. And if that means Audi has to go hire Walter Simbeck, animal trainer to the stars, and string up a bunch of GoPros on an A3, well, they're game.
In speaking with Autoblog, Mark Dahncke, senior product manager at Audi of America said it best: