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Ferrari Modulo catches fire driving through Monaco

Accidents happen when you drive a car. The one-off Ferrari Modulo concept is not immune to such a fate, as the spaceship of a car recently caught on fire while out driving. In fact, it's certainly far more likely for an untested concept car to experience more issues than any kind of a production car that's gone through years of testing and development. This particular incident was documented on Twitter by Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus. Jim Glickenhaus and his team recently bought the Modulo concept with the intention of making it road-worthy. The car was originally shown at the 1970 Turin Motor Show. We've since seen videos of it driving around, but this last drive went all sorts of wrong. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. As Glickenhaus details in his tweets, the muffler was responsible for the blaze that damaged the rear of the vehicle. He says that an unnamed firm they're no longer involved with designed the muffler that caught fire. Glickenhaus was prepared for such an occurrence (it does have a Ferrari engine in there after all). Jokes aside, the onboard fire suppression system did its job and extinguished the fire shortly after it began, saving the rest of the car. Unfortunately, it didn't act fast enough to save it from some pretty nasty damage to the rear of the body. Glickenhaus was driving the car through downtown Monaco when the fire began, so we can assume there was an excessive amount of heat building up in there. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. Surprisingly, Glickenhaus is continuing to drive about even after the fire. He tweeted a photo just an hour after the blaze showing the scarred Modulo charging up the mountains around Monaco. It's tough to trust a car right after a faulty design just caused it to catch fire, but who are we to doubt Glickenhaus? No plans for restoration were detailed yet, but we imagine the Glickenhaus team will have it looking like new as soon as it can. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. View 19 Photos

BMW, Ferrari, VW cars use tungsten mined by terrorists

Bloomberg Markets is reporting that BMW, Volkswagen and Ferrari have been using tungsten ore sourced from Columbia's FARC rebel terrorists. The extensive story focuses on Columbia's illegal mining trade and calls into question the provenance of the rare ore that is used not only in crankshaft parts production, but is also found in the world's computing and telecommunications industry for use in screens.
The ore is mined by the FARC (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - People's Army), and exported to Pennsylvania, where it is refined. The refined ore is then sent over to Austria, where a company called Plansee turns it into a finished product. Now, it's important to note that we aren't talking about the world's supply of tungsten here. In 2012, Plansee's American refinery purchased 93.2 metric tons of tungsten, valued at $1.8 million. That's peanuts, with the entire Colombian tungsten mining industry producing just one percent of the world's supplies.
That doesn't make indirectly supporting FARC any more acceptable, though. BMW, VW and Ferrari are all committed to not accepting mineral supplies from the Democratic Republic of Congo, which is also in the grips of a guerrilla insurrection funded, in part, by illegal mining. The same commitment would figure to extend to Colombian mining, but as BMW points out, it's difficult for a multi-national manufacturer to know where every item in its supply chain comes from. A company spokesperson says as much, telling Bloomberg, "These few grams out of the billions of tons of raw materials passing through the BMW supply chain are of no practical relevance."

The Ferrari 488 Pista is a 711 HP mid-engine track monster

Meet the Ferrari 488 Pista. The twin-turbo 3.9-liter V8 produces 720 of France's Cheval Vapeur, which equates to 710 of our U.S. horsepower, while torque churns in at 568 pound-feet. Those numbers outdo the 488 GTB by 50 hp and eight pound-feet of torque. The engine will get the 488 Pista in its lightest guise from a standstill to 62 miles per hour in 2.85 seconds, with 124 mph arriving in 7.6 seconds. Maximum velocity tops out at 211 mph. Ferrari Autoblog Minute Videos Original Video