2011 Toyota Prius Ii Model 27k Miles 1 Owner Leather Seats Window Tint*we Trade* on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Fernando Alonso reportedly will race for Toyota at Le Mans

When it was recently announced that Fernando Alonso would race in the 24 Hours of Daytona in January, it was described as a warm-up for an eventual attempt to win Le Mans. "Eventual" may come pretty fast: It now looks like the Formula One champion will race in the Le Mans 24 Hours next season as well. Or so reports BBC Sport, which says he'll race for Toyota. But wait, there's more: The BBC also says he's in talks with Toyota to drive most of the entire World Endurance Championship — while keeping his day job driving for McLaren in F1. "Le Mans is agreed," a source close to Toyota told the BBC. "The rest of the season is still being negotiated, but it looks like he will do most of the races." BBC's sources say Alonso will drive a Toyota WEC car in the season's last race, in Bahrain on Nov. 19, to get his feet wet. The season's final Formula One race is the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix on Nov. 26. Neither Alonso nor Toyota would confirm an impending deal. Alonso said at practice for this weekend's Brazilian Grand Prix: "So far, nothing to comment. We will see. Just rumors." What's motivating him is this: He's 36 years old and is intent on becoming only the second driver, after Briton Graham Hill, to win motorsport's Triple Crown. That entails winning the Formula One title (or just the Monaco Grand Prix according to one interpretation) as well as Indianapolis and Le Mans. He has won Monaco as well as the 2004 and 2005 world titles. He recently signed a contract extension keeping him at McLaren in 2018. As for the Indy piece of the Triple Crown, Alonso famously raced there this year and was running competitively when his Honda engine failed in the closing stages of the race. So expect to see him there again as well. Racing with Toyota at Le Mans and other endurance races should give him better luck than he had this season with McLaren-Honda in F1 and at Indy. Though Toyota has never won Le Mans, it is known to be developing a new WEC car. Traveling the globe to race in both the WEC and F1 in the same season sounds grueling, but it might be possible. The circuits have provisional schedules, and there's just one conflict — the U.S. Grand Prix and a WEC race in Japan are both penciled in for Oct. 21. But McLaren sounds none too keen on him doing the whole WEC schedule. McLaren racing director Eric Boullier told the BBC: "He has said he is keen to do some races outside. There is a case-by-case discussion. His main and first focus is F1, so that has to be the priority.

Toyota claims hydrogen fuel cell breakthrough

Platinum isn't cheap. And it's a necessary component of hydrogen fuel-cell technology. Which means that Toyota's recent discovery of a way to better analyze how platinum breaks down is a bit of an H2 vehicle breakthrough. Toyota worked with the Japan Fine Ceramics Center (JFCC) to observe nanometer-sized platinum particles and, specifically, how they deteriorate. Platinum is used as a catalyst for when electrons are stripped away from the hydrogen molecule to create an electrical charge and when hydrogen ions and electrons mix with oxygen to create water vapor. So, when platinum gets more course during the countless chemical reactions inside of fuel cells, things slow down. Now that Toyota says it's figured out a better way to observe this process, greater efficiency and durability within the fuel-cell process of electricity production are likely to follow, though more chemistry study will be needed to figure out how that will work. Still, it's topical because Toyota last year started producing the world's first production hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle. The Japanese automaker debuted sales of the Mirai fuel-cell vehicle in Japan late last year and plans to start selling the car in California this fall (the car will be priced at $57,500). Toyota also plans to boost Mirai production to about 2,000 units in 2016 from about 700 this year. Take a look at Toyota's documents and video below. R&D Breakthrough Sets Stage for More Efficient, Durable Fuel Cell Stacks Toyota City, Japan, May 18, 2015—A breakthrough in the real-time observation of fuel cell catalyst degradation could lead to a new generation of more efficient and durable fuel cell stacks. Toyota Motor Corporation and Japan Fine Ceramics Center (JFCC) have developed a new observation technique that allows researchers to monitor the behavior of nanometer-sized particles of platinum during chemical reactions in fuel cells, so that the processes leading to reduced catalytic reactivity can be observed. Platinum is an essential catalyst for the electricity-producing chemical reactions occurring between oxygen and hydrogen in fuel cell stacks. Reduced reactivity is the result of "coarsening" of platinum nanoparticles—a process whereby the nanoparticles increase in size and decrease in surface area. Up until now, however, it has not been possible to observe the processes leading to coarsening, making it difficult to analyze the root causes.

Question of the Day: What (non-Skyline) JDM car to import?

I have been looking into the idea of bringing a four-wheel-drive kei van over from Japan, something like a Honda Street or perhaps even a Mitsubishi Minicab Bravo Route 66, and so I have been researching the various bureaucratic hoops I must jump through in order to bring such a car into my state (Colorado). When I finally tracked down the state official who knew the answers, his very first words were "OK, so what year Skyline do you want to register here?" Yes, Nissan's not-sold-over-here factory-hot-rod of the 1980s and 1990s is what gets shipped over most often, but there are other worthy JDM vehicles. Say, for example, a stunning 1990 Mitsuoka Le Seyde (above), which was far classier than the Excalibur and based on the sporty S13 Nissan Silvia, aka 240SX. Of course, the king of JDM cars is the mighty Toyota Century, and you can get nice legal-to-import examples for reasonable prices. No, you can't get the V12 Century legally – yet; the V12-powered cars don't hit the 25-year-old mark until 2022. So, what's your choice for a 1991 or earlier Japanese-market car to import, assuming that the Skyline is off the table? Related Video: Auto News Honda Nissan Toyota Car Buying nissan skyline questions