Honda has pulled the covers off its all-new Civic Hatch prototype, revealing a radical design that “reinvents conventional compact styling” according to the brand.

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This prototype offers an early look at the bold design characteristics we can expect to see when the Civic Hatch reaches production.

In recent times Honda has shown concepts quite close to their production versions (Honda Civic Type R, for example), and the Civic Hatch prototype looks close to fully formed to our eyes.

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The front of the car features a familiar Honda ‘face’ plus LED headlights and daytime running lamps. A sculpted bonnet sits above the sharp front bumper that incorporates large air intakes and fog lights.

The Civic Hatch prototype is wider, lower and longer than the current generation, with bigger wheels and tyres for a more imposing and sporty stance. At the rear, a boot spoiler is integrated into the distinctive C-shaped tail lights. The aggressively styled rear bumper houses central exhaust tips.

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“This tenth-generation Honda Civic Hatch is the sportiest remake of the Civic ever,” said Honda Australia Director, Stephen Collins. “This is an exciting new chapter for a much loved Honda nameplate. The all-new sedan will arrive mid this year and then Hatch will follow, and then Type R.”

Morgan is a company well-known for its eccentricity and, well, cars don’t come much stranger than its new EV3.

Its unique face, with a gaping maw and triangular light configuration, looks like something from an H.G. Wells novel, however it’s under the skin – and the skin itself – where the EV3 really departs from Morgan convention.

Underneath the svelte silver bodywork is a liquid-cooled 46kW motor powered by a 20kW/h lithium battery, which thanks to the EV3’s sub-500kg kerb weight, provides a 0-100km/h time of around nine seconds, a top speed of around 150km/h and a maximum range of 250km.

Morgan Australia boss Chris Van Wyk is hopeful the car will come to Australia sometime in 2017 once the requisite ADR hoops have been jumped through. It might not be most enthusiasts’ first choice, but you’ll need a Bugatti Chiron to turn more heads.

Ford has unwrapped a mouth-watering new version of its brilliant Fiesta ST at the Geneva Motor Show.

It’s dubbed the ST200 in reference to its 200ps power output, which equates to 147kW backed up by 290Nm of torque. These are the exact figures produced by the current Fiesta in its 20-second ‘transient overboost’ function.

As well as the power hike, the ST200, shortens the final drive ratio from 3.82 to 4.06, which helps cut the claimed 0-100km/h time to 6.7sec, a 0.2sec improvement, while the top speed is 230km/h.

Setting the ST200 apart visually is the unique Storm Grey paintwork, matt black 17-inch alloy wheels, red brake calipers, charcoal Recaro front seats with contrasting silver stitching and illuminated scuff plates.

About 1200 Fiesta STs have been sold in Australia since its August 2013 launch, or about eight per cent of total Fiesta sales.

Twenty-sixteen is turning out to be a vintage year in performance cars with barely a month passing without another big release – here’s what we got up to this month.

Don’t forget you can purchase MOTOR in digital form for Apple or Zinio.

Our cover story is the hot new BMW M2, with our European correspondent Georg Kacher behind the wheel on road and track in California.

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AUSTRALIAN new car buyers hit the accelerator in February, pushing sales 6.7 percent higher than the same month last year.

The latest VFACTS sales data, released today, shows the big winners in the month’s 96,443 sales include Toyota and Mazda, which remain the most popular makes in the country.

The race for the bestseller list swapped as Toyota Corolla took over from the Mazda 3 at the top of the market, with Toyota increasing its market share by another 2.0 percent to reach a dominant 15.8 percent. That’s less than this time in 2015, when it boasted 17.3 percent share, but Toyota has already sold 28,644 vehicles this year, building up a solid lead over next-best Mazda.

The arm-wrestle between Holden and Hyundai has seen the Korean maker nudge 548 sales ahead of its General Motors-owned rival. Good news for Holden, however, was that while still well off last year’s pace, the Commodore jumped back into a top five spot on the passenger car sales charts after languishing in 11th spot in January.

The new car market overall is outperforming 2015, up 4.8 percent year-to-date. The SUV segments continue to spearhead the rise in sales, with the SUV Medium category – the likes of the Mazda CX-5 and Hyundai Tucson – up a massive 31.8 percent year-on-year. In sheer numbers, 20,718 medium SUVs had found buyers this time last year; this year that figure swelled to 27,302. Total SUV sales are now only 2702 behind passenger cars.

Also up year-to-date are people movers (+29.9 percent to 2041 sales), led by the Kia Carnival (+115.3 percent, 745 sales) and sports cars (+32.4 percent to 4248). Micro car sales, where the likes of the Nissan Micra (398 sales), Mitsubishi Mirage (316) and Fiat 500 (224) kick sand at each other, continue to decline, falling 34.7 percent to so far in 2016.

Mercedes-Benz continued its dominance of the luxury car contest, with its 3236 February figure giving it a tally of 6335 sales year-to-date. That’s up on this time last year (5338) and also easily ahead of BMW (4823) and Audi (4149).

Lexus posted a record month, with 816 sales, and is having its best year so far with 1451 vehicles sold so far in 2016. Jaguar’s 407 year-to-date result may seem paltry, but it’s significantly more than the 167 cars it moved in the first two months of last year.

After a slow start to the year with only 4156 sales in January, the number of Australian-made vehicles leaving showrooms jumped to 6439 in February with Holden snaring one out of every two sales for the month.

For Ford, the Falcon sold 421 sedans, 198 utes and 580 Territory SUVs. Holden, meanwhile, added just 968 Cruse sedans and hatches to the Commodore’s tally in the wake of the announcement last month that it would end local Cruze production in October, a year ahead of the locally made Commodore’s demise. Toyota capped its month with only 1457 Camry sedans sold after moving only 503 in January, and only 145 Aurion sedans.

Top 20 passenger cars in February

Top 20 brands in February

Fancy one of Australia’s rarest muscle cars? Here’s your chance.

During our monthly trawl through the Trade Unique Cars classifieds for our ‘It’s Tempting’ magazine section we unearth all sorts of weird and wonderful stuff.

Today’s find, however, can’t wait until the next issue, as Muscle Car Stables in Castle Hill, NSW is offering what it claims is one of 12 HDT VL Directors, with this example being Peter Brock’s own car.

And, of course, it features the Polariser, and never was a vehicle feature more aptly named. Brock claimed it was magic, nobody else could figure out what it did, and this little box of crystals was the cause of the much-publicised breakdown of the Brock-Holden relationship.

Big money, but while technically a failure, the VL Director is an extremely important car in Australian automotive history. For full details on the car’s options and conditions view the ad here.

Speed, obviously, is a top priority of Bugatti’s Chiron.

Bugatti wants the Chiron to set the ‘next speed record’, as it told Evo at the Geneva Motor Show, and completely revamped the Veyron’s special W16 engine to do so.

As the world’s ultimate hypercar, though, you’d want the hardware to sound good as the AU$3.65m Bugatti wants for it.

While it’s yet to hit roads until later this year, the Chiron’s enthusiastic handlers at the Geneva Motor Show have shown us what the big bug will sound like, starting the car and giving its right pedal a good prod for camera.

With 8.0-liters of capacity, the new Chiron’s engine will swallow 60,000 litres of air per minute. Four turbochargers will compress the stuff, before pouring it all in to 16 cylinders. The result is 1193KW/1600Nm.

Does the engine sound as good those numbers? Have listen and let us know.

(Tip: turn up your headphones at 0:35.)

Video credit: GTboard.com

In 2015, Volvo released the second-generation Volvo XC90 – a seven-seater SUV. Now, at the 2016 Geneva Motor Show the Swedish car manufacturer has displayed the XC90 Excellence, a four-seater version of the big SUV.

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At first, it sounds absurd to have all that space, but only fit four passengers. But when you find out what’s inside the Excellence, it all starts to make sense.

While the XC90 Excellence looks the same as the standard XC90 and features Volvo’s hybrid T8 2.0-litre engine, there are several very unique features that may be very appealing for those looking the XC90 without the extra seats.

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Like a fridge, for example. Yep, a fridge. Then there’s the two folding tables, heating and cooling cup holders, extensive leather used throughout the cabin, rear seat controls for the Bowers and Wilkins sound system and it also comes with crystal glasses from Orrefors.

At this stage, the Excellence isn’t available in Australia but may be later in the year.

It was obvious when Aston Martin’s DB11 debuted at the Geneva Motor Show it nailed a huge requirement for the DB legend – to look stupendously gorgeous.

But it was harder to determine if the exhaust note that helped define its predecessor, the DB9, was lost during the DB11’s move to turbocharging.

Luckily a bunch of videos released since the premiere, including a video we found of the DB11 development testing in snowy Finland, will help you decide for yourself.

Aston Martin developed an all-new V12 unit for the DB11. With polar bears in mind, it dropped engine capacity from the DB9’s 6.0-litres to a smaller 5.2 and added two turbochargers in the process.

With that, the new DB11 develops a fearsome 447kW and 700Nm.

Naturally turbochargers have a knack for muddying a beautiful exhaust note. However, we think the V12’s managed to get away with this one.

Anyways, enough talking, have a watch and let us know your thoughts.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BCdmz_5Ix2K/

(Video via Aston Martin)

(Video via Jalopnik)

FORD is considering a high performance ST version of its Kuga SUV as part of an expanding push in the performance market.

The company’s European arm used the Geneva motor show to confirm a Kuga Sport would arrive soon, but an even more potent Kuga ST could be in the wings.

“You’ll see a Kuga Sport for the first time,” said Jim Farley, Ford’s executive vice president and president of Europe, Middle East and Africa.

“We’re going to start with the Sport version first and we’ll see how the reaction is.”

A Kuga ST could use the 183kW/345Nm 2.0-litre four-cylinder turbocharged engine from the Ford Focus ST (pictured below).

The potential Kuga ST is part of the company’s bold plan to grow its performance car footprint by 60 percent this year alone, with vehicles such as the Fiesta ST200 also important models.

“When you talk to Ford performance customers they feel as strongly about the car as any BMW or Porsche customer,” he said. “We expect to see growth in our performance sales of 60 percent around the world this year.”

It’s not known if the Kuga Sport will be sold in Australia.

“It’s obviously an opportunity but at this stage we don’t know the details of the car, so it’s too early to comment,” a Ford Australia spokesman told Wheels.

“That wouldn’t be our highest priority,” said Farley. “We have some sport performance versions but the ST is special; we have very special criteria.

“We really think that the ST line is for the core products in Europe. [Mondeo] is a larger vehicle for mostly fleets in Europe.”