Volkswagen has introduced the new-generation Polo - physically much larger than before,  and better equipped than most offering similar boot space.

At $20,490 plus on-road costs, the 85TSI launch edition offers a 85kW/200Nm, 1.0 turbo petrol three-cylinder offers a fuel economy of 5.0 l/100km – a car ideal for getting you through city driving.

The interiors of the Polo range offers basics such as keyless entry, automatic headlights and wipers, auto-dimming rear-view mirrors, vanity mirror lights, rear map lights, cloth trim, power windows and mirrors, cruise control and manual air-conditioning.

The 8.0-inch colour touchscreen with Bluetooth phone and audio streaming showcases Apple CarPlay or Android Auto smartphone mirroring, wireless phone charging and six speakers.

A Driver Assistance Package can also be bought into – which includes adaptive cruise control, blight-spot monitoring, rear cross-traffic alert, front and rear parking sensors with auto reverse-park assistance and electric fold door mirrors.

All Polos – except the GTI – share the same suspension, the 85TSI Launch Edition showcases 16- inch wheels with Continental ContiPremium Contacts.

This new generation Polo offers an ANCAP rating of 5 stars – with safety features including dual front, front-side and full-length curtain airbags, ABS, ESC, reverse-view camera, forward collision warning with low-speed autonomous emergency braking (AEB) with pedestrian detection.

Polo 70TSI Trendline starts at $17,990 (plus on-road costs) delivers 70kW of power plus 175Nm torque and wears 15-inch steel wheels.

Next model up, the Comfortline comes in at $19,490 (plus on-road costs), 85kW/200Nm showcases 15-inch wheels, auto on/off headlights and wipers, auto-dimming rear-view mirror, rear map lights and map pockets, vanity mirror lights and a front center armrest.

The 85TSI Beats edition is also soon to be available, at $22,490 will offer all of the above plus sports seats, 300-watt Beats audio and a full-colour driver display.

Perhaps one of the most important factors to some when buying a new car, is how safe it is – ANCAP or the Australasian Car Assessment Program rates cars from 1 to 5 in terms of safety, where a 5 star rating is the highest that a car can receive.
ANCAP safety ratings are published for a range of new cars – including passenger, sports utility (SUVs) and light commercial vehicles (LCV).

The safety rating indicates the level of safety that the vehicle provides for the occupants of the vehicle as well as any pedestrians in the event of a crash. Other factors that influence the rating include the vehicles ability, through technology, to avoid or minimize the effects of a crash. Consumers can then use these ratings to compare the safety between vehicles of similar mass.
But how are cars given their ANCAP safety ratings? The cars are put through a range of internationally recognized, independent crash test and safety assessments. These include destructive physical crash tests, an assessment of on-board safety features and equipment, and performance testing of active collision avoidance technologies.
Vehicles are evaluated against four key areas, including adult occupant protection, child occupant protection, pedestrian protection and safety assist.
Adult occupant protection considers the level of protection offered by the vehicle, in the case of an accident, to the adult occupants – seated in both the front (driver and passenger seats) as well as the second (back seats) rows. While the child occupant protection assesses the level of protection offered to any child occupants – while seated in appropriate child restraints – in the rear seats of the car.
The pedestrian protection evaluates the design of the front of the car to minimize injury risk to a struck pedestrian. Factors that influence the pedestrian protection include the car’s crumple zone as well as the height of the front bumper. Vehicles are also assessed for their ability to avoid or mitigate impacts with pedestrians.
While the more stars the better, a vehicle that achieves the maximum of 5 stars in its ANCAP safety rating must exhibit the highest standards in all tests and feature advanced safety.

A large family car offering a premium feel and extra safety, the 2019 Peugeot 508 Touring has recently been unveiled. With added practicality, the French brand has shown off the wagon version of the 508. If you didn’t catch all of the highlights, then read on!

A few of the design features include frameless doors and the integration of Peugeot’s high-tech i-Cockpit. Lending to a more premium feel, the inside of the 508 wagon features premium materials such as leather upholstery as well as a panoramic sun-roof and a 10-speaker Focal stereo.

Safety was also made a feature of the new 508 – the 508 Touring wagon includes adaptive cruise control, lane keep assist, adaptive headlights, park assist and night vision which uses infrared technology to detect people beyond the scope of the headlights.

Another nifty selling feature is the amount of space. The rear seats can be folded flat – giving the 508 Touring a total cargo space of 1780-litres.

The 508 Touring will be offered in a range of petrol and diesel options that are matched to an eight-speed automatic transmission – while a plug-in hybrid petrol version will join the range later on.

The German-built Holden Commodore wagon is its closest comparison; however, the Peugeot 508 has generated a large amount of interest. While the Peugeot 508 wagon is set to go on sale in Europe at the start of 2019, Peugeot Australia has yet to announce whether the wagon will be on sale closer to home.

Mazda Australia has recently released its facelifted Mazda 6 sedan and wagon range – the updates, featuring revised powertrain offering and added safety equipment, also include a updated interior.

The Mazda 6 model line-up remains unchanged, featuring the Sport; Touring; GT and Atenza in both the sedan and wagon versions.

The Sport is offered exclusively with an updated version of the carryover 2.5 litre naturally aspirated petrol engine. And according to Mazda, the Sport and Touring variants now have $3000 worth of added value compared to the previous models.

Its worthy noting that in order to improve the on-road performance, Mazda has increased the chassis rigidity and revised the suspension geometry, while the electric power steering system has been further tuned.

The interior, as mentioned previously, has also had a significant update. With a new dash, updated centre console, seats and door trims.

Safety has also made a feature in the facelift. From radar cruise control as a standard to blind-spot monitoring, driver attention alert and emergency stop signal. Other features that round up this rather comprehensive safety suite include lane-departure warning, lane-keep assist, rear parking sensors, rear cross-traffic alert, auto-dimming rear-view mirrors, reversing camera and smart city brake support.

And if you are looking for an upmarket feeling, the top-of-the-line Atenza grade is treated to either white or walnut brown Nappa leather trim, wood door and dash trim, Ultrasuede door and dash trim, a sunroof, adaptive LED headlights, surround-view monitors, a 7.0-inch TFT LCD screen, ambient LED interior lighting and ventilated front seats.

2018 Mazda6 list pricing:

Sedan
Mazda6 Sport 2.5 petrol – automatic – $32,490
Mazda6 Touring 2.5 petrol – automatic – $36,690
Mazda6 Touring 2.2 diesel – automatic – $36,690
Mazda6 GT 2.5 turbo petrol – automatic – $43,990
Mazda6 GT 2.2 diesel – automatic – $45,090
Mazda6 Atenza 2.5 turbo petrol – automatic – $47,690
Mazda6 Atenza 2.2 diesel – automatic – $48,790

Wagon
Mazda6 Sport 2.5 petrol – automatic – $33,790
Mazda6 Touring 2.5 petrol – automatic – $37,990
Mazda6 Touring 2.2 diesel – automatic – $40,990
Mazda6 GT 2.5 turbo petrol – automatic – $45,290
Mazda6 GT 2.2 diesel – automatic – $46,390
Mazda6 Atenza 2.5 turbo petrol – automatic – $48,990
Mazda6 Atenza 2.2 diesel – automatic – $50,090

With many new innovations in headlight technology – we wanted to share everything you need to know to make the informed decision when buying your next car. From LED to halogen lamps, day-time running lights and more.

Halogen

In the early days, automotive engineers had to solve a basic problem – how to reliably generate light with limited resources (from a car). From the mid-19600s until now, tungsten filaments have been encased in halogen gas in order to improve the performance and longevity – the solution that they found all those years ago has been pretty consistent, until recently.

Traditionally, tungsten and halogen lamps focused light on the road via a lens that doubled as the headlights protective housing. This is now not the case – since the 1990s the exterior casings of headlights have been made from polycarbonate while light from the bulb is often aimed via a series of reflectors. Alternatively, the light beam is directed by a projector lens within the headlight housing.

While these low cost and long lasting bulbs are the most common headlamp type – the market is rapidly changing.

HID (High Intensity Discharge) headlights

HID headlights are a mixture of rare metals and gases that are heated to produce a bright white glow. HID headlights are two to three times brighter than their halogen counterparts. The Australian Design Rules require cars with HIDs to also have self-levelling mechanisms as well as headlight washers – this is due to the affect HID headlights can have on other road users.

HID lamps require less power to operate and are easy to distinguish as their cool white glow is often accompanied by a distinctive blue tinge. HID lights contain a trace amount of the gas xenon – and they are often commonly referred to as xenon headlights.

LED (Light Emitting Diodes) headlights

LED headlights have also come a long way, they hit maximum brightness within a millionth of a second, however, currently they fall short of the brightness achieved by HIDs.

The biggest selling point of LEDs are that they convert most of the energy created into light and not heat. Of late, LED headlights have started heading into mainstream cars – and as of late have become available on the Corolla sedan.

Laser headlights

BMW was the first to offer Laser headlights as an option in its i8 plug-in hybrid supercar. Laser beams are focused towards a cloud of yellow phosphorous gas, the gas then emits a powerful white glow – which is then reflected and diffused to light up the road. BMW claims that these headlights can illuminate the road up to 600 meters ahead of the i8 - making them more efficient than other variants on the market.

With the all-new Audi RS 4 Avant high-performance station wagon now on sale in Australia, we thought we’d share a bit more about this 2018 new-generation model with you.

The 2018 RS4 Avant is powered by a 2.9-litre twin-turbo V6 petrol engine, that produces 331kW of power and 600Nm torque – all models come with an eight-speed tiptronic automatic transmission and quattro all-wheel drive.

Standard features of the RS 4 include 20-inch alloy wheels, red RS brake calipers, adjustable sports exhaust system, LED headlights with LED daytime running lights, adaptive rear LED indicators, adaptive sports suspension and tinted rear windows with acoustic front glass to name a few.

If you are looking for something streamlined and funky in the interior – then the Audi RS 4 Avant delivers. The standard interior kit amongst other things includes Audi’s virtual Cockpit 12.3-inch driver info screen, an 8.0 inch tablet media screen with sat nav, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto phone mirroring and a 19-inch speaker Bang&Olufsen stereo system.

Front sports seats with Nappa leather trim and honeycomb quilting are showcased with the ambient interior lighting system (with 30 different colour options!). A panoramic sunroof is fitted as standard but you can choose to rather forgo this option if not suitable.

In terms of safety the lengthy list of features include Audi’s pre-sense front system with auto emergency braking with pedestrian detection, a 360-degree camera with reversing camera and front/rear parking sensors, traffic jam assist, active lane-keeping assist, lane departure warning, blind-spot monitoring, adaptive cruise control, turn assist and auto high-beam lights. Rounding off this lengthy feature list, Audi has also added rear cross-traffic alert, multi-collision braking and Audi’s “exit warning system” – which flashes the ambient lights if an occupant is about to open their door into the path of oncoming cars or cyclists.

The new twin-turbo V6 model is priced at $152,900 (excluding on-road costs)

Have you ever been on your way to work on a cool morning, and had your windscreen fog up? It’s actually pretty common in generally warmer temperate climates, such as Sydney.
The fog on your windscreen is caused by a difference in air pressure and temperature between the outside and the inside of the car – generally brought on by you and your breathing!
The quickest solution is to switch on the air-conditioning in your car. Air-conditioners will cool the temperature of the inside of your car to match the cool outside morning air. Many drivers will be surprised by the sudden rush of cool air brought on by the ‘demist’ button – but this will evaporate the water condensed on the windscreen as well as cool the temperature to match the temperature outside of the car.
Not keen on the cold? Turn off the vents facing you and point the vents at the side windows. Many of the modern cars come with windscreen air vents, which will blow the cold air directly onto the windscreen – and remove the discomfort of cooling the full car during the chilly mornings.
Other types of demisting car systems include windscreens with thin wires stuck into the windscreen used to warm up the windscreen – this is common for rear windscreens and are often less effective than other air-conditioning solutions.
If you are suffering from a foggy windscreen regularly however, putting a coating over the imperfections in your windscreen (to which the water particles and condensation stick to), keeping your windscreen clean and avoiding cheap replacement glass are all great solutions to investigate.
What works for you when de-fogging your windscreen? Let us know your solutions!

NSW motorists need to be sure to mind the gap and give cyclists a wider berth – this after the new cycling road rule comes into effect.
The new rule states that all vehicles are to leave a gap of at least one metre between you and the cyclist when overtaking at speeds up to 60km/h or 1.5 metres at speeds above 60km/h.
Research conducted by the Centre for Accident Research and Road Safety in Queensland has found that bicycle and vehicle accidents were reduced up to 15 per cent as a result of this new passing gap.
If you’re caught breaking the new laws, you might just be slugged with a $330 find and a loss of two demerit points.
With cycling becoming increasingly popular in Australia – as well as becoming a eco-friendly mode of transport being adopted by many – this rule will be sure to assist with road safely for all road users.
As a motorist, be sure to have a clear view of oncoming traffic when crossing broken and unbroken lines – both permitted as part of the new rule.
Nearly all states have similar rules or are undertaking a trial of minimum passing rules with the exception of Victoria, which early in 2017 rejected a recommendation to introduce such rules.