Motorsports: FPR debuts Falcon Car of the Future for V8 Supercars series

Filed under: Motorsports, Ford, Australia, Racing

Usually, shaking down a new race car can be full of agony and heartaches, so it's surprising how positive Ford Performance Racing's (FPR) feedback was after its first tests with the Ford Falcon Car of the Future (COTF). This new racer is being tested in preparation for the 2013 Australian V8 Supercars season.

In total, the Falcon COTF ran 20 laps around Winton Motor Raceway, and based on the initial tests, FPR said the car performed better than expected during a short session. The car will perform its first full day of testing on Monday ahead of the Dick Smith Sandown 500.

That's not all the news happening for next year's V8 Supercar season. We already knew that Nissan is returning to the series for the first time since 1993, but now we know what'll be under the hood of its Altima racer: a Nissan Motorsport VK56DE V8 engine. Made in Tennessee, this aluminum V8 has been modified for race use by dropping its displacement from 5.6 liters down to 5.0 to comply with V8 Supercars regs.

Of course, we'll be able to see all of these cars in action in the U.S. next season when the V8 Supercars invade the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.

FPR debuts Falcon Car of the Future for V8 Supercars series originally appeared on Autoblog on Sat, 08 Sep 2012 15:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google's Steve Lee talks about the history and future of Project Glass

Details on Google's Project Glass haven't been the easiest thing to come by since the wearable computing effort was announced earlier this year, but Google execs have been getting a bit more talkative and eager to give demonstrations as of late. You can now add product lead Steve Lee to that list, who's given a fairly wide-ranging interview to Fast Company on the project's origins and its future. Not surprisingly, he confirmed that the early prototypes were a fair bit bulkier -- starting a laptop in a backpack -- and that even the current prototypes are still "very early," although they do handle more than just photos (he gives Maps as one example). Lee does see photo-taking as a "key aspect" to the device, though.

He also cast some doubt on initial reports that the devices would be available this year for between $250 and $600, saying that would be "pretty aggressive timing," but he also noted that he "wouldn't be on this project if it was like a five-year endeavor." As for the future, he says that contact lenses with the technology is a natural evolution but a definite "long-term thing," and that a nearer term goal is to "serve everyone and make this is a universal device," adding that they've "prototyped lots of different form factors to accommodate all those folks." All of that comes just from the first part of a two-part interview, though -- the rest is promised later this week.

Google's Steve Lee talks about the history and future of Project Glass originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 May 2012 16:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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