$75,000 for new Honda

Honda's S2000 roadster will be launched in New Zealand in September. Word on the street is that the car will cost about $75,000. It has just gone on sale in Japan, where there is already a 10-month waiting list, for about $50,000. The S2000 is powered by a 2-litre, four-cylinder engine that develops 180kW. Honda says it is the most powerful, highest performing, naturally aspirated 2-litre engine in the world, revving right out to 9000 rpm, thanks to a new variable timing mechanism. The S2000 has 10 times the body rigidity of Honda's first sports car, the S800, unveiled in 1963. It also has a bright red push-button starter - for those who like a blast from the past.

The price is right

The 1.6-litre Renault Megane cabriolet, which has just gone on sale here at $42,500, sells in Britain for the equivalent of $50,000. The 1.4-litre, five-door Clio sells for just under $31,000 in London. In Auckland, it costs $21,995. Okay, so the Renault factory subsidised the price here to help the marque get re-established but new-car prices in Britain are still hellishly expensive. How about the flagship HSE Range Rover? $151,000 in Britain; $135,000 recommended retail here. And New Zealanders get more kit, including colour-coded bumpers and wood trim.

Rolls on a roll

Britain is about to go into a recession if sales of Rolls-Royce and Bentley cars in the first three months of 1999 are any indication. Worldwide sales increased by about 37 per cent but the British market was down 32.5 per cent compared with last year's first quarter. In the United States, sales were up 184 per cent, in Japan 200 per cent, in Germany 100 per cent and in continental Europe 240 per cent. At the end of March, 344 Rollers and Bentleys had been sold worldwide. Rolls-Royce is confident of the future, too. It is about to put into place a $1.5 billion research and development programme.

Probe into airbag death

Road safety experts in Britain are to study the death of a woman who fractured the base of her skull on her seat headrest when the car's airbag deployed in a low-speed, head-on crash. A Liverpool Coroner's Court heard that the detonation of the airbag caused the women's head to hit the restraint too hard because she was sitting too close to the steering wheel in her Rover 414. Rover will also study the Government's study. Ford, mindful of statistics in the United States which blame 131 deaths in low-speed crashes on airbags, is offering adjustable pedals in its new Taurus so that shorter drivers can sit further away from the wheel. The industry recommendation is that drivers shouldn't sit any closer than 20cm.

We are the world

* Boris Kalush, aged 37, drowned after apparently trying to get a drink from the beer tanker he was driving. He was found with his legs sticking out of the tanker's inspection cover on a road near Omsk, Siberia.

* Motorcyclist Paco Boscoro, 27, is to get a lifetime's supply of protective toothpaste after chipping a tooth in an accident with a car. A court in Milan awarded Boscoro enough money to pay for the toothpaste until he is 78.