With a bright canopy...

With a bright canopy and matching tyres, it is the handiwork of Paris fashion house Maison de Courreges - famous for inventing the mini skirt in the Sixties and using electric vehicles in its shows. It claims the car"s success is down to its lithium polymer batteries, which are lighter, quicker to charge and less likely to overheat than standard cells.

Oil changes will become...

Oil changes will become a thing of the past if a revolutionary filter system delivers on its promises. The on-board "refinery" scrubs the lubricant clean so it never gets dirty, say the Swedish inventors of the COT Oil Processor. The gadget has been tested on Scania trucks and Volvo marine units for the past year. A retro-fit version for cars works by taking a continuous flow from the engine oil line and removing the contaminants. Particles in the liquid that are bigger than one micron are removed by a special cotton-based filter. Unwanted fluids such as water are evaporated away by a miniature boiler.