Top: Z4 app on iTunes, Middle: Artwork I created with the app, Bottom: The real Z4 as tested

I promised I’d keep you posted (literally) on interesting car-related iPhone apps so here’s an update on my experience with BMW Z4 - An Expression of Joy - Lite (available free of charge on the iTunes Store) in comparison with my real-world  drive of the BMW Z4 which I got to try out at Millbrook last week.

My own background is creative: I excelled in art at school and went on to study Industrial Design at degree level, so I can appreciate BMW’s desire to follow a different (more artistic) path with its iPhone app than the obvious track or road-based driving game which has pretty much been done to death.

The problem for me is that this ‘expression of joy’ is simply lacking in the joy department. It’s actually dull. Painting a vast virtual canvas using the Z4’s tyres as rollers is about as much fun as watching…well, I guess the only redeeming feature is that the app doesn’t require you to wait for the virtual paint to dry.

In contrast to my joyless iPhone drive, I’m delighted to report that the real thing is a completely different kettle of fish.

I tested a Z4 sDrrive 30i and liken its performance to a Mike Tyson punch (in his heyday, of course) delivered in a velvet glove.

The stats are pretty impressive too: 258 bhp, 310 Nm, 0-62 mph in 5.8 seconds and a top speed electronically restricted to 155 mph. In light of these, 33.2 mpg economy on the Combined Cycle is not to be sniffed at either.

Artistically, I have to say I prefer the boldness of the original Z4’s styling to the subtlety of the new car, but I suspect I’m in a minority with that view. The adoption of the folding tin-top rather than the fabric roof also makes for a compromised coupe design, so I think the Z4 looks its best with the top down.

So BMW hasn’t lost the plot when it comes to sportscars, it just needs to make sure that the essential fun element present in the roadster remains undiluted throughout its creative advertising and marketing campaign - right the way down to its iPhone app.

PS:

I note that there is now a paid for app (59p) available called the BMW Z4 Experience which may well have appeared as a response to some who share my point of view but I’ll have to check that out another day.

The car - like the world - has changed a lot since 1957

We’re living through the death throes of the American ‘big three’ car makers, with an outcome still unclear. Governmental and public support for an immediate cash bailout should, on paper, be quite extraordinary, given the history of the U.S. and its aversion to socialist principles. Chrysler and General Motors (and to a lesser extent, Ford) are failing, yet rather than let the market take its course are being steered towards an artificial coma-like state. Even if they were competitive tomorrow, it would surely be years before they can pay back the billions, much less be profitable? Yet they will not allowed to fade away either.

In some respects this is perfectly understandable. No president wants the collapse of an industry on his watch. And there are pressing economic reasons to keep the cars coming of course - an awful lot of American jobs are at stake. But could there be something else going on here?

America didn’t invent the horseless carriage, but over the last century embraced and developed it like no other country has. Its arrival coincided with the nation itself: parts of North America were unfounded when Daimler patented his combustion engine in 1885. Take the city of Tulsa in Oklahoma, which had little over 200 citizens at the time, and only 1,100 by the turn of the century. It would later grow rich on local oil discoveries.

In 1957 during America’s economic boom time, the Tulsan authorities decided to mark the half-century of their city by burying a time capsule in the square. What better way to represent themselves and their lives than a car? So a brand new Plymouth Belvedere - tailfins and all - was lowered into a vault where it lay buried for fifty years, almost forgotten, in front of the courthouse.

Eighteen months ago, preparations were well underway to extricate the Plymouth – a marque that has ceased to be in the intervening years. As the earth was removed and sunlight bathed the tomb for the first time in half a century, tension was palpable. “It’s our King Tut’s tomb, it’s like a fairy tale,” remarked one onlooker. “I can’t wait to see her lifted out and that engine cranked over!” remarked another. Only there was a problem: the car was under water. The vault had leaked, probably within a year or two of being shut. And to make matters worse, Chrysler cars of the 1950s had subsequently shown a terrible propensity for rust.

There was little left of the Belvedere, save rivers of brown water and a rotten interior. Today, the car that was buried during America’s optimistic heyday seems an all-too painful parable for its car industry. “There’s nothing that isn’t restorable,” said a crestfallen visitor.

Perhaps the lesson should be that nothing lasts forever.

What’s the coolest wedding gift you can think of?  If money were no object, I guess we could all think of some crazy ideas like a gift-wrapped Lear Jet or a pearl-encrusted Bugatti Veyron, but when I tied the knot with my other half a few years’ back, one of my dearest chums surprised me with an absolute cracker of a present - a customised Scalextric set.

He’d swapped out the standard rally cars for versions of our own road cars, a VW Beetle and a SEAT Ibiza, which he’d painted and correctly number-plated for added authenticity.

Well it seems that VW’s marketing gurus have been thinking along the same lines in seeking out target customers for their new Golf GTI ahead of its launch on May 22. They’ve created a massive virtual Scalextric layout in a hangar in a secret location where you can sneak in and test the new car’s ‘on-track’ performance.

The track is the work of a team of 60 modellers and features over 200 scale buildings in a space occupying 25ft by 30ft.  My only gripe is that VW have created the car in 1:43 scale rather than the 1:32 of my classic boyhood sets (anorak alert) - but this in no way spoils the experience.

You’ll have to take it a little steady at first since the lab-technician will only replace your car a limited number of times when you come off.

If you set a decent lap time you can enter a draw to win use of the real GTI for 3 months. Log on to GTI Project to take a speedy Scalextric trip down memory lane without having to go into a dusty loft and then spend hours setting up your track. Enjoy!

David Martell (of Trafficmaster fame) has set up the Electric Car Corporation (ECC) to launch what the company describes as the UK’s first full 4 seat electric production car - the ev’ie (or evie, depending on how lazy you are with pretentious punctuation marks).

The launch took place at a West London hotel which gave us the chance to try out the Citroen C1-based car slap bang in the middle of the Congestion Charge zone - an area in which ECC hopes the evie will find many friends.

The brief presentation was well attended by council officials as well as journalists. Mary Toffi, Transport Policy Manger of Richmond Council explained that ECC has been approved as a Car Club. The Borough is planning to double its allocation of car club bays over the next year (mainly at the expense of residents’ parking) so ECC is clearly hoping to occupy as many of these as possible.

Although our brief drive was confined to a small area in and around Hyde Park, we were able to get a feel for the responsiveness of the evie’s power unit as we accelerated away from the lights and blended effortlessly into the lunchtime traffic flow.

The controls couldn’t be simpler. The ‘gearstick’ (there are no gears as such) has just two positions: forward and reverse. The pedals are just stop and go.

ECC’s Technical Director Jeff Solomon accompanied me on the drive. I was concerned that the severity of the regenerative braking (as you lift off, the car decelerates instantly without you touching the brake pedal) might catch out following drivers but Solomon reassured me, “As soon as the regenerative braking kicks in, the brake lights are activated.”

As you’d expect from an electric car, the motor was pretty much silent. In other respects, the car was as comfortable and refined as a regular Citroen C1. The only apparent compromise is the reduction in boot space to accommodate the battery pack, an overnight charge of which will give you a realistic driving range of 60-70 miles.

At almost £17K, the evie could look expensive, but it seems like an absolute bargain when compared to the Lithium-ion version of the toy town inspired G-Wiz quadricycle which is far smaller, has never been near a crash-test, yet still retails at just £1,000 less!

The evie’s price does include a 3-year warranty and even if you achieve half the annual savings of £7,000 touted by Martell, you can see that the numbers begin to add up.

All we need now, I hear you say, is some serious investment in infrastructure so there are enough charging points to meet the potential demand. Well, they’ve thought of that too, setting up a separate company called ECC Infracharge to assist with the installation of more juice points at a reduced cost.

ECC Board member, Christopher Ross, bullishly told me that the evie would be available from Citroen showrooms, but the Citroen PR team on hand seemed to suggest it was not yet a done deal. Either way, if you’re keen on the idea of electric motoring, the evie certainly seems to make a lot of sense.