Honda FourTrax Foreman 4x4 ES


Over the years, Honda’s FourTrax Foreman series of 4x4 ATVs have proven to be versatile, effective both for work and pleasure. For the 2012 model, Honda ups the ante with their popular 4x4 ATVs, adding a brand-new liquid-cooled 475cc single-cylinder OHV four-stroke engine with a new fuel injection system. These additions not only add powerful capabilities to the Foreman, but also adds to the ATVs overall performance package.

In addition to the new engine, the 2012 FourTrax Foreman also has a new, rugged and tough looking body work with an all new chassis and suspension set-up that dramatically improves the ATV’s comfort, precision. and handling capabilities. Add all of those elements together and you have a package that offers one of the best ATV rides on the market today. The fact that it’s built by Honda is only another indication of the ATV’s world-class capabilities.

Find out more about the Honda FourTrax Foreman 4x4 ES after the jump.

Honda FourTrax Foreman 4x4 ES originally appeared on topspeed.com on Friday, 7 October 2011 11:00 EST.

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Source: http://www.topspeed.com/motorcycles/motorcycle-reviews/honda/2012-honda-fourtrax-foreman-4x4-es-ar113524.html

Ralf Schumacher Vern Schuppan Adolfo Schwelm Cruz Bob Scott Archie Scott Brown

Twenty years of Schumacher

At Spa-Francorchamps

For the first time since he started his comeback at the beginning of last season, Michael Schumacher was the centre of attention as the Formula 1 circus rolled into the spectacular Spa-Francorchamps circuit ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix.

Twenty years ago this weekend, the man who would go on to become the most successful racing driver of all time made his debut here for the Jordan team, which was also in its first season in the sport.

It did not take long for him to catch the eye - a stunning qualifying performance put him seventh on the grid, several places ahead of his vastly experienced team-mate Andrea de Cesaris. And although he retired after a few hundred yards with a broken driveshaft, Schumacher had made his mark.

By the time of the next race, Benetton had stolen him from under Eddie Jordan's nose - and the legend that culminated in seven world titles and 91 race victories began.

Although it is - as Red Bull's Mark Webber pointed out - only Schumacher's 17th season in F1, on account of the three he missed during his 'retirement', this weekend has partly been set aside to honour his achievements.

His Mercedes team are planning an event on Saturday, while Ferrari, with whom he won five of his seven titles, have promised "a little something to mark the occasion".

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However you count the years, Schumacher's achievement came into sharp perspective when his rivals were asked whether they remembered his debut.

Most of them were too young to have any recollection of it at all, picking a later point in his career as the time they first became aware of him.

Most, though, were more than happy to pay tribute to his remarkable achievements, with the most glowing reference coming from Fernando Alonso, the man who ended Schumacher's run of five consecutive titles in 2005 and then won a memorable mano-a-mano duel between them the following season.

"Michael, I have great respect for him," Alonso said. "He is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, in the history of our sport. There are numbers there it will be impossible to repeat for any one of us.

"It has been a great pleasure to drive with him all these years. I will always remember all the battles with him and for me it was a privilege to drive against Michael Schumacher. It will be something I always remember. Then he decided to stop and come back.

"I'm sure he missed the adrenaline and the F1 show. Now he is in the second part of his career, the car is not competitive, but he is still enjoying [it].

"There are some criticisms about his return and results now, but I don't agree with those.Michael three years ago was watching F1 at home. Now he is doing seventh or ninth but I'm sure he is happy every morning because he is doing what he wants to do."

When Alonso was racing Schumacher before his comeback, the German was the benchmark, so beating him gave the Spaniard's titles the ultimate stamp of credibility.

There are no questions about Alonso's greatness now, standing as he does alongside Lewis Hamilton as the new benchmark against which all drivers are measured.

For Schumacher, though, these are very different times, and the last 18 months or so have been punctuated by ongoing questions about the merit and wisdom of his return.

Last year, he was by and large pasted by team-mate Nico Rosberg - a man who for all his undoubted potential has yet to win a race. This season there have been signs of progress - while the younger German still comfortably has Schumacher's measure in qualifying, the veteran has looked more competitive in the races

It is clear, though, that Schumacher is not the driver he was.

Where once he appeared to dance at will on a limit beyond almost all his rivals, he now appears too often to be searching for that rarefied high wire, usually without success.

But the man who was famous for his willingness to do almost anything to win says he is satisfied with his current lot, scraping around for lower-ranking points as Mercedes battle to catch the top teams, while still insisting he wants to repay the German manufacturer for funding his debut and "return race wins and championships back to them".

His anniversary has given him a chance to reflect on a career that is still remembered for its many controversies as much as it is for his great success.

And in an interview with BBC F1 pit-lane reporter Lee McKenzie, which will be broadcast as part of the race build-up on BBC One on Sunday, he went as far as to admit he had regrets about some of the incidents that in so many minds went beyond the boundaries of respectability.

"Certainly I would do things differently," he said. "After 20 years in F1, you have a few regrets but, quite honestly, if I think it was 20 years, the few spots I have, you have to make mistakes to learn from them - and I think I do learn."

Asked if any of his mistakes stood out, he picked this race in 1998, when he lost a certain victory in the wet after crashing into the back of David Coulthard's McLaren. Once he had made it back to the pits, convinced the Scot had slowed deliberately to take him out, Schumacher charged off to the McLaren garage and had to be restrained from physically assaulting him.

"Maybe I should regret to go for an attack to David after he spoiled my race in 1998," he says. "We had this mysterious misunderstanding, I had a certain reaction, I think it was the first and only time I have been like this, I am normally a very balanced person."

It is perhaps revealing that of all the many incidents in his career, he should choose one for which he was not at fault, rather than his two title-deciding collisions with Williams drivers Damon Hill and Jacques Villeneuve in 1994 and 1997, or his decision to 'park' his car in Monaco qualifying to prevent Alonso beating him to pole position.

He still refuses to answer questions about the last incident and is resigned to the fact he will always - at least outside Germany - be a man who is more admired than loved.

"Everybody forms his own opinion about any person," he says. "I think I just want to be treated fair, that's the only think I look for. Who likes me or loves me, I'm happy about. Who doesn't, I understand, because you can't be loved by everyone."

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2011/08/schumacher_learns_from_his_mis.html

Consalvo Sanesi Stephane Sarrazin Takuma Sato Carl Scarborough Ludovico Scarfiotti

Interstate Motor Freight Systems trucks

I just bought the AMT Kenworth K-123 cabover. It has decals for Interstate Motor Freight Systems, trouble is, I have heard on several sites that they didn't use Kenworth power. What would have been a more likely  cabover tractor for IS trucks? I also saw a Louisville Line box truck used by IS. I have one, and it in the works now. Thanks for any leads/info.

Source: http://cs.scaleautomag.com/SCACS/forums/thread/980443.aspx

Chuck Weyant Ken Wharton Ted Whiteaway Graham Whitehead Peter Whitehead

Vettel underlines title credentials with sublime drive

At Spa-Francorchamps

Sebastian Vettel and his Red Bull team-mate Mark Webber finished one-two in the Belgian Grand Prix after drives that can compare with many of those that have entered the annals of Formula 1 history from the famous Spa-Francorchamps track.

The two men went into the race on Sunday well aware of their team's concerns that their front tyres could fail.

Red Bull design chief Adrian Newey said it was "one of the scariest races I've been involved in", and the mind boggles as to the bravery of the drivers in that situation.

Spa's high-speed sweeps are arguably the biggest challenge a grand prix driver can face. Although safety has improved immensely at the circuit in the modern age, it remains an old-school race track, on which there are places "you wouldn't want to go off," as Webber put it in his BBC Sport column last week.

The drivers sounded phlegmatic about it after the race, but they were well aware of the potential seriousness of the situation. "We took quite a lot of risk," Vettel said. But, he added, "when there is a chance to win, we go for it".

Of all the many qualities that make grand prix drivers different from ordinary mortals, this has to be one of the most striking.

Call it bravery, call it lack of imagination, but Vettel and Webber went into the race, committed themselves to the 180mph rollercoaster ride through Eau Rouge, having put their lives in the hands of calculations by their engineers about how long their tyres would last.

The height of concern was in the early stages of the race, when the cars were running on tyres that Newey said Pirelli had told them "were very marginal and at five o'clock yesterday they wouldn't say after half a lap or five laps but they were going to fail".

Vettel and Webber's one-two in Belgium continued Red Bull's domination of this year's championship. Photo: Reuters

Red Bull's engineers had calculated that they could be pretty sure Webber's tyres would last two or three laps, and Vettel's five - which is when the two men made their first pit stops.

Red Bull were not the only team to suffer blistering, but theirs was worse than any of their rivals.

The situation caused controversy because they were running their cars with a greater degree of camber - lean away from vertical - on their front tyres than supplier Pirelli recommends.

Pirelli motorsport chief Paul Hembery chose his words carefully after the race, but I understand there were strong words between Pirelli and Newey before the race, and that there may be less tolerance of any team who choose to go beyond Pirelli's advice in the future.

It is yet another example of how Newey pushes every parameter to the limit, an approach that allied with his genius for aerodynamic design, has led him to create so many dominant cars, of which this year's Red Bull RB7 is just the latest in a long line.

With everything that was involved - the bravery, the tyre management, racing and overtaking Fernando Alonso's Ferrari, it has to rank as one of the best of Vettel's 17 victories.

Both Newey and team principal Christian Horner described it as a "mature" drive, and, as Newey pointed out: "Mark's race was every bit as good."

Webber was compromised first by a poor start, caused when his anti-stall kicked in, and then by a radio miscommunication that meant he did not follow his team-mate into the pits under the safety car period that followed Lewis Hamilton's collision with Sauber's Kamui Kobayashi.

That committed him to a long middle stint on the slower 'medium' tyre, at the beginning of which he showed bravery of a different but no less remarkable kind.

On lap nine, Webber passed Alonso on the outside going into Eau Rouge, pulling alongside on the hill down from La Source, nosing in front, and refusing to concede.

The two men are good friends, and they always race hard but fair, giving each other just enough room in such situations, but this incident was right on the edge.

"That boy must have some balls to do that - on the outside into Eau Rouge," Horner said. "Phenomenal. Pass of the day.

"Fernando was professional and gave him enough room to work with. Mark was always going to brave it out around the outside. I think we all closed our eyes."

Of course, Vettel and Webber's one-two was facilitated by the huge performance advantage of their cars.

Alonso appeared to be in the running for victory until his team chose not to stop under the safety car, but he insisted that was an illusion, saying Red Bull had a pace advantage of "one second per lap, maybe towards the end of the race even more, 1.5 seconds".

This is quite a turnaround after Red Bull failed to win any of the previous three races, where McLaren and Ferrari both showed Red Bull-beating pace.

Newey ascribes this to the "very cool conditions and slightly abnormal races" in Britain, Germany and Hungary.

"Hungary we were actually quite competitive in the dry and in those early laps on the intermediate tyres we suffered," he said.

"Germany it was exceptionally cold and we suffered in [tyre] warm-up. Silverstone we were compromised because we believed we had cold blowing (of the diffuser) allowed but it was taken away on Sunday morning."

This does not bode well for what were admittedly faint hopes that one of Vettel's rivals might have a chance of stopping his relentless march to the championship.

Although Alonso starred in the early stages in Spa, the car closest on pace to the Red Bull would seem still to be the McLaren, judging by Jenson Button's remarkable drive through the field to third place on Sunday, which was full of clinical and elegant overtaking moves.

As Button pointed out, though, McLaren's weekend in Belgium was compromised by the mistakes that have characterised their season, and which they desperately need to cut out.

In Button's case in Belgium, that was a "miscommunication" over how many laps he had left in the second period of qualifying that left him stranded in 13th place.

Lewis Hamilton, meanwhile, made another of several mistakes by himself and the team this season which have made it impossible to challenge Vettel.

Without them, he would be in the fight, rather than where is now, which is 113 points behind Vettel with only 175 still available, and his title hopes over.

Alonso, who after his fourth place in Spa is in a marginally better position but still 102 points adrift of Vettel, said he would keep battling until it was mathematically impossible to overhaul Vettel.

But even he, F1's most relentless fighter, admitted Ferrari's hopes were "not in our hands, and Red Bull need to make big, big mistakes, and have big problems if we want to win the championship".

Barring a disaster of catastrophic proportions, then, Vettel will win a second consecutive world title this year, and long before the end of the season.

After performances such as that at Spa on Sunday, and many others this year, he fully deserves it.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/andrewbenson/2011/08/vettel_underlines_title_creden.html

Robert OBrien Pat OConnor Jackie Oliver Danny Ongais Rikky von Opel