Ten things we learned this week: 9 October 2015 edition

It’s going to take some effort to top Toyota, which has pulled out all the stops for its home motor show. Not only do we get a near-production sports car that’s even teenier and more accessible than the fine GT86, but this too.
 
“What exactly is it?” you may rightly ask. And we can’t provide an answer any more precise than “chuffing cool”.
 
The very steampunk Kikai “takes the machinery normally hidden beneath the vehicle body and makes an open display of its beauty,” according to the Toyota bumf. As such there’s some Ariel Atom-esque views of suspension and wheels working away as you drive.
 
It’s glorious, though we’d wager the Kikai's mechanical bits are a little bit more artful than those beneath an Avensis. A McLaren F1-inspired three-seat layout and some truly wonderful analogue dials complete a car we really, really want.
 
Is Toyota on the verge of becoming genuinely cool?

More cool Toyota news. Our rallying calls helped get this Caterham kit-car kit into Lego’s ‘review’ stage, and now you can help bring this even-boxier-than-normal Land Cruiser to similar Lego-based reality.
 
Think about it: a Seven and a Land Cruiser would make for a spiffing two-car garage, sunny day thrills’n’spills balanced out by some utilitarian practicality.
 
But you’d need a hefty wodge of cash – and ample garage space – to make the dream reality. The Lego version can be enjoyed by all of us. Click this link and help make it happen.

Lexus produces cars at opposite ends of the spectrum. On the one hand you have ballistic stuff like the revs-to-the-stratosphere LFA. At the other, some incredibly blobby convertibles and humdrum hybrids.
 
Where this sits is up for debate, but it’s certainly grabbed our attention: the CAD drawings for a normal metal, glass and plastic Lexus IS were used to recreate the entire thing in cardboard. Brake calipers, wheel nuts… the attention to detail is admirable. It even moves.
 
Good on them for thinking outside the box.

First things first: Ten Things would like to apologise for two things: acknowledging dieselgate as a word, and referencing Halloween so early in October.
 
But how else can we direct suitable derision at the above? Much like Toyota’s recall woes, the public has really latched onto the ongoing Volkswagen emissions scandal, and this ramshackle fancy dress costume one of the more eye-boggling reactions.
 
You might be relieved to know it’s not a complete costume to buy, rather an idea by HalloweenCostumes.co.uk for those who want, in their words, “to be the ‘Oh, I get it’ Halloween 2015 partygoer that starts conversations.”
 
Those conversations are unlikely to lead to friendships.

You’d think Horacio Pagani, the man behind the Zonda and Huayra, would have crafted his own perfect supercar with the wealth of tech and carbon he has at his disposal.
 
But if reports are correct, he’s just bought himself a Porsche 918 Spyder. Naturally he’s gone for the track-biased Weissach Package, too.
 
The more cynical might assume he’s going to deconstruct it, perhaps to analyse its trick hybrid system to inspire something similar in a future Pagani.
 
Truth is, though, he’s simply a car nut, for the 918 seems likely to join an illustrious collection that also includes a Carrera GT and a Ford GT.
 
Bravo, Horacio.

If you’ll excuse us a quick moment to discuss football, Liverpool have a new manager this week. The arrival of Jurgen Klopp has been met with great excitement, too.
 
Rumours surrounded the German manager's appointment all week, some fans getting especially excited upon spotting the man himself purchasing a new car, namely an Audi RS6, at the brand’s Liverpool showroom.
 
All was not as it seems, though; Jurgen has a Kloppleganger. Audi Liverpool’s salesman John Vena had often been told he resembles Klopp, reports the Liverpool Echo, and therefore seized the opportunity to fuel excitable rumours with a posed shot in one of his cars.
 
Audi’s 552bhp estate car is extremely cool to our eyes, though, and therefore fitting transport for a man capable of this. We expect the real Jurgen Klopp in one soon…

Keen internetists will know this isn’t an event that occurred this week. But we couldn’t stumble across such a fine (and really quite mesmerising) clip without celebrating it in the way it deserves.
 
Birds may typically be the arch enemy of cars, their paintwork in particular, but this is evidence the two can get along on perfect harmony.
 
However you’re feeling, it’s a video that can’t fail to raise a smile. But however much it amuses you, consider this: you’re not enjoying it half as much as the crow.

You would think the suits at Audi would have more pressing things to put pen to flipchart about. But its squabble with the Fiat group continues.
 
Audi, see, wants the Q2 and Q4 badges so that its niche busting – in the SUV market specifically – can continue unabated.
 
Fiat, though, has rights to both those names, Alfa Romeo already having used both. Q2 relates to the differential it popped on its overpowered front-driven cars, while Q4 badges denoted all-wheel-drive Alfas.
 
Alfa doesn’t employ them anymore, though, but is digging its heels in about handing them over to Audi so it can neatly fill the gaps in its SUV range.
 
Does Alfa have a fair claim? Or should it – pun completely intended – get a grip?

Or rather its chief exterior designer Frederic Duvernier doesn’t, and not just because they’re ever so slighty offensive on the eye.
 
Duvernier told Car Advice this week that cars like the BMW X6 and Mercedes GLE are dangerous.
 
Over to Frederic: “There’s lots of SUVs you can’t [see out the back of] because of this fancy coupe stuff for example. Okay, but what’s the point? You can’t put stuff in your trunk and you can’t see outside, so, they’re dangerous cars basically.
 
“So I would ask myself, ‘Am I doing a dangerous car?’, and if it is the case, I would have my conscience to say to me, ‘No, that’s not good’. It may be fashionable but I think it’s wrong.”
 
Citroen may be plotting an SUV, but it sure as heck won’t get a coupe version, it seems.

You ought to remember the scrappage scheme. In a bid to pick up beleaguered car dealers during the credit crunch at the end of the last decade, the government decreed your ratty old trade-in – regardless of its age or condition – was worth a £2,000 discount on a new car.
 
The scheme's environmental pretences meant the cars traded in had to be scrapped. Many lovely old classics were clumsily, misguidedly lost while Britain’s roads became overrun with Hyundai i10s.
 
Therefore caution is advised when welcoming back the scheme, which Vauxhall has reintroduced. The discount is the same – two grand – but so is the obligation for the car to be crushed.
 
Fine if you’ve a ratty old Corsa you want rid of. But please, keep your Delta Integrales, BMW 2002s and Integra Type-Rs safe at home. They deserve so, so much more than being a mercy killing to fund an Adam Rocks Air.