G&W wins Aston’s V12 engine casting job

Aston Martin has confirmed Grainger & Worrall (GW) as its preferred engine castings partner for the new DB11.

Next Jaguar XE reinforces ally ‘road map’

The message in Jaguar’s ‘Road Map’ always claimed that the XE saloon could be built at the firm’s Land Rover plant in Solihull or Jaguar’s ‘home plant’ of Castle Bromwich. In the event, Solihull became the XE’s first port of call but with the option production could be moved to Castle Bromwich should the need arise.

Jaguar: A journey from style to design

Nick Hull is to be congratulated for producing Jaguar Design: A Story of Style – a benchmark in authorship pulling together in sure-footed detail, the diverse strands of Jaguar design.

The Queen to open JLR’s Ingenium plant

Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has confirmed that Her Majesty the Queen will officially open the company’s new, state-of-the-art Engine Manufacturing Centre on Thursday October 30^th 2014. HM The Queen will be accompanied during the visit by His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh.

Honda to make NSX in Ohio

Honda will make the all-new NSX supercar at a new Performance Manufacturing Centre in Ohio, in the US.

The $70 million advanced production facility encompasses 184,000 square feet and will be housed inside Honda's former North American Logistics facility. One interesting possibility is that Honda could use friction-stir welding (FSW) as one of its processes in the plant for the new NSX.

The site, Honda's third car plant in Ohio, is located close to the Honda R&D Americas Inc.’s Ohio Centre and which is engineering the supercar for production. The R&D centre is adjacent to Honda of America Mfg.'s Marysville automotive plant, north-west of Columbus.

Greenwell to retire from Ford

Ford of Britain chairman Joe Greenwell CBE has ‘elected’ to retire effective end of April 2013. Mark Ovenden, currently managing director, will add the chairman’s role to his responsibilities.

Chairman of Ford of Britain since 2009, Greenwell was also president of the automotive industry body the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders in 2009 and 2010.

Greenwell's career in the motor industry spans over 40 years.  

Torotrak: where to now?

Torotrak has a new CEO. Is the company now about to deliver the goods, or is a long wait still in prospect?

Many are the explanations why chief executive officers leave their companies. Some, like bankers, do so after feeling the ire of public, shareholders or government. Others feel they have reached the end of the road in what they can achieve. Others are tempted by the prospect of new challenges.

Only Dick Elsy knows the real reason for leaving transmission innovator Torotrak plc to join the High Value Manufacturing – Catapult from the first of  this month as chief executive officer, replacing the interim CEO. This particular Catapult first opened in October 2011.

Elsy is replaced as CEO by Jeremy Deering, Torotrak’s finance and commercial director; he has been with Torotrak since 2006.