I promised a report from the 2008 Bangkok International Motor Show, which is currently on at Bitec. Unfortunately with the site problems I haven't been able to share anything until now. Over the next few days I'll post up some photo galleries and stories from the show.

There was a time when Volvo had the monopoly on car safety. Not anymore. In Europe, with the Euro NCAP testing, the majority of new cars are proving to provide excellent crash performance.

The 2008 Toyota Corolla sedan, known here in Thailand as the Altis, also managed to turn in a very good crash test result, with a 5-star rating.

Even with this super cool airbag to protect my neck, I'd still be too chicken to ride a motorbike. Four wheels are good for me.

You might not remember the name Kanpithak Patchimsawat. You might not know his other title "Mu Ham" either. But if you have been following Thai news in the last year you will remember the story of a crazy kid who had a fight with a bus driver, hit him in the face with a brick, and then got back into his Mercedes and drove it into the people who had just got out of the bus he was involved in an accident with.

He killed one and injured several other people in that incident. He deliberately drove his car into a group of people and killed one of them!

Honda have updated their Thai website and it's all to do with the new Jazz. The first hint that something is up is when the model line-up appears at the base of the main page:

Ford have a surprise in store for visitors to the Bangkok International Motor Show, kicking off on 28 March at Bitec. Ford's website has a little button suggesting that there is going to be a surprise at the motor show, and offers free tickets.

Following the link brings you to a page which seems to give away everything. Surprised?

Remember the story on the pick-up truck safty testing from Euro NCAP? Well, Nissan have taken some action to try and rectify some of the safety concerns, and submitted the Navara for a second test.

According to reports coming out of Singapore, Yasuyuki Kawamoto, the chief engineer of the Thai assembled Corolla Altis, has said that Toyota would be assembling the Camry Hybrid in Thailand.

TMT has confirmed that it will have a bi-fuel version of the 10th generation Corolla Altis by the end of 2008. The car will retain its regular E20 fuel system and tank, adding to it a CNG (compressed natural gas) system with a 70-litre tank in the boot. As with current Taxi conversions this will result in about 1/4 - 1/3 reduction in boot space.

The tank will also increase the weight of the vehicle by around 100 kg, and Toyota will replace the rear coils springs with stiffer coils from the Corolla wagon which is around the same weight as this CNG version.

Every once in a while something interesting happens in the Thai motoring world, but mostly the industry is boring. For the vast majority of main-streme car buyers in Thailand, the new car decision will come down to a choice of which letter they would rather have on the front of their car: a "T" or an "H".

Hyundai started their campaign in Thailand with the side-by-side launch of 3 models: the Sonata, the Santa Fe, and the Coupe. Since then sales have been slow enough, with the Sonata notching up a modest 70 orders, while the Coupe sales are similarly low, with just 6-8 units a month.

General Motors (GM) Thailand Ltd has announced biodiesel compatibility for all Chevrolet diesel vehicles in Thailand. In effect this means that the diesel version of the Captiva and the Colorado pick-up truck are both capable of using B2 and B5 biodiesel without any problems.

According to a press release from GM Thailand, using the B2 and B5 fuels will not cause any harmful or damaging effects to the engines, and that the engines "will retain both the powerful performance and cost efficiency that owners have come to expect from Chevy diesel powerplants."

I'd been waiting for this for a long time, and now finally the Euro NCAP treatment has been dished out on some pick-up trucks. And no, the results are not pretty.

What Thai motor show would be complete without a suitably unmemorable theme, and a piece of badly translated text to try to explain it. This year the theme is "The Environmental Auto Globalization."

What does that mean? I suppose it means that we have yet another environmentally theme to the show. This is from the 29th BAngkok International Motor Show webiste:

No, bkkAutos.com is not shifting focus to pick-up trucks, although the last several stories have been related to pick-up trucks! There is just more news about the truck market at the moment. Mazda have just launched the update to their BT-50 with highlights including a new suspension set up that apparently allows the Mazda BT-50 to fly, and engines that are compatible with B5 biodiesel.

Full details and more images follow: