Ariel Atom was designed and made in the UK...it in it's truest form comes with a Civic Type R engine (the preferred engine of choice as they were going to slap in Yamaha's 1.8 also found in the Lotus Elise - the the CTR engine is much more powerful across the entire rev range versus the high end peaky Yamaha engine (this is rebadged as the 1.8 Celica GTS engine))

Brammo Motorsports, LLC is the sole American dealer of the Ariel Atom and they have made minor improvements for the better. Jay Leno was one of Ariel's first customers...he and the owner of the shop wanted GM engines in it well b/c they are American (in fact GM was not going to supply engines until Jay made a call to his GM connections)...seems GM just doesn't know what's good for them and has to be forced to do the smart thing. They note they were worried about the CTR engines availability but Jay didn't want a Japanese engine in it. Irony is that the Ecotec was a globally designed engine based off a Saab so it's roots is not in America

Unfortunately it made the car slower in n/a trim b/c the Ecotecs powerband is just inferior to the CTR (it's a step up from the tractor engines used in the older cavaliers)...so Brammo got the cheaper GM engine installed

On a side note the Ecotec [this engine has nothing in line of variable valve timing but like Zetec it is meant as a me-2 approach to it's competitors technology - but with no additional technology] is a good forced induction candidate (which is really the only way to make power - such as in the FSDE in the Mazdas - can't rev them to make power b/c they'll explode but you can force them to breathe better)...but this makes sense since Saabs are mostly turbo'd anyway

 

jay leno is a rich fool