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Here’s some news/analysis from Threats Watch:

Update: See also - Counterterrorism Blog: London Car Bomb Found, Defused

This type of car bombing plot is typical of other British Jihadist car bomb plots in the past, including both the July 2005 bomb plots, and the Dhiren Barot Jihadist group bomb plots.
—- In July 2005, a number of bombs and components, some packed with nails to cause death and maximum injury, were recovered from a car parked by the July 7 bombers at Luton station.
—- British Jihadist Dhiren Barot pleaded guilty to plotting a series of attacks, including detailed plans to explode limousines packed with gas cylinders, explosives and nails after leaving them in underground London parking garages or hotels.

Update II: Consider another potential explanation for the crash:

ThreatsWatch: A bomber seeking out the Tiger, Tiger club on a suicide mission would likely want to drive the bomb into the building, not park outside on the street, for maximum casualties inside. Another possible explanation therefor may be that the bomb did not go haywire after hitting the trash cans near the club, but well before. This might explain the “erratic” driving and stopping just short of what we are assuming as the target.
If the bomb malfunctioned before reaching its target (which in this scenario could clearly be other than the Tiger, Tiger club) and the car began to fill with choking noxious smoke while driving, the visibility and breathing may have proved so difficult that the bomber simply could drive no further to his ultimate destination, forced to abandon his malfunctioning rigged vehicle. If surveillance video exists, it would be interesting to see how soon after impact the driver exited the vehicle and if smoke was already billowing out of the opened door.

Update III: From ABC News -

“the bomb was composed of tanks of propane, butane and 125 liters of gasoline (33 U.S. gallons), roofing nails and a fuse that initial reports indicated was constructed of simple light bulb or flashbulb filaments and designed to be triggered by a mobile telephone.”

Update IV: Second car bomb found “in a Mercedes apparently towed into a car park pound beneath London’s Park Lane after being found illegally parked in the West End of the city.”

Update V: A suspect - this from ABC News -

British police have a “crystal clear” picture of the man who drove the bomb-rigged silver Mercedes outside a London nightclub, and officials tell the Blotter on ABCNews.com he bears “a close resemblance” to a man arrested by police in connection with another bomb plot but released for lack of evidence.
Officials say the suspect had been taken into custody in connection with the case of al Qaeda operative Dhiren Barot, who was convicted of orchestrating a vehicle bomb plot involving targets in London, New York, Newark, N.J. and Washington, D.C.