Top Eight Must Have Gadgets For Any Car

If you find yourself in the uncomfortable situation of having a few extra dollars that you just must get rid of, there are a number of possible additions to your vehicle of choice that can easily rectify the situation. And while they won’t necessarily make your car any safer or more fuel efficient to drive, they will make the journeys that you make in it far more efficient, convenient and relaxing. And if none of those things, they will at least make your car far more shiny.

Rear Seat DVD Players

If you happen to be a parent, I’m not sure that its possible to find a more useful in car feature than a rear seat DVD player. For all the talk of improved handling and lower petrol consumption, there is little that can make driving more pleasant than simply being able to do so without your kids screaming both at you and each other. For the low cost of a rear seat DVD player and the latest DVD about a frog or cat, you can drive in relative peace and quiet. Most systems even include headphones.

OnStar System

On the other hand if you would like to increase the number of voices that you hear while driving, the OnStar System could be for you. At the touch of a button, a human voice will emerge from your dashboard ready to offer you all kinds of assistance. They can even open your car door remotely if you happen to lock yourself out.

Voice Control

While we are thankfully not quite yet at the stage where one can drive their car with their voice, a range of in car devices now come with the functionality to be controlled using nothing more than carefully worded dialogue. The days of attempting to drive while toggling with your radio desperately trying to find your favourite channel could indeed be all but over.

Bluetooth Hands Free Car Kits

If you’re tired of almost getting a fine/crashing your car every time your phone rings, now could be an excellent time to get a Bluetooth Hands Free system installed. While these are the norm in most new vehicles, many car owners still drive cars without this useful functionality. Once installed, you can answer your phone by simply pressing a button near your steering wheel and the voice on the other line is simply broadcast through your car speakers as your own is transmitted via the inbuilt microphone.

The Latest GPS

If you are one of the surprisingly large number of drivers that still haven’t fitted their car out with a GPS system, you really are missing out. While you may argue that you already know how to get everywhere that you want to go, a few new features are making these devices more and more popular including live congestion reports, optimal route calculation and even Bluetooth connectivity allowing you to make and receive calls with the inbuilt microphone and speaker.

IPod/MP3 Audio System

If you’re tired of hooking up your traditional car stereo to your IPod, a car audio system that has been specifically designed for MP3’s could be the answer. For under $200, many manufacturers produce systems that store your mp3 files and allow you to browse your music collection on their easy to use interface rather. More expensive installations will even enable you to browse your extensive music collection from your steering wheel.

Autonet Mobile

Subaru have recently added built in wi-fi connectivity to their Outback models and in doing so have certainly made some waves in the car industry. But did you know that you can actually get a wi-fi hotspot installed in just about any car. One of the most popular companies offering the service is Autonet and for just $29 per month, you and anyone else within one hundred and fifty feet of your vehicle can stay connected at all times.

Back Up Parking Cameras

Finally, if you happen to be less than an expert when it comes to parking or you are simply tired of worrying about that damn blind spot, a wireless back up parking camera could be the perfect solution. Installed at the rear of your car, a camera can broadcast what you are unable to see onto your dashboard. Not only are these gadgets incredibly useful, they are also an excellent safety feature for any parents out there.

How To Paint a Classic Car

It can be intimidating to take on an automobile paint job, but with a plan of action in place, you can get the look you want and spend a lot less than what you would pay for someone else to do it.

Get Rid of the Old: In order to restore your classic car and paint with any success, you will first need to create a smooth surface.  It is not suggested that you paint over the existing paint, unless you are just touching up a small area.  Even then, that area will need to be prepared to accept the new paint.  For this step and all that follow, you will want to ensure that all glass is covered, tires are protected, and all chrome components have been removed from the vehicle.  In order to prepare the car to receive an all-over paint job, you will need an etching primer.  Keep in mind that the most effective varieties will include an acid component, which means that they should be handled with great care to ensure your safety.

Prime The Surface : Now that the surface of the vehicle is ready to receive paint, the next step is to prime it.  This will give the paint a much truer, bolder color in the end and will also reduce the amount of paint needed to get the surface that you desire.  Choose a primer that is a two-part urethane high-build variety and cover the surface to be painted four or five times, allowing drying time between each coat.

Time For Hard Labor : The next step will require some “elbow grease.”  That is to say that you will have to put forth some manual effort to block sand the surface once it has been properly coated in primer.  It is recommended, by most professionals, that you start with rougher sandpaper (220 grit) and work to a finer sandpaper (320 grit) to achieve a smooth surface.  This will create a smoother finished surface as well.

Hose and Bucket : When the sanding is complete, the residual dust will need to be removed.  That means a sponge and soapy water.  You may want to use a high pressure blow gun to dispel some of the dust before you begin, then clean the surface well.

Prepare Better Cover : There are a lot of places that you don’t want paint to be.  Those areas need to be covered with a reliable plastic to ensure that no paint is allowed to enter and no dirt that may be covering those surfaces can mingle with the wet paint.  While you have likely covered this step earlier in the process, this is a good time to check that it has been done well and you might also want to cover the walls and floor around the vehicle.  This, again, will prevent paint coverage and flying dust.

Double-Check the Clean : Youve removed the residual dust of sanding, but a clean surface is absolutely essential to a good paint job.  Use a solvent-based cleaner to go over the surface once more.

Time to Paint : Finally the surface has been fully prepared to receive the paint.  You will want to be prepared ahead of time and have all of your auto paint supplies ready to go.  When the sprayer has been loaded, set the paint gun between 25 and 30 psi, or consult the manufacturer guidelines regarding the recommended pressure for your gun.  It doesn’t matter where you begin painting; however, it is highly recommended that you pick a point that is easily remembered.  Once a surface is covered, you will want to return to the starting point to work in the other direction.  The goal is to spray wet paint beside wet paint, so it blends well.  If you allow an area to dry and paint beside it, you are likely to find the appearance of a “seam” when all is completed.

Accents : If you are adding pin striping or some other detail, wait until the base coat is dry before painting the accents.  Be sure to protect the rest of the vehicle from overspray by laying out the lines, taping, and then covering all other surfaces.  Remove this tape and covering approximately 20 minutes after completing the painting.

Clear Coating : When the painted surface is dry, you are free to apply a clear coat.  Be sure to use a tack rag to remove any dust that may have fallen on the surface, load the gun, and set the psi to a higher psi.  Check the recommendations of the manufacturer to be sure you are at the proper pressure.  Spray the surface with three coats, waiting 15 minutes between each.

The Final Product : Two days after the clear coat is applied, it is time to enjoy your accomplishments.  That means quick wet sand and buffing to reveal the true beauty of the brand new surface.  Choose a very fine sand paper (1000 grit down to 2000 grit) and be sure to keep it wet.  Work this over small areas at a time until the haziness has evaporated.

When all is said and done, you will feel even more pride riding around in the restored vehicle because you will know that it is your hard work that the world is witnessing.

Seven Ways to Save Money on Petrol

With the current economic climate ever looming in the background, more and more people are researching the best ways of cutting down on petrol costs. And while there are a number of myths widely available online that will do little other than inconvenience you, there are a number of methods that genuinely can reduce the price that you pay at the pumps. Here are the seven methods that I have found to be the most effective.

Don’t Slow Down for Speed Bumps

Well obviously it’s necessary for you to slow down a little bit but simply reducing the extent to which you slow down can save you petrol. When taking a group of speed bumps, slowing down and speeding up for each one you encounter requires far more petrol than simply continuing over them all at around fifteen miles per hour. Any faster than this however and you are likely to pay for your petrol savings in terms of your suspension.

Breaking the Speed Limit Isn’t Always Expensive (in terms of Petrol)

While some apparent experts will whine about the difference between forty and sixty miles per hours, the majority of people with actual qualifications in the field suggest that it makes little difference. In the average car, the petrol consumption will only increase a significant amount when you go over the seventy miles per hour mark.

Accelerating and Decelerating

All experts agree that one of the worst things that you can when it comes to petrol guzzling is frequently accelerating and decelerating. For lower petrol costs each month, you need to drive as steadily as possible. While this of course does not mean that you don’t slow down for pedestrians/roundabouts, it does mean that when you are on a highway you try to stay as close as possible to a particular speed. Even alternating between fifty and sixty significantly effects how much petrol you use. Simply choose one and stick to it. And when you do arrive at something that you need to slow down for, slow down slowly and steadily and once you have passed it, feel free to accelerate but do so gradually rather than simply jamming your foot down.

Revs

Many non petrol head drivers don’t pay enough attention to their revs when changing gear and this has a significant effect on how much they pay at the pumps. There is in fact an optimum level of revs per minute to have when you are changing gear. When you are making the move into fifth gear driving a petrol car, your revs per minute should be around the 2,500 mark whereas when you are making the change on a diesel engine, that number should be closer to 2,000. Changing into fifth gear when your revs per minute are significantly different than these levels (in either direction) leads to your journey requiring far more petrol.

Traffic Jams

Avoiding traffic jams not only helps to keep you calm, it can also lead to lower petrol bills. As you can imagine, constantly stopping and starting is pretty much the opposite of steady driving. And if you cannot avoid congestion and are going to be idle for more than ten seconds, you will actually save more petrol by switching off your engine.

Open Your Windows

When driving at low speeds, open your windows instead of using air conditioning. Some studies suggest that this can lower fuel consumption by as much as seven percent. On the other hand, if you are driving fast, the difference is minor so feel free to switch it on.

Modifications

As well as changing how you drive, changing how you look after your car can also help.

• Regularly getting your tires checked and therefore driving at all times with optimum tires will save you around two percent as well as making your tires last longer.
• For each forty five kilos of weight you remove from your car, you can save another one percent.
• If you have a rack on top of your car, many studies have shown that the significant drag caused leads to higher petrol consumption.

Finally, if reading this article has lead to you worrying that you are a little bit clueless when it comes to saving on petrol consumption, the following statistic should make you feel better. Shockingly, a recent statistic pointed out that ten percent of drivers think that turning off their radio will save on petrol when doing so has literally no impact on fuel consumption.

Car And Fleet Management

There’s a new competitor in the car leasing business, and it’s not who you’d expect. It’s you. Stemming from the success of the American rental car giant, ZipCar, Buzzcar aims to take a different approach to the idea of how car rentals should be handled. ZipCar was based on the idea that people didn’t need to necessarily have a car all year round to simply take them to the grocery store once a week. And in came ZipCar. It was an easy to use service that people could subscribe to that would allow people to rent cars for just an hour or two at a time. All you had to do was hop onto a website, say what time you needed the car from and when you were going to bring it back and it would spit back a very reasonable price. Insurance, gas, and everything was included. This plan worked great for those who lived where ZipCars were installed (read metropolitan areas). For those of us in the rest of the world though, ZipCar was just another token of urban living that we regular-folk wouldn’t get to enjoy.

A New Approach

The developer that came up with the idea of ZipCar is back with another revolutionary car idea. Instead of buying a fleet of cars and planting them around the country, she instead turned to the idea of allowing everyday citizens to be her fleet management team. BuzzCar allows average drivers to rent their cars out to strangers in their community for a few hours at a time. If someone needs to take a road trip out of town, for just a modest fee of about fifty or sixty Euros, BuzzCar users can lend their car to someone else to take out of town while they’re not using it. By no means is this a get-rich quick scheme for those renting out their vehicles, but it’s definitely some nice pocket money.

Insurance

Obviously, one of the biggest hurdles to overcome with renting cars to strangers was insurance. After almost a year and a half of negotiations, BuzzCar was able to figure out how to get car leasing insurance for everyday people without them having to change their current insurance plan. When you register with BuzzCar, you’re essentially signing a temporary insurance contract that gives you coverage to drive a borrowed car, as well as lend your car out. While the plan is far from perfect, and will of course take some modifying as it’s seen how much people are actually spending on insurance related claims, for now it’s a great solution that does the job just fine.

France Exclusively

And here comes the bad news…BuzzCar is only available in France at the moment. They have plans to expand their services to the rest of the continental Europe in the near future, but for now you have to live somewhere within France to avail of the insurance and driving discounts that come with the service. The reason the fleet management solution works so well in France is because of the short distances that people have to drive. Although France is a relatively large country, many people live close to a major city center and have access to excellent public transportation. Driving is more of a luxury than a necessity there, unlike in the United States.

When BuzzCar finally does manage to expand to the rest of the continent, it’ll definitely make a big splash. The ability to make a few extra Euros each month just by owning a car is a crazy idea. But with eco-friendly movements springing up all over the place, it’s no surprise that people are trying to take full advantage of the service. Instead of paying for petrol, insurance, and car maintenance fees year round, they only have to pay for a car in “real-time” when they use it, just like Zip Car.

Obviously, both of these services have a time and a place, but as the move towards carpooling becomes more and more commonplace, it’s likely that we’ll see more startups trying to copy what ZipCar has done and raise the bar on competition in the industry as a whole, benefitting both drivers and renters alike.

GPS Systems: Key Features to Look For

While technology has certainly spoiled car owners over the last ten years or so, if there is one innovation that has really helped make journeys easier, many would agree that it is GPS. For as little as two hundred dollars you can find yourself certain that you will never be lost again. And while some of us still somehow manage to get lost anyway, it’s still great to be able to keep the frequencies of such “excursions” to a minimum. If you have yet to kit your vehicle out with a GPS system, here are the key features to consider.

The Screen

When it comes to GPS system screens, size is not the only thing that you need to consider.

• While smaller screens are more portable, they can make touch screen buttons difficult to use while driving.
• Larger screens solve this problem but block more of the road if you are attaching them to your windscreen.
• Anti glare/anti reflective screens ensure readability in both different lighting conditions and from different angles.

Map Selection

First off make sure that the areas that you drive the most are actually mapped at street level on the device. This may sound obvious but it is both a surprisingly common and an incredibly frustrating mistake to make. Many manufacturers also sell add on maps which can be used to expand the geographical area that your GPS will work. This is a very important feature for those who enjoy taking their car with them on vacation.

Traffic Updates

One very useful features in many GPS systems is the ability to tell you about current traffic conditions. While some systems only offer this service via a paid subscription, many others offer such information completely free by simply displaying on screen advertisements.

Portability

If you would like to have the ability to utilize your GPS system at times when you are not in your car, there are a range of pocket friendly devices currently on the market. They typically come complete with car mounts and are therefore ideal for both in car and on person use.

Mounting

Regardless of whether you choose a traditional GPS system or one that is portable, how it is mounted to your vehicle is an important consideration.

• If you are selecting a GPS system that attaches to your windscreen via a suction cup, it is important to choose one with a ridged arm. Many of the “gooseneck” models tend to bounce up and down while driving.
• Not all states allow GPS systems to be attached to the windscreen so it is important that you check the applicable laws in your state prior to making the purchase.
• Some GPS systems that don’t attach to a cars windscreen are rather difficult to install and bring back awkward memories of that IKEA desk that simply never looked right. Before purchasing a GPS system it is always advisable to read a few independent reviews about how long it will take you to actually install the thing.

Spoken Street Names

The generic “turn left in 1.5 miles” announcements of traditional GPS systems are slowly being faded out and being replaced by text to speech technology that can actually tell you the name of the street that you are required to make a specific turn. This feature is particularly useful when you are driving in an unfamiliar area with multiple intersections in close proximity to each other.

Predictive Entry and Dynamic Search

To help you spend less time typing in street names when on the move, many GPS systems attempt to predict the name of the street that you are looking for. After you have typed in half of a street name for example, they will suggest street names in your current area that begin with those letters.

Extra Features

Finally, there are a number of additional features available in GPS systems that although do not necessarily make your driving any easier, they can certainly make it more enjoyable. The most useful are Bluetooth compatibility and video/MP3 playback.

• Bluetooth compatibility enables you to make and answer phone calls using your GPS systems speaker, internal microphone and screen.
• Video/MP3 playback allow you to play video and music files that are either stored on your GPS system or on an inserted SD card. While video playback of course disables the navigation features, it is a very useful features for drivers that frequently make long trips.