Indianapolis Auto Show Coming Soon!

Indianapolis will soon host it's 95th annual auto show in the downtown convention center. The 2009 Indianapolis Auto Show will run from December 26, 2008 - January 1, 2009 and will host a variety of vehicles from cool new trucks to hot new Bentleys (always a crowd pleaser). As always, the Indy Auto Show will also be raffling off a new car, which this year is the all new Toyota Venza. Adult Tickets are only $7 and children under 12 are FREE! Oh and get this, any active duty police and fire department personnel also get in FREE (with an ID ofcourse). Hold The Brakes will be there to get you the latest updates on all the most popular cars and exhibits so stay tuned!

Why so ugly?

We all know that cars have been around for a very long time. They are a great luxury and get us from point A to point B quicker than any other transportation, with an exception to a helicopter or some other form of aerial transportation. This could all change dramatically when our natural resource of oil runs out or becomes even scarcer. This is obviously going to result in gas prices to sky rocket and for people to wonder what they will do when they can’t afford the gas prices any longer.

This will result in a transformation of a lot of people to a different type of car. Right now a lot of people have switched to all the different kinds of hybrids. My problem is why do they have to make these practical cars so ugly. There are some new hybrids coming out that are astonishing in looks and look just like any other car with a little hybrid icon in a few spots on the car. This doesn’t change why they had to make the first hybrids so ugly. Who wants to buy a car that get 50 miles to the gallon but looks like a lunar discovery unit?

The first car that comes to mind when I think hybrid is the Toyota Prius. Who would buy this horrifying sight? There is nothing good about the car. It doesn’t have a banging sound system, a smooth ride, or a nice interior. All this POS has is an engine that will run 50 miles on one gallon of gas. Why can’t Toyota make a decently good looking car that people will buy for the looks and the average miles per gallon rate? The only people that are buying this car right now are the people that are going green that most others.

My friend has the Toyota Prius because his parent bought it for him so they didn’t have to spend as much money on gas. I took one road trip in that car and I decided I would rather walk. It was louder than my Jeep on the highway and it was bumpy as hell on a perfectly good road. It was also all over the road, that could have been because the driver sucked but it kind of felt like the wind was pushing us around.

Anyways, to continue along the lines of the outer looks of this car, the front looks like it is heading for a dive into the ground. The hood slopes down and makes the car all in all look like a hedgehog. The back end of the car is straight up and down; the hatchback style of car doesn’t help either. It doesn’t have any trunk, the backend is basically the back rest of the back seats. The car has a curve looking shape all the way from the front end of the car to the tail of the car. It’s like there is no definition to the car. No mean look, nothing to excite the driver or the people looking at the car. All it has is a slow hybrid engine that can 50 miles to the gallon.

Green Cars, A Marketing Gimick?

Now that the entire world realizes the need for more efficient fuels I'm finding that some car companies are finding loop holes in the equation. I know that, from just being a part of the car community, we have not met our goal of eliminating gasoline as a whole. Some companies such as Chevrolet, Kia, and Toyota, have all created cars that, yes are very fuel efficient for the times that we are in, but don't really include the normal features we are all used to. For example, Chevrolet has been running wild with their 2009 Cobalt. They claim it gets about 25 mpg (miles per gallon) in the city and about 37 mpg on the highway, according to their website and based off of their basic Cobalt model. That's ok, but what else does it come with? Well after looking around for a bit I found that they offered a 2.2L engine that produced around the equivalent horsepower as my 1997 Nissan Altima, which is about 150 horsepower. It also comes with the obviously standard features; mp3/cd player, side curtain airbags, etc. And because it's a GM vehicle it comes with OnStar as well. You know that little safety feature that comes with GM vehicles. Now don't get me wrong, I think it's a great feature but no other companies have it so does that mean that GM vehicles need that feature to cover up their vehicles' poor quality? So what makes this a marketing gimick you may ask? Well the bottom line is Chevy is selling cars solely based on the mpg rating, which means yes you get great gas mileage but you get the worst features along with it.

The same thing goes with Kia. Their Rio model gets about 25 mpg in the city and about 35 mpg on the highway. Those are some pretty good numbers right? Yes, they are but try these on for size: 110 horsepower, a base price of $11,495, and get this, that $11,495 that you spend (not including insurance and gas) will only get you about 5 years or 150,000 miles out of that car! My Nissan has lasted double that! And finally comes Toyota. Now at this moment they have truly made a name for themselves with the Prius model which gets about 48 mpg in the city and about 45 mpg on the highway. That's impressive but the car looks horrible! On the contrary though, Toyota does pull out the stops on the interior. Instead of having an actual gear shift, Toyota has created a "mini" shifter that switches gears electronically instead of physically changing gears, which might be good on the elderly. They also include their smart key feature which basically means when the car senses the key is around it, it automatically unlocks the doors, or allows the driver to start the vehicle.

The thing about this is they have had this technology for awhile now, at least on Infiniti cars. When I was at work one day this man lost his key inside of his car; so he can't lock the car because the car senses the key is near the vehicle, but he eventually found them (this just is to show a flaw in the system). To wrap this up, people, don't buy cars solely based on mpg ratings. Usually when a dealership is trying to persuade you to buy a certain model that gets great mileage there is usually something else, that you don't see, that they had to lessen the quality of to make the mileage rating go up.

Driving age, good or not old enough?

The United States government is very passionate about trying to change the age that a person may obtain their drivers license from the age of 16 to 18. Their claim for this is that the younger generation of drivers, 16-20 year olds, cause over 50% of the accidents in the U.S. in the past ten years. The government has a bill in the works now that teenagers won’t be able to get their permit until the age of sixteen, and then get their license when they turn eighteen. People are becoming very outraged at the thought of this because the two sides of this argument have been arguing and debating about this for the past couple of years. The neutral party, however, is intent on staying neutral on this manner and not getting involved. I, personally, have mixed feelings on this because I’m nineteen and have had my license for three years, but on the other hand I can see why the government wants to do this because I have done a lot of stupid things as a young driver.
The proponents for changing the age to eighteen have very good facts and statistics and arguments to support their claim. First they have provided facts and stats for the past ten years that out of all the reported traffic accidents, ranging from totaling a car to a minor fender-bender, 50% have been caused or happened because of a teenage driver. They claim that if a few more years of a teenager’s life would come before they received their license then they would be ready to operate a motor vehicle on public streets. Another claim is that a teenager is more susceptible to operating a vehicle under the influence of harmful substances such as alcohol, or different forms of drugs or illegal substances. Also the amount of minor consumptions has substantially increased in recent years which cause more worry for government officials. They are extremely worried about this because since a human body isn’t fully formed until the age of twenty-one there is always the worry of a teenager going to a party, having access to their car because they are old enough to drive, getting in, and driving off to go get food or go to the next party. This is probably the biggest factor in the argument for the proponents of changing the age to eighteen.
Also others argue that the state issued driver’s test is substantially too easy and should be made more difficult and that more hours in the car should be necessary in order for teens to pass the tests and obtain their license. Along with this claim, officials are saying that doing this would not only help out the accident total, as it would probably decreases based on statistics, but more gas would be saved and the environment would benefit from this most importantly. Al Gore was one of the first men to totally back this one hundred percent with actual scales that showed rising the age would give the earth’s ozone layer a better chance of maintaining itself if less gas was produced for cars and less natural resources were burned. Along with this it could cause the U.S. becoming fewer dependants on foreign oil, which has been a big deal for America in recent years based on the current situation in the Middle East and with Iraq, and the other countries in the East.
The opponents to this law being change claim that based on their age they should not be discriminated against. If teenagers can do many things such as going to school full time and getting good grades and if they pass the required tests that are given during the driving exam then they should be able to get their license. People think it is ridiculous that government officials blame teenagers for their lack of driving skills based on their youth, and people have shown proven evidence that states the years of 23-35 are responsible for the most DUI, drunken driving accidents in America over the past twenty years.
The neutral members in this discussion state that they agree that the state wide required test, in every state, should be increased and the hours in the classroom, and driving portion should be more intense and difficult. Also the written test should give more typical driving scenarios and more signs to identify so that they can teach teens the most effectively and if they fail then they have to wait a full year until they can take the test again. But on the other hand they agree that the government cannot place all the blame on just the teens and leave out the instructors or the state for choosing the instructors because it is not always the teenagers fault but sometimes their instructor that makes the difference.
In closing I would like to say that I have opinions for both parties. I agree that the tests and course should be more difficult and strenuous for the teens and that if they fail they should have to wait a year to take their test again. But on the other hand I think the law and age should remain just as it is, at the age of sixteen. I mean if a person wants to wait until they are older or if a parent wants to stop their child from getting their license then that is their prerogative and the teen should respect that. But if a parent wants to take their kid to get their license and then buy them a car or help them buy a car then more power to them. I personally love driving, and I am happy my parents allowed me to get my license at sixteen. I have experienced a lot since I have started driving and I plan on learning more and more based on my driving experience and what I will experience in the future. It will help me in later life because I have gotten a few tickets but in the end it is for the best.

Superchargers VS Turbochargers

Turbochargers and Supercharges are frequently referred to in articles about all types of cars, but are rarely defined or distinguished from the other. Both use Forced Induction, which means they push more air into the cylinders then would normally be there which allows each cylinder to produce more power then it normally would. Thats about where the similarities end. Both have their benefits and downsides, so it is difficult to say which one is "better".

Turbochargers get their power from the exhaust stream that the engine produces. Exhaust propels the turbines inside the Turbo. The Turbocharger compresses the air and pushes it into the cylinders, there by forcing more in then would normally be there. The major downside to turbocharging an engine is something called "turbo lag". Because the turbo is powered by exhaust, the engine must complete a full cycle to produce the exhaust to power the turbo. Cars with turbochargers should be allowed to warm up before driving because if you start it and immediately slam on the gas, you could blow your turbo very easily. The benefit of driving a turbocharged car is once you get past that initial lag, it can be very fast in 3rd or 4th gear. Thats where they trump Superchargers.

Superchargers run off of a belt instead of exhaust. They are directly bolted onto the engine and a belt or chain is hooked up to the compressor which does the same thing as a Turbocharger compressor. They both force more air in then would normally be there. A Superchargers strength is also its weakness. Superchargers produce massive amounts of low end torque. This means that as soon as you slam on the gas, the cars going to move, and fast. The problem is that the torque curve (a graph of where the car produces the most power) is very high through gears 1-3 but goes down rapidly through 4-5. Chances are the nine times out of ten, a supercharged car will beat a turbocharged car off the line because of that turbo lag. However once that torque starts to ease off, your turbocharged competitor's turbos will be spinning at full speed and you might get caught.

There are benefits and downsides to both S uperchargers and Turbochargers, but hopefully the next time you read about them, you will know exactly what the article is talking about.

A new player enters the hybrid game.

Fisker Automotive was a relatively unheard of company until they made the news by entering a plug-in hybrid in the 2009 Detroit Auto Show. The "Fisker Karma" is really the only competition for the fairly well known Tesla Roadster. It incorporates both and electric engine, as well four cylinder, turbocharged engine imported from GM. Release of a finished product has already been pushed back from 2009 to late 2010, but I don't think that will discourage buyers. With an $87,000 price tag it won't be cheap, but it might be and option for someone looking to buy an expensive car instead of a Porsche or BMW. The Karma has two settings, Stealth and Sport. Stealth utilizes only the electric engine and is perfect for city driving. The Sport setting uses both the electric engine as well as the gasoline engine to up the performance. In "Sport", the Fisker Karma can reach speeds of 60 mph in under 6 seconds and has a top speed of over 125 mph. The Karma has "regenerative breaks", which apparently have the "ability to recapture breaking energy" to ensure the car always can stop efficiently. That sounds like a big promise to fulfill, but apparently it's possible. Fisker's automobile also has a climate control system that uses a full length solar roof to keep the car at a certain temperature while parked. A big selling point that the Karma has over other hybrids or fully electric vehicles is that it is a sedan. It has usable backseat space whether you use it for people or stuff. It also has an amazing aerodynamic design that makes it extremely eye catching and interesting to look at. Fisker made good choices designing all aspects of the Karma and I imagine it will pay off for them.

GM jumps on the "sorry train" with Ford.

GM's CEO Rick Wagoner made his pledge to "do better" and decided to drive from Detroit to Washington DC next time. He will be driving a Hybrid Malibu for the majority of the trip, and then for the last leg he will be rolling up in a brand new Chevy Volt prototype. To me this kind of seems like a stunt for publicity more then a cry for help. If Mr Wagoner was really desperate, he would be driving a car that gets more then 30 mpg on the highway. The Malibu Hybrid should be traded for a 1995 Honda Civic so that Mr Wagoner can have the authentic experience of being the "common man". Ford chief Alan Mulally still has my vote for the who is trying harder contest. While the man has millions in the bank, working for a dollar a year is a pretty extreme thing to do. Mr Wagoner could learn a thing or two from Mulally rather then using this crisis to promote his new product.