Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Hot Wheels loop-the-loop
Remember Hot Wheels? It was a brilliant game that you or your brother or a friend of yours is likely to have owned at some point during their childhood. It might even still have a place in your heart and under your bed, secretly.
Well, two drivers in America have recently got into the Guinness Book of World Records for performing a double Hot Wheels loop-the-loop.
What’s so impressive about that you might ask? Me and Dave had our little cars going round those loops all the time!
Well, the thing is that in this case the loops were more than 60 feet high and the drivers went round them in real vehicles.
One of the men who performed the stunt said that he experienced extreme G-force on his way round the giant section of Hot Wheels track, and struggled to avoid blacking out.
The other driver involved is reported as having said, “I tell you what, I'm at a loss for words. That was absolutely the coolest thing I've ever done.”
The previous holder of this record was a Chinese driver who drove round a 42ft loop in September 2011.
The Hot Wheels set that I have in the attic doesn’t seem so exciting anymore…
Photo © dougww via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: cars, drivers, Guinness Book of World Records, Hot Wheels, loop, stunt, vehicles
Monday, April 16, 2012
Family find a unique way of beating fuel duty
The British public have come up with a variety of ways of keeping fuel expenses to a minimum. Some have chosen to drive less. Others have filled their tanks up with whisky (not advisable). However, few would have been prepared to trade their trusty vehicles in for a horse and cart.
A family from Essex have bucked the trend by calling their white and grey Lipizzaner horses into action. They claim that the chosen method of transport for people in the nineteenth and even early twentieth centuries still has a place in today's technologically focused society.Apparently they are far more reliable than both the Kia Sportage and the Nissan Micra to name a couple. They are also reported to offer a more pleasurable off-road experience than the typical 4X4.
One of the horse owners said, “The price of fuel these days is extortionate – it wasn’t that long ago I could put £20 in the Land Rover and it would fill it up to a quarter of a tank, but now it won’t even stop my fuel warning light.
“The horses need feeding and exercising anyway so it just makes sense. In the current economic climate it’s also very expensive keeping horses – but now they are definitely earning their keep.”
Of course the one major downside to travelling by horse and cart is the time that longer journeys can take. With an average speed of around 4mph, a trip between the UK's major cities could take days. However, for leisurely countryside trips there's nothing to beat good old fashioned horse power.
Photo © foilman via Flickr under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: drive, Essex, fuel, horse and cart, Kia Sportage, Land Rover, Lipizzaner, Nissan Micra, off-road, transport, vehicles
Friday, March 30, 2012
Drivers may suffer from small car syndrome
The stereotype of the disrespectful 4X4 driver has long proliferated among the motoring community. Owners of vehicles such as the Ford Fiesta and Morris Minor have been thought of as the victims rather than the perpetrators of road rage.
However, a shadow has been cast over the traditional thinking by Australian provider of cheap car insurance AAMI. After questioning a sizeable group of native drivers the company arrived at the conclusion that female drivers of small cars are the most likely to act aggressively.
The women motorists apparently feel so vulnerable when driving alongside big gas guzzlers that they see no other option but to lash out. Some exercise their anxiety by waving the two fingered salute, while others go so far as to shout and scream obscenities.
A spokesperson for AAMI said, “Because of the rising cost of motoring, we're seeing a trend towards smaller cars becoming popular, so it's worrying if people feel the need to overcompensate for their smaller assets by displaying risky driving behaviours.”
Whether British motorists should be looking out for women driving Ford Ka's or elderly people cruising about in Honda Civics is questionable…but being a considerate driver should stop anyone suffering from road rage due to your actions behind the wheel.
Photo © PinkMoose via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: 4X4, cheap car insurance, driver, Ford Fiesta, Ford Ka, Honda Civic, Morris Minor, road rage, small car, vehicles
Friday, January 6, 2012
Is there an end in sight for sat-nav misdirection?
It’s not unusual to hear about outrageous sat-nav blunders, and although I don’t use mine too often, there have been a couple of times where I have had to use my common sense and follow road signs rather than the little arrow on the screen.
However, it has been reported that the Government has plans to tackle those misguided drivers who end up in compromising situations due to a technological error. It will be discussing the out-of-date directions at a summit.
According to the Department for Transport, it can sometimes take months for road updates to be delivered to sat-navs from local authorities, and misdirection has been known to land lorries in side streets and cars into swamps.
At last, this may mean the sat-nav problems are finally addressed and sorted out! Mind you, it’s important that drivers are always careful to think about where they are steering rather than blindly relying on advice from their navigation system.
Photo © Tim Green aka atoach via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: directions, lorries, navigation, road signs, sat-nav, summit, vehicles
Monday, October 17, 2011
Running on empty
It’s a good thing that cars are so fuel efficient these days – back in our grandparents’ day, it was almost impossible to travel 100 miles without needing to stop at a petrol station, even on a full tank of fuel.
However, environmental considerations aside, fuel efficiency is becoming a practical necessity.This is because petrol stations are beginning to disappear from our nation’s roads. Even in my short driving life, just six years, I’ve noticed that petrol stations are becoming increasingly scarce.
More than ever before, I need to plan my fuel stops when making a journey otherwise there’s a very real risk I could be left short and stranded.
Perhaps supermarkets, which offer cheap subsidised fuel are to blame – as other sellers struggle to compete with their prices they shut up shop and disappear.
There are now only 9,000 fuel forecourts in the UK, which is 12,000 fewer than in 1991, and this is despite a doubling in the number of vehicles on the road in the same period.
Cheap car insurance, easy access to fuel, low house prices – our parents and grandparents don’t know how lucky they were.
Image © Adrian Wallett via Flickr, under Creative Commons Licence
Labels: cheap car insurance, efficient, fuel, miles, petrol station, roads, tank, vehicles