Carazoo Articles

Glossary on Green Car Part-IV

09 February, 2010 : The most common form of fuels today come from fossilized deposits found deep in the earth - including petroleum, natural gas and coal. Some geologists believe fossil fuels are running out, and some environmentalists believe their use is contributing to global warming. Renewable fuels come from resources that can be re-grown, or remade from other materials or harvested by other means. They fall into several categories. There are bio-fuels, such as corn-based ethanol, which come from renewable stocks and which may be burned in the same engines and furnaces as petro-fuels or coal. Other renewables, including wind, solar, wave and geothermal power, can be tapped to generate electricity. Costs are generally higher than traditional fuels, but have been steadily declining as they go into more widespread usage.

Glossary on Green Car Part-III

08 February, 2010 : Lead-acid battery is one of the most common types of battery. The technology involved in it combines lead plates and an acid, such as hydrochloric, to produce direct current. The interaction of the acid on the lead creates an electrical current. It is heavy, but relatively cheap and durable.

Glossary on Green Cars Part-II

05 February, 2010 : Ethanol is an alcoholic fuel that is viewed by many as a viable alternative to petrol and other petroleum-based fuels. Until now, ethanol had to be produced from sugar-rich sources - corn is most common in the US, sugar cane in Brazil - but a new cellulosic process (Refer Part-I) could expand the number of feed stocks. Ethanol may actually increase the performance of an internal combustion engine. But compared to gasoline, it also contains less energy, measured as BTUs, per litre and thus typically results in lower mileage.

Glossary on Green Cars Part-I

04 February, 2010 : Petrol and to a lesser extent diesel, currently make up 98 per cent of the fuels used to power automobiles. The term alternative fuels generally refers to any non-petroleum fuels, including ethanol, hydrogen, synthetic diesel compressed natural gas, or CNG and hydrogen.

A Brief History of Car Makers Part-III

03 February, 2010 : Daimler and Benz joined hands in 1926, with each company bringing with it 40 years of motorcar building experience, to form Mercedes-Benz. Mercedes had been the passenger vehicle line of the Daimler Motor Company from Bad Cannstatt, Germany. After the Daimler-Benz merger, the company renamed all of its products Mercedes-Benz. The marque has been a symbol of high-quality German engineering since its inception and has produced a number of classics such as the 500K of the 1930s and the 300SL Gullwing of the 1950s. In 1998, Daimler-Benz merged again, this time with America's Chrysler Corporation. The new company was renamed DaimlerChrysler, but the vehicle brands have remained separate.

A Brief History of Car Makers Part-II

02 February, 2010 : Enzo Ferrari worked for Alfa Romeo before he decided to set up his own company to build racing and road cars. He set up a shop in Maranello, Italy and developed his own car in 1947 after years of modifying and building racing cars using Fiat and Alfa Romeo components. His first car was called the Tipo or Type 166. The name was derived from the displacement of a single cylinder in cubic centimetres and this became the Ferrari tradition for many years.

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the legendary 250 GT, 250 GTO and 275 GTB were produced which were clothed in beautiful bodies by Pininfarina, the design house that Ferrari still uses to this day. Other iconic models followed throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, such as the 246 Dino, 365 GTB Daytona, 512BB, 308 GTS, Testarossa, 355 and 550 Maranello. Various roof styles were available on some of the models, including Berlinetta Coupe and Spider Convertible. Other noteworthy models include the F40, produced in 1988 to celebrate Ferrari's 40 years of building automobiles. Coincidentally, that was also the year Ferrari's founder Enzo Ferrari died. Presently, Fiat owns Ferrari and incredible sports cars such as the 360 Modena still roll out of Maranello.

A Brief History of Car Makers Part-I

01 February, 2010 : Lionel Martin and Robert Bamford started the Aston Martin Car Company in 1914 in a small West London workshop. In the beginning the company was known only in racing circles, eventually extending itself to Gran Touring cars, mostly under the DB nomenclature. Aston Martin has never been bothered about quantity, its chief concern has been quality. In its ninety-six years of existence, it has built little over 16,000 cars, each hand-crafted of the finest materials. Though the brand is not as widely known in popular culture as Ferraris and Lamborghinis, Aston Martins are mostly associated with British entities such as royal families and James Bond movies.

After a series of bankruptcies and exchanges of ownership throughout its history, Aston Martin was acquired in 1987 by Ford Motor Company and has been a part of Premier Automotive Group until 2007. On 12 March 2007, it was purchased for £479 Million by a joint venture company, co-owned by Investment Dar and Adeem Investment of Kuwait and English businessman John Sinders. Ford retained a US$77 Million stake in Aston Martin, valuing the company at US$925 million.

Toyota Etios: A New Beginning

29 January, 2010 : The largest car maker of 2009, Toyota Motor Corporation, has too joined the bandwagon to develop and sell small cars in India. Toyota's Indian arm Toyota Kirloskar Motors had showcased its concept small car Etios at the 2010 Delhi Auto Expo. The word ‘Etios’ is derived from the Greek word ‘Ethos’ meaning ‘original essence’. The name aptly suits the concept because as it is indeed a revisit of Toyota's car making ethos with the new upcoming car. The Etios is created for the A2 Plus segment for the markets in India as well as for Russia and South America.

Toyota took more than three years to study the Indian driver and the country's roads before developing its small car. The Etios Concept car is built by Japanese engineers with inputs from the domestic market. According to Sandeep Singh, Deputy managing Director of Toyota Kirloskar Motors, “Toyota's engineers from Japan visited India at least 30 times during the making of Etios. Our engineers met individuals and families and observed how they drove in different conditions and how they parked their cars. Indian drivers tend to brake abruptly in city driving conditions and accelerate frequently. These findings were incorporated in the new Etios engines, which are tuned to domestic driving conditions”.

Toyota has been in India for about a decade now and has made a niche for itself. And yet, there's one segment that has eluded it for the longest period - the one that screams “B-segment affordable hatchback”. Now the car giant is preparing an all-out onslaught with it entry-level offerings in the small car segment and entry-level sedan segment.

Toyota has revealed that bringing in a small car and an entry-level sedan to India is very crucial at this point of time as the car maker is bidding for a bigger share in the domestic market. Toyota was also invited by Late Sanjay Gandhi to look into his “people's car” project. Ironically, just like Honda and Nissan, Toyota too was apathetic to the “people's car” project. And now, after thirty long years, this Japanese car behemoth just like Honda and Nissan are reconsidering to foray into the small car segment of India. Honda had previewed its New Small Concept and Nissan is working on the Micra for India.

Mercedes-Benz and Motorsports

28 January, 2010 : Mercedes-Benz can rightly claim to have one of the longest running associations with Grand Prix racing than any other automobile manufacturer. After years as McLaren's engine supplier, Mercedes-Benz will now also step into the ring to fight alone this season, following their November takeover of the Brawn team.

Mercedes-Benz claims to have taken part in the very first car race, all the way back in 1894 between Paris and Rouen in France. Hence its relationship with Grand Prix racing is as old as the sport itself.

Motor racing became increasingly popular after the World War-I as cars became progressively more powerful and tracks were created, normally on closed public roads. Daimler was among the first companies to develop supercharged engines for racing. The power of these cars rapidly began to grow and by 1928 the mighty 6.8 - litre SSKL took victory at the German Grand Prix at the Nurburgring with a one-two-three finish, Rudolf Caracciola taking the top step of the podium.

The Nazi regime in Germany had recognised the propaganda value that racing offered and both the Mercedes-Benz and Auto Union teams were encouraged to build the fastest and most exciting cars possible to race against each other. Hence, a new weight formula for Grand Prix racing was brought into force in 1934 which was intended to end the development of ever heavier and more powerful cars (which overwhelmed the ability of existing tyre technology to control their power), the so-called ‘750 kg’ formula.

Mercedes-Benz elegant entrant into the class, the W25, was to become one of the most famous racing cars in the world when, on the night before the first race to the new formula at the Nurburgring, the racing manager Alfred Neubauer discovered his cars were one kilogram overweight and ordered mechanics to scrape off the white paintwork, leaving exposed shining alloy. So came along the legendary ‘Silver Arrows’. Power levels continued to increase until the cars were racing with around 500 bhp and in 1935 Caracciola took both European and German championships with victories in nine out of ten races.

Those days were a period of intense, dramatic and incredibly dangerous racing. The speed and performance of racing cars was completely unmatched by any safety provisions beyond the occasional straw bale. It was a highly symbolic tragedy when, on the eve of war in 1939, Mercedes-Benz's British ace driver Richard Seaman was killed in a ghastly accident at Spa.

Traffic jams and Cars

27 January, 2010 : Ask anybody in the city, what he or she feels is an integral part of life and pat comes reply. Traffic jams. Yes, Traffic jams are so common and popular that not one person in the city can escape it. Everyone would have experienced the long wait, queues, boredom caused by it and so on. Well traffic jams are becoming a regular part of the urban life.

Traffic jams are accredited to the influx of car ownership. With the considerable increase in car ownership in the urban areas, the free space becomes a constraint and the vehicles have to ply in a designated road or highway which causes traffic jams.

Now that we have understood the concept of traffic jams. Pun intended. We in Carazoo.com will look at some of the causes of traffic jams and identify some driving methods which will help to reduce this problem. We will also look at the problems caused by sitting in traffic with the engine running.

On the city roads and by lanes where you expect to travel great distances in a short time you will start to get a slowdown of traffic. Often the traffic will come to a complete halt for no apparent reason. Enter the ripple effect which goes something like this.

We give you an example. Try imagining a driver briefly touching the brakes of his car and lo the driver behind the first driver also responds and slows his car so that his brake also gets on well. The second driver, however, has to break harder to take into account of his thinking distance. The thinking distance is the time it takes for the message to apply your foot to the break pedal to get from your brain.

Soon it's a common sight on the road as the third driver will also have to break. He will need to break harder than driver 2. The ripple effect goes on throughout the cars until cars have to come to a complete standstill. When cars stop and then have to move off the delay becomes much greater and you end up with a jam.