Cars Of The World

One of Ubers first tests of self driving cars hit and killed a pedestrian on an early Monday morning of March in Tempe, Arizona. This unfortunate accident caused everyone and every car company to complete rethink the ideals of self driving vehicles. According to ABC‘s reporting, the vehicle was driving itself at the time of the collision, but a driver was behind the wheel, as per the terms of Uber’s testing program. Since the accident, Uber has pulled all of its self driving prototypes off of the road for more extensive testing, as they should. 

From someone who appreciates cars for the actual driving experience itself, i believe self driving vehicles are close to being ready, but yet still so far from perfection. The idea of self driving cars makes total sense to everyone. The ability to efficiently get from point A to point B without cognitive cooperation from yourself  would be amazing. However, taking away the human aspect of driving seems to be beyond our reach currently, and i fully support car companies focusing on vehicles for the driver, rather than for just the drive. 

The Nissan 240sx. Arguably the most popular platform for modern drift cars. But why? 

First, we should discuss what drifting is. Drifting is a type of racing where oversteer is purposefully “activated” one might say. Oversteer is when the rear of the car is pushed outwards due to driver commanding the car to steer further than intended. This in turn causes the rear of the vehicle to slide outwards. This is more easily achieved with Rear Wheel Drive vehicles (RWD), due to the ability of putting power to the rear and purposefully cause them to lose grip and slide around turns. 

The Ariel Atom comes from a British based company from Crewkerne, Somerset, England. They began delivering to American soil in 2016 with a few delivers of their other vehicle, the Ariel Nomad. 

The Ariel company makes custom made kit cars for people to purchase. You as their customer can get an Ariel Atom (their street performance version, shown above), as well as their off road dune buggy version, the Ariel Nomad. 

Every Ariel Atom is the same equation, two open seats, a cage, and a Chevy LS V8 motor for more than enough power to do anything you could want. Ariel releases limited runs of custom Ariel Atoms every so often to keep interests and sales as high as possible. 

Turbochargers! Turbochargers are arguably one of the coolest modern inventions for an internal combustion engine. They answer the question: “How can i get the most amount of power out of my engine without using a larger one?” They answer this lust for more power by adding the simplest thing possible you can to increase the power output: more oxygen. The more oxygen you have within your cylinders, the more quickly you burn fuel.  How turbos accomplish this is by taking the excess exhaust gas, and putting it back into the cylinders. As you can see from the diagram above, the exhaust pipe rather than being lead straight out of the car is fed into the turbo. Within the turbo is a fan with very smooth ball bearings. As the engine increases its revolutions per minute, and creating more exhaust gas, the turbo “spools up”. The pressurized air from said spooling then travels to an intercooler, almost like a second radiator, to be cooled. From there it is fed back into the cylinders at a high pressure right as the explosions within the engine are about to happen allowing for larger “BANG” due to the increased oxygen. This in tern makes your engine “rev up” faster increasing your cars acceleration. 

This post is to identify the different types of cars in the car person community . 

Tuners: 

Tuner cars are my personal favorite type of car group. A tuner car could really be any car, which opens it up to many possibilities only limited to your imagination. The rough definition of a tuner car is any car that has after market modifications. Not only under the hood, but ascetically as well. The modifications are all revolved around increasing power and performance. Examples such as racing suspension, turbo or supercharger kits, engine tunes for your ECU, and many more. With the right parts, any car could become an amazing tuner project. 

Muscle: 

Muscle cars are exactly how they sound, powerful. The basics of a muscle car are simple. American made, rear wheel drive, and TONS of horsepower. Generally, if your looking for a car with great performance straight from the factory, muscles cars are the go to option. 

Low Riders/Hot Rods: 

Low Rider/Hot Rods are very easy to spot. They are always older classic cars inches off the ground and heavily modified. So much so that the car they are now is barely the car they started off as. Built purely for the reason of “Because I Can”. Which makes sense; if you can, why not? 

Off-Road: 

While every other car on this list is build for horsepower or showing off, Off-Road builds are the opposite. Their purpose is one thing: to be able to take you anywhere. While there are many great options for Off-Road vehicles from the factory, to really step up your ability your going to need some modifications such as bigger tires, lift kits, metal bumpers and scrape plates, etc. Any large Four Wheel Drive vehicle could be considered and Off-Roader. 

Daily Drivers: 

Dailey drivers are the simpleton cars of the road. Cars that you see everyday everywhere you go. They’re fuel efficient, reliable, and cheap. Another term for a good daily driver is an “Economy Car”. 

Supercars/Hypercars: 

You may be asking yourself “A Subaru? the best modern car?”. Yes, hear me out. Every Subaru Impreza has the same recipe: 4 doors, compact size, symmetrical all wheel drive, and a 4 cylinder boxer engine. Subaru has been manufacturing the Impreza for over 20 years, and if that doesn’t show success on it’s own then lets go into more detail. 

The reason the Impreza has been so popular and so successful for so long is due to its simplicity. Subaru has been able to keep the Impreza about the same throughout the years while also updating the car with modern features and looks inside and out as needed. On top of this the Impreza has been very reliable for a long time. Every Impreza from 1995 to 2018 uses the same motor, a 2.5L 4 cylinder boxer engine. The boxer engine just works, hence why it hasn't been changed. (If it isn't broke don’t fix it, right?) On just about every road in America you will see old and new Imprezas alike, chugging around like the great cars they are. As well as being reliable, in its naturally aspirated form the boxer engine gets great fuel economy. 

Another reason the Impreza is so widely successful is due to its size. A compact 4 door that can fit the entire family with ease. Some years of the Impreza even are offered as wagons or hatchbacks for even more storage space. 

Lets not leave out the third reason, and possibly the most important one, as to why the Impreza is s great. Subaru’s symmetrical All Wheel Drive system (AWD). AWD allows any and every Subaru Impreza ever built to send power to any wheel at any time as needed. This was huge at the time when the Impreza was first released, because most cars at the time were Front Wheel Drive. Meaning only the front wheels would be powered by the engine, and the rear wheels would just spin freely. Due to the Imprezas ability to detect when a wheel was slipping due to ice, rain, snow, or mud, it could send more power to whichever wheels had traction. Meaning it could pull itself out of just about anything. When the AWD system is not needed, the Impreza is predominantly front wheel drive to save on fuel economy. If the computer senses that all the wheels in both the front and rear differentials are slipping, it will send an even amount of power to every wheel. To summarize, Subaru Imprezas eat snow for breakfast. 

The final reason why the Impreza is so amazing is because they offer a version for everyone. Theres the basic Impreza, which is simple and a great car. If you would like something more sporty, you can get the Impreza WRX. Which is the same recipe accept Subaru slaps on a twin scroll turbocharger from the factory and a five speed manual to increase the horsepower. If you need something more hardcore you can get the Impreza WRX STI which is similar but even more hardcore. With upgrades all throughout the vehicle to be a track weapon, but can also be daily driven as your every day car. 

This is Tesla’s new flagship performance vehicle, the Roadster. Tesla had previously manufactured a car they named the roadster from 2008-2012, and it was not hugely successful. The car had weird quirks and was their first and only car being manufactured at the time. Frankly, people just did not care about it. Since then Tesla has exploded with a only a few more cars to offer, however each and every one has redefined innovation in the car industry and people love it. However when the new roadster was unveiled at the Tesla semi event in November 2017 as a surprise, it shocked the world with its performance numbers. The Roadster is capable of a 0-60 time of 1.7 seconds and a 0-100 time of 5.7 seconds. To put these numbers into perspective, the newest Lamborghini Aventador SV goes from 0-60 in 2.7 seconds. While this is already monstrously fast, the electric Tesla was able to beat Lamborghinis v12 by a whole second.  

As my first post for this blog, I'm deciding to start simply; how does your car move when you put your foot on the accelerator. While the answer seems like it would be highly complex, it is simpler than you may think. Just about every car manufacturer on the planet uses the same concept in the modern age. An internal combustion engine (ICE). The most common version of this mechanical masterpiece that every major car company on the planet produces some version of is a four cylinder internal combustion engine. (Meaning is has four cylinders rather than 6, 8, 12, etc). These are great for fuel economy and decent power if needed while also being lightweight and not too complex to work on. However that doesn't answer the question, how do they work? 

The main part of an ICE where the cylinders and pistons reside is called the block. It all starts where air and fuel are mixed together and inducted into each cylinder in what is called the intake process. The next step is what is known as the compression process. This is when the piston is pushed upwards maintaining a tight seal within is chamber compressing the newfound air and fuel from the intake process into a confined area at the top of its stroke (Stroke = the distance or movement of a piston within a cylinder). At the peak of this stroke a spark plug ignites a small spark combusting or blowing up the fuel and oxygen within the cylinder forcing it downwards at a high velocity. This is whats known as the power stroke. While this piston is moving up and down the mechanical energy is creates moves something known as a crank shaft. The crank shaft is then connected to a variety of gears that eventually lead to what spins your tires and makes you go forward or backward depending. As the pistol is finishing up its power stroke and begins to return to the top of the cylinder is pushes out any extra gasses and unburned fuel out of a seal which becomes your exhaust gasses that travel out of the rear of your vehicle.