Entries from June 2008 ↓

While your car may or may not be perfect, a lot of people enjoy accessorizing — getting after-market parts, such as wheels, for their cars.  Wheels in particular are fun to buy — although custom rims such as staggered wheels are expensive, stock wheels tend to be so boring that many people don’t mind spending the money.  And it’s no lie — many cars do look A LOT better with aftermarket wheels on them!

There are lots of options out there for anyone looking for custom rims for their car.  There are quite a few popular manufacturers of top quality wheels.  For instance, TSW wheels are available in some great new styles this summer, and EXE wheels offer some great options too.  Spoke and mesh wheels are quite popular, as they allow you to show off a clean, brightly painted brake assembly — although I might avoid very open wheels if you don’t want to go through the trouble of keeping your brakes clean and brightly painted.  Directional wheels — wheels that are meant to go on one specific side of the car — used to be pretty popular too, although I haven’t been seeing as many of them in recent years.

If you want a way to improve your car’s appearance, a new set of aftermarket wheels is an easy way to do it.  Just be sure you get wheels that are appropriate for your car, and you’ll be good to go!

Technorati Tags: aftermarket wheels, after-market parts, custom rims, staggered wheels, stock wheels, TSW wheels, EXE wheels, mesh wheels, directional wheels

These days, the perfect car is frequently one that gets high gas mileage — and almost everyone will agree on that.  With gas over $4 a gallon in many areas, and steadily rising, many people are beginning to panic about what the rising gas prices mean for our way of life.

One thing is for sure — it’s caused us to value different things.  High gas mileage is now one of the best features a car can offer.  But what do you do if you don’t want to buy a new, more efficient car — if you need to make do with the one you have?

One of the biggest gas hogs is the pickup truck.  Luckily, there are things you can do to lower your fuel costs, such as:

• Installing a tonneau cover. Tonneau covers mean better fuel economy because they reduce the amount of wind resistance (which slows you down and makes you burn more gas just to maintain the same speed).  The bed of a pickup truck creates a lot of drag, so covering it and making it smooth can really help your gas mileage.
• Removing bug shields and ventshades. I know they look good, but they also create some drag.  I’ve heard of people improving their mileage by about 2 percent by removing just the ventshades.  Of course, this may not be enough of an improvement to make it worthwhile for you, but at least think about it!
• Taking the sandbags out of your bed. Having extra weight to haul around makes your truck heavier and makes you burn more gas to get it going.  Extra weight such as what’s in your truck tool boxes may be necessary, but at least get rid of anything that isn’t!

If you can’t or don’t want to get rid of your pickup truck, there are things you can do to at least help out with the gas mileage a bit.  Eventually, though, you should plan on getting a different vehicle — unless you need the truck for work, of course, in which case you might want to consider working more locally!

Technorati Tags: high gas mileage, rising gas prices, tonneau covers, better fuel economy, wind resistance, pickup truck, bug shields, ventshades, sandbags, truck tool boxes

Is there such a thing as a perfect car?  Many car enthusiasts would say yes, yet they would all differ on what they thought that car was.  It might be a certain favorite make or model, or a car that requires lots of work (a project car), or a car that requires no work at all.

My perfect car used to be a Nissan Z-car without rust.  Rust is what killed my first baby, a 1981 Nissan 280ZX.  (Well, technically it was getting rearended by a hit-and-run driver that killed her, but it was all the rust that made her not worth fixing up again.)  Now my perfect car would be a Z-car that doesn’t break down or need work.  My second car, a 1983 280ZX, has been parked for the last year and a half, because I work from home and don’t need it often enough (or have enough time) to want to work on it and get it running.

Whatever your idea of the perfect car is, you’ll find plenty of information about cars here.  Dig in and enjoy!

Technorati Tags: perfect car, car enthusiasts, favorite make or model