Competition Time – Win a Coolbox for Your Car

Posted on June 13, 2012 by motorquotedirect

We’ve had some pretty sporadic weather recently here in the UK, however at times it has certainly been very hot out there and we’re feeling positive about the coming weeks and months. Hopefully we will all be bathed in sunlight this weekend too!

So, to help you enjoy the summer months we’re giving you the chance to win an Electric Coolbox for your car! The 14 litre Coolbox we’re giving away is capable of carrying up to 17 330ml cans, with the height to carry a 2 litre bottle. This is the ideal Coolbox for you to keep your food and drinks chilled whilst on the move this summer! The Coolbox will come with the necessary adaptor so you can pre-cool your box and cool things on the go too!

Kids will love it for those hot, dehydrating car journeys in the sun whilst adults too will enjoy being able to take out a cool, crisp beverage after a long, warm summer’s drive.

How Do I Enter The Competition?

In order to enter this fantastic competition, all you have to do is Follow and Retweet us on Twitter. In just a few clicks of a button you could have bagged yourself a wonderful prize!

So what are you waiting? Just visit our Twitter page – @MotorMouthBlog – and Follow & RT us to enter the competition today!

The competition will close at 5pm Friday 22nd June and the winner will then be announced the following Monday.

Good Luck!

Survey Reveals We Do Not Understand Our Cars

Posted on January 11, 2012 by motorquotedirect

Whilst searching around the daily motoring news and views I came across the news that motorists are increasingly unaware of what all the lights and information on their dashboards actually meant.

It is in some ways quite amusing, but mostly it is not surprising at all!

Cars Increasingly More Complex

Cars are becoming increasingly more complicated both under the bonnet and inside too. A number of weeks ago I was riding in the passenger seat of a new Honda Insight, and I have to say, I had absolutely no idea what the futuristic dashboard was telling me without reading the manual. Which to be honest, most people don’t.

Including my very own mother who has owned her Vauxhall Corsa for three years and only last week found out that the windows can be controlled from outside the car by holding down the buttons on the key fob to make the windows go up or down, depending on whether you are opening or locking the car, and she only found out because we were at a Vauxhall dealer looking at newer models and the salesman explained it was a feature that had been around for a while now!

Study Reveals Shocking Stats

Furthermore, a recent survey that was carried out revealed that we spend around 360 hours in our cars every year and yet nearly half of us could not name some of the basic warning lights. It would seem that men are slightly more knowledgeable than women in this area with around 39% of men being able to identify where the main beam hazard was compared to just 28% of women.

The figure that concerns me is that only 12% of women and 7% of men could point out the handbrake warning light. That is worryingly low, and the handbrake warning light, you would have thought, is quite an important thing to be aware of.

Costly Damage

By not knowing the simple warning lights, someone could potentially be driving around unaware that there is a fault with their vehicle, which could increase the likelihood of a driver having an accident, which could in turn lead to them having to pay out on an excess on a motor insurance claim if the accident is proven to be their fault. In addition, by driving around with a fault it is also likely that the issue with the car could develop and thus end up costing owners thousands of pounds more to have the problem repaired.

The moral of the story here is quite obvious: we should all take time to read our car manuals and familiarise ourselves with all aspects of the car before setting out on our first drive in a newly purchased car. Whilst some people may indeed not be too interested in the particular features of a car, it is still very important to know what all the lights on the dashboard mean!

New models to be exposed in Paris

Posted on September 7, 2010 by motorquotedirect

The Paris Motor Show next month is promising to be every bit as exciting as it has been in the past. The show will be held at the Paris Expo centre at the Porte de Versailles and will be the setting for a few world premiers.

Widely awaited is the unveiling of the new Lamborghini. The Italian luxury car manufacturer is certainly keeping the motoring world on tenterhooks as it has only just revealed the first of six images that it is feeding to the press over the next few weeks. The image has the header ‘Discover the way to the future of supersports cars’ which may or may not have lost something in the translation. Whatever, all will be revealed on October the 2^nd. Another ‘supersports’ manufacturer, Lotus, are reported to be unveiling two front engine hybrids at the show, one a four door hatchback and the other being the more traditional Lotus offering a two door coupé.

Another vehicle to be launched upon the public at the show and one that will bring in a slightly smaller motor insurance quote is the Hyundai ix20. The Korean manufacturer has also fed a little taster to the public in the way of an image as well, although it must said the sketch of the ix20 is nowhere near as mysterious as the Lamborghini offering.

It promises to be quite a show for Multi Purpose Vehicles (MPV’s). Alongside the Hyundai ix20, which was designed in Germany and goes on sale almost immediately after the show, Chevrolet launch the Orlando MPV and Toyota will be in their fighting with their latest version of a mini MPV, the Verso-S. The real show-stopper, however, in the MPV section could be Peugeot’s offering, the 3008 MPV that will be the world’s first diesel hybrid offering fuel economy at 3.8 litres per 100 km.

Other cars to be launched at the show will be the Chevrolet Cruze, the American manufacturers first attempt at a hatchback in the Cruze range, and Renault will be presenting their new version of the Laguna.

The show launches on October the 2^nd and runs until October the 17^th. Opening times are 10am to 8pm with late night opening on Thursdays extended to 10pm. Admittance charges are 12 Euros for adults, half price for 10-18 year olds with under tens getting in free.

Over 100 years of experience

Posted on July 28, 2010 by motorquotedirect

Any driver car insurance was not even invented when the Fiat Company was born. Fiat is an acronym for ‘Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino’ and translated to English, reads ‘Italian Automobile Factory of Turin’. F.I.A.T. was founded on July 12, 1899, in the Italian city of Turin, at the time the city was enjoying a good period of industrial growth.

The first Fiat plant started in 1900, had 35 employees and made 24 cars. The Chairman was Mr Ludovico Scarfiotti, with Emanuele Cacherano di Bricherasio having the job as Vice Chairman. It was Giovanni Agnelli, however, whose strategic vision and determination paved the way for FIAT to become a household name. A former cavalry officer in the army, he managed to gain an important position with the original investors and he was made Managing Director in 1902. He came up with the idea of a promotional tour of Italy by car and this was successfully done with the finish line at the Milan Fair. The Fiat oval logo on a blue background was designed by Carlo Biscaretti and this was adopted in 1904, the first car to have the Fiat brand was a Model 4 HP. The Fiat Company focused on a two-pronged strategy for the company to grow. These were 1- diversification of production and 2- concentrate on the most promising markets. This has been the strategy for Fiat throughout over 100 years of history.

A decade after it was founded, Fiat had seen its capital stock increase to a massive 12 million Lire, it now had 2,500 employees and had manufactured a total of 1,215 cars. Even the First World War did not hamper them, as this meant a conversion to military production of army trucks, ambulances and engines for submarines, to name just a few. During this time, Giovanni Agnelli still had a vision of a bright future for Fiat based on car manufacturing. Following fact finding missions to the USA, Fiat then started to plan a new factory based on what they learned from the states. Fiat’s aim was to match the technology of America.

By 1948, mainly thanks to money received from the Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program, it was the primary program during 1947-51, of the US for rebuilding and creating a stronger economy for Europe) factories had been rebuilt. The number of workers employed by Fiat increased by ten thousand. In 1946 Fiat recorded a loss. But the upward trend resumed two years later. As manufacturing output recovered in the years after the war, Fiat introduced the Fiat 500B, which was available to customers as a sedan or as a station wagon. When the 500C was released it offered for the first time, heating and ventilation installed as standard equipment. The first vehicles that were equipped with a diesel engine were driven off the assembly line in 1953.

Almost 60 years on from that first diesel engine FIAT is still going strong even though it has had its ups and downs.

What Car, What Noise?

Posted on June 1, 2010 by motorquotedirect

The EU has been great in many ways for member countries. A common currency and free movement across borders have been a boon for trade. On the downside, though, are the many stupid regulations that hinder trade. At one stage 26 types of fruit and vegetables, including artichokes, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, cucumbers, onions, peas, carrots, plums, and ribbed celery were under shape restrictions, and they also told us that bananas must not bend abnormally. Thankfully they have since relaxed this bizarre ruling but don’t think we are free from more strange rulings as we enter the new generation of zero-emission vehicles. Greener cars will get you a good motor insurance quote and possibly a car that sounds like a spacecraft.

In the not too distant future when more and more of us will have changed our cars over to a greener version, the perceived notion of roads being used by fuel efficient motors that also cut down on noise pollution due to their smaller engines may not be the route we are going down at all. Thanks to a possible new EU ruling not only will you be thinking about the traffic ahead while driving but also what sound you want your car to make as you drive along. Each manufacturer may be allowed to provide its own sounds, with the regulation simply setting a minimum volume to prevent pedestrians, cyclists and especially blind people from stepping into the path of battery-powered cars. Some of the manufacturers are thought to be considering using the same noises used on the spacecraft in Star Wars; the noise will be projected in the direction in which the vehicle is travelling to cut down on unnecessary noise. The manufacturers think that a noise will only be needed when the car is travelling under 20mph as going any faster will create tyre noise which will warn the people who are most at risk.

Professor Paul Jennings at the university where the tests on different sounds are being carried out said: “We will have a week with music and weeks with natural sounds, engine noise and also with science-fiction sounds. “We need to find noises which alert people to the approaching vehicle without causing the annoyance people already feel when they hear the bleeping sounds of reversing trucks .It is possible that pedestrians will learn to look out for silent cars and that the warning sounds could become redundant but, he said, people were far more dependent on detecting noise than they realised when crossing the road. They think they are reacting to the sight of a vehicle but often it is the sound that is triggering their attention and sound also tells you whether the vehicle is accelerating or decelerating.” The tests are ongoing and the end results could prove very interesting.

Motoring Abroad

Posted on May 25, 2010 by motorquotedirect

With the winter behind us, we find ourselves on the cusp of summer and the thought of summer holidays enter the thoughts of many households. As with every other year many people will be taking the car with them to Europe and as with any other year many travel with the misconception that they’ve fully covered by their own car insurance. It is very important to get a motor insurance quote that will cover you for driving abroad, because if you think that your policy for driving in the UK will cover you while driving abroad, you will be in for a shock if you are involved in an accident.

If you are driving into Europe, an any driver car insurance policy would be one way to combat the main problems faced by many UK drivers, that of fatigue. Satellite navigation systems can be bought that cover europe’s roads, but the roads will still be very unfamiliar, the different traffic systems, strange road signs and different customs of the motorists all increase the risk of an accident It is vital that you check with your insurance company if you are covered, and if not most if not all insurance companies are more than happy to change your policy for the number of days that you will be driving abroad. Also check if you are covered should your vehicle be stolen, having your insurance papers with you when travelling overseas is essential and you should make sure you keep these with you in your car at all times when driving.

When driving abroad it’s also vital to check the legal requirements of the country/countries you will travel through. Laws about what equipment to have on board varies between different countries, so it’s a good idea to look them up before you leave. Depending on where you intend driving, you will need to make sure you have the right equipment in your car. Most EU countries require a warning triangle, a full set of spare light bulbs, headlight converters and some even require you to have a reflective jacket in the car, and it has to be within reach of the driver, so it will be no good having it in the boot. Something else to remember is that you will need to put a GB sticker on your car, without one a fine is inevitable in many countries. If you have a Euro-symbol on your number plate then you won’t need a GB sticker when driving in member states of the EU, but if you go outside the EU, and that includes Switzerland, you will need a GB sticker as well, so the best policy is to put the sticker on before leaving. Take care not to overload your car as this can get you a fine in some European countries swell.

It is important to prepare for driving abroad. Research is very easy to do, as all the information will be available on the internet. It is very different to driving in the UK.