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Mazda's New i-Stop Here
Coming to that dreaded stop at the red traffic lights can be a flustering experience for most. If the truth be told, and you’re anything like me, then you’ll never enjoy the red light experience, which is an invisible hand that reaches out and says, “No, no further,” for what seems like an indefinite time period. It’s worst when you have to come to a halt in the night when there are few cars on the road and you end up waiting for at least a minute as you count zero cars crossing the T-intersection in front of you. Just as well, then, that in the bid for making cars ever-more fuel efficient, there are systems like start/stop in a number of new cars which cut out the engine while you sit fuming at the time it takes you to wait for the red light to turn green again. You personally are fuming – your car isn’t. Mazda has a new type of system that fires the engine back up again a lot quicker and smoother than the conventional start/stop systems found in other autos.
It seems that car manufacturers are turning the heat back on fuel efficiency for being the main priority for selling cars. It’s little wonder, as we see fuel prices continue to increase. Stop/start or idle stop systems are becoming more common in cars. They activate when a car comes to a halt, shutting down the engine and quickly restarting the engine again when the brake is released. This saves the driver on fuel and is better on the environment… two great reasons why we should want something like this type of technology in our cars.
Mazda has designed and developed a unique system which it calls i-stop, and the system is part of the company’s very clever SkyActive technologies resources which it uses in all of its new cars. Mazda’s i-stop system uses a “combustion start method” to ignite the engine again after a period of waiting at the lights. Instead of using the starter motor alone to crank the engine, i-stop cleverly ensures that the cylinders stop in the optimum position to re-fire the engine back into life. Direct injection then squirts fuel into the appropriate cylinder and ignites it, which forces the piston down to start the engine again. Mazda’s i-stop still employs the starter motor; however, the i-stop system is easier on the starter motor and quicker than any other system on the market – particularly for diesel engines. Mazda’s engines with i-stop technology take just 0.40 seconds to burst into life. The experience is very quick and discreet, which adds to Mazda’s smooth, seamless operation.
Mazda’s i-stop technology has an information screen that shows the time the engine spends switched off when you’re driving from A to B. If you do a lot of city driving, then the i-stop could end up revealing close to five hours of stoppage time every 10,000 km you travel. Imagine how many litres of fuel will have been saved compared with a car that just sits idling at the lights in between the red and green cycles. Now that gives drivers without stop/start technology even more to get frazzled about!
How To Really Piss Off Other Drivers
I recently read a post on Facebook that read “Pleasing everybody is impossible but pissing everybody off is a piece of cake.” Now, most of us try to be good drivers and to keep everybody else on the road happy – especially that white Holden with a few extra antennae and lights that you strongly suspect to be an unmarked cop car. Plenty has been written about good driving etiquette and how to be a nice courteous driver. But instead of inflicting yet another one of these on you, let’s work out how to really annoy other drivers.
When deciding on the best methods to induce road rage in others, remember the old safety first rule. You don’t want to drive on the wrong side of the road or play chicken with a B-train. Randomly rear-ending people in traffic is also out – no point denting the emblem sitting proudly on the nose of your new Audi, after all. And remember to keep your door closed when some red-faced person with swinging fists comes up to your car.
Ten ways to lose friends and irritate your fellow road users:
- Go round and round a roundabout several times, making everybody else give way to you.
- Overtake someone right at the end of a double lane and cut in front of them as the traffic merges. Then pull over abruptly to the left onto the shoulder of the road to take a phone call that requires your hands.
- Do all of the actions in Point 2 with minimal use of the indicators.
- Wait until the very last minute before dipping your lights for an oncoming driver when driving at night.
- Drive well below the speed limit (i.e. more than 10 km/h below the limit) and sit right out in the middle of the lane. See how long a line you can get building up behind you.
- Throw rubbish out the window where it will fly backwards and narrowly miss the driver behind you. Bonus points if the rubbish is old chewing gum or a cigarette butt and it hits the person in question. Double points if the person behind you is a motorcyclist or a bike rider.
- Slow down in front of other people if there is no passing lane and the road rules have turned into Gandalf on the Bridge of Khazad-dum (“You! Shall! Not! Pass!”). Then speed up when passing is possible.
- If you are held up in any way possible even for half a second, lean heavily on the horn.
- If you’re the person behind, get as close as you possibly can to the car in front so you can overtake at the next possible opportunity. Even if you make the other car jam on the brakes when you’ve completed the manoeuvre because you didn’t quite have enough space to overtake the three cars in front of you.
- Use the bike-only lane as a left-turning lane and get into it early. Cyclists are safe to irritate because they will go out of their way to avoid a collision.
Driver Distractions They Can't Ban
When the traffic safety boffins talk about driver distraction, they’re usually talking about the perils of texting while driving. And they’re pretty much right. I guess we’ve all seen people having near misses because they’ve had their eyes on the phone rather than on the road. Saw one on a main road the other day just about crossing the centre line and frantically correcting before having a close encounter with an oncoming car.
However, I had done something similar a few days previously. Not because I was trying to text and drive, though. I got distracted (and nearly crossed the centre line, etc.) thanks to suddenly spotting a spider that looked like one of the nasty ones crawling around on the sweatshirt sitting on top of the centre console beside me and I was trying to squash it. Now, they may be able to outlaw texting while driving but that’s one thing that they can’t outlaw easily (“Excuse me, madam; we’ve just got to check your car for deadly spiders.”)
It also got me thinking about other things that can distract drivers but can’t be cracked down on in the same way that using phones and texting can. I mean, anything can pull a driver’s attention away at a crucial moment. Here are my top five driver distractors (that don’t include things you choose to do like check makeup or eat):
- Children in the car. Some children just do not grasp the idea that even though Mummy is sitting down and looking relaxed when she is driving, she cannot look at the lovely picture you drew, open your drink bottle or put your shoe back on. Babies are the worst offenders because they don’t understand and can start to scream, especially if Mummy is nowhere to be seen. The safety experts who say that children nine months old (the age where they go through major separation anxiety) should be in the back seat facing backwards need a reality check – a distressed child makes for a stressed driver.
- Sound systems. Steering wheel-mounted audio controls for advancing, repeating and adjusting the volume are all very well. However, fine-tuning the balance between bass, treble, left and right and so forth is a bit more fiddly. Changing CD doubly so.
- Advertisements. They say it’s more of a guy thing, but those ads showing bikini babes that are designed to catch the attention are put beside the road where people driving will see them. Tell me, guys, which would you rather look at? The road in front of you or a seriously photoshopped woman without a lot of clothing? Bit of a no-brainer in more ways than one.
- Anything that insists on giving you instructions while you’re negotiating tricky traffic. This can include a navigation system or a passenger with a map. At least you can tell the passenger to shut up while keeping your hands on the wheel.
- Any type of animal in the car, especially the smaller ones that have more than four legs and bite, such as wasps, spiders, bees and mosquitos. They might be able to come in the window but can they find their way out again?
They have come up with devices in some new safety conscious cars (such as the new Volvos that shut down the radio and the phone when the car detects that you’re driving a bit more hectically and possibly need the distractions to a minimum. If only they could do something about the Top Five as well – although a good set of lungs can deal with #1: “SHUT UP! It’s busy here and I can’t pay attention right now, OK???!!”
Beyond the Sticker Price
When it comes to new car ownership, the cost of owning the car for the first few years is a significant factor worth considering before you hand over the money. Running costs from one car to another can differ dramatically. Costs like the replacement of parts, tyres, oil filters, fuel and even registration all factor into the equation that reveals how costly it’s going to be to run your dream car over time. For 2013, Australia’s cheapest car to own and run is the new Suzuki Alto. The car looks pretty cool and, for the second year running, has come out as the clear winner in a survey of Australia’s most economical vehicles.
Obviously, if you’ve seen a Suzuki Alto, you already know the car is small. It looks cute and is powered by a zippy little 1.0-litre petrol engine. No surprises then that the Suzuki Alto finished ahead of 109 other vehicles and was found in the Light Car class.
Owners of a Holden Cruze Equipe , Volkswagen Jetta 118 TSI, Audi A4 1.8-litre Turbo, Holden VF Evoke LPG, Nissan Dualis ST , Hyundai Santa Fe Active or Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo should also be very pleased with their cars. According to the survey, these cars came up as the least expensive cars in their class to own. Now, did I notice the Toyota’s name in the list? Australia’s top seller wasn’t a feature, I’m afraid!
Interestingly, LPGs, hybrids and EVs were also included in the car survey and all vehicles were checked for their affordability during the first five years of ownership. Things like purchase price, fuel use, servicing and depreciation featured among the factors that added to the cost of owning the cars.
Now who reckons hybrids ought to be a cheap vehicle to run. Rather amusingly, the Honda Jazz Hybrid 1.3-litre was the most expensive car to own in the light car class. In the small car class, the Honda Civic Hybrid 1.5-litre was the most expensive car to own. This survey made for some hard reading if you happened to be the owner of a Mazda6 Touring (hey, that’s what my brother-in-law drives), Mercedes Benz C200 , Ford FG Falcon XT MK2 (my next-door neighbour’s latest new toy), Mazda CX-5 , Toyota Kluger or the new Nissan Patrol . These were the most expensive cars to own in their respective classes.
According to the RACQ Vehicle Running Costs survey, the hidden costs of vehicle ownership meant motorists were paying a lot more than they needed to when purchasing a brand new car. RACQ’s safety policy executive manager, Steve Spalding, said that “The real cost of owning a car is much more than just the sticker price and the wrong choice could set you back thousands. Servicing, fuel consumption, spare parts, insurance and depreciation play a major role in how much a financial burden your vehicle will be.”
Now that’s got you thinking!
Take a look at the RACQ website page if you want to know how they figured it all out: http://www.racq.com.au/motoring/cars/car_economy/vehicle_running_costs_2013
Level 2, 9 Help Street