Men vs. Women: Who Do Insurance Companies Think Are Safer Drivers?

Is gender playing a role in your car insurance premiums?  Check this out:

Those condescending jokes about female drivers seem to have vanished with the Bob Hope generation of comedians. Nowadays women appear  to have a positive image of themselves as safer drivers than men, according to a recent poll. In a survey done for insurer MetLife, 51% of women said their gender drives more safely.

The evidence is on their side: Men are 3.4 times more likely than women to get a ticket for reckless driving and 3.1 times as likely to be cited for drunk driving, according to a study by Quality Planning, a research firm that works for insurance companies. “Women are on average less aggressive and more law-abiding drivers — attributes that lead to fewer accidents,” the study says.

Not that guys have completely caught on. Of the men surveyed by MetLife, only 39% claimed male drivers were safer — but 35% of men didn’t know which gender to pick. The findings did back men up on one point: automotive knowledge. The poll showed that more men are familiar with current safety equipment such as electronic stability control, which helps prevent rollover accidents.

 

Learn more here: http://autos.yahoo.com/news/men-vs--women--who-are-safer-drivers-.html

Your Pet Passenger

 

Keep your pet safe while driving, not only for your animal’s health and well-being, but for your wallet’s sake as well!

States Cracking Down On Dogs Behind The Wheel

If it's any indication of the danger free-roaming pets face in a vehicle, New Hampshire, the country's only state that does not have a mandatory seat belt law, actually requires dogs to buckle up.

Live free or die, goes the state's motto, but Spike and Spot don't have that liberty. And with due reason. Seven other states, Connecticut, California, Massachusetts, Nevada, Washington, Oregon and Rhode Island require owners to kennel or tether animals because of the severe danger the sudden stops and potential collisions pose to pets. An unrestrained dog can land you with a ticket between $50 and $200.

Animal lovers would almost always rather take their pet with them to run errands or on a road trip than leave them at home or at a pet motel. But for all that love for canines, most drivers have seen "dog people" take things too far, driving with their dogs in their laps or lying around their shoulders like a neck pillow and, yes, sometimes at the wheel.
And it's a double dose of danger: for the distracted driver and the unrestrained animal.

Find out more here: http://autos.aol.com/photos/driving-doggie-style-the-best-vehicles-for-pets/

Tips for Driving in the Rain

Check out the following tips for driving in the rain from Smart Motorist.

• First and foremost: slow down! It takes longer to stop or adjust in wet weather.
• Stay toward the middle lanes - water tends to pool in the outside lanes.
• Maintain proper following distance (3 Second Rule). This needs to be increased in wet weather.
• Drive in the tracks of a car ahead of you.
• Don't follow large trucks or busses too closely. The spray created by their large tires reduces your vision. Take care when passing them as well; if you must pass, do so quickly and safely.
• Be more alert when driving in wet or slippery conditions. Watch out for brake lights in front of you.
• Avoid using your brakes; if possible, take your foot off the accelerator to slow down.
• Turn your headlights on even in a light rain, or in gloomy, foggy or overcast conditions. Not only do they help you see the road, but they'll help other drivers see you. If your car has daytime running lights you still should put them on, so vehicles behind you can see you better.
• Before it starts to rain, replace old or brittle wipers.
• Avoid off-road driving: it's hard to judge the actual depth of puddles and you can easily become stuck, even in an SUV.
• Never drive beyond the limits of visibility. At night rainy roads become especially treacherous. The glare of oncoming lights, amplified by the rain on your windscreen, can cause temporary loss of visibility while substantially increasing driver fatigue. In rainy conditions pedestrians, livestock, and wildlife are extremely hard to spot and even harder to avoid.
• Never drive through moving water if you can't see the ground through it; your car could be swept off the road.
• When driving through a puddle of uncertain depth, go slow. If it's deeper than the bottom of your doors, turn around and find another route. Deep water can cause serious damage to a modern car's electrical system.
• Avoid splashing pedestrians.
• If possible, stay off the road during heavy thunderstorms. Large flashes of lightning can temporarily blind and disorient drivers, and the accompanying high winds and heavy rain can create deadly driving conditions.

Slow down! This should be obvious but it also very important. People are so used to driving certain speeds on certain roads that sometimes they forget the need to slow down when inclement weather presents itself.

Before you go - Wet-weather driving demands gentle use of all the main controls - steering, clutch, brake and accelerator - and a larger allowance for errors and emergencies. When you begin a journey in rain, your shoes will be wet and liable to slip off the pedals. Scuff the soles on the rubber matting or carpeting of the car before you start the engine. All motorists should regularly check that their headlights, tail lights, brake lights and turn signals are working properly.

How are your tires? - Check your tires on a regular basis. Bald tires significantly reduce your traction on wet roadways, and offer little resistance to hydroplaning. When your tires run over water, the water is displaced and it needs somewhere to go quickly. The best place is between the treads of your tires. If your tires are bald, the water has no place to go and you end up riding on a layer of water, like a boat. (See Hydroplaning, below.)

Turn on your wipers - Replace your wipers regularly, at least once a year. Wiper blades in bad condition don't clear water from the windshield very well and distort your view. Older vehicles may need to have the whole wiper arm replaced. The arms bend over time and sometimes can't keep enough downward pressure to clear the windscreen, even with new blades installed. Wipers will often clear light rain from the windscreen with a few sweeps, then run on an almost-dry screen and leave smears of drying dirt. Don't be afraid to use the windscreen washers liberally: the fluid is cheap (99 cents a gallon) and the safety benefit is high. Carry extra during the winter.

Don't follow large trucks or buses closely. Splash and spray from these vehicles can obscure your vision, creating a potentially disastrous driving situation. Keep your distance, and your windshield wipers on, when other traffic is in front of you.

Read more: http://www.smartmotorist.com/driving-guideline/tips-for-driving-in-rain.html

How can a speed bump harvest electricity?

Ever wanted to power your home with speed bumps? It’s not as crazy as it sounds. Read on for more!

“There was a time when debates surrounding speed bumps revolved around whether or not a community needed speed bumps to slow down drivers on a certain road. Safety was the key issue. Now, a new key issue is making its way into the discussion -- the question of whether or not speed bumps can actually harvest unused energy from a car.

Many energy discussions involving vehicles focus on how to reduce the fuel consumption or overall energy cost of operating that vehicle. Hybrid car technologies seem to focus on either reducing the amount of fuel a car uses or ways to create power (for the car) by implementing systems like regenerative braking. But using a vehicle to create power for an outside device hasn't received as much attention. So how might it work?

When a vehicle approaches a speed bump, most drivers press down on the brake pedal to slow the car down. The car's braking system expends energy that gets transferred to the brake pads and then into heat. It takes a lot of energy to slow or stop a car. In addition, the speed bump itself receives energy via the weight of the vehicle coming into contact with it.”

Read more at: http://auto.howstuffworks.com/fuel-efficiency/fuel-consumption/speed-bump-harvest-electricity.htm

How are cars becoming more user-friendly?

 

Are we approaching an era of self-driving cars?

“Fred Flintstone had a car that he had to power with his own feet; by that standard, all of today's cars are pretty easy to use. But cars are becoming even more user-friendly -- so user-friendly, in fact, that they may not even require a user at all. That's because much of the new car technology involves taking over the role of the driver.

For instance, no longer does a driver need to mind the blind spots, as certain cars come with detection systems that will alert the operator to obstacles in other lanes. If a driver should start to drowse off and drift into another lane, the steering wheel will shake or a voice will alert the driver to what's happening. Gone are the days of manually changing the cruise control speed when the car in front of you slows down -- now, adaptive cruise control uses radar to track the speed of that car and adjust the speed on its own. And since cars with adaptive cruise control can sense just how much space separates them from other cars, they can go into panic mode when cars ahead start hitting their brakes.

But you needn't fear a world of self-driving cars just yet. According to a survey conducted by Harris Interactive, drivers want features that improve safety, but they're not ready to turn over complete control of the road to a machine just yet [source: Adams]. In other words, while drivers may like alerts about a car in their blind spots, they want to be the ones that adjust their cars to account for it. And the same survey found that drivers are willing to keep their eyes on the road despite the goodies that new cars are offering; fancy features like WiFi or temperature-controlled cupholders are at the bottom of drivers' wish lists, perhaps indicating that drivers know they need to focus on driving, not on checking the latest sports scores online.

While today's drivers may be wary of cars that do too much for them, that doesn't mean they don't appreciate a little help and convenience. Keyless ignition systems save drivers the hassle of looking for their keys, new fuel tank caps that don't require a lot of turning can save time at the gas station, and self-repairing paint, which covers a scratch as soon as it occurs, eliminates the ordeal and expense of the body shop.”

Read more: http://auto.howstuffworks.com/under-the-hood/trends-innovations/cars-more-user-friendly.htm