Fresh Fuzz

Santa Monica Plug-In Parade (Video)

by michael October 16th, 2011 - No Comments »

This morning Santa Monica made an attempt at breaking the Plug-In Parade World Record. The attempt consisted of over a hundred plug-in hybrids taking to the streets of Downtown Santa Monica to dominate the old record of 208.

The cars silently made their way around Santa Monica, buzzing around in EV Mode with no gas being consumed. Being that it was National Plug In Day, a lot of hype was brought upon the event.

The coolest car of the show was the Fisker Karma, being driven by the owner of LA Car Guys. The record is still being determined but I think if the plug in record hasn’t been broken, the record for the quietest parade has.

 

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Google’s Self Driving Car Crashes

by michael August 7th, 2011 - No Comments »

Google seems to have run into a snag when its infamous self-driving car crashed this week. Google is saying that the crash was human error and the car was in its normal driving mode with a driver behind the wheel.

Google’s self driving car requires a driver in the car at all times to take the controls if anything were to go wrong, evidently this precaution seemed to actually cause an accident, rather then prevent it.

The driverless cars that Google have created are amazing machines. They use radar, lasers and cameras to drive the car safely to its desired destination. Google is developing these cars to help with traffic and prevent accidents, this recent accident proves that human error is a problematic factor in everyday driving.

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Leo’s Got Karma

by michael July 16th, 2011 - No Comments »

It’s always nice to see celebrities take action for what they believe in. Some celebrities are against fur and animal testing, others try to help poverty-stricken areas and some are environmentalist.

There are lots of perks to being famous, one of which is money but more importantly, you’re known. Your face alone can sell people on things, that influence alone gives you immense power.  One of the biggest things I’ve seen here in Los Angeles is the Prius Effect. I don’t know what sparked it but lots of celebrities started buying Toyota Priuse’s and they became cool, now they’re everywhere.

This trend has started up again with Leonardo DiCaprio, he will be one of the first to have a Fisker Karma, the electric sports cars. Cars like these are great, it’s amazing that people are swapping out their twelve cylinder Lamborghinis for EV’s like the Tesla Roadster and Fisker Karma.

In my opinion these cars are the revolution for electric vehicles. You have to make something appealing in order to make it popular and with cars its all about the styling and performance.

 

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It’s Not The Car, It’s The Driver

by michael July 13th, 2011 - No Comments »

When you think of good gas mileage, your mind normally goes to cars like the Toyota Prius and other hybrid electric vehicles; however, Top Gear recently proved it’s not so much the car as it is the driver.

The test that Jeremy Clarkson does, proves that driving aggressively in any car will kill your MPG’s.  In the video you see a car being pushed to its limits(Prius) and a car trailing it (M3) go 10 laps on a circuit.

This video really demonstrates that if you get an efficient car, you have to drive it efficiently. It’s been proven in the past that having a heavy right foot in an electric car will lower your range, which makes sense. More output requires more energy, watch the video to see the surprising results.

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Hybrids Will See Gridlock Soon

by michael June 29th, 2011 - No Comments »

California is now taking away the privilege of driving in the carpool lane from hybrid drivers. For the last 6 years Hybrids getting more then 45mpg, like the Toyota Prius and Honda Civic Hybrid, received a yellow sticker allowing them to hop in the carpool lane and bypass traffic. This used to be an added incentive for people who were considering a hybrid electric vehicle but now the standards are changing.

New regulations will only allow a select few to zip by the carpool lane. The lucky few will be plug-in electric vehicles like the much anticipated 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In. These new electric all stars will now get a new Green decal to stick on their bumper to ride in the HOV lanes. Now that this incentive is gone, 85,000 hybrid drivers will join California’s gridlock traffic.

These drivers, who once laughed as they silently coasted by in peak traffic, will have to honk and wait with the best of the gas guzzlers. I suspect these new regulations will skyrocket any new plug-ins hitting the market in the next several years, especially in Los Angeles.

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Driverless Cars Will Soon Share The Road

by michael June 24th, 2011 - No Comments »

Ever since the first cars left the assembly line, they have always needed a driver. Today, man is no longer needed to pilot his car. Google has been working on unmanned cars and have already logged more then 140, 000 miles on California roads. This new technology is considered artificial intelligence and uses GPS and other sensors to drive and safely navigate the car to its destination.

Sebastian Thrun, who is the project leader for Googles Endeavor is very enthusiastic about this project.  He quotes “Do you realize that we could change the capacity of the highways by a factor of two or three if we didn’t rely on human precision on staying in the lane but on robotic precision, and thereby drive a little bit closer together on a little bit narrower lanes and do away with all traffic jams on highways.”

His point is very valid, with most accidents being caused by human error, eliminating that factor opens up so much untapped potential. I cannot wait to have a robotic chauffeur and zip through my daily commute with no traffic. Nevada has already authorized this technology in a recent bill, hopefully others will soon follow.

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1,000,000 Prius’s On US Soil

by michael April 6th, 2011 - No Comments »

In 2008, Toyota announced that it had reached 1 million worldwide sales of its Prius hybrid. Then in 2010 it reached 2 million sales around the world, today Toyota announced that 1 million Prius’s have been sold in the U.S. alone. It’t no wonder why where ever you go you will always see a Prius. Here in Santa Monica, you cant see more then 10 cars without one being a Prius, thats probably why Toyota has filmed there most recent commercials in Santa Monica.

Prius’s have saved Americans around  881 million gallons of gas, $2.19 billion in fuel costs, and 12.4 million tons of CO2 emissions, when compared to the average car. We cant wait for the new hybrid and plug-in arrivals Toyota is set to release.

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Prius Commercial shot in Santa Monica!

by michael January 19th, 2011 - No Comments »

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For the 10-Year Prius Anniversary Celebration, Toyota decided to thank their loyal Prius owners with impromptu carwashes.

They took to the Santa Monica streets bright and early with a car washing crew and two Prius Plug-ins. Once they washed the cars, with minimal water and eco-friendly soaps of course, they were off scouting for our next drive-by. With loads of Prius owners in Santa Monica, it wasn’t hard for the Toyota Team to spot them. Owners gladly celebrated with the crew by receiving a free car wash.

Essentia was lucky enough to have a Prius parked out front when they washed one of the cars. At 47 seconds the blue Prius is outside of our store, but only for a quick second. We at the Santa Monica store were lucky enough to also check out the two Prius Plug-Ins they had, which get 100+mpg!!

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