KeriBlog

Cars, Security & a Peek into my Life

Refresh VS Redesign – What’s the Difference

Sounds similar, but there’s a huge difference:

Refresh = slightly updated from the previous model year
Redesign = all-new from the ground up

How to know which it is? Use the 5-year Test – typically, a vehicle is redesigned once every five years.

Read it online at Autonet.

Use this to your advantage when shopping, because all-new doesn’t mean it’s all-better (see last 3 paragraphs)

Favourite line:

Say to the salesman: Next year the car is being redesigned, so who is going to want this year’s model? It’s about to become outdated, so give me a better price!

Back to ‘Keri on Driving’ – Index

 

 

All Vehicles Must Contain These Features

From posts and seats, to manuals and lights, all passenger vehicles must contain certain features according to the CMVSS – Canada Motor Vehicle Safety Standard.

I read the handbook, here’s the more interesting ones:

Read it online at Autonet.

Favourite line:

I saved the saddest for last – the note that horn emits must be a sound associated with a  warning device, meaning musical tunes are not allowed. 

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Back to ‘Keri on Driving’ – Index

 

 

The World’s Most Powerful 4-Cylinder Engine

That title goes to Mercedes-Benz and their  2.0L 4-cylinder turbocharged engine found inside the CLA 45 AMG.

355 hp
332 lb.ft of torque
0-100 km/h in 4.6 seconds
Top speed – 250 km/h
Engine is hand-built, start to finish, by one technician

Starting at $50,600
Sold out in Canada

(pictured above is a CLA 250, but the AMG looks similar enough, with the main difference being the badge on the back)

(non car nerds: AMG is Mercedes’ line of high-performance vehicles, see this chart)

(to be clear – the post title refers to a “production engine found in a consumer vehicle”)

(I did not mean for this post to have so many brackets)

 

 

Audi’s Night Vision Assistant

It’s Audi’s Night Vision Assistant.  Neat eh. And crisp, look at those buildings.

Below is Bay Street.

See the time? 4:30pm, the sun hasn’t gone down and it still works.

The yellow rectangles are pedestrians. If there’s a risk of collision, the highlighting turns red and an alarm sounds.

How it works:

It uses a thermal imaging camera, aka an infrared (IR) camera, mounted in the grille.

It can detect pedestrians up to 90m away. Turn the system off via a hard button.

Came up with an idea – a car appears almost all-white when it’s fully loaded with people. Therefore I could use this tech to find 18-wheelers being used for human trafficking, tada.

And that’s me about to get hit.