Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/388498
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 28 SEPTEMBER 2014 MOTORING 46 AFTER the Geneva show, car com- panies tend to use shows to both gauge public opinion on the con- cepts and to keep their brand in the minds of the media. It's at these shows where press conferences tend to either lean towards the future of the car company or ram the latest model down our necks. In the lead up to the show a lot of car companies put out pictures and even details of the equipment in- side. In actual fact cars have never been so good, nothing much goes wrong with them, they start every morning. There are a few family hatch back cars with a faster 0-60 time than an race cars from the 80s so what is the future? If I really knew the future of cars I could make a lot of money sell- ing the info to the car companies because they don't know it either. It's not the driving dynamics or the engines because that tech is as good as it ever has been, it's all about the device now. Yes, mobile devices have intruded to every little private part of our lives and car companies know this so we see Apple joining up with Mercedes to put an iPad on the dash but there's a huge problem with this, will we be still using iPad's in 5-10 years' time? This car might be around in 30 years and what will the tech be then? You see nothing is moving faster than the mobile segment, even apps change overnight hence every time one connects to Wi-Fi their phone wants to update some app that I've forgotten was even on the phone. There's another problem, most apps, phones and tablets require your at- tention. They can be demanding lit- tle buggers, this won't work when it comes to driving because it's more important that you pay attention to the road than the latest tweet; so there's more tech on the way. Self driving cars is the next arms race in the car companies, this will mean that you can get on with look- ing what your friend had for break- fast on Instagram or seeing what someone is trying to sell you on Facebook and all of it while the car looks after the driving bit. That's the theory anyway but in practice you'll probably jump into the back seat for a sleep and just let the car take the strain because people are a bit stu- pid when it comes to trusting elec- tronic devices with out lives. It's already more than possible for a car to basically drive on its own, we already have radar guided cruise control and lane keeping in a stand- ard VW Golf so what's stopping the next step? There's some legislation changes to be made because cur- rently in most countries the law states that 'you must be in control of your vehicle at all times' and that means hands on the wheel and we all know how slow legislation is to change. Another factor is insurance. If you're lying down in the back seat when the crash happens who's fault is it? Yours, the car company's or the little black box of tricks that was doing the driving? There's also the human equation to consider, we are erratic and unless every car on the road is driving it's self then there will always be the problem of unpre- dictability. With sites like kwik-fit offering personal accident cover, it still begs an interesting question for the future, how insurance is going to change with these self-driving cars. You see, computers aren't very good at predicting what humans will do next especially on the road and that ultimately will be the downfall of the self driving car, some people like to drive and others see it as a means from A to B either way it'll be an uphill struggle for the car tech- nology of tomorrow. ACCORDING to USA Today hydrogen cars have several advantages over gas powered, elec- tric vehicles or hybrids. These cars are fueled by a chemical reaction between hydrogen and air, which produces electricity. Called fuel-cell cars, major manufacturers, such as Toyota, Honda and Hyundai have already introduced or will be introducing hydrogen cars into the consumer marketplace. Drawbacks The two obvious drawbacks to fuel-cell cars are cost and convenience. The price tag for hydrogen-powered vehicles will vary by manu- facturer and available options, but is expected to be significantly more upfront than what consumers can currently pay for either gas or hybrid vehicles. Hyundai's fuel-cell powered, mid-sized Tucson, for example, has a lease price of $499 a month and there is a $600 a month price tag for Honda's gas-powered FCX Clarity luxury sedan, which has been leased since 2008. Fuel is included in the lease price, however, which makes the overall price compa- rable to a gas-powered vehicle. Because many cities do not even offer sta- tions that can refuel these vehicles, purchasing a hydrogen-powered car will not be an option for many consumers. California, for example, a state known for its support of nontraditional power vehicles, had only nine fuel-cell stations as of 2014. Overtime, however, as these vehicles become more popular, the number of stations where consumers can refill will exponentially increase. Costs are expected to decline as man- ufacturing processes become more efficient and streamlined. Advantages Owners of hydrogen-powered cars don't have to worry about running out of juice while they are out on the road, as do electric vehicle own- ers. While electric cars need to be repowered after about 100 miles, hydrogen vehicles run for hundreds of miles on one fill up of compressed hydrogen. Charging electric cars takes multiple hours, while refueling a fuel-cell vehicle takes only about five minutes. While there are few available refueling stations, hydrogen-powered vehicles do not need as many physical stations as do gas, electric or hybrid vehicles due to their short changing time and lengthy time frame between charges. Statisti- cal analysis suggests, for example, that 68 stations can easily fuel 10,000 fu- el-cell cars. Fewer stations means more real estate will be available in crowd- ed urban areas, which is an unexpected advantage. Because they are under legislative mandates to increase the sale of zero emission vehicles, many state and local agencies, such as firefighters, para- medics and police offic- ers, may begin to drive fuel cell vehicles. This extra up front expenditure can be balanced by refurbishing and maintain- ing existing vehicles so entire product lines last longer. Companies such as those at Firetrucks Unlimited, rise to this challenge, offering com- mercial vehicle sale and repairs. Legislation may drive the infrastructure. Cali- fornia will have to build the infrastructure nec- essary to support fuel-cell vehicles if it wants to meet its legislative mandate that at least 15% of new vehicles sold in this state in 2025 produce zero emissions. Hydrogen-powered vehicles are an excellent way to meet this mandate as these vehicles earn double emission credits in comparison to electric vehicles. MOTORISTS' ability to concentrate on the road falls dramatically while talking on a mobile phone even if they are using a hands- free device, a study has found. Drivers registered almost a third less infor- mation about their surroundings, including road signs and other vehicles, while speak- ing on the phone than when driving unin- terrupted. Phone users' awareness of the road dropped even lower when higher levels of attention were required, for example to read illumi- nated signs. There was no difference in performance between drivers using Bluetooth kits, ear buds, telephone loudspeakers or their phone held to their ear. Neuroscientists from Strasbourg Universi- ty questioned 3,500 drivers at a service area on the A11 motorway between Paris and Chartres in France. The participants were asked a series of questions about signs, monuments and oth- er vehicles they had passed during the previ- ous 50km, some of which were red herrings. Motorists who admitted to having used their phone were able to recall 30 per cent less information overall, and 50 per cent less for events which required a sustained level of attention – such as reading a flashing sign. Some 40 per cent also claimed to have no- ticed "decoy" events which never occurred compared with nine per cent of other driv- ers. Prof André Dufour, who led the study, said: "Asserting that a non-existent event was seen indicates a very vague perception of the road environment, resulting in a random en- coding process in the brain." A second set of tests conducted in a labora- tory found that drivers' performance dipped significantly when speaking on the phone compared with talking to a fellow passen- ger. Participants made 50 per cent fewer eye movements when using the telephone, which could explain the narrowing of vision highlighted by previous studies, researchers said. They also spent more time in the passing lane, made more sideways movements and had significantly slower reactions than driv- ers who conversed with passengers. Analysis of the volunteers' conversations found that those speaking on the phone took 12 per cent longer to respond to questions, suggesting that conversations were more distracting when the speaker was not with the driver in the car. Patrick McLoughlin, the Transport Secre- tary, recently suggested he could double the penalty for using a mobile phone while driv- ing from three points to six. Bernadette Moreau of the VINCI Auto- routes Foundation, which commissioned the study, said: "The constant search to optimise one's time, including while trav- elling, leads many drivers to perform tasks that have nothing to do with or even disturb their driving. This is the case for telephone conversations regardless of whether they are made with or without a hands-free kit." Could self-driving cars really be the wave of the future? Fuel-cell cars: the next wave in automotive technological advances Hands-free phones still distract drivers