Malaysiaminilover

Author: Angelina Soul

  • Steps to buy a used car

    There are steps to know when buying a used car either from private seller or direct owner. With the help of technology, many car owners can now direct upload their advertisement to the internet with little cost or totally free. This has bring a lots of freedom for shoppers to direct purchase a used car from owner without have to pay extra cost for used car dealer’s profit.

    However, when there is expediency, there is difficulty. Scams could be happened when an advertising company neglects to filter out the scams advertisement. Therefore, here are some steps to follow when buying a car either from private seller or used car dealer.

    Step 1 Get a vehicle report of the car

    Once you have known which car you would like to purchase, you can easily get a vehicle history reports from either CARFAX or Autocheck through internet. These reports are less than $30 dollars but it buys you a certainty. It tells you the title information of the car (normal, salvage, or junk), accident history, lemon history, number of owners, or any flood damage history. All these information are worth for just $30 dollars.

    Step 2 Check out the car

    Three don’t, don’t have a hungry stomach when viewing the car, don’t view the car at night time, and don’t go with empty hands. Here are few things to check:

    Car body: Look carefully each of every part of the car body and see if there is any dented part. A car that had any accident before will not have smooth texture. This is because some car paint shops just restore the car with some cheap skills like knocking or using suction cups to restore dented area, and then paint the same color. You should also check the car color whether it is consistent. Inconsistent body color means some part has been fixed before. Alternatively, you can also use a small piece of magnet to see if the car body has a major repair before. If there is any part that the magnet doesn’t stick, it means that part has been repaired with non-magnetic material like filler.

    Car engine: Open the car hood, pull out the dipstick and see if the engine oil is at the right level. If it is not, it means the owner did not really maintain the car well. See also if there is any oil leaking around the engine. For example, transmission oil, engine oil, coolant, or brake oil. Not to forget to check the engine number, it must match with the document. Other than that, check if there are any broken parts like cracked hoses.

    Car body/chassis number: Check the VIN number. VIN (Vehicle Identification Number) must be match with the document, CARFAX report or grant.

    Windshield: Often windshield look like nothing wrong in a good tinted. Check properly to see if there is any cracked or small hole at every piece of glass on the car.

    Car wheels and tires: Common sense will tell you if it is a new tire. Check each wheel and see if there is any unbalance. If one tire looks newer than another, that literally means the alignment and balancing of the car is not in good condition. You can use a ruler or a coin to check the tire thread.

    Car interior: Bad car that always park under sunlight or under rain will not have a nice smooth dashboard. Check the dashboard color and also check if there is any fracture on it. Check also if all the lights and electronics are working in proper condition.

    Car carpet: Most of the people overlook this especially when buying an older car like 1999 or earlier car. Remove the carpet and see if there is any hole underneath, if there yes, give up the car. See also if the carpet is still in good form. A few pieces of car carpet or floor mat could cost up to 100 dollars.

    To get into more details, see what to check when buying used cars.

    Step 3 Time to test drive

    Do not feel pity to the car while you test drive. Try running it up to 80-100 km/h and feeling if there is any shaking or weird sound. See some of the symptoms of worn automatic transmission here. Do not give too much of love to the car by driving 20-30 km/h but we did not advice you to rape it over 100 km/h too. After been driving for a while, stop the car and open the car hood with the engine running. Don’t touch anything with your own hand and just try to smell if there is any burning or smoke or check for splattered oil.

    Step 4 Make a down payment or deposit

    Ask the same thing in three different shops will not waste your money. Try to look for other seller with the same model of car you want before making your decision. Once you have made your decision, you need car bill of sale. Write down all the promises clearly in the bill of sale and the selling amount. The down payment shouldn’t be too much and it should be around 1-3% of the car amount. This is because you will still have to bring the car for inspection. What if the inspection failed and the owner not willing to return the deposit to you?

    Step 5 Bringing the car for inspection

    This is depending on buyer and seller. Some buyer does not prefer to pay any deposit or down payment until they confirmed the car is clean and able to transfer the ownership. In this case, buyer and seller will have to bring the car go to inspection together. If the seller trusts the buyer, the buyer can bring the car for inspection alone. In Malaysia, it is a must to inspect the car at Puspakom before you can transfer the ownership of any vehicle.

    Step 6 Transfer of ownership

    Now the inspection is done and you have confirmed that the car is ready to transfer the ownership, you can pay the balance to the seller and transfer the ownership. If you are getting a car loan, you will have to wait until the loan is approved and the money is transferred to the owner, and then only transfer the ownership of the car. Happy dealing!

  • Most expensive exotic car crash made up by eight Ferraris, a Lamborghini, and three Mercedes

    People who love cars must step into Japan once in a life time for sure to see all the exotic cars and how car enthusiasts rape their cars. Yesterday, 14 exotic cars destroyed and crashed in Japan motorway pileup, marking the most expensive exotic car crash in history with eight Ferraris, a Lamborghini, three Mercedez-Benz, a Toyota Prius, and possible a Nissan Skyline. The estimated total cost involved in the crash worth more than a million dollar.

    In Japan, most of the Ferrari cost more than US$100,000 except older Ferrari 550 Maranello or Ferrari Testarossa. With eight Ferraris crash together, the combined value is already more than a million dollar excluding the Lamborghini and three Mercedes. Base on the pictures we can see from AP and video from NTV, some of the Ferraris can said to have total loss. The amount for the damage is yet uncountable.

    How could this happen? The exotic drivers were actually heading to Kyushu from Hiroshima and this was supposed to be a perfect exotic car convey. However, one of the Ferrari drivers, a 60-year-old man tried to change the lanes he is driving and hit the median barrier. Other Ferraris that follow from behind apply the brakes immediately and some other cars tried to avoid but things were happened too fast. Cars behind collided when trying to avoid hitting the first Ferrari, end up a tragedy for exotic car enthusiasts.

    Reports said that one witness told the news that they were speeding and end up they were gathered together in a mess. It took six hours for traffic police to clean up the mess. There is not much of information from Police in Yamaguch. However, from the pictures and video, it is roughly a Ferrari F360, F512, F355s, and a F430 Scuderia.

    Mitsuyoshi Isejima, an executive officer for Yamaguchi prefecture expressway told Bloomberg, “It was a gathering of narcissists”.

      

  • Volvo P1800: An iconic car that may be forgotten

    Volvo P1800

    The Volvo P1800 was one of the most sought-after sports cars in the ‘60s. It is also considered as the first Volvo sports car after the Volvo P1900 went into production as a tragedy. Why we say the P1900 is a tragedy because only 68 cars produced and 5 among the 68 was prototypes, that means only 64 were sold to consumers. However, it has become a history and most of the Volvo P1900 is now either stay in museum or some classic car collector’s garage.

    Unlike the P1900, the P1800 was a huge success with more than forty thousand units sold across the world in between 1961 and 1973. Let’s talk about the car and not just the number. It is the car that makes us think is this car been forgotten by most of the people today?

    There are four types of 1800 from the year of 1961 to 1973 including the P1800 (1961 to 1963), 1800S (1963 to 1969), 1800E (1970 to 1973), and 1800ES (1972 to 1973). Well, you can forget about the 1800ES because it is a coupe station wagon and it doesn’t really spark out interest with its all-glass rear door. It is a little bit look alike with the new Honda Brio.

    What about the performance of the car? Each of the models is pretty much the same except each generation the car receive a better power from 100 hp (1800) to 108 hp (1800S) and then to 130 hp. From 0 to 100 km/h, the Volvo 1800S took 9.5 seconds which is one of the car that goes under 10 seconds in the early ‘70s. Due to this reason, the 1800S gets a little more luck to receive four-wheel disc brakes.

    What about the outlook? Without a single word, it is a piece of beauty in automobile history. The design of the car has successfully catch people’s eye wherever the car go even on the road today. The radio of the front part where the engine place and the rear is just so perfect. It also has a very nice silk roof that goes all the way down to the rear boot with a perfect angle just like a hot girls with 36, 24, 36 body. You will 100% attract by the outlook. Not to mention the car also has a little fin tail at the back which looks like Batman’s Batmobile.

    With less than fifty thousand cars sold across the day, not much of the Volvo P1800 left surviving on the planet today. This is also the reason why the price of this car is keep on increasing as one by one has gone throughout time. We hope this iconic car will not be forgotten and there should be more gathering day for the Volvo P1800 after the Viking Classic Auto Show held inFrancein 2010. Volvo, For Life.

  • Why the Volvo S60 and S80 don’t fully hit the Asian market?

    Why the Volvo S60 and S80 don’t fully hit the Asian market? Why we say so? This is a research purely done by us and it has nothing to do with Volvo or any other statistic. In fact, it is really an interesting research and may be Volvo designer can think of this when designer the new car.

    If you are living in Asia (mainly China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, Bhutan, Vietnam, Cambodia, Brunei, India, Indonesia, Korea, Laos, and some other Asian countries with lots of Chinese), you may notice that majority of the rich or whoever can afford a luxury car prefer to go for Mercedes-Benz, Audi, BMW, or some other car brand which has the similar performance and price with the Volvo S60 or Volvo S80. Why?

    The Volvo S60 or the Volvo S80 is no doubt a good executive car that fit most of the large family. The price is also reasonable after all the taxes in those countries mentioned above. The S60 was first introduced in year 2000. The performance, durability, and safety are 100% without a doubt that no one would not go for this car. However, it is the design of the rear car that has a little problem with Asian especially Chinese based on our research.

    If you notice, the rear view of first generation of the Volvo S60 (2000 to 2009 model year) and Volvo S80 are unfortunately, similar to the traditional coffin of Chinese people. With no offense, but Chinese are one of the most superstition people on the planet and they would not prefer to drive a coffin on the road. Try to look at the rear view of a Volvo S60 on the left and traditional Chinese coffin here on the right.

    We have done a research by asking some of the Asian drivers “What do you feel when you look at the back of a Volvo S60?” Most of the answer we get is “coffin”. It is mainly the tail light that makes majority Asian people think like that.

    The current second generation Volvo S80 (2006 until present) is still have the feel of Chinese coffin. As for the new generation of Volvo S60 that introduce in May 2010, it is a success. It totally changed the design and this time, we believe it will give a big hit not only to Asian market but whole world.

  • Peugeot RCZ

    Peugeot RCZ

    There is a lot of “Wow! Wow! Wow!” when everyone saw the first debut of the Peugeot RCZ at the Frankfurt Auto Show in 2009. The reason why there are so many excitements is because Peugeot fans has been long waiting for something new, fresh, and different from the French auto maker. It has been long time since Peugeot built cars that really get their fans excited about. And now, the RCZ finally make all the car lovers feel like having level 1 drugs when looking at it and top level drug when ride on it. (more…)