Annotated Bibliography Kameron Moshier

1. Anderson, Jessica. "Bargains In Used Cars." Kiplinger's Personal Finance 64.6 (2010): 75. MasterFILE Complete. Web. 21 Feb. 2014. -In this article, Anderson goes over some tips when buying a used car. This whole idea is important to my topic because while used car buying in general is a big step in the developing of the automotive industry, it also addresses the other side of my topic and that is watching out for modifications. Anderson says in the article buying a certified used car these days is a necessity. She explains that this is so because the automotive brands themselves will now take a used car, and they will complete very thorough Inspections of the car. This means that a consumer can be a little less stressed when looking for a used car because rather than buying an uncertified used car, the buyer now doesnt have to worry as much about the way the previous owner treated the car, whether its with personal modifications or if its just how the person maintained the car. 2. Bae, Yong-Kyun, and Hugo Bentez-Silva. "Do Vehicle Recalls Reduce the Number of
Accidents? the Case of the U.s. Car Market." Journal of Policy Analysis and Management. 30.4 (2011): 821-862. Print.

-Bae and Benitez-Silva address how recalls work and how they affect the automotive world. In relation to my topic on how the automotive world has developed and how modifications affect cars, recalls play a big part in the way cars have developed over the years. The article explains that before recalls became a big thing for automotive companies to issue, big problems occurred. Consumers would be left responsible when their vehicle would have an issue that is a factory fault and on a bigger note, accidents where a lot bigger of a problem then they are today as recalls become more common. The article explains that with a 10 percent raise in recall rate for a particular model of car, the number of accidents with that car are dropped by between .78 and 1.6 percent. Recalls are becoming a big thing with any car producer today and in 2010 alone, 20 million vehicles where recalled in the United States. Bae and Benitez-Silva agree that as long as drivers stay on top of recalls if they are issued by their cars manufacturer and the actual companies take the responsibility to issue the recalls, roads will be safer and less money will be wasted by their consumers when an automotive issue is NOT their fault. 3. Li, Shanjun. "Traffic Safety and Vehicle Choice: Quantifying the Effects of the arms Race on
American Roads." Journal of Applied Econometrics. 27.1 (2012): 34-62. Print

-This article goes into to the second of my main topics for this assignment and thats how cars have developed in terms of safety. The article discusses how peoples individual choice on what kind of car they buy can affect their and the rest of the publics safety when on the road. According to Li in the article, the amount of larger personal vehicles such as SUVs, Pickups, and passenger vans on the road increased from 17% of all vehicles in 1981 to 50% of all vehicles on the road in 2006. This is a fascinating statistic considering how cars have developed in just over 20 years form simple passenger cars to

a larger number of large vehicles for personal use not only commercial use. More than just the fact that these larger vehicles are more common, a big suggested reason why these vehicles are more common is that they are known to be safer if in an accident while driving. Most modern cars have pretty extensive safety features today, but being in a larger car is thought by many to be even safer, the only issue that is discussed in this article is that although it may make it safer for those in the larger vehicle, the more of these that get on the road, the more in danger people in smaller cars can be. The main point in this article though is showing the development of cars overall through safety and through how available larger cars are today. 4. Machrone, Bill. "Quick & Easy Car Upgrades." PC Magazine 25.16 (2006): 83. MasterFILE Complete. Web. 20 Feb. 2014. -This article discusses DIY or Do It Yourself mods that can be done to cars. This article displays DIY job ideas like a backup camera, a collision detector, and a G force reader. These are all beneficial mods that can be done by pretty much any normal car owner. Machrone explains in the article the great thing about anything Do It Yourself, is that anybody can do it, regardless of skill level. This is in fact true. Many mods of this kind to cars come with types of instructions that can make it easy for even the most amateur of car moders to do these jobs. Machrone mentions his friend who didnt know a thing about doing car modifications who was able to put a simple license plate frame on his Honda and he felt more accomplished than ever. This is also true, doing things to cars can ignite the smallest bit of passion one has for their own car, it just takes a little effort. This article talks about only beneficial mods that can be done to a car so it fits into my assignment topic. 5. Peters, Eric. "Modifying An Emission-Control Car And Staying 'Legit'." Consumers' Research Magazine 85.3 (2002): 31. MasterFILE Complete. Web. 19 Feb. 2014.
- This article is about what modifications can be done to cars while staying legal. A big

thing this article discusses, opposite to what was discussed in the article by Machrone. Here Peters talks about the risks that can be faced when doing a DIY modification to cars when one isnt careful of the outcomes that can come from a certain mod. For example, Peters explains tampering with any emission control units in a car is a big no no. This relates to a lot of times when people try to remove components of cars like the Catalytic Converters to make cars louder. Peters continues saying if a car owner messes with/removes components from the factory that keep a car legal in terms of emissions, they can expect to fail inspection next time they go to get their vehicle inspected. The article tries to advise against obvious mods that change the car from its stock appearance. 6. Moshier, Kameron. Top Gear. Charlotte. February 1-2 2014. Observation. In this document, I observed three different episodes of the BBC hit show Top Gear. In the observations I noted many different elements of cars and how theyve developed mentioned by the hosts of the show. The hosts on the show talk often of how cars have developed and changed over the years. Besides this a big thing the hosts do on the show is they compete in many challenges in which they must

upgrade or modify cars. This is important to my entire topic because modifying cars is a very big element in how car works. In my topic, I discuss how modifying cars affects them and in Top Gear they often put this to the test. Many times they do ridiculous modifications to the cars that significantly impact the way the cars work and run. They do mods that many normal people would consider ridiculous! Another big thing about Top Gear is that they go really into the passion for cars that I went into a lot in assignment 1. But aside from the passion everything that is being investigated in my assignment 2 is normally covered on various episodes of Top Gear and on various cars.

7. Sopena, C, P.M Dieguez, D Sainz, J.C Urroz, E Guelbenzu, and L.M Gandia.

"Conversion of a Commercial Spark Ignition Engine to Run on Hydrogen: Performance Comparison Using Hydrogen and Gasoline." International Journal of Hydrogen Energy. 35.3 (2010): 1420-1429. Print. -I chose to include this article because it explorers a whole different kind of modification to cars that really affects every aspect of driving the vehicle. The authors of this article talk about converting a normal Volkswagen Polo 1.4 Liter spark ignition fuel injected car into a car running on hydrogen. The authors mention that with certain things done to the engine of the polo like changing the timing of the engine (which reduces the possibility of getting a potentially deadly condition to an engine called spark knock,) changing some of the air intake parts that allow air into the engine, and also doing a lot of work to the components that would normally deal with the gas in the car, now being hydrogen. One of the larger points presented in the article is that although the engine was a lot more environmentally friendly that the normal gas powered spark ignited engine, the engine as expected was still not very efficient in terms of performance with the authors saying the engine is able to meet the requirements of a normal gas engine, and in some instances like brake efficiency exceed the gas engine, but there are areas of flaw. With this said the vehicle was still able to reach a speed of 140 km/h and still did produce some of the same performance specs of the 1.4liter gas engine. This really relates to how modifications, even to an engine can affect a car. 8. Bernstein, Viv. Nascar Continues to Be Strict On Car Mods. LexisNexis Academics. Section D pg 4. June 27 2007. -I chose to include this article for one of my sources because altought NASCAR isnt addressed too often directly in my overall topic of Top Gear, being a NASCAR fan myself I know how important the modifying of cars is in the sport. The article addresses how often NASCAR officials have to penalize drivers and their teams if their cars fail pre race inspections. Explained here, this is because the modifying of a car especially a car thats only purpose is racing can extremely impact its performance. For example here the author states that numerous teams where fined extensively before the Daytona 500 during inspections for thought to

be modified front bumpers on the cars. This is how big modifying cars is in relation to the cars performance. This is why things like inspections are even required in NASCAR because think if a modified bumper will do this much, think about a modified engine in a car. This article helps prove how much any kinds of modifications form stock settings to a car can affect them, whether its on a race track or a normal road. 9. Valdes-Dapena, Peter. "THE FUTURE Of CAR SAFETY ...IS HERE." Money 38.11 (2009): 114. MasterFILE Complete. Web. 27 Feb. 2014. I chose to include this article as one of my sources because it addresses modifying cars to make them safer. These mods are being in the factory normally but never the less, they are indeed changes being done to cars that are dramatically improving the safety of cars on the road. The article mentions how many brands (BMW and Audi being one of the first) have started including things like lane detection systems when changing lanes that actually display a small warning light on the mirror of the car normally whenever the driver is changing lanes and there is a car that he or she cant see. Another detection system that has made huge improvements in vehicle safety is the warning system when you actually may be about to hit something and some cars now can even stop themselves. This on top of or combined with blind spot warning sensors is a huge improvement in safety in cars compared to previous years. The biggest point in this article that is mentioned by Valdes-Dapena is that these great normally pricy safety features normally found on luxury brads like Mercedes, Audi, or Volvo can now be found in average Joe car brands like Ford. This article mentions how amazing safety changes in cars are that now the car can sense trouble to really provide the driver with the highest quality safety. The fact that more and more brads are using these methods is just a perk! 10. Twigg, Martyn V. "Progress and Future Challenges in Controlling Automotive
Exhaust Gas Emissions." Applied Catalysis B, Environmental. 70.1 (2007): 2-15. Print.

-This article discusses the final of my points on what modifications or changes to a car can do and thats the cars impact on the environment. This article talks about how a cars catalyst system (exhaust) can affect how much the car impacts the environment when talking in terms of harmful gases, much like how cars that get better fuel economy (often small diesel engine) impact the environment significantly less than a car that runs on a normal gas engine. The big thing talked about in this article is how newer cars use a new system of catalysts that is a three way catalyst chamber rather than a single catalyst like many older cars. The main importance here mentioned by Twigg is that the cars that use a three way catalyst system release A LOT less carbon monoxide emissions from the car over the lifetime of the car when compared to a car with a single catalyst system. The article mentions that controlling of these pollutants being released started actually with engine modifications in cars but it was quickly realized that this isnt enough. The catalysts are where a lot of the complex chemical reactions in a car takes place resulting in the harmful pollutants being released through the exhaust

in cars. It is a very complicated modification to do to a car since the catalyst is like the chemical plant of a car but changing the single catalyst to a three way does appear to make a big difference in how a car impacts the environment around it according to Twigg.