Boyd Autobody & Glass Articles

If you were to get into your vehicle, drive down an empty street and pull into your neighbor's driveway, how many dangers did you face on the road?

You might say "none" but, in fact, you faced several. Fortunately, the rules of the road PLUS your safe vehicle, your safe driving skills, and your experience made those risks seem like none at all. You faced risks by not backing out of your driveway correctly, you might not have driven straight down the road or you might not have turned into your neighbor's driveway correctly.

That driving experience might be considered a "best case scenario" because there were risks but there weren't very many and they were quite minimal.

Now consider your average driving experience: If you...

Since we were all that age once, parents know that their children will probably drive unsafely

A parent recently told me the following alarming truth: His daughter admitted to him that she drives very unsafely when he is not in the vehicle with her. Although the statistics suggest that young male drivers will choose to drive unsafely more often than young female drivers, the fact is that both genders are learning to drive at an age where the respect and admiration of their peers can often trump their ability to make logical and safe choices.

Even in the hit show "Breaking Bad", meth cook Walt White and his wife Skyler are concerned about their son's safety when Walt buys his son a flashy new sports vehicle for his birthday.

So...

The Essentials For Students in College

When a parent sends their children off to college, they'll send them on their way with all of the essentials that these students need to live while studying: Clean bedding and towels, laundry soap, and an industrial-sized box of macaroni and cheese.

What about transportation?

If your university-aged child is bringing a vehicle to college, make sure that they will be safe while driving. The vehicles of college students might not be the safest or most reliable pieces of machinery on the road. So while you should be sure that they have clean underwear to wear, you should also make sure that they can get to and from class safely.

Give them the gift of safety by bringing their vehicle in for a...

So how can drivers drive more safely?

With thousands of collisions taking place every year on our roads, it's no surprise that many groups are trying to raise awareness and inspire people to drive safer: Governments, insurance companies, charitable organizations, and your friendly neighborhood Boyd Autobody & Glass shops are all trying to inspire drivers to be safer on the roads.

One of the key ways that drivers can be safer is to have a healthy respect for the unexpected

Here's what we mean: When we drive, we are bombarded with information every single second. We filter what we can and pay attention to the stuff that seems to matter most. Often, collisions happen because something out of the ordinary occurred and we didn't have time...

As parents, you are always helping your kids live better, smarter, safer lives

You remind them not to touch a hot stove and to look both ways before crossing the street. By the time they become teenagers, they want to do the opposite of whatever you tell them and they are heavily influenced by their peers. Reminding them as teenagers to be safe drivers doesn't always have the effect we parents would like it to.

Here's how you can teach your kids about safe driving even before they get their driver's license

So by the time they do become licensed drivers, they will have the basics instilled in their DNA.

Model safe driving. Kids watch their parents and imitate what their parents do (even years after… even during those...

The first vehicles didn't go very fast

In the late 1800's Karl Benz's Motorwagen achieved speeds of sixteen kilometres per hour. This may have seemed fast compared to horses, which walk at about six kilometres an hour and trot at about thirteen kilometres per hour. Ford's Model T could achieve speeds of about 70 kilometres per hour, which may have seemed breakneck in that era, but it's likely that they went much slower because the roads weren't paved and they were sharing the roads with pedestrians and slow-moving horses.

Fast forward to today

Today's vehicles are built solidly, can achieved speeds in the hundreds of kilometres an hour, they drive on paved roads, and many city roads and suburban plans are designed around the vehicle. With...

Among safe driving educators, it is easy to point the finger at young drivers as being the unsafest drivers

The combination of inexperience and peer pressure to occasionally do dangerous things is not a good combination when someone is behind the wheel.

However, that doesn't mean seasoned drivers are necessarily safer. Seasoned drivers can still be unsafe drivers… But for very different reasons. For seasoned drivers, it all boils down to habits. Seasoned drivers might start off with good habits but over time it is easy to become lazy and let some good driving habits disappear, or even to fail to keep up to the changing demands of driving.

Here are some of the top ways that seasoned drivers are unsafe drivers They fail to...

The commute home after work is, for most people, probably the worst 30 minutes of the day

You've had a long day at work, you're tired and hungry, everyone around you feels the same way, and the red lights are conspiring against you to keep you from getting to the only place on earth you want to be right now.

At these times, it's easy to feel road rage, to drive aggressively (and even vindictively) and to ignore the rules of the road in a desperate attempt to get home to your loved ones. This is a classic case of driving unsafely because of your mentality. You lose focus or focus on the wrong things and you can make poor driving decisions.

Here are some tips to help you change your thinking so you drive more safely and get home in a...

To Finance Or Lease?

If you are thinking about getting a new vehicle, one of the things you'll need to consider is whether you want to finance your vehicle or lease it.

Financing

Financing your vehicle is where you borrow the money to buy it. You pay regular payments to the lending company. Leasing your vehicle is where you borrow the vehicle and pay regular payments to the company lending it to you.

With financing, you own the car. If you cannot make payments, the lending company will repossess the car to try and sell it and recoup what they couldn't collect from you. With leasing, the dealership owns the car. If you cannot make payments, the dealership will repossess the car to try and recoup what they couldn't collect from...

When automobiles were first invented, they didn't have a lot of safety features on them

As more vehicles appeared on the roads and as speed limits increased, more safety features were introduced: Seat belts, airbags, crumple zones, heads-up displays, hands-free calling, safety glass, rearview cameras, and more.

What does the future look like?

How will advancements of the future change how our vehicles keep us safe? Here are some ideas. Obviously not all of these will definitely appear in our vehicles but some of them might. Who knows, maybe someone reading this article will be inspired to make vehicles even safer.

Vehicles that shut off prior to collision: One problem with collisions is not the initial collision but the...