Category: Automotive

According to the Arab Times, 7,543 citations were issued by the surprise General Traffic Department campaign this past week. I was super close to getting a violation myself the other day because of my car tint but I guess my tint wasn’t as bad as others since I was allowed to pass through the checkpoint.

I really think car tints should be legalized or at least light tints where you could still see who’s inside the car. Something dramatic must have happened recently for cops to crackdown down this hard on car tints and I’m curious to know what.

Anyway, these campaigns do benefit everyone and they do make the roads safer but because the campaigns last a week or two it’s a temporary fix and not long term. I’ve recently noticed a lot more people are running red lights and to me those drivers are a lot more dangerous than car tints. But, on the bright side I heard they’re going to be installing a lot more red light cameras so that’s a good thing.

I just read on the Qabaq blog that the new Range Rover Evoque is now available in Kuwait with prices starting at KD16,500 for the 4-doors version and KD17,500 for the coupe. Not bad at all. [Link]

I’ve seen drifting videos similar to this before but I hadn’t seen one with this much street traffic nor one showing the view from inside the car. I’m glad we don’t have that crap here. [YouTube]

I got the following email from one of my readers:

I just witnessed the most stupid and careless accident I have seen in ages. It happened on the Gulf Road maybe 2-3 km before Kuwaiti towers going towards Kuwait city around 10.30 am today.

I was driving on the slow line ..maybe 70 – 80km/h. The road was not very busy.

There was a car coming on the fast line with a speed of maybe 85- 90km/h …it was rather slowly passing me, so could not speed much for local standards. Out of this car on a passenger seat there was a guy hanging out through the open door having a great fun!!! I swear, I was about to reach my phone to take a picture when he fell out !!! He rolled good couple of times on the road and was laying there. His head was pouring blood and I am pretty sure he must have broken few bones. He was conscious though, but must be in shock. Luckily the car driving behind managed to stop just before him, otherwise he would drive over him.

I’m not sure what to say or who to put the blame on. It’s obviously the fault of the guy hanging outside a fast moving car but I’ve seen so much crap on the Gulf Road I wonder sometimes why there isn’t more law enforcement monitoring it. But then there is the problem that law enforcement a lot of times don’t enforce the law either. On a number of occasions I’ve seen people run a red light right in front of a cop without fear of being stopped. If people are running red lights in front of cops then that’s a sign there is a major issue here. Hopefully the person didn’t suffer a serious an injury.

A company in the US called ICON asked themselves a question, if they were to revisit the classic FJ40 how would they improve on it? They kept the same classic styling but gave it modern performance and the result is the ICON FJ Series. Someone needs to import these cars to Kuwait like right now! [Link]

A friend of mine shot the picture above yesterday of a Chevrolet Traverse with a speed camera in the back. Previously the ministry were using GMC Envoys and tiny Suzuki Jimny’s with cameras in the back to catch speeders but now we’ve got to keep any eye out for one more kind of car parked on the side of the road.

This is the sequel to Jetski on the road.

Thanks Kasia

Last week just before Eid I was able to get a hold of the new Audi A1 from the dealership to test drive over the holiday. I had been nagging them for a test drive since June but since I wanted the car for more than a day I wasn’t able to get my hands on it until now. I’ve always had a thing for hatchbacks but I also got interested in Audi’s recently and even more so after watching Truth in 24 which is a need to watch movie if you love cars.

The car a fuel efficient 2.0l engine pumping out 122hp which doesn’t sound like much on paper but in reality I found the car pretty zippy. That probably has a lot to do with the 7-speed automatic gearbox that comes standard with the car. The first day I drove the A1 I was actually pretty annoyed with the gearbox since whenever I stepped on the gas pedal for just a bit more power the car would dramatically drop down 3 or 4 gears which I thought was overkill. But, by the second day I had gotten used to it and started appreciating the gearbox a lot more. It’s very smooth and really does make the engine power more readily available which is why the car felt zippy. Still 8 gears is a lot of gears and if you use the paddle shift then you’ll be doing quite a lot of clicking.

I’m around 6 feet tall and found the car cozy with a very adjustable seat and steering column. It was actually pretty comfortable… that is as long as you’re sitting in the front. The car is a 2-door and I tried sitting in the backseat and found it too claustrophobic for my size. I wouldn’t mind sitting in the back for a 5 or 10 minute ride but I definitely wouldn’t want to sit there for a trip down to Bnaider. The trunk is also pretty small, you could fit one large travel bag but barely. But since it’s a hatchback the back seats fold down and you end up with a much larger carrying capacity.

Tech wise the car I drove came with LED lights which I think helps give the car an eye catching look. The car I drove didn’t have navigation (it’s an extra option) but it did have a popup screen and a pretty good sound system which comes with two SD card slots to use for MP3s. You could also purchase an iPod cable or even stream music from your iPhone to the car using Bluetooth which is what I was doing most of the time.

Overall I had a lot of fun with the car. I drove it all the way to the junkyards at the end of the 6th ring road and even through Bin Khaldoun Street traffic so I managed to experience a wide variety of environments. It’s easy to maneuver as a hatchback should be but the car also feels really well built with a nice thick steering wheel and great feeling buttons and nobs. Most importantly the car looks great which at the end of the days is probably the most important thing. The starting price of the Audi A1 is KD6,995 but the car I drove costs KD8,995. If you’re interested you can call them up for more information on 1811118.

I passed this scene earlier today but right after they had managed to put the jetski back on the pickup truck. I didn’t really know what had happened until I spotted this picture on the Al-Mubarkia blog. It fell off in a pretty dangerous location since it happened coming down a bridge so it’s not something you would have spotted ahead of time. [Link]

If for some reason I accidentally hit that bus from the rear I could easily imagine getting decapitated. Why are buses allowed to have their rear engine cover open like that? It’s not the first time I’ve seen that and I’m guessing they do it to keep their engine cool but that’s no excuse.

The partial opening of the 1st Ring Road got postponed because they forgot to put up signs so until the project fully opens here are shots of a 1st Ring Road model that will give you an idea of how it will look like once completed.

Thanks Cyril

Shouldn’t wearing sunglasses while driving be illegal as well?

Thanks Musaed

A reader emailed to tell me that the First Ring Road is going to open up tomorrow but I didn’t think it was true. I passed by the other day and it didn’t look like it was going to be finished but according to an article on Kuna the road and bridge should be open to the public tomorrow. Weird. [Link]

Thanks Q8 Mods

I could clearly make out the Durango’s license plate in the video above and it’s 8-60971. So this brought up an idea. Instead of stopping and impounding cars with lightly tinted windows, why doesn’t the Ministry of Interior assign one police officer to check YouTube for illegal and dangerous racing videos and impound those cars and arrest those reckless drivers instead? [YouTube]

A friend of mine had his car impounded last week because his car was tinted. Another person in the forum also posted about how his car also got impounded because it had tint… a colorless invisible tint. I am pro-tints since in our weather they play a very important role. But why are the authorities making such a big deal out of tints to the extent of impounding the cars?

The weather in the summer gets extremely hot and car tints help reduce the temperature of the interior considerably. My FJ is tinted and because of the tint I no longer have to worry about parking the car in the sun or about having my thighs burn from the sun while parked at a traffic light. The tint makes a HUGE difference and I really can’t imagine my car without one. Other than the major benefit of reducing the interior temperature, car tints also offer privacy.

If you’re a girl and you’ve ever been on the Gulf Road at night you obviously know how irritating it can be having guys hovering around you in their cars trying to hit on you. Car tints offers the girls privacy which keeps them safe. If a guy can’t see the girl inside clearly he’s very unlikely going to try and harass her.

Of course I am against those complete black out tints that degrades visibility but not everyone does that and those who do should probably have their car impounded. But what about us regular people who just want some protection from the blistering heat or a bit of privacy? Why are car tints illegal in Kuwait?