Karl Pilkington doesn’t get many perks from Ricky Gervais and Steven Merchant. When he was tasked with travelling Route 66 in America for his series An Idiot Abroad 2, Karl was hoping for a nice flashy convertible in which to enjoy his journey. Instead, Ricky arranged a Smart Car for him.
The Smart ForTwo Cabrio is actually a great little city car, if not entirely suited to a long road trip like the one Karl Pilkington completed on An Idiot Abroad. This convertible Smart car is agile, small, comfortable, safe and eco-friendly – finding a parking space in this car is super-easy. It also looks pretty cool too (and pretty small alongside a monster truck as seen on An Idiot Abroad!). Karl’s Smart car was a convertible in white. He was filmed driving along Route 66 with the top down and the top on at different parts of his journey, and the serial complainer didn’t seem to complain much about this car.
AlcoSense is a portable breathalyzer designed specifically for the UK market. Drink driving is a serious offence that can lead to loss of driving license, a lengthy prison sentence not to mention the risk of injury or fatality to you, your passengers, other road users or pedestrians. Even if you have only consumed 3 or 4 glasses of wine in an evening, you could still be over the limit 12 hours later. AlcoSense allows you to quickly and accurately test your level of intoxication and warns you whether you are near or over the UK drink driving limit.
AlcoSense featured at The Gadget Show Live recently, and it received a glowing review from Channel Five’s motoring programme Fifth Gear where it received praise for it’s accuracy – in the test, which you can see in the video below, the reading on the AlcoSense unit exactly matched that of the official police breathalyzer – making AlcoSense a breathalyzer you can trust.
Impressed by AlcoSense? We are. They have a range of breathalyser products to suit your budget.
Top Gear is back on our screens for a new series. One of our favourite parts of the show is the ‘Star in a Reasonably Priced Car’ segment, where Jeremy Clarkson interviews a celebrity and then tells them their lap time. Recently, guests who have driven the reasonably priced car have included Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz, John Bishop, Simon Pegg and Amber Heard. But what is the reasonably priced car, how much does it cost, and how can you buy one?
Since mid-2010, the Top Gear Reasonably Priced Car has been a Kia Cee’d. It is a front wheel drive small family car. It’s got a Euro NCAP 5 star safety rating and comes with a long 7 year warranty. It also looks good as it powers round the Top Gear Test Track every week. Jeremy Clarkson describes it as the Kia C apostrophe D – the only car with an apostrophe in it’s name.
You can request a brochure, or a test drive of the Reasonably Priced Car as seen on Top Gear by clicking here
The Marin Northside Trail Bike was the second of this week’s Something for the Weekend gadgets and one that got a big thumbs up from presenter Tim Lovejoy. The Marin Northside is apparently exceptionally light for a mountain bike and allows you to do amazing tricks, or just carry it around easily if you’re not into attempting 360 degree stunt jumps on it.
It costs around £625 according to gadget guru Seema Parmar, but we’ve found it for £599.
The GoCycle was the first of this week’s Something for the Weekend gadgets. At around £1200 the Go Cycle is not cheap, but it’s perfect for a commute to work if you don’t want to get too sweaty. Something for the Weekend gadget expert Seema Parmar explained that the Go Cycle had an electric boost function allowing you to go up to 15 miles per hour without pedalling – great for travelling uphill or against the wind.
The GoCycle is designed so that the chain and the internal mechanics of the bike are protected by an outer shell. This also protects your clothing from getting caught up in the bike chain. Tim Lovejoy said the GoCycle works really well. A red button on the handlebars turns the engine on and off.
Katie Melua appeared on The Gadget Show to help test several in-car entertainment systems. The highest rated system according to Gadget Show presenter Jon Bentley was the Kenwood DNX-9240BT. Despite being the most expensive of the three systems at around £1300, the Kenwood delivers the best sound quality, pretty good video playback and a very good sat nav interface, making it the Gadget Show in-car entertainment system of choice.
The new Formula 1 season is back this weekend for a new season, and back on the BBC after a long stint on ITV. The season kicks off in Melbourne with the Australian Grand Prix this weekend. Defending F1 champion Lewis Hamilton will have his work cut out this season with the McLaren team really struggling for pace in practice.
British F1 fans needn’t despair however, because Jensen Button has a real shout this year with his new team Brawn GP – Jensen has been leading the pack in practice sessions in Barcelona and should be a real F1 title contender this year. Brawn GP was borne out of the old Honda team, and run by Ross Brawn formerly of Ferrari. Others likely to be challenging for pole position are Robert Kubica of BMW, Fernando Alonso, Kimi Raikonnen and Felipe Massa.
Betting on the F1 Australian Grand Prix this weekend is easy with Paddy Power – there are a range of bets to choose from.
Top Gear DVD called The Great Adventures Volume 2 features the Botswana Special (Director’s Cut) and the Vietnam Special from the hit BBC2 motoring show. See Top Gear presenters Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May take on tough terrain and different cultures in different vehicles as they encounter the Kalahari desert, the Makgadikgadi salt pans and other African wonders in the Botswana Special. Then watch as they attempt to cross the entire country of Vietnam in just 8 days using only motorcycles.
Top Gear the Great Adventures Volume 2 is a great addition to the DVD library of any motoring or Top Gear fan – it contains plenty of motoring-related thrills and spills.
Navman Wireless were the subject of a special feature on today’s Working Lunch. Navman Wireless provide vehicle tracking devices and software, and mobile messaging. In today’s credit crunch climate companies are looking to cut costs and run as efficiently as possible. Navman Wireless sell tracking devices that can be installed into company vehicles so that the company can see exactly where their salesmen, managers etc are at any given time and can track their route throughout the working day.
Navman Wireless combines satellite technology with the internet to pinpoint their tracked vehicles. Even if it seems a little ‘Big Brother’, the Navman Wireless should improve the efficiency and cut the costs of businesses with several company cars on the go.
The Boomboarder electric skateboard, Boom Border or Boom Borda 2 Junior Electric Skateboard to give it its proper name, was the third of this week’s Something for the Weekend gadgets. The Boom Border 2 is bigger than your average skateboard, but what really separates it from other skateboards is that it is electric powered. It comes with a handheld remote control for speeding up or slowing down. Direction is controlled as on a normal skateboard by shifting your weight in the appropriate direction. The Boom Boarder 2 Junior Electric Skateboard is around £150.
