Car Tuning,Car Finance,Auto Loans

Archive for September, 2009

Whether you are playing a show or just practicing, you should tune your acoustic guitar every time you play. Playing an out of tune guitar is not fun. Beginners can become frustrated with learning because they do not understand the importance of acoustic guitar tuning. The few extra minutes it takes to tune your guitar is always worth it.

It’s best to use an electronic tuner for acoustic guitar tuning. Sit down with the electronic tuner on a nearby table or stool. Turn it on and strum the first string. The tuner will sense which string is being tuned using its built in microphone. The indicator will show you how close you are to the correct pitch. It will also show you whether you are sharp or flat. Turn the tuning key and tweak the string until your tuner shows that you’re in tune.

Always remember to tune up. This means going from loose to tight until the string is in tune. If you go too tightly and then loosen the string slightly to put it in tune, this is referred to as tuning down. It is always best to loosen the string and then re-tighten it to put it into tune. Tuning up keeps the string in tune in a much better fashion and the results are more precise.

If you don’t purchase an electronic tuner, you still need to have a reference for pitch when playing acoustic guitar. You can use another guitar, a piano, tuning fork or an MP3 that you are certain is already in tune. Acoustic guitar tuning with an electronic tuner will consistently provide reliable tuning. But if you choose to tune the traditional way then use an electronic tuner to test your results. This is a great way to learn to develop your ear.

The sixth, or E string is the place to start acoustic guitar tuning. Be sure to tune it to the reference pitch, and after you have it tuned, the other five strings can be tuned to that note. Simply follow the tune. There is a lengthy reason for how and why this works, but it’s not necessary to know how a car works to drive it. Under that same theory, extensive musical knowledge isn’t required in order to perform acoustic guitar tuning.

Then proceed with your acoustic guitar tuning as follows:

1. After verifying the guitar is in tune, play it on the fifth fret. Use that as a basis to tune the open fifth string.
2. Using the fifth string as a guideline, play the fifth fret on that to tune your fourth string.
3. Use the fifth fret on the fourth string to tune the third.
4. Pay close attention here, because there is a bit of a change. The third string should be played using the fourth fret to tune the open second string.
5. Changing it up again- return to playing the fifth fret, only using the second string this time, to tune the first string.

Before you try acoustic guitar tuning for the first time, have an experienced player show you the ropes. The best place to learn is probably the music shop where you bought your acoustic guitar. After a few tries, you’ll get the hang of it. You have to put time and effort into mastering the skill of acoustic guitar tuning. It’s a whole lot easier for someone just starting out to use an electronic tuner instead. Since they only cost about $20, they are well worth their price. What’s more, if you choose one that was manufactured especially for use with guitars, it can actually let you know which string you’re playing too.

Camber is probably the most useful and popular alignment adjustment that can be made to a street car. The other alignment adjustments are toe and caster, which I have covered in accompanying articles. Camber is the angle of the wheel from the vertical as viewed from the front or the back of the car. Negative camber means that the top of the wheel is leaned in towards the car, and positive camber means that the top of the wheel is leaned out away from the car.

Maximum cornering force is achieved when the camber of the outside wheels relative to the ground is about -0.5 degrees. A slight negative camber in a turn maximizes the tire contact patch due to the way the tire deforms under lateral load. Hence, it is good to have some negative camber to increase cornering force.

Another reason why it is helpful to align your suspension with a slight negative camber is that camber will change with suspension travel and body roll. Most suspension systems are designed so that camber increases with more suspension travel. However, camber relative to the car’s chassis is not the same thing as camber relative to the ground. It is camber relative to the ground that affects handling. Therefore, even though camber relative to the chassis is made to increase, camber relative to the ground may actually decrease on the outside wheels if there is substantial body roll. To counter this tendency, it is important to use negative camber and to control body roll.

The only drawback to negative camber is increased wear on the inside of each tire. Since the top of the wheel is leaned in, the car is riding on the inside of the tire while it is on straightaways. In a corner, suspension travel and lateral forces on the tire’s rubber compound combine to straighten the tire relative to the ground. Therefore, the car rides evenly on the tire in turns, which improves cornering ability. However, extra time spent driving on the inside of the tire causes that part of the tire to heat up and wear. This effect is small if you avoid adding too much negative camber.

On most street cars (which use a MacPherson Strut front suspension), camber is not easily adjustable. However, if you choose to purchase aftermarket camber plates, you can set camber to improve handling. More negative camber tends to increase tire grip in corners. Therefore, if your car experiences understeer, you can decrease front camber (make it more negative) to improve front grip or increase rear camber (make it more positive) to decrease rear grip. Remember not to add too much negative or positive camber since it will decrease the life of your tires and may cause a blowout. Even pure race cars rarely use more than about 3 degrees of camber. As with any adjustments, make camber changes in small increments, and make sure to test the setup so that you can see the results from each specific change.

Visit my website for more information about camber adjustments:
http://www.240edge.com

If you are looking to get car finance and you have bad credit, it’s likely that you have quickly discovered how difficult it can be. Many people go through this and is definitely an obstacle to be overcome. It is however, very doable if you know what car loan companies that you can apply with and get approved by.

One of the benefits of using the right company, is it saves you a lot of time. You’re able to get approved faster, you’re able to get approved for more car and with lower payments. You get a higher interest rate if you go through the company that mainly deals with people that have good credit, then you will if you deal the company that works with bad credit. Secondary finance lenders will you need to be working with if you want to get the best deal while having credit problems.

When arranging your financing in advance, which is the best option, you are able to know what your payments will be ahead of time. This can be a big relief. Rather than picking out a car, and having to haggle down your payments to something that is affordable, you can simply have all of that arranged ahead of time. One of the biggest mistakes that car buyers fall into is getting caught up in the payment negotiation game at dealerships. It’s better to focus on the actual price of the vehicle that you’re buying, rather than payments. That way, you know what you’re really paying as it’s difficult to discern the total amount when just negotiating payments.