Driving less than 7,500 in the course of the year makes you eligible for a low-mileage discount with your insurance carrier. You can save even more money with discounts if using public transportation on a regular basis during the weekdays.

2. Use your auto only for personal purposes

Most insurance carriers will increase your premium or add additional coverage (and price, respectively) for driving more due to business purposes. But if there’s no way to avoid the business use of your auto, you should inform your agent or broker about it, to make sure your vehicle is properly covered in all cases.

3. Raise the deductible

Deductibles and insurance rates are inversely related – the higher is your deductible, the lower is your annual rate. And by raising your deductible from $250 to $500 you will be able to save up to 15% on your rates. On the flip side, you will have to pay more from your pocket if an accident takes place.

4. Monitor your credit rating

Your credit rating is one of the key factors influencing the premium you will have to pay, as insurance companies use it to determine how risky you are as customer. The better your credit score, and the cleaner your record is of due credits and unpaid bills, the “safer” you are considered and the lower your rates will be.

5. Safe driving helps

Having no tickets or car accidents in your driving record for a period between three or five years (depends on the insurance company), will give you really good insurance discount. Getting even one minor speeding ticket can boost your insurance rates up to 10% higher.

6. Buy a less risky auto

Auto insurance companies all have different ratings for evaluating the risk factor of a vehicle, However, most insurance carriers agree in defining sports, muscle cars, flashy and exotic vehicles as being high risk objects, because they are most common targets for theft and vandalism, and also because the owners of such vehicles tend to drive aggressively and risky in general.

7. Move to another place

Living in an urban area is definitely comfortable and convenient for most of us. But living in an urban area will make insuring your car a lot more expensive than in rural areas. Heavy traffic, high theft rates, accident risks – these are what cities are known for, and that’s exactly what makes insurance rates considerably higher in much more populated places across the country.

8. Have a garage

Storing your auto in a garage means that it’s less likely to be hit by another car, stolen or vandalized. Some insurance companies will offer a small discount if you keep your car in a garage.

9. Increase the safety of your vehicle

Most insurance companies tend to offer special discounts to drivers, who install security devices on their cars such as automatic seat belts, anti-lock brakes, airbags and anti-theft systems. The more secured your car is against theft or vandalism, the more likely you will get a discount.

10. Do some comparison shopping

If you are looking for a new policy or already have one, there’s no better way to get cheap car insurance than shopping around. Make sure to get as many quotes from different companies as possible and compare not only the prices but the amounts and types of coverage too.

Tinkering with cars began long before Detroit caught up and the younger generations need for speed did not go unnoticed by major automakers. Management at GM, Chrysler and Ford finally recognized the changes in auto buying tastes.Unrecognizable to the “guru” in the automotive industry, this cultural revolution was due, in part, to the growth in the population of the youth. Family friendly cars were not desired by a growing market came from the hot-rod culture of the 1950s. More powerful cars is what this new customer wanted and the Big 3 in Detroit would have to deliver.Convenience and size was the trend as families grew larger along with automatic transmissions, power steering, power brakes and other creature comforts. With all these extras the additional power from larger engines was being reduced. Autos needed more power to retain the status quo of the new power hungry market.A conundrum – how to build more powerful engines with more cylinders – this already began in the late 40s when manufactures followed the lead of Ford and began building V-8 power plants. However, Ford’s flat head design was now antiquated, a new design for combustion chambers was needed.Chrysler’s Hemi engine was a direct result of WW II when their engineers were experimenting with hemispherical combustion engines as an attempt to gain extra power from tank and aircraft engines. The Hemi engine design became the logical choice when Chrysler began introducing their V-8 in the 1951 model year. Detroit’s hottest engine resided in the top-of-the-line Chryslers offering 331-cubic-inches and 180-horsepower.In 1955 Chrysler redesigned the Hemi not putting out 300-horsepower with a pair of dual four-barrel carburetors and now it was time to place that engine in a car that offered some style moving away from the family car stodgy look. This job was left to Virgil Exner, a top auto designer. The result was Chrysler’s C-300, low, sleek and of course, fast “muscle car.” The problem with the C-300 was it wasn’t affordable for the market seeking “muscle car” status from Detroit.In 1957 the dual-four-barrel version of Ford’s 312 Super V-8, called the E engine, which offered 270 horsepower in street trim. However, the E engine no longer occupied the top spot in the Thunderbird’s engine hierarchy. For 1957 Ford also offered an F version of the 312 featuring just one Holley four-barrel carburetor in place of the E engine’s pair, that carburetor breathed through a McCulloch single-stage, centrifugal-type supercharger. In street trim, the blown 312 produced 300 horsepower, but there was much more power available for the clever tuner to unleash.With the F model, Ford had produced a 3,000-pound rocket, a genuine muscle car, but one that fail to connect with the buying public.Chevrolet had greater success reaching the younger “muscle car” market by offering more affordable performance. The V-8 Chevrolet was the first to bring a truly affordable overhead-valve V-8 engine to the mass buying public. In the fall of 1954 Chevy introduced a of cars they called the “Motoramic Chevrolets.”Their newest engine, called the Turbo-Five V-8, didn’t quite meet today’s more impressive specifications for muscle with a 265 cubic inch engine capped by a two-barrel carburetor producing only 162 horsepower, just more than one-half that of Chrysler’s top-of-the-line Hemi. However, smart buyers knew they were looking at something special.Chevy’s overhead-valve design, with its stamped lightweight rocker arms and no rocker shafts, gave the engine potential to produce greater horsepower. Chevrolet engineers immediately began mining the new engine’s potential, developing a “Power-Pack” option consisting of a four-barrel carb and a dual-exhaust system that increased horsepower to 180.The new Chevy Super Turbo-Fire V-8s too the car straight from the showrooms to the racetracks.In 1956 Chevy upgraded the Super Turbo-Fire engine to 205 horsepower. The 1956 Chevy with a Power-Pack was an inexpensive, stylish car that could barrel through the quarter-mile in 16.6 seconds, making it one of the strongest performing cars on the market.Chevy’s own engineers proved this when they released a Super Turbo Fire featuring a pair of four-barrel carbs forcing their fuel charge through valves operated by solid lifters. This engine produced 225 horsepower. A special edition of the Super Turbo Fire V-8 used Duntov camshafts, increasing horsepower to 240, making it Chevy’s strongest engine yet.In 1957 Chevy produced their most radical engine, a 283 cubic-inch V-8 fed by a Rochester Ramjet fuel-injection unit. The injection unit consisted of a two-piece cast-aluminum manifold incorporating tuned ram tubes running to the intake ports. Air and fuel metering equipment mounted on the side of the lower casting measured and injected air into the intake plenum just ahead of the intake valves.Individual nozzles metered fuel into each cylinder. Through this system proved to be finicky and difficult to start, it pushed power output to true muscle car levels. With hydraulic lifters, the “fuelie” produced 250 horsepower. When filtered with the side lifters and pop-up 10.5:1 pistons, power jumped to 283 horsepower, achieving one horsepower per cubic inch in an American engine.With the fuel-injected 1957 Chevy, General Motors had almost perfected the muscle car formula. Ford, GM, and Chrysler all made noble attempts to serve the youth market in the 1950s. About the time they would perfect that craft in the following decade, there would be a waiting market of young car buyers.

Muscle cars were certainly not intended to be valuable. In fact, the complete idea behind muscle autos was to make them inexpensive along with fast. Muscle cars ended up stripped-down versions of the most utilitarian, cozy, and basic mass-produced cars to ever roll out of Detroit.These types of rattle trap, bare bones, raw devices were built to adapt to a price point with small regard given to sophistication or even longevity, and aimed directly at the youth market. Which market couldn