• more about

    #qotd

    What Car Puts You To Sleep Quicker Than Tryptophan?

    What Will You Drive When You're 70?

    What's The Dumbest Thing You've Done For Speed?

    read more: #questionoftheday, #qotd

    How Smart Is Your Car?

    While hardcore enthusiasts would rather not spare weight, most consumers are yearning for smarter cars with as many electronic gadgets as possible. To find out where your car falls we've developed this quiz answering: "How smart is your car?"

    This test is divided into eight sections. Add up the points in each section and use the handy Jalopnik rubric at the bottom to discover just how smart your car truly is. If you have multiple features in a section (say ESP and ABS) add them both into to the total. If your car is controlled by your iPod, you get to start with 100 points.

    1.) Engine
    Variable Valve/Cam Control (VTEC, VVTI): 5 points
    Electronic Fuel Injection: 3 points
    Mechanical Fuel Injection: 1 point
    Carbureted: 0 points

    2.) Ride/Handling/Brake Control
    Launch Control: 10 points
    Paddles: 5 points
    Dynamic Stability/Ride Control: 5 points
    ESP: 3 points
    ABS: 2 points
    Just A Steering Wheel: 0 points

    3.) Navigation
    Realtime Traffic/Weather: 10 points
    GPS: 5 points
    OnStar: 1 point
    KeyMap: 0 points

    4.) MMI Interface
    Voice-Activated: 5 points
    Touchscreen: 3 points
    Dials: 1 points
    Push-Button: 0 Points

    5.) Entertainment
    Sync: 15 points
    Full iPod Control: 13 points
    DVD Player: 12 points
    Aux input: 11 points
    Sat Radio: 9 points
    CD Player: 7 points
    Cassette: 5 points
    AM/FM: 3 points

    6.) Communications
    Wireless Internet: 15 points
    Voice control: 10 points
    Hands-Free Bluetooth: 7 points
    CB Radio: 5 points
    Electric-Roll-Down-The-Window: 4 points
    Roll-Down-The-Window: 3 points

    7.) Instrument Display
    Heads-Up Display: 10 Points
    Full LCD: 10 Points
    Partial LCD: 5 points
    Electronic Speedo: 4 points
    LED Display: 3 points (Black Gooold!)
    Warning Lights: 2 points
    Clock: 2 points
    Odometer: 1 point

    8.) Hybrid
    Full Electric Vehicle: 10 points
    Extended Range Electric Vehicle (Volt): 8 points
    Full Hybrid (Prius, Fusion): 5 points
    Partial Hybrid (Malibu): 3 points
    Internal Combustion Only: 0 points
    Two Internal Combustion Engines: - 5 points

    9.) Safety
    Airbag: 2 points each

    The Answer Key
    60+ Points: HAL 2000 - "I'm sorry Dave, I can't drive you there"
    50-59 Points: CYLON CAR - "Silly humans, you don't want to go there"
    40-49 Points: R2D2 - "Beeep beeep boop boop"
    30-39 Points: JOHNNY 5 - "Your car is alive, man!"
    20-29 Points: RoboCop - "I'm half man, half machine"
    10-19 Points: The Six Million Dollar Man - "We have the technology, we can rebuild him"
    Less than 10 Points: HUMAN - "The smartest car of all, only controlled by the human brain"

    So, how do you score?

    (QOTD is your chance to answer the day's most pressing automotive questions and experience the opinions of the insightful insiders, part-time pundits and gleeful gearheads making up the Jalopnik commentariat. If you've got a suggestion for a good "Question Of The Day" send an email to tips at jalopnik dot com.)


    Send an email to Matt Hardigree, the author of this post, at matt@jalopnik.com.