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Marco Bianchi

Articles by Marco Bianchi

Home, DIY & motoring writer · View profile

· 4 min read

Car Lease vs Buy: Which Costs Less Over Time?

Leasing means lower monthly payments and endless flexibility; buying costs more up front but leaves you owning an asset. Here is how the total cost really compares.

· 14 min read

Financing a Motorhome Is Not Financing a Car

The loan is written like a car loan and behaves like a mortgage on an asset that loses value like a car. That combination opens a negative-equity window measured in years — and the number that decides the purchase is the cost per night of use.

· 18 min read

Compression Ratio, and What Actually Limits It

Efficiency rises with compression ratio, so why do petrol engines stop around 12:1? Because compressing a charge heats it — r to the power of gamma minus one — and above a certain temperature the unburnt end gas lights itself.

· 13 min read

Rolling Circumference Decides More Than You Think

The speedometer is the famous consequence, and the least expensive one. The same number sets your odometer and therefore your lease bill, your effective final drive and cruising rpm, and what the ABS believes about wheel slip.

· 11 min read

The Fuel Saving That Is Not Linear

Going from 10 to 20 mpg saves six times more fuel than going from 30 to 40, over the same distance. The reason is that fuel used is the reciprocal of fuel economy — and it changes which vehicle you should replace first.

· 15 min read

Fiscal Horsepower Is Not Horsepower

Several European countries tax cars on an administrative power figure that nobody has ever measured — it is the output of a formula, the formula differs by country, and it has been rewritten more than once. Here is what each market actually taxes, worked through on one car.

· 12 min read

Headlight Aim and How Far You Can Actually See

A dipped beam is aimed downward by a fraction of a degree, so its reach on flat road is a single division. Do it and you find that at motorway speed the beam is shorter than the stopping distance — and that a loaded boot can throw the whole calculation away.

· 13 min read

Tongue Weight Is the Number That Stops a Trailer Swaying

Towing limits tell you whether you may hitch up. Tongue weight tells you whether the combination will stay straight. It is set by where the trailer's centre of gravity sits relative to its axle, it moves faster than anyone expects, and the recommended bands are not the same on the two sides of the Atlantic.

· 13 min read

Where the Weight Sits Decides How the Car Behaves

Two axle weights and a wheelbase give you the exact position of a car's centre of gravity. From there the arithmetic keeps going: how much weight braking moves forward, why the rear axle is the one that runs out of grip, and why a load behind the rear axle takes weight off the front.