Riding the winter out

A/C maintenance for cars

Brace yourself, winter is coming. And many car folk have found out to their dismay that a car AC that was working fine till November refuses to blow cool air when summer is back. Instead, it starts blowing warm air into your face reminiscent of a sweaty man standing too close to you at Ekushey Boi Mela.

Here's a surprise fact: Car air conditioners often break down over the winter due to lack of use. Sounds counterintuitive but it's not. When put into use, the AC circulates refrigerant and oil through the system which in turn keeps rubber seals and hoses soft and flat. Without circulating, rubber seals break down and leaks could form. Prevention is quite simple. Run your AC periodically in winter. Heck, it sure beats the cold outside considering most of our cars have disconnected heater hoses. The AC should keep the interior less cold than outside. The AC also dehumidifies and prevents the windows fogging up when there's more than one person in the car.

Surviving fog on two wheels

Fog in Bangladesh is a sudden, freaky occurrence. It gets terrifying just outside the cities because everybody else uses the road like a game. And there are goats wandering the streets as if they are in a mid-life crisis.

The most important tips of riding in fog or any low visibility conditions: see and be seen. How?

Make yourself visible: Wear jackets with reflective strips on them. A lot of hardware stores and motorcycle accessory stores sell high visibility jackets. It's well worth the several hundred taka.

Low beams if you have it: Most modern bikes have high and low beams. Keep them low so that you see the road more clearly. High beams reflect off the moisture droplet in the air increasing the glare and making everything more difficult to spot. Avoid HID kits for winter or rain because the extra brightness causes excessive glare when reflecting off droplets. They make everything go blindingly white. AIm the lights low towards the ground.

The best lights? Yellow fog lights/bulbs. It's the color that is least stressful on the eyes and lights up everything evenly without unnecessary glare.

Remember: Fog lights aligned too high are a nuisance at best and quite dangerous at worst for other road users. Be responsible.

Originally published for Shift in 2015. Repurposed for this issue.