Your Horn Honks in the Key of F and Other Interesting Automobile Trivia

When the person driving in front of you doesn’t notice the light has changed and you have to honk your American car horn, you’re actually serenading the slow driver in the key of F.

While this wasn’t always the case—many early American car manufacturers widely used E-flat and C—this has been true since the 1940s. That was when General Motors standardized car horns to the key of F to simplify GM’s parts line.

As an automobile parts manufacturer, Ficosa has come across a variety of interesting facts about cars and car parts that are both amusing and interesting.

Car Manufacturing and Repair

Here are some interesting tidbits about building and repairing the trusty automobile:

1. Drivers ignore about $60 billion worth of car maintenance issues every year. Ironically, by not having these simple problems fixed, we create $180 billion in what would have been unnecessary repairs over the same period.
2. The new car smell we all adore originally was a result of the early plastic, vinyl and leather treatments used in the automobile’s manufacturing. However, with the changes in the manufacturing process, the smell is now often only piped into car interiors as a marketing tool.
3. The most common reason a check engine light comes on is because of a sensor error, and it’s usually an oxygen reading sensor.
4. The average automobile has about 30,000 moving parts.

Driving and Traffic

What’s a list without some amusing anecdotes about driving and traffic:

1. It would take an automobile driver nearly a month to drive to the moon at 60 miles per hour.
2. The average American driver spends two weeks of their life waiting at red lights (we know it seems longer).
3. Most of us sing along with our car’s audio system. That’s right, 90% of us are automotive singing superstars.
4. We waste 3 billion gallons of fuel while sitting in traffic worldwide every year. That’s the equivalent of 50,000 Space X launches. No wonder Elon Musk wants us all to drive green cars.
5. While cars are built for driving, the average car spends 95% of its life parked.

The Automotive Industry

And what list about automobiles would be complete without some trivia about the creative process:

1. While we may marvel at how fast NASCAR pit crews change out parts, the fastest engine swap was done on a Ford Escort in 1985 by five United Kingdom Royal Marines on a BBC show called, “Record Breakers,” and took 42 seconds.
2. Speaking of the British, about 75% of all Rolls-Royce luxury cars ever produced are still operational.
3. A Cleveland man invented the modern steering wheel in 1896. Bicycle manufacturer Alexander Winton came up with the idea to replace the tiller and give drivers more control.
4. A woman named Mary Anderson came up with windshield wipers in 1903. We guess she got tired of having to stop every few minutes on rainy days to wipe off the windows by hand.
5. Henry Ford is the reason we call maintenance on a car a “tune up.” He came up with the idea when he noticed that the coils on his first vehicle prototype were at their most efficient when they buzzed. He compared tuning a car to make this buzzing sound to tuning a piano, and the phrase stuck. 

So, there you have it. Some interesting facts to keep you entertained and intrigued. If you have some interesting automobile trivia to impart, we’d love to hear from you!