We love hearing about people and companies who feel the same way about environmental responsibility as we do.

Recently we learned of The Plastiki, a project designed to raise awareness of the negative impact of post-consumer plastics on the Earth's eco-systems.  The central theme of the project is a boat made entirely from recycled PET drink bottles, that will sail from California to Sydney, Australia via the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a seething mass of post-consumer discarded plastic circling within one of the Pacific Ocean's largest gyres.

You can read about The Plastiki in our previous post here.  Incidentally, word out of the US is that the boat is now floating, testing and preparing to set sail for a March 2010 arrival in Australia.

But if you thought sailing across the Pacific in a plastic boat was impressive, then you'll be bowled over by this.

Australian documentary filmmaker Richard Pain is preparing to swim across the Pacific Ocean from Japan to California, 9000km's give or take.  Yes, he's swimming.  He's going to be swimming behind a boat that'll be towing a protective capsule that'll be in the shape of a PET bottle and made entirely OF PET bottles.  His route will take him through the same garbage patch that Plastiki will have visited some time earlier and he'll release the whole trip as a documentary.

His aim is to raise $1 million to donate to organisations engaged in trying to clean up the garbage patch as well as raise broader community awareness of the issue by doing something crazy and memorable.  Well Richard, we think you've nailed it.

Prep time is estimated at 12-18 months and the actual swim set to take around 40 weeks.  You can read one of the articles covering the recent launch of the campaign here (source: SMH)

While both Plastiki and the Pacific Swim (as it's dubbed) are bound to raise awareness about the impact of post-consumer plastic waste on the environment, our Repeat products also aim to change behaviours and attitudes towards plastic recycling in the automotive repair industry.  Our scope is narrower, but our message is the same.

In the midst of the debate over climate change and reducing CO2 emissions, it's vital not to ignore the unfolding ecological catastrophe being brought on by discarded and non-recycled plastic waste, one that we can see with our very own eyes.

The most amazing and confronting story has just crossed the news desk at Smart Automotive, which has special relevance to our own business.  It's a story that must be spread, because it brings to the fore a problem that's serious, undeniable and reversible yet, for some reason, we have little awareness of.

The Plastiki is a 60-foot catamaran, being constructed in a warehouse overlooking San Francisco Bay, to make a journey across the Pacific and - all things to plan - sailing into Sydney Harbour some time during March 2010.

What's so special about that?  The Plastiki is made entirely from PET plastic bottles, some recycled and some still in original form lining the frame and hull, for buoyancy. 12,500 bottles alone will line the frame of the boat.  It's the brainchild of David de Rothschild (a descendent of the Rothschild banking family) and is designed to highlight the ecological impact of PET plastic waste and raise awareness of the need to act now to arrest the growth of plastic waste, including reusing and recycling.  You should check the expedition website by clicking here.

Early into its journey, The Plastiki will set sail across what's known as the eastern pacific garbage patch, which is a mass of post-consumer rubbish in the Pacific Ocean, gathered by natural ocean currents (gyres) and an area at least twice as big as Texas (or New South Wales and Victoria, in Australia, combined).  Yes, you read it right; a rubbish patch twice the size of Texas, floating in the ocean.  Unimaginable enough, but most confronting is this: it's been discovered recently that the mass of plastic now exceeds that of plankton (the food source for thousands of species' of sea animals and birds) by a ratio of six to one.  That's sampled at the edge of the gyre too.  Therefore it's theorised that, due to the nature of the gyre, at the centre, the ratio would be much higher.  Take a look at this clip and we dare you not to be affected.

At Smart Automotive, we're very excited by the expedition for two reasons. 

Firstly, we share the same passion and similarities in our attitudes for making a positive impact on the environment.  On our own patch, we're doing what we can by using and encouraging the use of reusable, sustainable material.  Second, the expedition will complete its ocean journey in our hometown and HQ, Sydney Australia (after which the boat will be broken down and recycled again).  The boat's due to depart some time during November and we'll be following its journey closely as it heads towards its goals and our home, so visit us (or their site) often to get the latest.

In your line of business, there's a practical need and desire to protect customer cars while they're in your care.  It reduces your liabilities and protects your image as an automotive professional.  Smart Automotive fulfils this need in an environmentally responsible way and our Repeat seat protectors break new ground by being manufactured from 100% recycled PET bottles.  When you buy and use Repeat seat protectors for your workshop, business or franchise network then you're also doing your part to reduce the impact of PET plastic waste on the environment.

In our line of business, there's a lot of rational processes in making decisions.  There are high costs and squeezing margins, so you need to be crystal-clear about what to invest in that'll add value to the experience and satisfaction of your customers via the service that you give them.

To do that you want choices, features and benefits.  You also want to get all of the most valuable aspects in as few choices as possible, otherwise you end up spending more time thinking about what to do than actually doing it.

Although using guard and fender covers enhance your business image, also providing promotional value and additional revenue through merchandising, when used in your workshop they're an offset cost.  This means that they cost you up front but over time they will save you (potentially, significantly by reducing damage liabilities).

Once you've made the right decision to use them, you need to compare.

Apart from the style, colour and branding options we offer, our guard and fender covers incorporate all of the required features that are sometimes offered as options by our competitors.  That way your choices are down to the exciting stuff like choosing colours and print graphics.

So ask yourself of guard covers, are they made of tough, durable vinyl?  Do they have a soft, fleece backing to protect the paintwork?  Do they use sand-filled channels to hold them in place instead of magnets that attract metal fragments?  Do they have a tool channel on the top of the cover?  Do they have a generous overhang to cover as much of the fender on just about any car?  Do they have a wheel-arch cutout so the front wheels can still turn and not rub on the cover?  Are there cutouts at either end so they can butt up close to the firewall while clearing bonnet hinges, etc?  Are they available in a variety of colours?  Can they be custom-branded with your business name, logo or visual identity? Are they available in several styles, including single, 3-piece and 4-piece wrap around sets?

Compare our guard covers and sets to Brand X and if you can't answer yes to all of these questions, then contact us about the save part.

We recently launched our new Repeat seat protector, which is made from recycled PET bottles. 

Here's the story behind Repeat.  It's a longer post, but a really interesting one and worth the read.  To check out the Repeat seat protector, click here. 

Polyethylene terephthalate - commonly abbreviated to PET - is a thermoplastic polymer resin of the polyester family most commonly associated with food and drink containers.

Interestingly, though, it was initially developed as a material from which cloth (polyester, dacron and terylene) was produced and most of the world’s PET production still is for synthetic fibres (more than 60 per cent: think polar fleece, carpeting, sails and space blankets as well as for various industrial uses) with bottle production accounting for around 30 per cent of global demand.

PET was patented in 1941 by British chemists John Whinfield and James Dickson of the Calico Printers' Association of Manchester and the PET bottle was patented in 1973.

While most thermoplastics can, in principle, be recycled, PET bottle recycling is more practical than many other plastic applications. The primary reason is that plastic carbonated soft drink bottles and water bottles are almost exclusively PET, which makes them more easily identifiable in a recycle stream.

Recycling PET bottles saves 84 per cent of the energy it takes to make new bottles from raw PET, however according to a spokesman for a Sydney recycling centre, less than 10 per cent of PET bottles produced are actually recycled.

Given one PET bottle equals one PET bottle, theoretically, if every bottle was recycled, there would be no need to create new PET. That being said, the reality is the discrepancy between bottles produced and bottles returned.

The other issue is one of clarity. Over time, with multiple processing, the transparency is affected: in other words, the recycled bottles aren’t as clear. That can be an issue for food and beverage presentation in particular. Also, if a manufacturer wants a coloured bottle, they need a percentage of virgin material to keep the colour true.

Although PET production is an important segment of polymer production, it should not be confused with polyethylene (PE) or polypropylene (PP), which are both produced more throughout the world. PE is widely used, especially in the production of the plastic shopping bag while the fatigue-resistant and recyclable PP has a variety of uses including packaging, textiles, stationary, plastic parts, lab equipment and parts for automobiles.

Aside from Repeat^tm, Smart Automotive also uses non-woven polypropylene (NWPP) for its products. It is actually called non-woven polypropylene because the cross-hatched ‘pattern’ on the material is stamped on to make it look woven.

While the term ‘environmentally friendly’ implies that PET and polypropylene leaves no ecological footprint, that’s not entirely true. Obviously they are manufactured using fossil fuels and so contribute to greenhouse gas emissions. However, they contribute to waste reduction (because they’re recyclable) and the movement away from one-use products, which means the ecological impact is smaller than that of similar alternatives.

Check out our Repeat seat protector and make an enquiry today.

We've been at the Great Race, the Bathurst 1000, where we launched our latest product to the media.  Apart from being an iconic event on the international motor racing stage, the move by V8 Supercars to E85 Ethanol fuel (made from the molasses by-product of sugar refining) provided the perfect angle from which to launch our new Repeat seat protector, which is made from recycled PET.  Both Repeat and E85 reset benchmarks, being conceived to have the most minimal impact on the environment through both their manufacture and use.

Here's an extract from the media release; at the end is a link to the product page on our website, so don't forget to check them out.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, OCTOBER 8, 2009

If you thought there was no way the automotive repair business could be eco-friendly, think again.

Like the move by V8 Supercars to a cleaner, greener fuel, Smart Automotive has moved to create a cleaner, greener product range for those working in the mechanical and smash repair industry.

Smart Automotive is launching Repeat, a fabric made from recycled PET (Polyethylene Terepthalate), for its latest range of seat protectors which technicians can use to protect their customers' car seats during service, repair and maintenance.

A Repeat seat protector will last for about six months of repeat use, depending on wear and tear, but the good news is that once its working life is over, it can be dropped into the nearest PET recycling bin ready for the next reincarnation.

Each seat protector starts out as four 600ml PET bottles (or equivalent) which are chopped, washed, ground, melted and reformulated to become 100 per cent PET flakes. Those flakes are then extruded and textured into yarn which is woven into fabric.

At this point, this process is carried out in Taiwan and the US, with manufacturing of the fabric done in China.  The fabric is then bought by Smart Automotive’s partner in China, which puts it through a special sealing process to ensure the products are non-soluble and repellent before creating the seat protectors to Smart Automotive's design.

While seat protectors are currently the only Repeat products in Smart Automotive’s range, they will soon be joined by steering wheel protectors and similar coverings for the gear and handbrake lever, so technicians using the product know they are keeping their clients’ cars clean during servicing, and being environmentally responsible at the same time."

For more information, an e-brochure and to get a quote on our Repeat seat protectors, visit the product catalogue.

Was riding with a friend just this weekend in his new BMW M3 coupe.

Very sweet car indeed.  Nimble, mid-size chassis.  All alloy 4 liter V8 with 420 horsepower and a six-speed manual (the way it was intended). Zero to 100 in 4.5 seconds, give or take.  Apart from the bonnet bulge and the dinner-plate brake discs, it’s not too ostentatious.

What makes the M even more sweet is that a standard 3 series coupe (on which the M3 is based) is had with either a 4 or 6 and is as quiet and safe as your grandparents need it to be.

As we’re winding up in this exceptional piece of automotive engineering, I couldn’t help but reveal to my friend that this sweet piece of German 4-wheeled fun owed a thank you note to a distant, unlikely relative, the Pontiac GTO.

See, back in the early sixties, the then chief of Pontiac (John Z. DeLorean) hypothesised the concept of putting their big car engines into their mid-size model range, thus creating the muscle car category.  The first muscle car was the 1964 Pontiac GTO and the wider Pontiac brand became a lightning rod for driving excitement.

The M3 is the exact same concept (though granted, far more technologically evolved); take the mid-size body, remove the grocery-getting engine and put in the bigger, more powerful one from the range.  Instant power to weight equals instant length of smile.

Pontiac died not long ago, and while there were plenty of business factors that forced this, the brand had been on life support for years before.  It’d lost its value and its distinctive positioning, one that had been accelerated (pun intended) years before by dropping a mountain motor in a mid-size.  This was an innovation that shifted the direction of an entire industry and Pontiac, for a long time owned it.  Unfortunately, they failed to keep it up and they let the competition catch up and ultimately overtake them.

Here at Smart Automotive, we're always looking at innovations and we're set to release a new product that takes the concept of recycled protection in a whole new direction.

In the meantime though, our current products are innovative in design and available now, so check them out in our catalogue and see how our solutions can help your own competitive distinction as an automotive professional.