Your car is an expression of yourself. Not one week after you buy your new metallic piece of pride and joy do you find yourself wanting to add or tweak a thing or two to make it truly your own. Sure, fuzzy dice let everyone know that you blast Santana's "Lowrider" when driving through crowded areas and a personalized "420blzit" license plate makes a cop's job a lot easier. But there are other modifications that leave us scratching our heads. Here are some of the most cringeworthy offenders.
The most common of these customization face palms is the steering wheel cover. The steering wheel cover is like that kid who wears two pairs of long socks to add more cushion sandals when he hits the mall in his sandals. Car companies make their designers spend days creating steering wheels that are ergonomic, useful, and last a long time. And just like the double sock wearing mall walker defies common sense by not wearing shoes, a steering wheel cover owner sidesteps logic to spend money and make a steering wheel designer's work obsolete. Depending on the quality of the cover, a driver can turn something as simple as taking a turn into a life or death scenario.
At least with a steering wheel cover, no one gets hurt except your credibility. But some customization options were made for nothing else but to declare war on the rest of humanity. Before spinners, whistle tips were the way to get everyone to hate you. Anyone who wanted a quick way to break their lease and get kicked out of the neighborhood would weld a whistle into their car's exhaust to make it sound like a never-ending train whistle. This is for the type of person who goes to a party and does an upper decker on the host's bathroom. Trust us, there's no faster way to get a gas tank full of sugar from a revenge-seeking neighbor than to put an annoying and infinite rape whistle on your car.
Girls who pad their bras and guys who use bananas as jean accessories will know all about fake hood and side vents. Glue pieces of plastic to the side of your ride and take a cutting tool to your hood and abracadabra…Racecar! But in real life there are no shortcuts. Let's assume for a second that there's a hypothetical guy named Jonny. Jonny has a Honda Civic with fake side vents and places tropical fruit in his pants. What does this get Jonny? Slapped in the face by his date once she finds out he's all talk. The worst part is that many times, these fake parts act like mini parachutes and help slow the car down instead of make it faster. Double facepalm.
Just like the fake side vent and hood vent guy, fake turbo dump valve guy is someone who didn't get hugged enough as a child. Now the quest for validation has gone as far as to allow this individual to put a fake turbo blow-off hissing noisemaker on their car to make accelerating out of a grocery store parking lot sound like a tribute to Paul Walker. Except Paul Walker would turn in his grave at the very thought of this. Sure, in the wild, animals bluff all the time to seem tougher and scare off enemies. But wouldn't it be a better use of evolution to actually evolve more effective methods of attack? Similarly, bluffing gearheads could actually add useful customizations to their cars and stop showing off.
Car bras are such contradictive devices. They're meant to protect the front end of a car and keep it looking nice, but they make the front end look terrible and cumbersome by just being present on a car. Its like wearing a mask to keep your face looking nice, except that no one ever sees your perfectly preserved face since you're always wearing the mask. The worst part is that its always the ugliest cars who would look better with a busted front end that have car bras. When is the last time you saw a Ferrari with a black leather cover on the front? On the other hand, you'll make some drivers think you host S & M club meetings in your basement and give other drivers a reason to laugh.