The Honda Motor Company is a Japanese firm started in 1948. It was set up by Soichiro Honda who first began working for Toyota. Honda set up the Honda Technical Research Institute in Hamamatsu, Japan with the aim of producing 2 cylinder motorcycle engines. His first motorbike the Honda Cub meant the beginning of the Honda Company proper – by 1964 the Honda Motor Company was the world’s largest motorbike manufacturer. Honda diversified into cars with the first, a pick-up truck called the T360. The first sports car manufactured by Honda was the S500.

Honda’s headquarters are in Tokyo, Japan and they have industrial plants based all around the world. Some Honda models are the Civic, The Accord, The CR-V and the Insight. Honda tend to tailor their models towards the countries they are selling in. They have upped the number of smaller cars over the last few years and make a hybrid electric model in competition with the Toyota Prius, known as The Insight. From 1964 onwards Honda played an active part in Formula 1, only leaving the market in 2008, as a result of the global downturn.

How can you get cheap car insurance for your Honda car? There are many ways of keeping insurance costs low including raising the level of excess you are prepared to pay, and garaging your car when off the road. But perhaps the best way of making sure you are getting a great insurance deal is to compare car insurance quotes from a range of providers – the competition to attract customers means insurance companies will all try to outbid each other – which is great news for you, a Honda owner.

In order to get great and affordable car insurance you can compare car insurance quotes by going online and obtaining the help of a car insurance comparison website. The website acts like a broker for you, the owner, on one side, and all the top insurance providers on the other – it will send your details and requirements to its bank of insurance companies and they will then have the opportunity to quote for your business, meaning you can choose which of them suits you.

Standard cars were built from 1903 to 1963 in Coventry, Great Britain. Standard bought Triumph in 1945 and made Triumph cars in their UK Standard factories. Whilst many people are familiar with the Triumph brand fewer are cognisant of its parent company, Standard – apart from the owners of Triumph cars, many of whom are members of clubs set up to commemorate the Standard Company.

The Standard Company started at the turn of the century and in 1905 had a stand at the London Motor Show, attracting the attention of Charles Friswell who soon became Chairman of the company. He was well connected – Standard provided cars for George V on his visit to India in 1911. In 1914 the company went public. During the war Standard manufactured over 1000 aircraft from premises in Canley, the site of its future operations.

By 1924, production of cars was doing well, but by the late 20’s sales were down. The decision to produce more mid market models in the 30’s kept the firm going. Buying Triumph revived its fortunes and in the 50’s it was decided that Triumph was the more popular name and its biggest sellers remain in the public consciousness today (think Triumph Herald).

If you are a member of a Standard owners club then you could get big discounts on your car insurance. Car insurers who specialise in providing cover for vintage cars sometimes give owners up to 15% off for being a member of a club. The importance of going online in order to compare car insurance cannot be stressed too much if you are – as we all are- searching for cheap car insurance.

As the owner of a vintage car it is also very important to get a proper valuation done – the insurer must be aware of the price is will need to pay you in the very unfortunate event of your car becoming irreparable. Also be sure to mention if your car is kept off the road for significant periods of time – cars which don’t go out very often will attract lower premiums.

The heyday of the microcar took place following the Second World War. Cheap to produce and economical to run the first models were like open air tricycles or quadricycles. Later models were more comfortable with less basic features, but as larger cars became more affordable to the general public, microcars disappeared. Recently however, as people are becoming more concerned about the environment and fuel efficiency is a top priority there has been somewhat of resurgence in the microcar style of car. New trendy microcars such as the Forto , Mini and the Smartcar are gaining in popularity both because they are economical and easy to drive and park in busy cities.

Early models of the microcar include the Vespa 400 and the German Messerschmidt, the narrowest car ever built. Both these models are now very collectible since so few were produced. There are a number of vibrant specialist owner clubs in existence.

Comparison websites are a useful tool when choosing car insurance. The credit crunch has meant that people have been dropping luxury items from their shopping lists – unfortunately however we are legally obliged to buy car insurance. Although we can’t avoid paying to insure our cars we can certainly make sure that we are getting a good deal – in order to get cheap car insurance it’s essential to compare car insurance via the web. A good car insurance comparison website will be able to direct you to a car insurance provider with the most competitive deal to suit your requirements. Simply by inputting your details once and waiting a matter of seconds, you will have quotes at your disposal. Having perused the quotes you will be in a position to make an informed decision as regards car insurance for your car.

There are things to make sure you include when filling in your details. These are the age and condition of your car –if it is a vintage model then make sure your car insurer includes a price for valuing it – obviously classic cars are very valuable especially rarer models. You do not want to be left out of pocket in the unlikely event of it being written off.