by Flagship Staff | Jun 15, 2015 | Blog
Your car’s tires are essential for safe and efficient driving. Normal wear and tear, along with the changing seasons, will decrease the effectiveness of your tires, leading to less traction and decreased braking ability. Use these tips to ensure that your tires are in good condition and that you are safe on the road.
- Inspect the tread wear bars on your tires, which appear as small bridges that form between treads. If you notice these bars are beginning to form between the treads or are running across the tires and become flush with the tires’ tread, your tires should be replaced.
- Take a standard penny and insert it into a tread, with the top of Lincoln’s head facing the center of the tire. If you can see the top of his head or the metal above it, your tires should be replaced as soon as possible. You should also consider replacing your tires if Lincoln’s hair is visible.
Tire maintenance is a key aspect to staying safe on the road. To learn more about your automobile insurance coverage, contact your Flagship Insurance Services, LLC today.
by Flagship Staff | Jun 8, 2015 | Blog
As the weather warms up, relaxing on an outdoor deck can be a great way to spend time with friends and family. However, the International Association of Certified Home Inspectors estimates that only 40 percent of the 45 million decks in North America are safe. Use these tips to inspect your deck and keep your friends and family safe.
- Inspections should begin at the bottom of your deck. If a deck seems unsafe or is sagging in any location, do not walk on the deck.
- Inspect the connection between your deck and the building to ensure that it is secure.
- Ensure that railings on the deck and stairways are properly supported and stable.
- Check for water sources near your deck that could contribute to accelerated wood decay. These can include the following:
- Lawn sprinklers that regularly come into contact with your deck.
- Indentations around your deck’s support beams where water may pool, especially in newly installed decks.
- Downspouts from gutter systems that exit near your deck.
- Narrow gaps in the deck’s floor boards that don’t allow water to pass through.
- Make sure that none of the deck’s wood has decayed. Keep in mind that layers of paint can hide decay.
- Visually inspect the beams below your deck for signs of sagging.
If you have any concerns about the safety of your deck, refrain from using it and contact a home inspector to perform a complete inspection. Using your deck should be a relaxing experience, and following these tips will help ensure that everyone using it will have a safe and enjoyable time.
by Flagship Staff | Jun 4, 2015 | Blog
Breaches, scams, fraud, identity theft. These words are all over the news and, sadly, have affected millions of people. Unfortunately, these crimes will not be going away anytime soon.
Do you ever think about how secure your passwords are? You should. Passwords are vital in protecting your home computers, as well as your bank accounts and credit cards. Because of that, passwords can cause a fair amount of consternation if you have to remember so many of them.
One way to solve this dilemma is to develop a method/scheme to create passwords that are easy to remember, but hard for others to guess. Here are just a few suggestions for devising a password.
• Use a password scheme that contains characters that are the same across all of your passwords with other characters that are unique to the site you’re logging onto. For example, if you’re a dog lover and you use the stock symbol (or some other way to represent the company), you might come up with a password for Yahoo that’s “yhoodog2015.”
• Use a passphrase and turn it into a password. “A Coke and a smile” could be “aCokeAndaSmile.”
• Create a compound word using a couple of small words. “My dog Odie” might become “MyDogOdie.”
• Take a word or phrase and remove the vowels from it. “Fly like an eagle” becomes “flylkngl.”
• Pick a memorable word or name, as well as a number that’s the same length as the word and intermix them. “Kennedy” plus “1234567” is now “K1e2n3n4e5d6y7.”
In addition to these suggestions, it’s always a good idea to mix upper and lower case letters in your password and add special characters (i.e., @, $, !, etc.) within the password to make it harder to guess or hack. Just do it in a way that’s easy for you to remember, like replacing each letter S with a $ or a 5. To make your password even stronger, remember that longer is better
Below lists various passwords and the time it takes a hacker to crack them.
Password < 1 second No method
P@55w0rd 3 days Replacing letters with sympbols and numbers
wbmidog01 7 hours Company representation, a word, and a number
Wbmidog01 39 days Same as above, but added an uppercase letter
1Xa5jK@9# 275 days Random 9 charcter password
Du4*fB9$0t 58 years Random 10 charcter password
T4@nk$J04n@bil 2 billion years Using mixed caseand replacing letters with numbers and special charcters. (Says Thanks John a Billion)
K1e2n3n4e5d6y7 98 billion years Intermixed letters and numbers
As you can see, there are ways to create passwords that are easy to remember but hard for others to guess. If you do this, you won’t have to write them down on a piece of paper and stick it to your keyboard. What can you come up with?
by Flagship Staff | Jun 1, 2015 | Blog
Sitting for extended periods can contribute to health problems later in life, including heart disease and diabetes. However, research suggests that engaging in a low-intensity activity every hour, such as a two-minute walk, can help reverse the negative impacts of sitting for a long period of time.
Here are a couple ways you can fit those two-minute walks into your work day:
- The next time you need to speak to a coworker, considering walking to talk to him or her instead of using electronic messages.
- Instead of taking an elevator, walking up or down the stairs is an excellent way to get moving.
The benefits of walking, or engaging in another low-intensity physical activity, are also additive. Every extra minute spent walking not only contributes to the health benefits, but it is also a minute that you didn’t spend sitting. Even small amounts of physical activity can help improve your health.
by Flagship Staff | May 25, 2015 | Blog
Winter is not kind to automobiles, especially ones kept outside during snowstorms and frigid nights. Consider giving your vehicle a spring overhaul to restore its condition and extend its life. Areas of concern include:
Tires: Low pressure can cause a blowout, diminishes handling and will lower your fuel economy. A sticker in your door jamb will indicate correct pressure. Inflate your tires properly. It is a good idea to rotate tires about every 7,500 miles,
Fluids: Check your coolant level and dipsticks for oil and transmission fluid level. Also be on the lookout for brittle gaskets.
Hoses, belts and blades: All of these deteriorate through use and age, but especially when temperatures are cold. Check the tightness of the belts when the engine is off, and check the firmness of the radiator hose when the car is running.
Underside: Salt and sand can cling to your car’s exterior and damage the body of your car. Wash the undercarriage with a sprinkler or a garden hose to get rid of lingering debris.
