Parking in a garage tighter than a pair of skinny jeans? Try a wall of ‘screaming chickens’
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The rubber chickens on his window grille act as a warning device when he is backing into his very small garage.
PHOTOS: XU JIAMAO/FACEBOOK
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A student in Taiwan has found a fantastic fix to his parking problem. With the help of a wall of eight “screaming chickens”, he can now slide his brand new car into his tight garage with peace of mind.
Mr Xu Jiamao, who studies at Ling Tung University in Taichung city, said in a Facebook post that has gone viral that he recently got himself a new car – an MG ZST.
The small SUV is typically short at about 432cm. Yet even at that length, the vehicle has only around 3cm of space between its front bumper and Mr Xu’s garage door, and between its rear end and a protruding window grille.
With such a narrow margin of error, not even the car’s rear sensors and camera could help.
Mr Xu said parking, to him, was like walking on egg shells.
“I was afraid that sometimes I would go too far back and hit the grille,” he said in his Facebook post.
So Mr Xu devised a clever solution: Hang eight rubber, screaming chickens on the window grille and make them work like his reverse park assist.
“Every time I hear screams, I know the car’s back is protected,” he said.
In a video on his Facebook page, Mr Xu could be seen slowly backing up his car into his garage. He stops just as the rear end of it touches the yellow plastic chickens – their eyes and beaks wide as they loudly squawked.
Mr Xu said he had considered using bumpers and cushions, but those alternatives do not make any loud sound.
Also, the rubber chickens cost just NT$30 (S$1.30) each.
“It’s quite a bargain in my opinion,” he said.
He said he has to roll down his driver-side window to hear the screaming fowls.
Otherwise, the system has been fool-proof. He said he has been using this method for over a month already, and his car has so far been scratch-free.
