How to determine if object is in array

Use something like this:

function containsObject(obj, list) {
    var i;
    for (i = 0; i < list.length; i++) {
        if (list[i] === obj) {
            return true;
        }
    }

    return false;
}

In this case, containsObject(car4, carBrands) is true. Remove the carBrands.push(car4); call and it will return false instead. If you later expand to using objects to store these other car objects instead of using arrays, you could use something like this instead:

function containsObject(obj, list) {
    var x;
    for (x in list) {
        if (list.hasOwnProperty(x) && list[x] === obj) {
            return true;
        }
    }

    return false;
}

This approach will work for arrays too, but when used on arrays it will be a tad slower than the first option.