Gas Guzzling Money Pits
pointless expenses and cars
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Always nice to see a C-Max.
Grim...'s focus doesn't brake though, which seems weird
Cras wrote:
Grim...'s focus doesn't brake though, which seems weird

Mine doesn't either. I suspect it's a liability thing.

On the other hand, because mine's an autobox and it has creep [1], you don't need to touch the throttle.

[1] which is computer controlled, I think, as there's no torque converter in it. It's a semi-automatic dual clutch thing. Amazing how high-tech these things are.
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
two-zone climate control

Christ, I wasn't aware that was a thing you had to look out for now. I figured it was as common as electric windows.

Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
CarPlay and Android Auto (because fuck car mounts and cable clutter)

You need to plug your phone in for Android Auto :(
Grim... wrote:
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
two-zone climate control

Christ, I wasn't aware that was a thing you had to look out for now. I figured it was as common as electric windows.
Well, it's pretty common, but my Skoda didn't have it, so it's an upgrade to me. And a useful one, as MrsDoc and I would regularly have temperature wars.

Quote:
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
CarPlay and Android Auto (because fuck car mounts and cable clutter)

You need to plug your phone in for Android Auto :(
More of a feature than a bug, given how fast your phone will go flat just from satnav + music streaming, let alone if you also had some sort of wireless display broadcasting on it too. CarPlay is the same, BTW.
I was in the car for five hours yesterday and with it plugged into the head unit for charging, the battery charged up 3% from where it started - with GMaps and Spotify running. Definitely needs to be plugged in.
I read somewhere that some of the newer Android Autos work via local wifi hotspot.
Cras wrote:
I was in the car for five hours yesterday and with it plugged into the head unit for charging, the battery charged up 3% from where it started - with GMaps and Spotify running. Definitely needs to be plugged in.

To be fair, that's probably down to some miserly 0.5 A output. I had a nice 2.1 A Anker charger in my old car and even my massive iPhone would gain charge at a reasonable rate while using that.
True, the power output on the head unit is guaranteed to be shit.
DavPaz wrote:
I read somewhere that some of the newer Android Autos work via local wifi hotspot.

Oh yeah, turns out you're right. Either I forgot this was a thing or I never knew. It's very limited though, both in terms of phones and cars/headunits.

And it still sucks battery like it's going out of fashion, so you'd only want to use it for short trips.
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
DavPaz wrote:
I read somewhere that some of the newer Android Autos work via local wifi hotspot.

Oh yeah, turns out you're right. Either I forgot this was a thing or I never knew. It's very limited though, both in terms of phones and cars/headunits.

And it still sucks battery like it's going out of fashion, so you'd only want to use it for short trips.

I reckon it's for executive types who don't want to actively do anything.
Grim... wrote:
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
You need to plug your phone in for Android Auto :(
More of a feature than a bug, given how fast your phone will go flat just from satnav + music streaming, let alone if you also had some sort of wireless display broadcasting on it too. CarPlay is the same, BTW.

Not so good for cable clutter though.

Especially when your wife keeps taking the fucking cable out of the fucking car.
Grim... wrote:
Not so good for cable clutter though.
The USB port is inside the armrest storage cubby, where the cable lives and where the phone goes when driving. No clutter to speak of.
Grim... wrote:
Grim... wrote:
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
You need to plug your phone in for Android Auto :(
More of a feature than a bug, given how fast your phone will go flat just from satnav + music streaming, let alone if you also had some sort of wireless display broadcasting on it too. CarPlay is the same, BTW.

Not so good for cable clutter though.

Especially when your wife keeps taking the fucking cable out of the fucking car.


Glue it in
The wife I mean
Cras wrote:
The wife I mean

He plays a big man on the internet, but he's meek as a kitten to her face, folks.
Cras wrote:
Fucking right

So say we all.
https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/indu ... r-industry

Quote:
The rise of electric vehicles threatens the car industry as we know it, according to PSA Group electric and connected boss Helen Lees. “EVs are far simpler [than internal combustion engined vehicles]," she explained. "They need less parts, less time in the workshop. Ultimately, it means less time in aftersales. That’s why we’ve chosen to diversify into areas such as shared mobility.”
...
“Longer-term, we'll sell fewer parts and less service hours on our EVs. When you look at the service plan pricing for Peugeot e-208, for example, it’s a third cheaper than the service plan for the equivalent petrol or diesel 208."


(PSA = Peugeut, Citroen, Vauxhall, etc)

Interesting to see it stated so baldly. If there were any public charging infrastructure in our street, we'd have considered electric rather than the diesel C-Max. There isn't, for now, but our local council claims to have a buildout plan over the next few years. If that gets lamp-post based trickle chargers into our street, then I could see us changing the C-Max for an EV in 2021 or '22.
People do live with public charging only but even if you had a range of 250 miles it could get trying. But if I had that choice then without hesitation I'd still get the EV before going back to a piston engine.
markg wrote:
People do live with public charging only but even if you had a range of 250 miles it could get trying.
The plans are for trickle-charging up and down streets (it doesn't say what the density would be...) and for additional fast chargers ("every resident to live within 500m of one"). I haven't considered it in detail, but that feels like it would work; fast charging is a mild inconvenience but still there when you need it. As Londoners we only do at most a few thousand miles a year, so we have a commensurately low need of charging.
We have 3 public chargers 200 yards from our house, and we've only ever seen the same taxi use them. To be honest I hadn't even considered using them for the next car - our annual mileage being 7,000 a year then this is again workable.
The loss of revenue for the government is huge too.
Zero VED (at present) and no fuel duty will poke a big hole in the budget that will need to be covered somehow.
We are (finally!) getting shot of the awful Toyota Wish. It's being replaced by a quintessentially Asian SUV, the Toyota Harrier:

Image

Obviously entirely practical for living in a city 25 miles across without so much as a pothole on it.
Dr Zoidberg wrote:
The loss of revenue for the government is huge too.
Zero VED (at present) and no fuel duty will poke a big hole in the budget that will need to be covered somehow.


Oh I'm confident they will have thought ahead and drawn up scenarios with nice clear plans on how to handle the change. It'll be fine.
Hello! The little metal liner bit of our electric socket/cigarette lighter thing has come out and broke, so it’s not working.

Does anybody have even the first clue of what I should search for to get it replaced?
Doctor Glyndwr wrote:
DavPaz wrote:
I read somewhere that some of the newer Android Autos work via local wifi hotspot.

Oh yeah, turns out you're right. Either I forgot this was a thing or I never knew. It's very limited though, both in terms of phones and cars/headunits.

And it still sucks battery like it's going out of fashion, so you'd only want to use it for short trips.

It's a thing for CarPlay, too, it turns out, although I don't think any current cars support it. Ford are putting wireless CarPlay and Android Auto into Sync4 from next year. I still think the battery drain issue means you wouldn't want to use this for longer trips, but perhaps if you can get enough watts into the device via a high-power wireless charging pad it'd work well?

(It also supports screens up to 15.5", for that Tesla-like experience.)
Mimi wrote:
Hello! The little metal liner bit of our electric socket/cigarette lighter thing has come out and broke, so it’s not working.

Does anybody have even the first clue of what I should search for to get it replaced?


Car cigarette lighter. Halfords, Amazon etc have them.
Oh, I’d hoped just to buy the inner metal bit than the whole thing as the rest works and didn’t really want to fiddle with the wiring.

But anyway, I asked my parents the other day and my stepdad had ripped theirs out when they scrapped their car as he remembered that ours was a bit knackered, so hopefully that will work.
Polestar 1. Drool.
Polestar 1 price. :'(
New water pump has reduced coolant loss! Was topping up before every journey to and from work (30 miles), been two days now without the dreaded three beeps. Heater dropping when idle or revs under 1.5k which I’m hopping is a gunked up heater matrix (something I’ll attempt to flush out myself). New wishbones have greatly improved the driving experience , old ones were fucked, especially drivers side. Here’s to the next 140,000 miles!
Picking up my new (to me) car tomorrow! It is fresh off the boat and getting valeted in the morning. It is a glorious, 2019 Black Edition Audi A3. It's white, and I love it already without even seeing it. My specific requests were: Audi A3 TDI 40 184PS, preferably Quattro, S-Tronic, S-line, at least 2018 and in either grey or white. And they absolutely nailed it!

I know, it's diesel (booo) and car fans say the A3 Quattro isn't really proper Quattro but I think this is as close to 'performance' as I can get, without going into S3, Type R, Golf R, etc. Which I'm pretty sure my boss wouldn't go for.

Can't wait! Aside from driving it, I'm excited for the shiny virtual cockpit, and the dynamic rear indicators!
Does every one on the IOM buy a car without driving it? :)

Nice car though..
KovacsC wrote:
Does every one on the IOM buy a car without driving it? :)

Nice car though..


I did go try out a 1.4 TFSI because the dealer said it'd be 'fine for your needs'.... and I really didn't want to commit to an Audi without at least sitting in one. I tried it, just so I could be 100% right in my assertion that it would not be what I wanted. At that moment, I decided this guy was a knob and then I went somewhere that sources cars for import, and he did a great job!
New coolant resrvoir / cap and a length of black silicon 8mm inner diameter hose get!
flis wrote:
2019 Black Edition Audi A3.

flis wrote:
It's white

Image
GazChap wrote:
flis wrote:
2019 Black Edition Audi A3.

flis wrote:
It's white

Image

Who is he? I keep seeing that gif and I always wonder who he is.
It's Hearthly's car dealer.
Mimi wrote:
GazChap wrote:
flis wrote:
2019 Black Edition Audi A3.

flis wrote:
It's white

Image

Who is he? I keep seeing that gif and I always wonder who he is.


Drew Scanlon
‘Blinking white guy’ would be a great gravestone header many years from now.
devilman wrote:
Mimi wrote:
GazChap wrote:
flis wrote:
2019 Black Edition Audi A3.

flis wrote:
It's white

Image

Who is he? I keep seeing that gif and I always wonder who he is.


Drew Scanlon


Whaaat? I've always thought it is Michael C Hall.
GazChap wrote:
flis wrote:
2019 Black Edition Audi A3.

flis wrote:
It's white

Image


Standard reaction from literally everyone :D It almost becomes like that "Dude"... "Sweet"... scene from 'Dude, Where's my Car?'

Black Edition is the trim line, which I'm sure you know! So it has fancy alloys, black mirrors, privacy glass, black wing mirrors and all the detailing that is usually chrome, is black. So it's obviously super cool.
Their whole approach seems like a misstep to me. I think that people who like old Mustangs will hate it and most people who are excited about EVs probably couldn't give a shit about something referencing an "iconic" ICE car.
Yeah, I can appreciate them wanting to get a leg up by using an existing brand, but i'm not sure Mustang was the right choice.
Other than them getting a lot of publicity from people saying "but it's not a Mustang", which to give them the benefit of the doubt, could be their marketing approach...
They've got an existing brand, though. Ford. Their whole EV effort seems half-arsed and I think they'll be left catching up, but probably in the long run there will still be enough people that will just buy the new Ford whatever.
markg wrote:
They've got an existing brand, though. Ford. Their whole EV effort seems half-arsed and I think they'll be left catching up, but probably in the long run there will still be enough people that will just buy the new Ford whatever.


I'd genuinely love to drive a Ford Whatever.

And a Hyundai Fuck You.

And a Peugeot Who Cares?
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