February 2009
I saw my old neighbours a couple of days ago and remembered the time when we moved into our new houses and started to lay concrete drives etc. His house was opposite mine, and the house was not far from the road and several feet lower. I was very impressed at the care he took to get the profile of the incline from footpath to drive. He made a very professional profile gauge and laid the concrete to it exceedingly well. We were all motoring cheaply in those days he had an old Reliant three wheeler. The path suited the Reliant perfectly. However, we became more prosperous and he came home with a Humber Hawk. ( Does anyone remember those ?). Anyhow, the road clearance of the Humber was much lower and the wheels further apart, and it grounded. I think that the writer of the final scene in ?The Italian Job? got his ideas from the seesawing of the car as my neighbour climbed out. I was at work the next day and never did find out how he got the car back on the road. Read more
Just done a 30 mile round trip in our hire car taking the place of the Sirion while its being fixed, so have some initial impressions. The car was an 07 with 8000 miles.
The car itself is a nice one id say, nice quality, feel solid, rides nicely enough and fairly quiet...
There is a strange issue with road noise though or rather water on the road noise.
When you go through even a small puddle, a noise not dissimilar to running a tap on an empty ice cream tub resonates through the floor and its really very loud - I assume its water hitting the wheelarch linings but I have NEVER come across a car that makes such a racket - my mum said it was louder in the back and to such an extent that she asked me if there was something wrong with the car.
Seats are terrible, very hard and with a strange shape that didnt support my shoulders at all, apparently even worse in the back.
Controls very nicely laid out and easy to find and use, plus attractive to look at.
Boot is a decent size although looking at it, much space is lost to interior coverings as is often the case these days and with a bit of a redesign, it could make a more practical space for a small families belongings. Rear visability isnt great though with a tiny rear window and thick pillars.
The engine is rather nice, gutsy bit not too vocal and gives the car a good turn of speed.
The only real downside is the gearbox - everything negative ive read about these MMTs is so true. It seems to have all the disadvantages of the manual and few of those you get with an auto.
It isnt all that smooth, certainly no better than the box in a Smart, infact its a bit harsher than that as while in the Smart you could adapt to make it drive smoothly, the MMT clonks down the gears and even on the lightest throttle, you still feel the upchange, something that the Smart does better, especially when going down the gears coming to a standstill.
It is also a tad dangerous as takeoff is far from instant, so you need a couple more seconds to jump into a gap in traffic as it just doesnt respond well at all from standstill.
Its fine in normal leisurely driving, but in the cut and thrust of town, it leaves you wishing for a proper auto.
It also has that alarming habit of changing gear just at the times you want it to skirt across a gap and for some reason, on the manual mode, changing up a gear is pull back and change down is push forwards - it didnt feel intuitive at all, seemed the wrong way round to me.
Its only been a brief drive, but my misses has already said its not a patch on her Sirion with its proper autobox and she said why Toyota have given what isnt a bad car, a very inferior solution all in the name of a few mpg is beyond common sense. A CVT would have been far nicer.
If they changed the seats and stuck a decent autobox in it, would make a nice proposition.
Read more
Misses has just returned from a 250 mile round trip and the economy seems to get alot better - she got 60 odd on that run, so it would appear town work isnt its thing but motorway is, economywise.
Had a new axle fitted to the rear, all fitted fine. The garage replaced the existing brake fluid (dot 4) with dot 5. My car has abs
The brake pedal also feels spongier now (according to some goggling its the silicon that?s in the dot 5 that?s making it do this)
More research shows that it is not compatible with abs systems, is this true and do i ring them and tell them to put either dot 4 or dot 5.1 instead.
Read more
Yes, if old shoes used (or new for that matter) and it is drum brakes there will be a bedding in period which makes the pedal a little spongy. Should firm up in about 500 miles. Probably the handbrake feels a bit "springy" at the moment too!
hi to all, just new on here and looking a bit of advice. i am looking to buy a passat sport i have heard good reports and very bad reports about the 06-07 models, can someone maybe shed a bit of light on this for me, i dont wont to spend this sort of money to end up having a headic. i would be going for the manual model in this.. any help would be great thanks... Read more
Don't listen to the others they have got something against
VWs. I think it may be envy.
You owe me a keyboard! lol :-)
An 8yr old one won't be the 2.0TDI and will be the old shape. A completely different car to the one the OP asked about.
Saw this on Calendar earlier, Speechless!
tinyurl.com/bkc7jf
Link made tiny, Rob Read more
I just want to know why he felt the need to hand brake turn it with three lanes to do a turn in. Moron.
This link is to a report of a trial forum members might want to follow.
It's proceeding, so best not to comment until the jury has reached a verdict
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7878605.stm
Perhaps the mods would like to make this thread read only. Read more
hi all,
i bought a car from a garage back in december which came with a 3rd party 6 month warranty.
i now need to claim on this warranty but the company say there is a £250 limit with a £25 excess.
there is nothing about the limit in my policy document
the warranty was about £160 additional on the price of the car.
thoughts please
cheers Read more
Good result for you hxj, I hope it sloves the concerns etc.
I think by the warranty company agrreing to pay, they understand too, that they will not be able to force the dealer to pay out.
Best course of action with least stress.
Please understand that I wish the trader had accepted responsibility and sorted it but was trying to prove that he could side step the issue and the SOGA as he has the advantage.
Hope it all sorted out ok!
Hope someone can help
My sister in law has had a low speed impact at the rear of her Aygo, damaging the bumper. She has been quoted £800 to replace, apparently around £200 for parts the rest labour. Does this sound about right?
she is reluctant to claim on insurance despite low excess of £250 because she has run a quote in theory without her 4 yrs no claims and it was £400 more, yes I know she is still better off but thinks in the long term if she can pay less to repair she'd be better off.
Thanks in anticipation Read more
the bumper is approx £115, but that is just a plain unpainted, obviously i costs no-where near £700 to paint and fit so I can only assume there is more damage beneath it.
Just a quick question about whether having the rear heated screen switched on whilst the engine is off as you can do with this car (for 10-15 minutes) can do any harm to the battery or does it depend on whether the alternator is working as it should ? Read more
IIRC my old '98 Focus switched off the HRW after about ten minutes.
The car concerned is a 1999 Ford Focus 1.8 petrol which has done 78k miles.
I have owned the car since 2004 and have always thought that the clutch "biting" point is near the top of the pedal travel compared with other cars I have driven.
The problem with this is that on hill starts it is quite difficult to balance the clutch pedal and the accelerator pedal in order to move off from a standstill. This applies to reversing on a hill or slope. The other thing that I notice is that when I have reached the biting point and the car is about to move, the engine revs on the tachometer come down to not much more than 1000 rpm. For example, if prior to bringing the clutch pedal up to the biting point I rev the engine up to say 2250 rpm and then bring the clutch pedal all the way up to the biting point, the revs drop right down to like I said about 1000rpm.
Does this sound normal ?
Read more
For example if prior to bringing the clutch pedal up to the biting point
I rev the engine up to say 2250 rpm and then bring the clutch pedal
all the way up to the biting point the revs drop right down to like
I said about 1000rpm.
If the clutch was going engine revs would not die.
Best way to check a clutch is to park on the flat and select 5th release handbrake and try to pull away if car stalls clutch is fine if revs increase and clutch is fully out it is gone.
Browse
Learned to drive in my father's Hawk in the 60s. Huge black tank of a thing. Once I passed my test I would borrow it for hot dates in return for cleaning and polishing it.
Big full width bench seats..... those were the days!