January 2010
HI
I'm looking at purchasing a mercedes CLK in the near future with a budget of 7k. I'm stuck whether to get a low mileage cabriolet W208 (I would prefer a cabriolet over a coupe) but I'm worried id will look dated in a couple of years.......
OR buy a high-ish mileage W209 coupe... I'm changed my mind like one million times
Any advice would be appreciated!! Its giving me a headache
What do i go for?? Low mileage W208 or newer high(er) mileage W209 coupe Read more
Hi
I've been home for about an hour.
As I was return home from work, a push bike rider clipped the front end on my saloon car. I was moving in stop start traffic. I heard a thud, got out, the cyclist looked back and said 'WHAT'!! It was dark, cold and i could barely make out the guys mush in the dark. I said to him, you've clipped my car, and you know it. He said 'So WHAT'!!
i was a bit nervous and angry. I told him I wanted his details so i needed to pull over from the second lane and check for damage on my car. He said 'XXXXOFF' and snip off himself. I gave chase on foot but the fear in the back of my mind was, what if this cyclist is a fitness freak as well as a freak, stops and attacks me, so I stopped and returned to my car feeling very angry, frustrated and small.
When I got home, checked my saloon, no obvious marks so possibly the fool caught it with his leg.
most here will be aware that like them, i'm a road legal motorist that the gov uses as cash machine.
Is it not time that these cretins are forced to have number plates, road tax and insurance/ This should get the gov more money and people like me/you and even pedestrians that get knocked over by these idiots on pavements half a chance of getting these people locked up.
rant over!
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I totally disagree with those cyclists that do this in town centres during the day
you know the type I mean. From a cyclists point of view it really annoys
me to see that as I know we will all be branded the same!
Fair enough! :)
Just for the record I too don't want to see cyclists regulated (re tax for instance) either, all it will do is provide "jobs for the boys" which the rest of us will pay for, but I can see it coming, just hope I'm wrong... and it would be a nightmare to police, they can't even police the motorist properly so I can't see how it would work for cyclists!
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Thanks guys.
Sometimes the cheapest prices don't include the EPC eg. in my link above (saves £50).
I own a 2007 Maxus Minibus and 5 weeks ago the EDC light came on putting the vehicle into limp mode.The vehicle was submitted to an LDV dealership and I was told that it required a new electronic accelerator pedal. Unfortunately nobody has a pedal. Unipart are saying that they have over 60 requests for the pedal and there is no hope of finding one due to LDV going out of business. The part is made by Hella but they were produced by LDV under licence. Does anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks Read more
>> I was told that it required a new electronic accelerator pedal. That's an easy thing to say - but what is wrong with it? Couldn't it be fixed, rather than replaced? How do these things work?
My guess would be that it is a sealed potentiometer with a carbon track which ius either dirty or worn out causing erratic or lack of signals to the ecu causing limp-home mode. If it can be opened up, maybe - just maybe it can be cleaned.
Is it a con? I can't see any bad reviews on their site for any garages, which is a bit suspicious. After some Googling, it seems that to be in the scheme, a garage has to buy specific lubricants/oils and fuel cleaners and if they don't, then they are not allowed into it.
This is what I have read:
www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/garage-service...l
Not sure if any of that is true though...so maybe someone here can clear it up. Read more
dont knockit - there is no other scheme out there - honest john could administer the scheme in association with the lubricant firm but he doesnt. - personal recomm is good but maybe you are in a new area & dont know many people. I asked my local motorists accesories shop or my good local tyre dealer for a recommendation - that did produce some reasonable results. small independents will be vital in future my local vw dealer is £140/hour so the only way to keep my car on the road is to goto an independent & the older it gets the more unusual the repairs will be & the more experienced the mechanic I will need.
I was just idly looking at some CashCows on autotrader. Looking at 4x4 equipped models, it appears that the 2.0dCi diesel has only slightly better fuel conusumption figures (better by 2mpg on the combined cycle) than the 2.0 petrol. I expected the difference to be greater. Should I have?
Also, the 2.0dCi's CO2 figure is 208g/km, whereas the 2.0 petrol's figure is lower, at 198g/km. Not only does it seem odd that a diesel engine of the same size as the petrol verison emits more CO2, but to manage that whilst demonstrating better fuel consumption seems contradcitory.
Am I missing something here? Read more
Going back to diesel automatics, the unavoidable problem is that, unlike with a manual, you step off from rest at 0 rpm, and you have to use plenty of right foot to get it up to the rev range where it's at its best.
1. Engage drive (whilst holding footbrake with *left* foot)
2. Step on accelerator to 3,500 rpm (whilst holding still footbrake)
3. Release footbrake
Heats up the transmission oil so if your car doesnt have a transmission cooler / radiator i wouldnt do it too often on the one journey.
Done it once just to see how it goes. Like snow off a dyke in June was the answer :-P
When I bought my 325D almost two years ago the dealership offered 2 services free of charge as an incentive.
The car is booked in for its first service tomorrow. I assume the garage will try to cheat me (it wouldn?t be the first garage to cheat its customers) in terms of what are service items and what are maintenance items that I should pay for.
Anyone have a definitive answer to which is which or point me to a reference on it (preferably BMW.)
Thanks
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One thing you need to be aware of if you are signed-up to condition-based servicing is that after Inspection I ( and/or II ) you will possibly find trips to the dealers become more frequent, albeit for isolated examples, eg: one trip for the brake pads, one for a micro-filter, one for brake fluid etc etc, the reason being is that they wear/need replacing at differing intervals. Scrolling through the relvant part of the OBC will give you a good indication
My Mini as started to unlock itself then re-lock every 5 mins, have tried changing the battery in the key but problem persists, sometimes remote key does not work and i need to manually lock the car, then it starts to work again before it begins it's random lock and unlocking. I left it unlocked last night and have just got up to find it is now locked - HELP!! Read more
Thanks Andy - Took it to the garage for once over and they confirmed it was exactly what you said, I needed new locking mechanism, due to a lot moisture getting in.
As it says snow related stuff in here please. Saves going over old ground.
953213
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Driving through Glasgow this morning, we had quite a heavy frost last night, down to minus 4.
Driving along at 7.30am I was amazed to see that in one area, the footpaths had all been freshly gritted over the top of the frost.
I think we have now gone the full circle here, why are we sending out workment at 6-7 am in the morning to grit footpaths due to there being some frost? There are no forecasts for snow, in fact it is quite sunny just now.
So following this to its logical conclusion, come summer, as soon as we have nice weather, will the council be blasting all pedestrians with suncream?
AFAIK, the treads in tyre are to displace water to prevent aquaplaning.
How would a normal summer tyre behave on snow?
Will a tyre with deeper tread (say 8 mm) will perform better than same tyre with say 4 mm tread?
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Company car drivers usually have to wait until 2mm before being allowed to change.
This is one of the 'downsides' of leased company cars, always irritates me but it's a facet of their business model (cf long life servicing), you always have the choice to pay your own money (although a bit extreme) of course.
Personally I'd like the option to pay a few more £ pcm to change at 3mm as I do on my own cars but I guess I'm an exception to the norm in this respect - I recall a poster a few months back that wanted to put remoulds on their leased car so I suspect that most car leasers (?) company or otherwise do not give tyres much thought.


No. Sold it because I didn't enjoy it anywhere near as much as the Boxster! I keep saying I will buy another Boxster one day. One day!