Jottings from Sweden

Honest John Back Room » Motoring discussion
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Tue 10 Dec 2002 17:09
Jottings from Sweden - SjB {P}
I'm currently in a cold, white, Sweden, with a rental Hyundai Matrix at my disposal. Ahem :-(

Apart from the Landrover-esque thrum generated by metal studded snow tyres, the least pleasant aspect of the car is the centrally mounted instrument binnacle.

There is something pyschologically odd about having a black void in front of you when driving at night, instead of a nice warm glow.

There is something equally odd about having the bright (non-dimmable) light source that is the instrument binnacle to one side of your vision, in the middle of the dashboard.

Am I alone in prefering conventional instruments in a conventional location? Hyundai don't even seem to have had production engineering in the front of their minds, because the instrument binnacle is angled towards the driver, inferring another moulding for other markets such as the UK.

What's it like to drive? Hard to say fairly, as the only clear road driven on so far is the E4 motorway, where the winter tyres drowned out everything, but a tall bodyshell and degree of steering inertness is not very confidence inspiring when the going gets twisty. It looks complete cack, too!

I must say though that fully studded winter tyres are awesome. What a shame we're not allowed to use them in Blighty. On an icy road where I nearly fell over whilst getting in to the car, I had to consciously try in order to provoke wheelspin, such was the available grip.

What a pleasure too driving in a country that if switched on it's southern shore would reach Rome, but has less population than London.... Oh well, M25 here I come in two hours time...

/Steve
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