Tag: car

Hello everyone,

It does feel a lot like time is going whoosh by at the moment. Oh and something might have changed around here. What’s happened since last time ? Let’s see : more book, car stuff, boats and Space. First up … thumbnail !

There we go. Deed done. The blue one is my last car, a Lexus ES300h. The red one is the car I’ve switched to, a Lexus CT200h. It’s actually a return to the CT after time away in their other cars. I’ve gone back to a used one because they stopped making the CT a few years ago. Lexus don’t make a car I’d want to buy any more though. The ES is too big (and I wasn’t a fan of its size and handling) and their UX is a nasty SUV with no boot. If a daily driver car can’t take the groceries, it’s not really suitable. A sporty car is kinda allowed to have a tiny boot, I don’t think it’s acceptable in an SUV. Kinda takes the U for Utility out of it.

So why did I change ? (And this is a bit for the memory banks too to remind me in a year or two !)

The ES was an incredibly good motorway cruiser. I could drive it for hours without really noticing. And that went for the 5 hour trip back from Gatwick when everyone had to come off the motorway and the other roads were gridlocked. It had lots of toys too, although perhaps not quite as many as I was expecting (the manual made me think I had the HUD, back seat radio controls and self opening boot).

But I also think it was broken. There was very excessive body roll when going round corners, plus the traction control would kick in at the slightest of slight breaking up in the road surface. It also had a heavy understeer tendency which gave me no confidence going round the corners. I’m curious that they’ve revised the back suspension set up in the car (not just the set up, they completely redesigned the rear running gear).

That said, they changed something I’d wished they’d changed in the hybrid system a while ago. It’s an excellent system. Instead of having gearbox, clutch, alternator, starter, the Toyota/Lexus hybrids have a couple of big motor generators, the battery and an inverter to control the power. The motor generators are the gearbox and I think it works really well for driveability. What they’ve changed is the target battery level. Old ones – it’ll charge the battery up to an 80% hold level. (More means the battery makes heat, which is bad). The ES would hold the battery around 50% on the motorway. Why is that better ? If you’re going at 70mph, there’s a lot of kinetic energy that has to go somewhere when you come off the motorway. The lower battery hold point means that the kinetic energy can all go in the battery.

That’s kinda geeky innit.

Yep. Visited the farm shop place on the way back. It’s kinda required :-D.

Yep. Things escaped the shop with me again. The brownie didn’t survive long enough to be in pictures. They never do.

Anyway – latest car. Lexus CT. It’s a little bit older than the last car. We record the ages of our cars in the registration plates. Blue was a 21 plate, which means it was registered in the first half of 2021. Red is a 68 plate, as it was registered in the second half of 2018. Older means no lead time (electronics shortages are still a massive problem for the car industry) and it’s 25% cheaper on payments too. Oh and they stopped making the CT a couple of years ago.

Red’s a Premier spec model, so it’s got the better radio, various nice toys (the satnav is a nice improvement) and better lights. Heated seats have been appreciated, plus they’re the electrically adjustable leather ones with (first for me) a button to remember the seat position.

The CT is slower, at 10 seconds to 60 instead of the probable 8 to 8.5 of the IS and ES cars. But I have massively more confidence to point it at a corner and press the pedal to make it go Fast. The IS could do that too but my 3 had other issues. I gave up on fast cornering quite quickly in the ES due to its road barge understeer tendencies.

So there we go. Car change, I’m very happy with new thing so far.

Yep. I may have weakened and at the mention of what might be a tradition now by the garage people, found myself acquiring not one but two cars that day. My models to build queue is now :

Wooden dragon

Wooden trimaran boat

Lego McLaren car

Need to get to it some time ! But not tonight because I’m wanting restful times before heading off to bed and I’ve recently been watching something lovely who streams under the name BillieTrixx. (Twitch link). Fun to watch and she’s got a wonderful hyperactive streak going too, so you never really know what’s going to happen next. But it’s all good vibes and I’ve been enjoying watching and she has a good community there too.

Time to go back to stream and book too. I just re-read Leviathan Wakes, the first Expanse book. It felt like a bit of a grind to be honest, as I mostly remember it from the first time around. It makes more sense overall than the series. Books have more time to breathe through a better ability to show the timeline. Series are more tuned for drama and they are totally bound by the vaguaries of the TV networks. Books usually get a chance to go for their full run. Series get cut off early before they can fully tell their story.

It’s Annihilation next, the book from a very intriguing film from a few years ago. I’d recommend checking out the film.

Later everyone ! (Must stop rambling) (Must post more because I’m thinking I’m rambling more while trying not to dive in to other stuff)

Hello everyone,

This post probably should have come out a bit sooner ! It’s been a weird weekend, definitely haven’t been feeling particularly great over the last couple of days. That might be more fallout from vaccine but it’s probably more cumulative effect from getting close to needing more time offline.

Still, the deed is done, wrapped up the second last loose end today (the last one is getting the work related stuff updated but that’s fairly trivial), just need some excuses to get out and about in it.

Erm … what am I talking about ?

There we go. That’s Car as it was when I picked it up at the garage on Friday. Curious to see an electric charger point on the wall behind … That’s for their UX electric cars. This one is an ES300h hybrid. The power train is essentially the same as the IS300h’s I had before, except that it’s been turned through 90 degrees (I think !) and powers the front wheels instead of the back wheels. There’s a 2.5 litre long stroke* engine again with a couple of electric motor generators providing the hybrid bits and acting as a pseudogearbox.

*Engines are normally very similar bore and stroke. The bore is the diameter of each cylinder, the stroke is how much the cylinder goes up and down. That all calculates together to give the cubic capacity of the engine. More capacity, more power. What Lexus have done with their engines is to make the stroke a bit longer than usual, it doesn’t give as much power but it does extract more energy out of each boom that happens as the engine fires. And then there are a couple of big motors there to supplement the power.

This one is a little longer than my last few, which kinda takes them in a direction that I don’t want to go as I prefer smaller, nippier cars. I haven’t tested it round corners yet, outside of choosing the off motorway stretch I can go to when coming home. Felt good on that.

There’s more toys on this one, including a nicely chunky 12.3″ display in the centre. The music sounded great on the way back too. I’ve lost the seat coolers from the previous car but there’s a Climate Concierge thingy that apparently automatically blows cold air up from your feet if the temperature gradient suggests that should be a Thing. Hopefully the seats will be an improvement, the old ones weren’t bad but I am being more prone to cramping and hip issues as I get older.

I had to stop off at the farm shop on the way back, partly because of LOOT, partly due to wanting a couple more pictures and a little reset before the rest of the trip home.

The toys are a little different on this one. Low level autonomy is still in the car in the shape of radar assisted cruise control and lane keeping cameras. I don’t think I’ll be using the lane keeping assistance because it feels a lot fiercer than the last car and it felt like I was fighting the car instead of relaxing into the cruise. The road sign cameras can apparently pass the message on to the cruise control now, must try that. When the speed limit changes, I usually take back control and do the change in advance and more smoothly than cruise control does it, so it’ll be curious to see what the electronics do.

I need to read the book more to see how to get the best out of the satnav. The idea is to get the technology making things easy for you, instead of you having to interact with it to show you what you want to see.

As an aside, I can still vaguely remember the old days where I’d have an A4 sheet of paper that would have the big directions elements written down on it, from planning ahead with a road atlas. It’s like … remembering but I don’t miss that at all. I’ll come back to satnav later.

I don’t have all the toys on this one (like the automatic boot opener alas!) but I do have many, many toys to take advantage of and get used to. Like a blind spot manager that lights something up in the wing mirrors when someone is coming alongside. And the ones from before like the darkener for the mirrors that stops you getting dazzled when someone comes up behind with bad lights. I would definitely miss parking sensors and the reversing camera, they help out massively.

I’ve broken from tradition a little there by taking the description out of the alt-text and into the main text. I couldn’t go past the farm shop service station without bringing some things back with me. Here’s the list … In a box in front is a salted caramel chocolate brownie. To the left and right in front are a couple of bags of strawberry bonbons. On top of the box is a Chocolate Dwagonsaur and Chocolate Bunny (I oopsed! It should have been 2 Dwagonsaurs!) and lemon sherbets. Behind is an (empty) box with a large chocolate mint choc teacake (chocolate dome with marshmallow inside) on top, flanked by a bag of chocolate brownies on the left and all butter fudge on the right. On top of the box, there are 2 bags of Kola Kubes and a bag of candy mice. Behind, there is a blue box from the garage (which holds a bottle of Prosecco) upon which sit my Red Dwagon and my Green Dwagon. On top of the blue box sits a smaller black box with a brown case on top (which holds the spare car key).

Gosh, that’s a lot. That’s the kind of description I’m attempting to put in my alt-text for screen readers, it just felt like I needed to have that in the main text this time because there’s a lot going on there and some hidden things.

That loot should last me a good few weeks.

Gosh. Running out of speed. (Plus the F1 has started and I’m watching that live with time delayed cricket on the telly)

As to why I changed, there were a few issues with the last car which prompted changing away from it.

1 – annoying and embarrassing … the centre compartment lid liked to open at random, especially when the car was at rest. Probably expansion of air in the heat. This would make the alarm go off …

2 – annoying but mostly manageable – a change happened in the satnav which meant it just gave up before the crucial Last Mile.

3 – worrying … On one of the last pre-covid business trips in late 2019, I was driving back with colleagues when on the motorway, a large sturdy canvas bag came bouncing down the road towards us. I couldn’t avoid it due to cars to left and right, I had to drive through it with it going under the right side of the car and past. I never felt any effects after like the car pulling to one side but the mpgs were down by 10-20% since. Instead of getting 50+, I was getting 43-45. Car drove fine, nothing was spotted on 2 services since but I think there was damage there.

Oh and I think the dead car incident at the end of last year might have damaged the 12V battery.

So it will seem very extravagant making the change again but I think my reasons were good.

I’d better sign off there cos the F1 and cricket are kicking off 😀 … One last pic :

Did something strange appear in the sky between going into the farm shop and coming out again ? Hope they make it back to their time safely.

Stay safe everyone, be well.

PS A little covid related addendum … the garage adapted to the new situation we find ourselves in pretty well. Everything was done online, including digital signatures for finance documents and sending the other documents through via email. The only face to face meeting requirement was right at the end, where we did the handover and this was done outside the showroom with us being masked up.