Car appreciation... the aesthetics, the engineering, etc

MK2 is an investment for the children.

Car alarm (astra VXR) is going off intermittently. All times late at night.

A - it's faulty
B - it's being tripped by something innocent
C - it's being tripped by someone trying to gain access

What do I do?

I just found a new garage, I'm in love. They quoted me £120 to repair my rusty sills and do an underseal. I said that it can be agricultural and I don't care about matching paint, they didn't look at me funny, oof, swoon.
In other news, I have a very slow air leak in my rear car tyre. It probably needs re-seating but fuck that, I'm gonna throw some tubeless fluid in through the valve and go for a drive, tyres are old but loads of tread left. Your thoughts would be good on this please.

How old? The rubber starts to go hard and crack after a while, so probably should be replaced even if they have plenty of tread as they will have lost a lot of grip.

The rubber degrading may well explain the slow leak.

maybe +5 years. I don’t drive often or hard

sealant will still work though maybe (avoiding suggestion about loss of grip!) edit: suggestion is appreciated, new tyres on the list

Use slime as it is water washable.

Is it a certain time after the car has been used? Or has the car not been used for days?

air appears to escape when parked over period of weeks, usually not tons but enough to need a good top up

Bit hard to say. It's always late at night (midnight and 2am)

Only happened twice, while parked at home, was away for a week and it didn't happen there. So could be environment (it's a bit close to a bush, but has been forever)

Or it could be genuine

Last time this happened to me eventually I found a screw in the tyre. Take it to a tyre place and see what they say.

👍🏼

I had this on a Vauxhall Vectra, just googled it and it turned out to be a broken window break sensor on one of the back windows. Easy DIY fix thanks to some forum posts - could well be something like that.

I'd not worry about grip, unless I found issues in the wet, but then I've driven a car on ats own brand cheapies that had no grip wet or dry from new. Ever seen a diesel Citroen bx wheel spin from standing start on an incline? Have used slime (or the Wilko equivalent in orang) to sort out leaking and even porous rims.

Used the same stuff on motorbikes and not had any balance or performance issues.

Stupid answer, is it aftermarket or oe fit? Could try charging the battery off the car.
Seems modern cars don't like voltage fluctuations. My Mondeo had that issue of internal alarm battery getting old and occasionally setting alarm off. Replacement of battery in the module was easy but took a bit of work and stripping to get to the module.

New car day just for @amey

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You can look for a four digit code on the sidewalls of the tyres to see how old they are. It will be the week number and year of manufacture - eg 2618 will be week 26 in 2018

Recent central London spots.

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wow what even is it?

The Lincoln has been there for a while judging by the historic street view images on Google. It looked better in 2020 - https://goo.gl/maps/2ANtBasCPi51tcwDA
And its MOT expired in April 2021!

wow what even is it?

Something that costs circa £50k with plastic arches and sills 😬

zackly what I was thinking. though not for very long

An abomination. I preferred being car free. Going to park it round the corner and pretend I have nothing to do with it.

I genuinely dont know what that car is lol, never seen that logo before. I like the yellow calipers!

~~It’s a Cupra (Seat’s electric/fancy brand). ~~

Edit: it’s a polestar, getting my logos mixed up.