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

They are forecasting freezing rain in central and southern Scotland. If that does come to pass be really really careful. It's absolutely treacherous.

I think once I get out of Dundee area and back onto the M8 things should be better as the roads are a lot flatter. Plus I hope the gritters are out in force tonight/tomorrow morning.

Take it easy and you'll be reet.

I recall one early morning driving my dad to Edinburgh airport from Dundee. It was below freezing and I could feel the car moving about a bit at times but put it down to the wind.

Got up to the highest bit of the road and found about 10 cars in the barriers all crashed separately and on different stretches of the road.

I reckon the winter tyres saved my bacon that day. It certainly wasn't my driving skills!

Can you find out if your car is fitted with winter tyres?

I'm swapping onto winter tyres tomorrow.

I'm seeing @OldSkoolRacer, he says he has some winter tyre/chain for me, hopefully it will fit the little Fiat, don't worry I have driven in snow before. It will just be a very slow drive back to Glasgow.

I have one of these. Nobody believes how much fun they are.

These sound so naughty.

You'll be better off in a FWD hatch than the X3 for sure! High gear if it snows otherwise the wheels will spin.

Think it's mostly the air suspension getting old, replace it with real springs and then just deal with the electrical stuff as it comes up

The stereo in this car is a bit shit, doesn't even have an AUX socket... Toying with the idea of putting this in, includes a dashcam and reversing camera as well as GPS, hands-free Bluetooth, etc... Pretty cool...

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I gave it a bit of a wash today, noticed it's also missing a passenger side parking light!!

I've also mostly been driving it around with the handbrake on today... Took me ages to figure out what the fucking beeping sound was... Idiot...

Double-posted my reply below so here's a random pic:

Found a way to get more than 20mpg out of the RRC. No LPG conversion required.

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You called?

Although it's an '18 MY Octavia vRS 245. Similar spec to a Golf GTI Performance Pack (fancy VAQ diff etc). Reasonably brisk, yet can get close to 40mpg on a run. Leased for £151 per month for two years with a £2,400 deposit. This is my second Octavia and I haven't had an ounce of bother with either in 50,000 odd miles. The fixed price servicing is fairly reasonable to boot. You are welcome to come and take a look/ride if you are ever passing through NW6.

I still have the W115 Mercedes, ITB MX-5 and V8 Range Rover Classic too. It's actually a surprisingly economical fleet to run. Not being dependent on them for daily transport means a sensible approach can be taken to maintenance and there should not be any depreciation to worry about.

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Dibs duck if splitting etc.etc

Winter wheels and tyres on- very interesting going to smaller, narrower tyres, the car moves around a lot more and you can feel the lack of tyre when braking (or accelerating onto a roundabout).

I live up a steep hill that has in years past totally defeated every car that tried to drive up it on summer tyres, so we shall see how this experiment pans out.

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Re. Passenger side parking light. Does this come on when you park with the indicator on?

Oh I love the noise from these little 1.4 beast! Super fun and super silly!

Also got back safe everyone, granted it was stupidly wet and dark on the Scottish motorway, hardly any lit roads, you can imagine my surprise when I went through some massive puddles in the rain at 60mph 🤦🏻‍♂️

"60"mph

Looks like we need two sets of E46 M3 ITB's per engine - as we need actuator and TPS per bank, and those are specific castings, of which there are only one per M3.

Anyone need six BMW throttle bodies?

Indeed, a random lady a fair bit older than me complimented me on the noise today, saying she thought it was a much bigger engine than 1.4. 180bhp as standard from the GT1446 turbo, can be remapped to 205ish with no other mods.

I drove in the rain and on the motorway for the first time today, loads of fucking fun... Must've gone close to 100kms running around trying to find a new phone on a Sunday... Any excuse to get in the car at the moment... :)

What's the thinking with leasing more than one car?

I think he means 2 at the same time. You return one then start a new lease.

£151/month is dirt cheap...! How did you manage that?

Car woes... Found my dream Peugeot 505, drove it, love it. Realised I can't buy it. Not about the money but the one I found is in such good condition it needs to live in a garage. I don't even have a flat yet, let alone a garage! I already have 2 cars slowly getting ruined while parked on the street. Boooooo....

Oh and more cars need lounge chair like seats covered in velour. So comfortable.