QOTW: What car do you drive?

[philehidiot]

I'm not fine with either. I don't want a car computer that thinks it knows better than me what lane I want to be in, and I certainly don't want stupid beeps.

While I'm not idealogically opposed to a good buttock massage, first, not while I'm driving, and second, not by a jumped-up mobile microchip.

I don't mind it being equipped but the odds are I'll turn it off. Frankly, if it vibrates the seat to warn you, I just can't be dealing with the mess as I drive in the middle of the road on country lanes anyway and I'm forever moving back in before corners and then back out afterwards.

I much prefer being able to turn everything off - ABS, the works. I have done advanced training and I know when the safety aids are going to work against me (very rarely - anyone who thinks they can beat ABS is wrong 99.9% of the time, but the times it works against you are the times it makes you crash when you wouldn't have).

The safety and electronic stuff has its place. Absolutely it does and I'm glad that when there is excrement-fan interaction (e.g. a pushbike falling off the car infront on a motorway) that I can lean on the electronic aids to swerve at motorway speeds rather than jam on the brakes. My escape plan in that scenario was to swerve due to the vehicle's stability control and clear lanes to the right. If the stability control wasn't there, my escape plan would have been to brake and lean on the ABS. It should always be the case that the driver is trained to know how these aids work as they actively affect the control of the vehicle and also the decisions you might make.

The problem is that most people don't have an escape plan. I have a plan of where I'm going to go as part of normal driving / riding. The problem is that driving like that is mentally exhausting and I can't do more than a couple of hours without a serious break. I like to be completely attached to what I'm doing and what the vehicle is doing so I have ultimate control over what is a life and death scenario. There is a beauty to the physics and the maths underlying what you're doing if you care to pay attention to it.

The comfort that you get, as well as the false sense of safety, lulls people into driving with as little effort and cognitive load as possible. When you see fast and safe road drivers, you'll find that it looks effortless because the cognitive load is so high and everything is planned well in advance.

Cars these days are designed to completely detach you from what is actually happening. They are more comfortable than most people's beds, with climate control to half a degree of resolution and relaxing scents and plush, perforated, soft leather seats. They are designed to lull you into a state of relaxation which, aside from quelling the road rage, does one other thing....

... IT MAKES ALL YOU LAZY rubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishS SIT IN LANE 4 WITH TWO OR THREE EMPTY LANES NEXT TO YOU, COMPLETELY BLIND TO WHAT'S HAPPENING AROUND YOU. MOVE OVER YOU LAZY, HALF DRUNK, HALF ASLEEP, MORONIC SODS AND STOP TUTTING AT ME WHEN I UNDERTAKE YOU. MOVE OVER. IF THIS WAS MY WORLD YOU'D BE IN A CONCENTRATION CAMP FOR THIS, ALONG WITH ANYONE WHO SHARES YOUR GENETIC MATERIAL IN ORDER THAT THIS CANCER OF HALF-BAKED DRIVING CANNOT SPREAD.

So, yes, road rage.... terrible thing. Wouldn't ever want to be like that. Tea?

[gordon861]

Car - 2010 Mitsubishi ASX Diesel - ABS but otherwise very little tech except the bluetooth, replaced the head unit for DAB(+ better MP3) but never use DAB.

Bike - 2009 Honda Hornet 600

It's surprising to see how many bikers are on here.

[cheesemp]

Seat Leon 2015 1.6tdi - Has satnav, LED lights, DAB etc - Do I use any of it apart from the lights - no. Phone is mounted on a vent and the radio is in phone bluetooth mode 100% of the time. Encomoy wise its super cheap 55Mpg+ and £20 a year road tax. Problem is the thing has so many issues I can't wait to be shot of it. Electric windows on drivers side that drops for no reason. Electric window on passenger side that won't rise. No heater on passenger side. Still not as bad as the 12 plate Qashqai my wife had but getting there. My first VAG group car and it has really put me off the marque. My old Hyundai i20 never went wrong in 8 years. Plan to replace the leon with electric as soon as economically advisable - probably a kona or eNiro just because I trust there engineering more than VAG.

[Darkedge]

2016 Nissan Qashqai 1.2 Tekna (which is a lie)
It has 7 inch touchscreen with ok satnav.
It has bluetooth which the paring process is terrible and cannot link to more than one phone at a time.
I'll cope with music over bluetooth and calls just about BUT:
No reading of text messages, no displays of who is calling, none of the niceties of a smartphone link up.
However you can pay a subscription to have twitter and facebook connectivity and handsfree use for htese apps ONLY while you are driving! Morons.

[jnutt]

2016 BMW 428i Msport. Good in car tech. Nav system is good. Sound system is excellent. Only thing I'd like is Android Auto.

[Smudger]

Up until last month, a 2019 Mazda CX-5 GT Sport Nav. More tech than you can shake a stick at, some more useful than others.

Good: Heated and cooled seats (heated rears), Android Auto, head-up display, and something I thought I would ever need but is quite nice: heated steering wheel.

Bad: Lane keep assist. Intrusive.

Good/Bad: Radar cruise control. Good at keeping distance, even tested in a traffic jam and it took us down to a stop, then started us off again when it started moving again. Took a lot of faith to trust it to stop us without pumping the brake myself. Downside, when you're approaching a car in your lane, unless you move to the other lane really early, it starts to slow you down. You can adjust the distance to the next car, but even on the shortest distance, it's further than I would usually leave before overtaking.

Unfortunately, my wife got made redundant, so that went back to Mazda. Now running our 'spare car', a 2007 Ford Focus Titanium, pretty much zero tech.

[Phage]

Rebuilding my 1984 Harris Magnum II 1170cc, engines done, just need to do the rest. Want it to be ready for the TT on the IOM next year.

Bloody hell. You should post pictures of that. What donor engine ?

Ever see one of these ? I'd be all over it...
https://raresportbikesforsale.com/ki...hurst-edition/

[half_empty_soul]

2019 Ford Fiesta ST3

[lon3wolf2002]

2010 Mazda 3, it has a 3.5 mm Aux input/BT and a decent sound system, serves me fine for now.

[tonyd2233]

2016 BMW 428i Msport. Good in car tech. Nav system is good. Sound system is excellent. Only thing I'd like is Android Auto.

You can get android auto, but it's about £600 + fitting...try Bimmertech.

Me? I'm an old man, so BMW X6 40d MSport...

[Psihomodo]

2019 SEAT Ateca 1.5 TSI.

[pcolvin00]

I'm a little more old skool... Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 4GSR from 1996... Sees off a lot of modern cars... (but then the IoM doesn't have an island speed limit)

[NiPPonD3nZ0]

I drive a 1999 Opel Astra 3door 1.4i 16V with around 278.000KM on the odometer and do not intend to switch, and I hate car tech! First and foremost it distracts you from driving, second: it makes the car look outdated after a few years! Third: stuff breaks, its a fact, and the more stuff integrated you have harder it is to repair/replace (car manufacturers only make parts for your car up to 10 years after that model stops production). The perfect car for me is the one WITHOUT integrated stereos or screens! My opel has had around 3 stereos in it, because its easy to get new features! First, I added a CD player to replace the factory cassette player, the I replaced the CD player with a MP3 player capable one, and now I wwill fit a Bluetooth enabled one! Try and do that with a new car without the need of adapters an without messing the CAN and VAN lines on a newer car!

[[GSV]Trig]

04 Audi TT, 179k on the clock, still on its original turbo
Its a knacker, but as I only work 8 minutes down the road, I see little point in replacing it as if we go anywhere the missus has a 15 plate Toureg so that does the family trips..

I would like something a bit newer and larger tho, simply so I can get people in the back, thinking 5 door S3, Golf R/GTi, M140, but cant justify spending the money tbh..

[raygdunn]

I remember finding the expanse of red glow in front of me being very distracting, when I test drove my current 2014 Astra.

Sadly the cameras and satnav were extras not fitted.

Most annoying tech is the catalytic convertor filter full message, insisting that I keep driving. Too many short trips)

[samuraiweasel]

Golf MK3 1.4 from 1996 Cheap and cheerful...until summer when I die without aircon.