Smile of the day - What is yours?

[garynortheast]

Originally Posted by svenrico

What is CMATS ? I would be interested in exercises for my knee but the chance of being referred to a physiotherapist ,assuming I could get to see a doctor , seem very remote !

https://hduhb.nhs.wales/healthcare/s...service-cmats/

[Bibio]

not complaining about seeing a nurse in fact it was better. i got antibiotics to which i usually get fek all from my doc and the only time i see my doc is when im really ill which is never (unless you count the bypass.. lol)

[SV650rules]

Originally Posted by Sir Trev

My car now has a towbar. I can get a cycle rack to fit on it now instead of hurting my back hoisting the bikes up to the roofbar carriers. Hoorah. If Lady Poppy and I get the e-bikes we've been promising ourselves we can also cart them off to places too as the car would not be happy with around 60kg of rails/carriers/bikes on the roof.

Another smile is I got chatting to the sales guys at the dealership while the towbar was being fitted as its nearly time to replace the other car. Thanks to the semiconductor supply issues our current cars are worth a crazy amount. In "normal" times a seven year old Focus would get me c£5k in trade in but I can expect almost £10k at the moment. Madness! My three year old Focus had a list price of almost £30k (I bought it as a six month old used one) is still worth at least £20k... Although that's partly because it's a rare as hens teeth petrol estate automatic, according to the sales guy. The manufacturers assume everyone wants crossover things instead now, which I don't. It's a mad world.

I suspect the reason older low tech cars are going up in price is because there is massive amount of annoying features on newer models. My brother spends 10 minutes before every journey disabling stuff...

[Craig380]

Originally Posted by SV650rules

I suspect the reason older low tech cars are going up in price is because there is massive amount of annoying features on newer models. My brother spends 10 minutes before every journey disabling stuff...

Heh, I know how he feels. On my last three company cars, I would disable the auto stop/start and traction control immediately after firing up the engine.

[admin]

You're going to love the 2022 cars with the automatic speed limit control.

https://www.evo.co.uk/news/22326/man...ars-after-2022

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[Bibio]

Originally Posted by SV650rules

I suspect the reason older low tech cars are going up in price is because there is massive amount of annoying features on newer models. My brother spends 10 minutes before every journey disabling stuff...

Originally Posted by Craig380

Heh, I know how he feels. On my last three company cars, I would disable the auto stop/start and traction control immediately after firing up the engine.

i'm the opposite. i want all the safety gadgets. in a car i just want to go from AtoB and not drive like a looney. i'm more than capable of controlling a car in emergency situations and if there are built in features in the car to help me than all the better. ask any F1 driver if they want better electronic driving control/aids they will say yes please.

stop/start is simply awesome, why anyone would want to turn it off is beyond me. same goes for traction control and abs. its learning to drive with these features that is the real challenge, but once you do learn you will wonder how you lived without them.

each to their own and all that...

[embee]

Unobtrusive safety features are broadly speaking welcomed and have been responsible for a significant part of the reduction in road deaths (from air bags, safety cage structures, crumple zones, antilock braking, to stability control etc).

The systems which seem to be causing issues are the intrusive ones, especially the latest level of lane/road departure etc which tug at the steering when the car assesses that you are leaving either a marked lane or the edge of the road. The classic one which is leading to complaints on the Honda Jazz forum seems to be when on narrow country roads etc and the car decides you are pulling too close to the nearside (usually when meeting an oncoming vehicle) and the car wants to steer into the middle of the road, into the path of the oncoming car. Sure you can override it but it can be unnerving by all accounts.
Similarly there are active anti-collision systems which may or may not behave properly when approaching traffic ahead for example, some people are commenting that when active it doesn't always react and you end up very close to the car in front. Fine if the driver is on the ball but the very nature of these systems is that they lead the driver to think they can relax and let the car do the speed/distance regulation.
Active speed limit control will be a problem as/when it becomes a standard. Often cars now will see speed limit signs on adjacent roads and react, my car uses a camera to recognise standard speed limit round signs and shows it on the panel display, it's very useful but not totally reliable. Plenty of cases of a car seeing a sign on a service road etc beside a motorway and saying the speed limit has dropped to 30mph. Fine if it just shows a warning, but bad if it decides to slow the car down suddenly.
A dilemma is that most of these "safety" systems are on by default when starting the car, you cannot de-activate them as a persistent setting, only on an individual trip basis. If you live in a rural area and need to switch off the road departure system because of the false activations etc, it means a tedious "pre-flight" procedure of menus and selections every time. That's just annoying, it might be considered a good idea to have these systems on by default, but it's a pain in the harris in real world use.
Any system which can affect the steering, brake or accelerator can potentially upset the control by the driver and has to be very carefully implemented. If they have shortcomings it can affect the willingness of drivers to accept them.

[admin]

Originally Posted by Bibio

i'm the opposite. i want all the safety gadgets. in a car i just want to go from AtoB and not drive like a looney. i'm more than capable of controlling a car in emergency situations and if there are built in features in the car to help me than all the better. ask any F1 driver if they want better electronic driving control/aids they will say yes please.



stop/start is simply awesome, why anyone would want to turn it off is beyond me. same goes for traction control and abs. its learning to drive with these features that is the real challenge, but once you do learn you will wonder how you lived without them.



each to their own and all that...

I'm much the same. I don't drive the car particularly fast (it's not fast anyway). On the otherhand I don't completely rely on all the aids such as the rear camera and parking sensors, my inbuilt sensors do a better job but it's nice to have backup for that one time you're distracted and fail to see little Jimmy as you reverse out of the drive.

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[admin]

Originally Posted by embee

Unobtrusive safety features are broadly speaking welcomed and have been responsible for a significant part of the reduction in road deaths (from air bags, safety cage structures, crumple zones, antilock braking, to stability control etc).

The systems which seem to be causing issues are the intrusive ones, especially the latest level of lane/road departure etc which tug at the steering when the car assesses that you are leaving either a marked lane or the edge of the road. The classic one which is leading to complaints on the Honda Jazz forum seems to be when on narrow country roads etc and the car decides you are pulling too close to the nearside (usually when meeting an oncoming vehicle) and the car wants to steer into the middle of the road, into the path of the oncoming car. Sure you can override it but it can be unnerving by all accounts.
Similarly there are active anti-collision systems which may or may not behave properly when approaching traffic ahead for example, some people are commenting that when active it doesn't always react and you end up very close to the car in front. Fine if the driver is on the ball but the very nature of these systems is that they lead the driver to think they can relax and let the car do the speed/distance regulation.
Active speed limit control will be a problem as/when it becomes a standard. Often cars now will see speed limit signs on adjacent roads and react, my car uses a camera to recognise standard speed limit round signs and shows it on the panel display, it's very useful but not totally reliable. Plenty of cases of a car seeing a sign on a service road etc beside a motorway and saying the speed limit has dropped to 30mph. Fine if it just shows a warning, but bad if it decides to slow the car down suddenly.
A dilemma is that most of these "safety" systems are on by default when starting the car, you cannot de-activate them as a persistent setting, only on an individual trip basis. If you live in a rural area and need to switch off the road departure system because of the false activations etc, it means a tedious "pre-flight" procedure of menus and selections every time. That's just annoying, it might be considered a good idea to have these systems on by default, but it's a pain in the harris in real world use.
Any system which can affect the steering, brake or accelerator can potentially upset the control by the driver and has to be very carefully implemented. If they have shortcomings it can affect the willingness of drivers to accept them.

I do wonder about the liability of the driver with all these aids. Who is actually driving the car? For example if the car suddenly brakes because it missreads a road sign and you get hit from behind, or decides to position you in the path of an oncoming car. Who gets the blame?

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[Bibio]

the public right now are test pilots for the "smarter" cars.

we are in an age of no blame so nobody gets the blame if these things go wrong. the insurance companies will just pay out and hike your insurance premium.

i'm surprised that your not made to sign a disclaimer when buying a new car.