Modern cars - pet peeves ?
Basically, all the electric ‘toys’. But then I am quite happy being a dinosaur - I don’t like all these electronic gadgets that just make a car look and feel like a PC on four wheels !
I have this on mine and the first few times using it I was very weary of it’s performance. My background is in Electronics and Software so it’s natural for me to be cautious. On long journeys, especially with the family in the car, I have adaptive cruise control on together with lane keep assist. As long as I’m holding the steering wheel the car more or less drives itself. However I’m not fooled into thinking I can place my life and my family’s life solely on technology. There’s been maybe 10% of the time where the tech will switch off due to the system not being 100% sure so you need to notice this and continue the driving line.
Sunburn warning?
Yes there is - it prevents the stop / start from engaging…
Surely that’d be more applicable on the continental models of this car?
This post spawned multiple posts!
Having read all the subsequent posts I was getting confused myself!
Easiest way to not have stop start keep engaging is to not put the car in neutral, simples ==> to prevent stop start working you need to be in gear all the time. Or am I not parsing this sentence correctly?
I believe the easiest way to cancel the stop/start system is to use the engage/disengage button, see car manual for instructions, section 4-4 in mine.
The way I drive it doesn’t matter whether I disengage the auto stop/start function via the button. The thing never comes on unless I’ve been driving for a long time. On mine it feels like certain planets have to be aligned and the outside temperature have to be summer for it to activate. The manual has a list of conditions that needs to be met before it activates in fear of draining the battery too much. I would have preferred if the manufacturer provided an actual on/off selection as opposed to a temporary disable. Next drive it’s back on again.
Talking about batteries - another pet peeve is trying to use the radio with the engine off. Radio goes off after about 2 minutes after I stop the engine. I then need to press start to put the car in to Accessory mode which gives me maybe another 10 minutes before the radio is killed off. I understand why they need to do this - all the multimedia touchscreen display can drain the battery - but it is still annoying.
You should use the i-stop on/off button for that rather than resorting to unsafe driving practices!
Sometimes the gadgetry is essential. Last year in Germany we were given a Puegeot 3008 SUV as the “Mondeo size” hire car. Ripoff. I hated it, dreadful car. A thousand kilometres later I hated it even more.
The outside rear and side visibility was abysmal, making conventional parking almost impossible,
HOWEVER, if one trusted the amazing big TV screen with its overhead view of the car and the road around it, then it was easy. The fore and aft cameras recorded the scenery and the computer knew the dimensions of the car and what it looked like from above, stitched together the scenery into a believable overhead view and plonked the car on top of it, knowing what I was doing with the steering and showing where the guidelines were, accurate to within an inch or so for the wheels.
It was simply amazing. It was also necessary. It was the sole redeeming feature in the car.
The 360 degree camera view is cool. I make a game out of it much to my wife’s chagrin. There’s no excuse to not park perfectly!
However I should have realised sooner that it was, as you say within an inch, and not try parking too close to the kerb. Plenty of wheel rash relying on the camera view for parking. The low profile tyres didn’t help either.
modern cars have never been better.i started driving in a very old ford escort.always under the bonnet,water ingress, rust and very unreliable.my main car is an Audi A3 35 sport.fantastic.give me a modern car any day.
Aye, but of course WE 'ad it tough!..
See mk1 Golf Gti for a prime example of that.
Tbh the biggest peeve i have in the ND is the build quality, lack of seat adjustment (that lever idea is awful but a lot of new cars have this now) and the little rattles that creep up every now and then, but i guess that’s the price i pay for weight reduction. Apart from that the tech in this car is hit and miss; love the lights and auto wipers, keyless start and walk-away lock, hill hold, cruise control etc etc but the infotainment console is one of the worst I’ve ever used. Once you get used to it then it’s not too bad but it’s clunky at best and i do find myself crying out for a normal head unit at times.
The entertainment system is a bit weird, but with the volume turned up to get the full benefit of nine speakers in such a small space it’s like driving a very manoevreable concert hall.
Its much, much better with Carplay installed.
Anyone else spot the irony?
Sorry but i beg to differ with that. It offers nothing more than just hooking up your phone via bluetooth unless you really must use apple/google maps. You still have to use the silly controller knob in the apple interface and it’s quite obvious that it’s not made for that.
Whoever it was at Mazda that made the decision to make the screen untouchable while moving needs to be publicly flogged imo.
Sorry, have to disagree with you on that. If you’re fiddling with the screen (or anything else) whilst on the move you’re not concentrating on your driving; accident waiting to happen. Example, the recent court case of the truck driver who crashed into the back of a stationary car, killing the driver, whilst fiddling with his phone, verdict “causing death by dangerous driving”.