Hobby

19 hours ago, steve1 said:

And doesn’t look too happy about it.

Probably thinking I'm better out here than in that box with poison and radioactive material!

@roythebus1 Perhaps worth posting them, it'll make a change from US and Australian ones!

I thought some of the videos were in Australia, but I could well be mistaken, they do look similar in many cases! So it's a peculiarly US trait...

When I made the comment it was specifically about people driving onto crossings and then turning onto the tracks.

As I said I've seen plenty of evidence of that in the USA and some in Aus but apart from that one incident a few years back at Brockenhurst I can't remember many in the UK, certainly not recently, and I've not seen any evidence of it happening a lot over the Channel. Russia i could understand after seeing a programme of dash cams from over there!

39 minutes ago, Kickstart said:

 is a Talbot Solara isn't it?

The Solara had a boot if I remember rightly, hence I thought it was an Alpine which was a hatchback.

And mainly in the USA with a few Australian ones thrown in, the only recent one I can think of in the UK was that one at Brockenhurst a few years ago. Without the US and Aussie posts this thread would be dead!

Is it just those two countries where stupidity at level crossings predominate or are there similar incidents in, for instance, Mainland Europe?

Yes with the 128, or one of it's copies. I don't think the other is a Pony, however that did stir some brain cells - FSO Polonez or Chrysler Alpine? I suspect the latter.

Just on that photo, not the video, a Metro, Sherpa, what looks like the back end of a Montego (with the L plate, buried), I should know some of the others, especially that red one above the Sherpa, but can't name them at present! That Jag's a rare one as well, it's a Coupe!

Learned to drive in the instructors Datsun Cherry in the mid 70s, very easy to drive! 

BTW I'd have put this in the "old cars" thread, not this one, there was nothing modern about the car except that it was more reliable than the British ones! From the OP: " I know it's all about perspective but I'd suggest that we use the Modern Classic Magazine's lead which features cars from the late 80s onward." Surely the colour alone makes it an "old" car!!

I remember a driver at our depot who had hit several people over the years, he said that he took the view that their actions were nothing personal against him, therefore he wasn't responsible for their actions and got round it that way. Not everyone can compartmentalise things as well as that, though.

I'd have thought it would have less capacity than the shipping route, I agree with Apollo that a rail route would be far worse both for capacity and volume. I doubt the rail route would be able to handle the shear volume of containers on that route. Just looking it up it seems that "New Panamax" ships which will fit through the new locks on that canal carry up to 14000 containers, on the Suez they can carry over that and up to 25000! That's an awful lot of trains, don't even think about lorries!

21 hours ago, 31A said:

In another episode (sorry can't remember which one) they filmed some railway scenes in Belgium on I believe the CF3V line, Mariembourg-Treignies.  At least it looks a bit more like France than the Czech Republic does!  The SNCB station at Binche also featured in one of them.  From the credits at the end it looks as though TV production companies from Belgium, Czech and Switzerland as well as France were involved in making the series.

I think that was the one where he went to some relations in Belgium to find out who'd killed someone as his wife's family was being blamed. I checked out where it was filmed as it looked Belgian rather than "somewhere else pretending to be Belgium" and it turned out to be a small town outside Brussels. They also had the episode where there was a tram featured quite heavily. IMBD is usually quite good to find locations for the various episodes.

I think they've changed quite a lot since your 2019 model. I'll let you know when I get it.

Part of the 2023 fifth generation update I believe. I'll know more when I get it. I do wonder about all these ways to improve things like economy getting in the way of actually driving the car. Watching to see if the EV light us on fir instance.

Late to the party, so I'm not sure if this is still on the go!

I lived in Hutton and then Longton as a child in the 60s and "collected" many relics from the railway after it shut. I notice you've said you are using bullhead rail, but many of my relics were the J clamps used on flat bottom rail which is borne out by photos of the line in the 60s showing FB rail on the main line. However you've not said what era the model is in and the sidings may well be BH!

I've always wondered why no-one has made a model of Fishergate Hill Station in Preston, it seemed and interesting prototype and I ca remember sneaking into it in the 70s!

Just to add to the discussion on satnav it seems that the system in the Corolla is linked to the hybrid system itself and can tell it when it's best to charge the battery, etc (regen braking and so on) so perhaps there's more to it than first meets the eye. I'll know more in April when I get it.

Yep, and then you have to pay for it! Just a cost cutting exercise. The Skoda and VW ones have been fine and the one in the Toyota seemed on a par with them based on the one in the Yaris whilst we were on holiday last May. I'll just stick with the less hassle in car version, thanks!

Final update. I test drove a Toyota Corolla, VW ID4 and Suzuki Swace. To be fair to the ID4 whilst it looked big from the outside it seemed smaller when driving it! The Toyota was the latest version (5th gen), though the hatch rather than the estate, not that made much difference. The Swace was a '21 model so previous generation, though the dealer didn't tell me that, I just noticed the difference in performance compared with the Toyota!

The ID4 was nice and quiet, roomy and as I said didn't seem as big to drive as it looks, but I just don't feel we are quite ready for a full EV just yet so I've told the dealer we'll be back for another look in three years when we change next time.

The Swace and Corolla are technically the same car, just different equipment and slightly different advance payments. Driving the previous generation hybrid on the Swace and the latest on the Corolla made me realise just much of an improvement there is between the 4th and 5th generation Toyota hybrid powertrains. I was able to keep in EV mode for a surprising amount of time in the Corolla, even at speed (50mph), something I couldn't in the older Swace.

So the decision was purely down to which spec I preferred and the Corolla won out mainly because it had satnav, something not included in the Swace for some unknown reason. I know I could use my smartphone but I have a very basic contract and would be using data I'd have to pay for. As I said it seemed strange these days for it not to have satnav unless they feel it's the "new way"!

So a Toyota Corolla Touring Sports (estate to you and me!) in red with delivery when my current Motability contract runs out in April.

Thanks again for all your help!

13 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

The red lights didn't stop flashing though. 

They did! Then started again. ;)

6 hours ago, Hobby said:

Current update is that I've got to take Jennie along to the VW dealership to see if she can get in an ID4,

She managed it, though it was a bit of a climb and the seat set at it's lowest setting, I'm not completely convinced. Why oh why do they have to push these SUV things over conventional cars.... Test drives to arrange now, waiting for phone calls from VW and Suzuki dealerships who seem reluctant to talk to me... Must have been something I said!

Whatever happened to standardisation, eh!

Current update is that I've got to take Jennie along to the VW dealership to see if she can get in an ID4, if she can then it's test drive time, the ID4 and a Suzuki Swace which other users recon is good for 60mpg+ so I'd only be looking at a difference of £100/150 per year difference in fuel costs but with current ic car convenience... Decisions, decisions!

Thanks, folks, I went to bed before Ian's post and then spent the next few hours with my brain in a whirl trying to figure it all out, bad idea but I couldn't shake it off!

I've got the "mpg" thing, I think, looking at various reviews of EVs I get the impression that most think that 2 kWh/mile is low and if you can get 4 then that's good, but even around 3.5 is ok!

It's the cost of charging that I was struggling with, therefore if I'd have read Ian's post before going to bed I may have slept better!

The VW website for the ID4 (82) has a useful "how long will it take to charge" calculator which if reasonable accurate gives me the following:

Charging times for 10% to 80%:

Wall socket 30h 

Home charger (7.2kW which I think is what Motability pay for) 7h 55m

Public 22kW 1h 55m

Motorway 50kW 55m

Motorway 150kW 37m

Right now down to costs, forget wall socket, it doesn't seem like it's worth bothering unless you're really stuck!

Home charge first, if I can get Octopus's 7p kW that works out at 49p per hour and roughly £4 for per charge, so it's using 56kW?

A 22kW public charger at, say, 55p per kW, would be £30.80.

A 50kW motorway charger at 79p per kW would be £44.24.

Now if I can get an average over the year of 200 miles per charge (hopefully more, but erring on the low side) that would work out at:

Home charge 2p per mile.

22kW public 15.4p pm

50kW motorway 22.12p pm

Against my current petrol of 13.5p pm.

Going in deeper! Since retiring I'm doing roughly 9000 miles per year. Main holiday would be roughly 2000 miles, another couple of shorter holidays, say 1500 and another couple of longer trips for model railways, etc., say 1000. Continuing with the 200 miles average range that would be:

4 Motorway charges at £45 each, £180

18 public charges at £31 each, £560

23 home charges at £4 each, £92

Giving a total of £832, or 9.2p per mile, so £2500 over 3 years as against £3700 currently

Does that look right?

I know @BR traction instructor had an ID3 recently and didn't seem to have any issues.

Thanks! This is what I'm trying to get my head round, when it says a 7.5p rate, what, in total, does that mean for a 6 hour charge? How do you calculate it? As I said I'm a novice so need it explained!

Mmm, isn't it quiet on here! So, just to liven things up...

We got our letter from Motability telling us the three years are up and it's time to change cars. The Octavia Estate with the 1.0l engine/DSG gearbox has been quite a revelation, smooth and quiet and using Fuelly to get an accurate MPG reading averaged just under 49mpg over 27k miles with a total fuel bill of around £3700. Considering it's lugging round a large car that's not bad going. It's a mild hybrid (hence it can be mentioned on here!) and the stop start works well. Lowest mpg I've seen was in the early 40s when around town and best on the German autobahns going at a steady 110kph Just under 70mph) when we saw mid 60s. But as I said it's now time to change and as neither the Golf or Octavia estates are on the scheme it's off to pastures new.

First of all I'll lay down our requirements:

1. Must be on the Motability Scheme!

2. Maximum advance payment of £5k, but preferably below £3k.

3. Large boot, 550l is a round minimum, preferably it should hold SWMBO's folding wheelchair without any extra folding (legs or handles) and all the other gear we have to take away with us on holidays. Bonus of that is that it neatly tallies with carting the layouts around as well, which take up similar room!

4. Not too bothered on fuel, though I'd prefer PHEV, FHEV or EV rather than a mild hybrid as I'd like to get better mpg than at present.

So, after a gruelling few hours trawling through the Motability's search car function I've narrowed it down to these cars:

Skoda Enyaq and Karoq (smaller boot but has removeable rear seats like the old Yeti and Roomster)

VW ID4 and 5

Peugeot 308 Estate in 1.2l Mild Hybrid (yes, I know!) and PHEV versions

Vauxhall Astra Estate in Mild Hybrid mode (the PHEV is a ridiculous £7500 AP)

Dacia Jogger Estate (not seen yet, so could be deleted quickly!)

Suzuki Swace or Toyota Corrolla (same car, Suzuki being cheaper)

I've looked at, and done, the "wheelchair boot test" on all (and several others) but the Dacia/Astra/308, hence the shortness of the list.

This is where I need your help, folks, as I have no experience of EV running costs. I'm not interested in tax, servicing, etc., Motability pay them, just the cost of fuel, i.e. electricity! I'm with Octopus and as some of you are aware I have solar panels as well, though no battery, so:

1. What are the costs for a typical 7 or 9 hour overnight charge using Octopus's overnight charging rate (charging to 80% and 100% respectively)? (I'll have a suitable charging station fitted by Motability). I'd expect a charge like that to last at least a week, possible two, if I'm just staying local.

2. More importantly what are the costs of a motorway fast charge of say, 35 minutes, to take it up to 80%?

The Enyaq, is for the time being on the back burner as they've deleted the 85 and only left the 60 which doesn't have a very decent range, but it's sibling, the ID4/5 are still there so it's them I'm looking at.

Thanks for looking and hope to hear some real world costings!