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Post by racingteatray on Jul 26, 2021 8:11:05 GMT
DP due to an angry bear apparently...
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 26, 2021 8:10:34 GMT
Ha! Good one Garry. I think for me just the portable a/c.
Although who knows what FG we've all decided our cars cannot be without as a result...
Car-wise, the only person who really influenced a decision of mine was James/ALF with the GTA. He took me for a spin in his and I decided that there was no finer way to spend £13k than on a 2yr old GTA (and there almost certainly wasn't).
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 22, 2021 17:48:21 GMT
At Stansted this morning it was pretty much 100% masks.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 21, 2021 21:20:29 GMT
Sounds good, fingers crossed for you that all goes well. Thanks Mike. It's just a little roof-top flat in the historic centre of my wife's home town, but it has a decent terrace, a spacious garage and is 10 mins walk to the beach. And most importantly will be our own space after a three year hunt.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 21, 2021 13:34:38 GMT
I potentially need my car next month to go away to France/Italy next month (unless it all goes to hell in a handcart and either we can't leave here or France/Italy bars us from entering). But come the autumn it's a possibility.
But I may defer - my wife (already down in Italy) finally agreed the purchase a property in Fano yesterday - the benefits of being there in person to negotiate with the octogenarian sellers. All being well, that will probably complete in September, so I'd want to avoid doing the two things at the same time.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 21, 2021 13:15:44 GMT
And it's a fair attempt at an answer to a question nobody has the answer to. I've just been chatting virtually to one of our vac schemers - I can't begin to imagine what doing a virtual vac scheme is like - particularly since for us they are an integral part of the interview process for a training contract. So I do get the isolated teenagers point. We had my wife's 19yr old cousin staying with us for the month of June and he definitely was way more cautious and risk-averse than any normal 19yr old guy and I don't think it's a question simply of character.
I'm just worried that because our PM is indeed a bit prone to knee-jerk changes of direction and appears to lack any form of spine, we'll career back into mass restrictions pretty soon at this rate. Which will be worse.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 21, 2021 8:52:09 GMT
Thanks. It has the same slightly too deep and throbby sound that afflicts my car - I prefer the clearer more soprano engine sounds of yore.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 21, 2021 8:33:41 GMT
Linate, yes but it's over three hours away and Milan is a major business city so along with Rome has stayed open throughout. But we normally fly to Bologna and that's what has been cancelled.
Mercifully out of an abundance of caution I made double travel plans - I have an refundable Eurotunnel booking for the same day. And Ryanair is still flying.
That wasn't the point - I just think they wouldn't cancel that route if they were expecting demand.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 17:47:09 GMT
Well possibly BA knows something we the public don't yet. Our flights for 12 August have just been cancelled with no alternative offered - they seem to have block-cancelled.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 17:45:27 GMT
I’ve just been to Aldi and I’m happy to report mask wearing down below 20%. Just out of curiosity, what would need to now happen for you to think that we were making a collective mistake? On the scale between normality and 28 Days Later?
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 17:41:22 GMT
So too early to get quotes yet as they won't have the predicted residuals for another couple of weeks.
But an order now would be delivery at the end of the year apparently, which is shorter than I expected.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 15:59:42 GMT
Without going completely mad? My “not going completely mad” spec was £70k! A little more if I indulged in the GT alloys. You need to indulge yourself more! I tried again so I could get the code and must have missed something last time....it's £80,277 now. As I said, I really haven't gone mad as I've missed off the Burmester (which I'd want...) and some of the nice to have extra leather bits etc, all of which I've got used to over the last few years. www.porsche-code.com/PNVYDX13I suppose I could lose the race-tex headliner, full leather and contrast stitching to drop £4k off the cost but the last 2 are options we really enjoyed on the Boxster and they made it feel more special every time we sat in it. If you are going to spend £76k on a Macan, which I think is too much for a small SUV no matter how nice, then what's another £4k really. So stuff it, I'll add the Burmester and let's call it ££83k all in! So…I didn’t bother with: - Sport Chrono – having read around, it doesn’t seem essential on a GTS - GT alloys – for £800 less the Turbo ones are equally nice in my view - Coloured stitching – can live without - need to go and see what Agate leather looks like in real life – so long as it doesn’t look close to paedo leather, it might be my choice. - Laminated glass – no, merely privacy and not sure why I need rear blinds at that point either - Tinted lights – no, couldn’t care less - Full park assist – no just added a reversing camera - Speed limit indicator, adaptive cruise and comfort access are all unnecessary FG that I’ve never missed on my previous cars - Heated windscreen and heated rear seats I care not about, and ventilated seats are nice but not essential - The standard steering wheel is fine - Really not bothered about the headlining - I don’t much care for carbon trim so went for the Walnut which is free - Wireless phone charging I didn’t bother with either – don’t have that in the house, much less in the car. And somehow that’s about £9k less.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 15:42:57 GMT
I’d still be looking at Stelvio’s Yes, it would be rude not to. But I must confess that I'm not that keen on the styling of them, and the interior and tech gets a pretty poor rep... I have driven a cooking (280bhp) Stelvio before and it was perfectly nice without leaving me wanting one. Whereas I drove a Macan S last year and liked almost everything about it except the performance and engine, which was just a teeny bit lacking compared to my current car. This new S gets a completely different engine (looks frankly to be what was offered in the outgoing GTS) so might fix that.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 15:33:08 GMT
Well I could happily order one now and not see it for a year - I could easily run the 4GC for another year - it's only got 36k miles on the clock. That's not a big issue. I've been looking at things like F-Types but they are all just very impractical and for one reason or another, I'm just always going to be best served by a Swiss armyknife of a car and really I can't see anything else that ticks as many boxes for me.
I agree that it's an awful lot of money but they are so stupidly expensive second-hand - £50k for a five year old GTS or Turbo with 40+k miles - that buying new might be the best way.
I'm not mad on the revised rear end but then I never much cared for the original rear either, so that makes little odds. It's not new-BMW-grille-ugly.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 15:11:13 GMT
That's a really nice set of changes, it looks great in Gentian Blue with 21" GT Design wheels in satin platinum. It's just a shame you can't get rid of the tinted rear lights as they look aftermarket. The GTS is the one to have, the premium isn't huge once you've got it to the spec you want, it will be worth more when the time comes to sell and in the meantime (which is the most important thing!) you'll been enjoying a car that's better to driver and quicker . I've just configured one and without going completely mad got to £79,603, dropping down to absolute essentials didn't make a huge difference (£76,375) and full Martin spec is £83,500. Without going completely mad? My “not going completely mad” spec was £70k! A little more if I indulged in the GT alloys.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 14:24:14 GMT
Well that's a nice discovery!
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 14:18:41 GMT
Wearing masks is horrible when it's hot - I expect that has a bearing on matters.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 14:13:57 GMT
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 20, 2021 10:37:43 GMT
No it's a Cooper S not an SD.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 23:56:14 GMT
Oh well maybe then. It certainly has flappy paddles. To be honest with my mother in (her) car I wasn’t hammering it!
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 19:02:41 GMT
I don't know that Mum's does that - it's a bit more of an old-fashioned gearbox where you physically move the gearbox through PRND.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 16:40:23 GMT
I had one of the original S3s, and whilst I'd never pretend it was the sharpest driver's car, it was a very handsome, classy and (even in Nogaro Blue as mine was) understated piece of kit, with old-school "hewn from granite" perceived build quality. I absolutely loved it, but none of the subsequent generations or RS versions has ever appealed quite as much.
And this latest one least of all. I just don't like all this fussy styling that Audi now has.
Although I was in traffic behind whatever Audi calls its version of the Taycan (I get lost in all those trons) and I have to say it was rather a fabulous looking bit of kit. Purely on looks alone, were money no object, I could see one of those being an adequate GC replacement!
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 16:33:20 GMT
Indeed. And in fact even I couldn't help feeling slightly smug at the weekend as I sat on a Suffolk beach in glorious hot sunshine whilst my wife complained that it was wet and grey down on Italy's Adriatic coast where she is! One in the eye for Italian chauvinism about how dreadful our weather is.
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BMW i4
Jul 19, 2021 16:15:46 GMT
Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 16:15:46 GMT
TBH I'm not entirely sure. I just know that hydro is considered a classic example of something that is not considered as green/renewable as you might think.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 16:11:54 GMT
Had cause, for the first time, to drive the Granny Rocket further than 5 miles up the road. My mother needed driving to Ipswich hospital (she's due a knee replacement shortly) and can't get in and out of my car, so I drove her there and back (about half an hour each way).
I still don't think a great lot of the engine/gearbox combo, although I admit that it got considerably better (mainly improved throttle response) once I finally located the Sport button hidden in a low-down row of chromed rocker switches, and it does go with some vim if prodded. But what I mainly noticed is that it corners remarkably flatly and handles actually quite decently. The ride has also softened off usefully since it was new. It's still firm but acceptably so.
Mum still very pleased with it, but she's going to be off driving for 6-8 weeks (right knee unfortunately).
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 15:45:43 GMT
Yes, it's not as silent as I expected/hoped. With the a/c on, it's certainly noisier than the wall-mounted sort my in-laws have - and the three speed settings seem to be loud/louder/loudest.
But the fan setting is much quieter and it was definitely a godsend when I got back to London last night.
It was 25.5 degrees on the ground floor and fully 30 degrees in our bedroom on the top (second) floor. Took about an hour but the pinguino got the room down to a much more bearable 25, provided I kept the bedroom door shut (given rest of the second floor also baking).
Turned it off and went to sleep - awoke in the small hours feeling hot, but at that point I found the quieter fan setting more than sufficient to cool the room and allow me to go back to sleep.
The only downside I can see is how heavy it is - 30kg! I fondly imagined something I could easily move around the house. But staggering down our narrow twisting stairs with such a heavy and bulky unit isn't going to be a regular activity.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 15:01:14 GMT
I sort of get the Welsh and Scots ones a bit more. But bothering to put the cross of St George on your plates always seemed correlated to driving like a bit of a dick to me. Ah right, pride in your country is not seen as nationalism if you're Scottish or Welsh but is if you're English? Got you. The beauty of this country is that you can be British, Scottish, English, Welsh, Irish, or a mix of all of them, of all different heritages from around the world. You're wife is Italian, if I saw her driving her car with an Italian flag on it I wouldn't automatically assume she was more right wing than Mussolini or drive like the Italian stereotypes. I think you're thinking far too much about this. I don't really go in for overt identity politics myself. I struggle a lot with the sort of people, found in many nations around the world, who feel the need to jump up and down and loudly proclaim their country/people/race/nation/whatever is the greatest. That doesn't make me unpatriotic or an elitist. I'm just not a kneejerk patriot. Personally if someone asks me my nationality, I'd never think of saying "English" any more than I'd ever have thought of saying that I was "European". I'm British - that's what it says on my passport and that's enough for me.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 12:35:49 GMT
Oh I agree. I use proper ones which are close-fitting. They have the advantage of being comfortable and easier to breathe through.
Some of the cloth ones are virtually impossible to breathe through properly.
But I veer towards wearing any mask, especially somewhere where it is mandatory, being better than not wearing one at all. It gives me more faith than the person in question is generally responsible about taking a minimum of common sense precautions.
I'd never glare at anyone for not wearing one, not least because they may have a medical reason for not doing so. But that's not the same as not noticing.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 12:27:42 GMT
I sort of get the Welsh and Scots ones a bit more. But bothering to put the cross of St George on your plates always seemed correlated to driving like a bit of a dick to me.
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Post by racingteatray on Jul 19, 2021 10:11:36 GMT
I encountered an acquaintance at the local car wash in Suffolk yesterday. He was there in an XC90 T8 family bus but told me he'd just sold an F-Type S coupe after running it for a year and broke even on it. More to the point he used to have a very smart campervan based on a Mercedes V-Class and he told me they flogged that on after three years for a profit! He used to work for Marshalls, the dealership chain, and confirmed that prices for pretty much everything have gone up, but prices are anything desirable or lifestyle-y have just gone nuts.
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