Linas.P

Where do you see "overcharging" in this sentence?

Regarding condensation - hard to say, if car was sitting on the lot for a while then it could be damp. As well if previous owner didn't use A/C regularly. But you can only know if there is a leak after a while. Normally if you turn temperature to the hottest for say 30 min and then turn A/C on and set it to coldest for another 15 min, then AC should clear all humidity. If it comes back then there may be leak somewhere or A/C drain may be blocked. Sadly you can't check this during test drive. Replacing callipers is not cost effective - much better to refurbish them. Simply because you basically going to get remanufactured one anyway and they going to rust within a year. Whereas if you get them refurbished, then you can use any coating you like in any colour and they will stay clean and shiny for years as long as you maintain the pins yourself.

Nobody said anything about overcharging, simply charging Lithium batteries above 80% and or running them down below 20% degrades the capacity faster. This is fact. The spare capacity is true, but there is no value for the consumer, in the end of the day you still have to carry exactly the same battery in your car, just last 10% of it can't be used, or it is reserved for complete basic/critical functions and emergency. The space capacity is really being used to hide the fact of how quickly battery degrades from the owner for first couple of years. Batteries do degrade, but because there is hidden margin owners won't see as much difference after just few years or on colder morning - it is clever ploy to fool the owners.

I think goverment will soon try to take control of that! Imagine that - being allowed to use the energy you have produced only on certain hours or paying tax on your own electricity if you use it for the car. So use it while you can 😄

Idle at 1200 is normal for cold start, should drop to ~700-800 once warm.

No difference, Lainsail may as well be called Landfill. Michelin Primacy is low rolling resistance "ecodrive" tyre, meaning hard wearing compound, less grip, but it is not "dangerous" tyre. Grip is not the only thing that matters for safety, much more important is consistency and predictability. On Primacy you simply know you have to take each corner 5MPH slower, you feel when it is starts to loose grip, it does it predictably and you back-off before you are in any trouble, on Land**** (or any crap tyres) in one corner they grip, on other corner it catches you out and you wrap around the pole, in the morning it grips, in the evening after slight rain it suddenly doesn't... so you can never predict what tyre will do and that what makes them dangerous. When these cheap tyres lose grip they lose it suddenly and unpredictably, so even correcting the slide is difficult. Or they loose grip momentary, upsets the car balance and then grips-up again and in that case you over correct it - not good situation to be in. Kind of accidentally my auction IS250 came with 1 Land**** on OSF and some other crap on other side and two Fastroad tyres (235 for some reason) on the rear. And the first time I drove it caught me out in completely random place, literally slow 20MPH corner, I accelerated on the exit and had massive tankslapper out of nowhere. Car does not start at the moment, but once it does these tyres will be very first thing to go to the bin for sure. Besides I don't see value in "saving" £20 per tyre, when @~ £78 one can fit excellent tyres like Dunlop SportMaxx RT2s, which on top of being safer and more enjoyable to drive will last twice as long as well (so they are cheaper per mile). If I ever in the pinch for money then I would go for Debica, Sava or Uniroyal tyres (although Uniroyal costs more than Dunlops now). First two are part of Goodyear (as well as Dunlop) and all 4 are literally made next to each other in the same factory in Poland or Slovenia. Uniroyals are made by Michelin. So I am not some sort of snob for whom the only tyre is PS4s, but budget tyres could be bought with some sense. Buying literally cheapest available Landcrap is not sensible. By the way we have these ones around UK now, so be careful 😄

Seem to be market price now - I paid £3950 8 years ago for 2008 SEL with 120k miles. That was 6 years old car then! Nowadays prices have increased significantly, so £5k doesn't buy you much now. However, for that price I would expect immaculate car without missing buttons and with decent rubber on the wheels. When I see anything with chinesium tyres that instantly has to go before any deal can be made, or discount for full set of tyres has to be made. I hate when dealers says "yes, but they road legal" and that just drives me mad. Not everything that road legal is good and chinesium tyres are literally dangerous to use at any speed. I would argue they should be illegal and found it funny that insurance cares about aftermarket wheel shape, but don't care that the only thing holding you on the roads is not up-to standard.

This discussion just sound really bizarre to me - from when measuring whose fuel tank is bigger became a thing? "My car can fill 65L and do 400 miles .... no no no - mine is better I can put 85L and go for 600 miles.... but wait there is new car with secondary tank totalling 150L and could do a 1000 miles!" Just sounds ridiculous. By this logic fuel tanker is the best vehicle ever! Manufacturers just trying to go around inherent BEV issue of slow charging by increasing battery size to ridiculous sizes, but that is not even the issue. I would be happy to own BEV even with 200 miles range if I could recharge it in under 5 min and the battery would not deteriorate over time. I can't think of any time ever where I have driven 520 miles or indeed 700 miles without stopping. This just isn't realistic use case, but use case of 5 min coffee stop after 200 miles and at the same time refilling is real use case. It is just funny how BEVs manufacturers indoctrinates people in belief that "it is not product that it is bad - you are using it wrong". 🤯

You will have to run check (ideally even before you go to view it) on this car to see what the previous plates where and proper MOT history. Seems clean inside and out, with exception of few thing which caught my attention - never seen start button so worn down, volume button missing on radio and the chinesium tyres require immediate replacement. I would keep this in mind when negotiating the price - start button is like £100, not sure about radio button and what is required to replace it - worst case scenario £200 for used unit, decent tyres ~£400.

Yes, for that reason fords are very rare on public roads in Europe - most countries decided (I guess) they are dangerous enough that they don't consider them safe to use for average driver. Actually, I am not aware of any in continental Europe (I am sure I am wrong and somebody could tell me all about them), the ones I have encountered are either in UK or in Iceland.

Wading requires skill and a bit of luck, you need to enter the ford slowly build-up the wave and the cross it with steady speed. That is obviously assuming your car has enough clearance and wading depth is not exceeded when doing it. The problem - it is difficult to judge how deep the ford is and I guess many drivers assume that "if the road is open, then the depth must be safe to cross", that is very dangerous assumption. Obviously, if you have" "lifted" SUV then skill does not matter as much. I just remember driving in Iceland, we had brand new Jeep Renegade and it was a bit scary. On one hand some fords where clearly too deep and we could not keep-up with proper off-roaders in the area, but others were just matter of skill. I remember stopping by one and wondering whenever I could safely cross it, then local guy came and just blasted thought it with Skoda Octavia 😄 Or they are just lulled by false sense of security, because they are used to babysitting state looking after them. That is why I always had issue with too many signs and too many rules. When people can experience it, they will over time build proper knowledge, but when people are "shielded" from experience it takes single missing sign and it ends-up in disaster. So it kind of has to be either one way or another, if goverment chosen to be prescriptive, then they have to like that everywhere, if they decided to let drivers figure it out themselves, then again let them decide everywhere.

The key issue I see with this approach is that current solution of range seems to be putting ever bigger batteries, or packing them more dense, yet we must realise that this is no different from simply putting large fuel tank in "gas-guzzler". It is not sustainable... I remember talks about oil running out by 2100, but we have even smaller reserves of usable lithium and it is expected to run out by 2040s even at current rate, but we have not replaced even 3% of ICEVs. Just putting more cells into battery, using less insulation, packaging it more densely isn't a progress. Sure I know that even on existing battery technology we can still improve a little and store slightly more energy, but we have approached the limit of technology and now any investment is diminishing returns. Solid state batteries would be better, because the technology is different there i.e. with same amount of lithium they can store more energy and they better in other ways. That is progress. As well at the moment electricity is not subject to taxes, but it will be. So sooner or later it is not going to be only range that matters but miles/KWH will start matter as well. So the way we should be looking at this - how much KWH battery can store per kg of rare earth metals used and CO2 produced in making, instead of having a race of who can connect more cells together to make the biggest battery.

Yes sometimes they go as low as £25k, at which point buying 200t/300h makes no sense. But it was a while since I have seen RC-F under £30k. As you said now it is not good time - all cars seems to be at least 20% up in price.

Yes - it is lottery thought, probably 1 in 5 of such mistakes will result in catastrophic damage, because if engine is hydro locked it most likely to be scrap. I would be wishing it just stalled, but driver will need to fish his number plates out of the ford as well. Can't think it being good for ford waters either when every car washes oil, fuel and so on every time crossing it and some may even have engine explode in the middle of it. I don't know local area, but if there are alternative routes, then maybe this one needs to be properly closed - at least for me that sounds like sensible idea. I am not saying those drivers are smart, or that they should be doing what they doing, it just surprises me that in the country which babysits everyone with useless signs like "slow down" before the slightest bend, local goverment does not think they should be closing the stretch of the road which is clearly dangerous and results in unacceptable number of damaged cars. The sign of "closed road" seems to be temporary for last year, but as noted there seems to be no other signs. I think there may be one other thing which catches drivers out - one one day it may be just a puddle you can cross at full speed, another day it may be half-meter deep river. Now common sense tells me that is what "ford" is about, but as we all know - people at large are not known for "common sense". My surprise is just that in every other area government feels the need to enforce their interpretation of "common sense", but only in this particular area which really needs it - they don't!

Most of the drivers drives in way too fast, floods the intakes and most likely destroys the engines. I have been through ford with my IS250 dozen times and never had issue. That said I have seen several cars being ruined by this ford even in cases where I can't fault the driver and they did everything right, the ford was just too deep - mostly BMW, I think this channel started mostly on BMW content, but later grew in all cars. What I found strange that it seems like quite busy connection in the middle of town so I am sure it is time to find better solution there. People literally come to watch cars being destroyed everyday, but I think it is no longer funny considering that goverment forcing us to pay more everyday for whatever little pollution cars make, but nobody seems to have issue with thousands of cars ruined by some stupid ford. Considering how many cars this ford had ruined, it singlehandedly causing more pollution than all the cars in UK over the day. Maybe it is time to build a bridge there?

That wouldn't be the case, because their database is their responsibility and not yours - what they ask you in online quote is simply to answer the question to best of you knowledge truthfully. Nobody even asks about power output, so you could never answer this question wrong. You are right in saying that it is your responsibility to ensure that details you have provided are correct in the best of your knowledge. But again - no questionnaire ever asks what is power output (at least none that I have seen), so you could never get this wrong. Such details are usually pulled from DVLA database automatically and if insurance made mistake in mapping the details to their database then it is their problem. That said you probably better off - AXA is definitely better company (as much as insurance companies can be) than Direct Line.

I just need to clarify the context - in London (and in wider UK) most of the cars are parked on the road or in large communal garages, some people have driveways, but very few have garages. So when I said cover would be missing or broken I assumed that this applies i.e. you have to take battery out of the car, lock the doors with the key by removing the cover, then next day reconnect the battery, put the cover back and and repeat in the evening. If you keep car in garage, then you in a lucky situation, it will not be a problem for you - you simply buy battery "maintainer"/charger, connect it to the battery without removing it from the car and you can lock the car or even leave it unlocked, my comment won't apply. That is obviously safest and most convenient way to maintain your battery charged-up.

Lexus only dropped the model in UK (not sure about situation in EU). 200t and as they named it elsewhere "RC300" remained quite popular across Asia, Middle East, developing world and US (US more comparable to developing world when it comes to fuel situation). There are multiple reason why it doesn't make sense in UK, like list price - in US RC300 was quite significant saving compared to RC350, whereas in UK start price was actually more expensive than 300h. Then there is obviously cost of fuel - 22MPG in US is fine, whereas in Europe it really hurts. Then there is point of taxes etc. In summary RC200t meant to be "cheap" by Lexus standards, as that suppose to be the sole strength, but in UK it was anything but... thus negating the only strength the car has. I think RC-F being literally more fuel efficient under normal driving circumstances summarises the point.

You kind of know the answer 😄 Just don't!

Probably late now, but in such case I probably would have gone for generic cats and paid for them myself. Going through insurance will increase your premium for many years to come, so all in all you may be loosing money going this route.

So they only cut two cats in mid section? The other two are way up inside engine bay. As for carbon fibre - it is as easy to cut as plastic as far as abrasive discs are concerned, as well it is not abrasion or heat resistant. Kevlar would be better option for both. Finally, don't forget you dealing with scum - I have heard of stories of them smashing windows, lights and scratching paint when they discover additional obstructions for their scummy intentions. Not sure what to advise here - in UK we have no rights to protect ourselves properly and police is simply not interested in any car related crime, society seems to look at motorists like criminal themselves. Sad...

I guess you have an option to take the old one from IS300h and compare it to the one you have ?

That is very sad hearing, and as well very unusual. V6 cars were unpopular with thief for exactly that reason - most other hybrids have 1 massive single cat, whereas V6 Lexus has 4 separate small cats, two of which are pain to get to even at best of times, so it means 4 times more work for same or less profit. It seems they may be getting even more desperate than before, if they targeting V6 now... just digesting! Based on above ... yes! they were "unpopular", but no isolated from it. As Steve said - it seems that no car is safe now.

Would still be cheaper to buy IS-F in UK 🙂 IS350 in US costs more (or very close) than IS-F in UK + import duties and shipping.

The brakes were identical between IS250 mk2 and IS250 mk3. If kit works on IS250 mk3, then it should be the same - unless the seller is saying this kit is for IS300h specifically. I still believe it would be the same, but I can't remember for sure and would need to check further to confirm.