Herbie

It appears that the animation is still there but it needs Adobe Flash to be enabled to see it and interact with it, but it's definitely still there as you'll see below:

That may well be the case if we were talking purely about an electric motor but I don't think we are because it's not as simple as energising the motor which then cranks the engine. Toyota have been extremely clever in developing what they call the Power Split Device or PSD and starting the engine is part of it's duties. There used to be a great animation here http://eahart.com/prius/psd/ but it seems to have disappeared, although a great explanation of the PSD and the role it plays can still be found at that link.

All you're doing is supplementing a dodgy 12V source by piggybacking a good 12V source onto it. 12V is still 12V, whether at the front or the back, so it makes no difference whatsoever where you connect a charger or jump leads - the main thing to worry about is making sure to get the correct polarity.

Our RX is an Advance and is very comfortable. The grunt is there if you want or need it, especially in Sport mode, but I'm more than happy to just leave it in 'normal' mode and waft about in complete luxury.

Toyota/Lexus seem to have skimped a bit in the provision of the 12V battery. My 'normal' cars have had batteries of 75Ah rating but my RX450h battery is, if I remember correctly, about 50Ah or even less. Because a hybrid doesn't have a traditional starter motor it doesn't require such a big, beefy battery as a normal car. A traditional starter motor draws upwards of 300A to crank the engine, whereas my RX only draws 15.32A to get the car to the READY state, so in that case the smaller capacity battery doesn't matter. However, there is always a quiescent current draw for things like the alarm, radio presets and other stuff that needs to be powered up, even when the car is parked up and not being used, which is where the lower battery capacity makes itself known, in not lasting as long as a higher capacity one. It also has to be said that traction battery voltage is not the only cause of the petrol engine firing up. The engine provides heat for the cabin so it will fire up to provide whatever temperature you've got the system set to and to keep it there.

I also have an Aldi compressor and it's brilliant for all sorts of things around the garage and house. Sadly, you have to wait until these things come round in the stores but a quick look on eBay brought up this one which is very similar. This one isn't quite as powerful but is free delivery and free toolkit as well. I initially got mine for blowing out computers that came in for repair; some of them can be quite nasty as you can see below (although these photos are from somewhere else, not me, as I've never had anything quite so bad):

RX all day long, well worth it.

Our cat just asked me if I want the radio left on while he goes out!! Little b****r

I have no idea why they say that in the manual but, as a time-served electrician, then telephone engineer on BT, licenced radio ham, and now self-employed doing computer repairs - in other words, someone who's been around the electrical/electronics fields for the last forty-odd years - I can say that it's just not necessary. Even if there was some form of voltage spike, the battery itself would act as a huge smoothing capacitor and stop that. Although you do it at your own risk and if something bad does happen then I can't be held responsible, if it were my own car I would have no hesitation in doing it myself as I just cannot see any reason whatsoever to disconnect the battery. After all, you don't disconnect the battery to give the car a jump start and it's the same scenario, ie, supplementing one dodgy 12V source by piggybacking a good 12V source onto it.

I find this stuff to be infinitely better than WD40 for releasing stuff.

Yes, it does. We live about 40 minutes from a sea front and if we go there during rainy weather we'll sit in the car with the radio on, the transmission in 'P' and the engine fires up as and when necessary.

Not if yours is like mine. The main cable is crimped into the clamp that goes around the battery post, so you can actually unscrew the nut and take the bolt right out without the clamp losing contact with the battery post. Put the bolt through the CTEK eyelet then back through the clamp, screw the nut back on and Robert is your mother's brother.

Most likely the 12V battery going bad. Either give it a proper charge overnight or replace it and I reckon that'll solve your problem. If you have a multimeter it might be a good idea to check the battery standing voltage and compare it against the chart below. If you can get the car into the READY state then you should be able to measure about 14.5V across the battery as the system attempts to charge it.

The traction battery should be good for a couple of months but my first thought is that you'll need to go food shopping won't you? Unless you live very close to a supermarket then you could make a trip there and that should be enough. Otherwise, maybe once a week I'd go and sit in the car with the system in the READY state for about half an hour. The system itself will fire up the engine and sort things out, just as it would do if, say, you were parked up on the prom watching the sea and listening to the radio.

I don't know how much adapters are but there's no need to go to the expense of buying two - just cut off the original ones if they're the incorrect size and just crimp or solder new eyelets of the correct size on. Yes, perfectly fine and acceptable to connect both positive and negative directly to the battery - that's exactly what I did in my RX as you'll see below:

Hyperflashing is the way the driver is alerted to an indicator lamp has blown. If the lamp itself is genuinely alright then it can only be a loose or dirty connection, or the lampholder that's causing an intermittent contact and making the system think that the lamp has blown. Use some wire wool or emery paper to clean all the contacts and terminals.

It is believed to have come out of Wuhan and there are plenty of videos on Youtube showing the Wuhan Meat Market. If you've got a strong stomach here is one of them but don't watch if you're squeamish. However, having seen it myself, I'm not at all surprised that the virus first made the jump to humans there if that is indeed the case.

That doesn't actually mean anything as the word "Coronavirus" is an umbrella term for a group of viruses, amongst which are SARS and MERS. Covid-19 is a coronavirus but it's a novel virus, which means that it's a new one that no one has ever seen before and it started out in animals. The initial route of transmission was animal to animal, then it mutated and made the jump from animal to human, and now it's human to human.

My car has a beige or ivory leather interior that I try to keep as clean as possible, so I always have disposable gloves in the car for use at petrol pumps etc. Those gloves would also do for your other scenarios, although my wife is disabled so we do have a blue badge for her and don't always need parking tickets. As for toilets, disposable gloves, face mask and antibacterial hand gel should suffice. If I hadn't had a severe back injury that saw me being medically retired, as a telephone engineer I'd be classed as an essential worker and have no choice but to enter into all the scenarios you mention.

I don't see anything wrong with going out for a drive to be honest - although I'm not going to do it. How more 'socially-distanced' could you be from others when you're inside your car whizzing past them? The problem would be if you drove to a destination and then got out of the car for a walk or a chat or something, but I see nothing wrong with, say, going to the seaside and parking up on the prom to watch the sea - as long as you stay in the car - but again, I reiterate that I'm not going to do it and it's only my personal opinion.

Front fog lights only have to be tested if the vehicle was first used on or after 1st March 2018. Strangely though, you may still fail the MOT with regards to switching of fog lamps. If the car has a dedicated and specific switch for fog lights, then it must operate those lights as expected.

A trickle charger is fine, or a solar panel charger like these will work too. Alternatively, just sit in the car and run it for a few minutes every two or three days, or go to the food shop in it.

A guy in a tractor came along our road earlier, shouting at the top of his voice, "It's the end of the world". It was Farmer Geddon

That's because the alarm will not be activated.

DRLs should come on with the ignition and go off when the ignition is switched off, so you can piggyback on any fuse that is ignition switched. Additionally, because they are very bright (they have to be bright enough to be clearly seen on a sunny day) they present a very real dazzle hazard during the hours of darkness, so you must wire a relay in the circuit so that the DRLs are automatically switched off as soon as you turn your sidelights on. This topic may help you: