..and You Think There Expensive Here!, Have a look at this one.

Hi Mike

I agree entirely (and my son has a 2.8 Capri). From what I have been reading, it would seem that once a car is about five years old, if anything mildy serious goes wrong with it, it is 'beyond economical repair' How is that reducing pollution?

I have witnessed the same thing happening in the TV trade. Most of my income was generated not by repairs but by reconditioning and selling TVs with a guarantee. In the early '70s a refurbished colour TV would earn my weeks wages. I used to have a 200 gallon diesel tank for the business vehicles, and I could fill that with the proceeds of one colour TV sale, a few years ago it wouldn't fill the tank in my car up and now there is no profit whatsoever. I think maybe Currys and the like are making more from the flat TVs but until recently, the reason they were so desperate to sell you a five year guarantee is because they were making practically nothing from the set sale.

We had to start doing B&B about ten years ago because we could no longer make a living from TVs. Fortunatly I am now retired, which is just as well as I dont understand digi at all! There are virtually no TV engineers left now. I can see the independent garages going the same way

Peter.N.

As one of the younger generation, who makes a living in IT, I'm not one bit averse to progress, indeed it is vital to the continuity of my livelihood. In addition to that, I do love my electronic devices, to the point where my family call me 'inspector gadget'.

However I do have to say that inclined to agree with say that there's still a difference between progress, and change for the sake of change.

Plenty of things in cars have benefited from progress. Aircon, electric windows, central locking, immobilisers, airbags, sat nav etc. However, there's such a thing as too much improvement. A prime example of this is the case Peter mentioned of the horn not working because of a problem with the ECU. The simplest electrical circuit you can get, now hopelessly complicated in the name of progress and improvement. Certain things which just work should be left alone IMO.

Peter mentioned work for TV engineers dwindling because we're now in the era of the cheap, electronic, disposable TV. I see the same thing happening to computer repairs in the next lot of years, the price of replacement components is falling, software is becoming increasingly resilient and self healing. There will always be a market for training, consultancy, bespoke application development etc, but for the most part I expect to see the repairs dwindle as time goes on, which is why I'm branching out into other areas.
Anyway, I'm getting side tracked, the point I was going to make was that we're now heading into the era of the disposable car. Plastic fantastic construction, ECUs for everything running proprietary software, deliberately obscure diagnostics, all designed to freeze out the DIY mechanic, and be thrown away rather than repaired*. Ironically, people in my kind of profession could probably create applications and systems to diagnose these cars - if the manufacturers would use standardised protocols, or release theirs to the public, neither of which they'll do for obvious reasons. Who knows, perhaps we'll one day see the kinds of anti-trust law suits against car manufacturers that the likes of Microsoft had in the 90s for making their software deliberately closed and obscure.

So perhaps all this stuff is progress, but at what cost? When something is more expensive to own and complicated to repair than what went before it, yet still performs exactly the same task, you do have to ask the question what is the benefit to the end user? It's actually a hindrance in some cases. I could name many examples from the IT world where this has happened, but I won't bore you with that.

*I read recently of a scheme Opel/Vauxhall were trailing, whereby they would sell you a new plastic fantastic Vauxhall every couple of years at a reduced price, on the condition that you surrendered the old car to them. It would then be either scrapped or reused in a limited capacity. When your 2 or 3 years were up,\ you would hand back the existing car for scrapping, and get a brand spanking new one. The aim of the scheme was to have, within 10 years, no Vauxhall aged older than 5 years on the road. Just think, they wouldn't have to worry about building products that lasted more than a couple of years. Great for their coffers, 'great' for the car owners apparently, shit for the environment but who's counting?

Ciarán

Just remind me, all you progress guys ---- weren't computers going to leave us all with more leisure time than we knew what to do with, in a society powered by nuclear energy that would be so cheap it needn't be metered ? Where have we really got with our obsession with endless change ? Sure, some kit and products are more reliable and efficient than they used to be -- but many are not. We have come to a point where most families can't afford anything like the lifestyle they feel they should have unless the adults all work so hard there's no time to enjoy it. I was with a chap today who installs MRI scanners -- so fairly clued up, I guess --- and he lives in what strikes me as a shoebox because that's the extent of what he can afford. Much of the technology has been subverted from what may have been well intentioned ideals to oppressive methods of population monitoring and control, to ever more ruthless killing systems. I'm curious whether those of you in the progress must go on camp would care to enlighten me --- in the face of what the ruling class (whoever they may be) have done with enhanced technology so far -- as to exactly where you see it going and to what end ?
There ---- nothing like a bit of light hearted banter !!

Mike.

Things may be changing though. Taking Ciaran's computers example, the endless supply of as-good-as-free labour from the far east is drying up rapidly. The cost of manufacture is due to rocket in the years ahead unless something changes.

I'm not sure how that will affect things as we cannot just fix things like we used to. If something goes wrong then you need to replace the circuit, but if that circuit now costs 20 times what it used to then what do you do. Will it mean things like cars etc become less gadget heavy? I don't know.

I do think progress is a good thing, but only when applied correctly. As has already been said, Aircon, airbags etc are good use of technology. Medical advances are good use of technology. Some things are not. Early adopters will always be guiney pigs and will get an unreliable product.

There is a girl at work who is complaining that she has run out of heating oil as the gadget on her oil tank has stopped working and so when the tank got low it didn't automatically call the oil company to come and refill it. she didn't find out till the heating stopped working. My reply was 'what is wrong with a glass tube?'. She said that would mean she would have to go and check it. OK, so how often does the tank run out? 2 years or more. An expensive and unreliable gadget has been used in order to save her going and looking at the tank in her garden every 6 months or so and now she is seeing why the simple solution is better.

Exception to the rule

I wonder what this will do for decreasing CO2 emissions the EU is so committed to.

I've got one of those gadgets that tells you how much oil is in the tank without getting cold and wet The reason I got it is a case in point, the original sight tube had become so opaque due probably to ultra violet light, that I couldn't see the oil through it. I looked on the internet for a replacement and found that I could get an electronic 'Watchman' for less money than a replacement sight tube!

That has now developed a fault, when the sun shines on the tank and it gets warm the display goes crazy, but fortunatly it doesn't do it in the winter when I need it most

Peter.N.

Hi all,
We, on our heating oil tank have a novel human interface device . It's called a dipstick. It's never developed a fault or broken down yet.........
Cheers, Carl G

It's like so many things in life, some things are an improvement and other things are not. Surely that's the difference between progress and change? A bit like common sense being replaced by political correctness, that's not progress if you ask me.

However binning the old fashioned headlamps for halogen that was progress.

As for where it will all end who knows. Personally I'd like a usable electric car and and a very efficient house house so that I didn't have to pay an extortionate amount of tax/duty, etc.

I work in IT support so there's quite often change purely for changes sake. But sometimes there's progress.

Steve.

Ah yes. The goal is a good one I think. But unfortunately the implementation of it is always in the hands of some fool who is incapable of looking at the whole picture.

Cars burn a lot of fuel and create lots of emissions. The proposed answer? Everyone scraps their old cars to get a new one with a slightly more efficient engine that does 3mpg more. What about the emissions from the manufacture of all those new cars? Well - lets just forget about that (or hope they are all manufactured outside the EU so go on someone else's emissions targets).

Exactly. Consumers have a right to know, should know, not only how much harmful gas a car emits per mile but also how much damage was done to the environment in the production process.

Unfortunately it is not in the interests of the manufacturers to tell us that. If they did then people who wanted to reduce their emissions would keep their cars for longer and that would mean less new cars sold.

Cynical - me?

Exactly. Consumers have a right to know, should know, not only how much harmful gas a car emits per mile but also how much damage was done to the environment in the production process.

while we're at this, let us not also forget the cost of scrapping said older vehicle too, as that's not a carbon-free item either - there's a cost to EVERY part of the life-cycle, including re-cycling, which is almost never mentionned in all the renewal ideas.

How does this sound (off the top of my head, and my own opinion)

1989 XM v6 - ~23-24mpg average in my experience, though could be up to 28!

2007 C6, say v6 petrol ~25mpg (combined)
- from official figures, so maybe up to 30
deisel ~32mpg

so comparing the petrol versions so like for like - where's the benefit!

on the deisel, maybe a little, but not convincing enough to scrap a serviceable 89 XM and shell out $$$ for a new car that'd never pay for itself in fuel cost savings, likely cost as much as itself in extra garage charges.

Then from the eco POV, likely a similar carbon footprint in manufacture, and say 20% less in end-of-life scrap/recycle given more is probably recycle-friendly given legislation etc.

net gain ~zero most likely, bearing in mind that scrapping a car before it hits end-of-life 'wastes' some of it's original carbon footprint, as that never realised it's full potential of carbon cost vs use.

regards
Dave

I have a Citroen Xantia with the HDi engine. It does about 45mpg, which is pretty good for a family estate car but...

I used to have a Renault Savanna. Bigger than the Xantia, late 80s technology, seven seats and it did about 45mpg (slower though). In 1983 you could buy a Peugeot 305 with perfectly acceptable performance, nearly as much space and about 45mpg.

Even the stone age 1970s rwd petrol cars had mpg figures approaching the real-life figures of modern petrol family cars. All advances in efficiency seem to go into speed.

I thought the reason why MPG suddenly dropped was emissions technology and crash safety making the cars heavier? I'm told that the 1.9 td in the 406 was sluggish yet in the 405 it was fine.

Steve.