DSL

Another observation, they could do with another element to the heated rear window element. That would break the bond with the wiper blade nicely, means I wouldn’t have to lever it off. -6c this morning, bit of snow overnight so car was de-iced and de-snowed and taken out for a lockdown spin, well drive the slightly longer way to the local pharmacy. A few pics. Smaller roads around here, preferably the ones the pesky gritter/plough hadn’t found. Local high street, loving the mullet look. And matching slush accretionary wedges. a Back in the warm now, sun is out and another day of lockdown ahead. :(

Did someone say wiper blades? https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00W1KKYUI/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I did think of that but too late, by that time the snow/slush had refrozen. Plus I’d forgotten how to do it.. The milk container tops work quite well as the don’t ping off and disappear if I forget to remove them, the tops just stay under the wipers and give me a nice blue wave, laughing at me on the way past.

It is indeed. Fantastic part of the world. No better place to be in lockdown. Been out today to get the car de-iced, I was lazy and hadn’t cleared the car and the slush had refrozen solid last night when it was -4c. I thought this would be a good chance to see how long it takes to de-ice. This was how she started. -1c and a little snow drizzle coming down. Side windows well iced up and would have needed some serious scraping. Engine running and with 5 mins on max screen heat the wipers could easily deal with the slush, plus side windows are all clear. Rear window was de-iced in less than a minute! Wipers weren’t stuck to the screen as the milk container tops did their job well, in spite of being well consumed by the slush. Then out for a short(ish) run as it’s a shame to waste that nicely warmed up engine.

Cheers, will have a look at the update portal and see what’s there. Still feeling a little nervous re updating. Plus will have to find an old SD card, haven’t seen any of mine in years. PS And yes, I think it is Bolero with the slot, 2020 MY SE.

I noticed an “update software” choice in the settings menu. When I went in it found nothing connected so it doesn’t want to do it via my phone’s 4g connection. I’m assuming this is a dealer plug-in thing, is it worth doing? Does a newer software version give anything else or is it a case or if it’s not broken don’t fix it?

PS Forgot to say the real testing section I wanted to try out was the part of the road to the left of the wood in the middle of this pic. Unfortunately it had been gritted and cleared.

Just been out today to see what she’s like in more challenging conditions. Mostly ice, once off the gritted roads, with snow on top. This is typical. Temps just below freezing. All well, prob down to tyres rather than being 4x4, but driving and braking pretty good. Pulled into a few deeper snow areas, a forestry access and lay-by, both snow that has started to melt then refrozen so provides resistance that “normal” snow doesn’t. Even stop/starting in the deepest parts wasn’t an issue. I didn’t choose any areas where I knew there might be the slightest chance of not going out, at worst backwards, but getting going again wasn’t an issue with no sliding around or wheel spin. Even getting into my drive, which is mostly black ice (was lazy and didn’t clear the snow) with about 1” skin of soft snow was no problem at all. Gratuitous pic of Grantown on Spey area from the Tomontoul road. Oh, and again impressed how fast the front windscreen started to defrost. By the time I’d gone round and brushed the snow off the front screen was half done and slush was taken off with squeegee.

Saved on eBay for future. Cheers.

And from me.

By quick, I mean only a few minutes for the ice at the bottom of the windscreen to be slush and able to be squeegeed out the way. No aux heater/FBH that I know about, just started her up, pressed the various switches for max demist, heated rear screen on and mirror heating on. Then closed the door & rear screen was ready to be cleared almost straight away, mirrors were cleared but they were folded in. And it was -4.something so deffo not melting on its own. In the light of CJJE’s experience with mirrors it might be a good idea to switch off folding on locking. PS Folding mirrors are now off.

I didn’t need any de-icing spray, I tend to let the car warm up enough via the engine then it’s easy enough to get the ice off sometimes just with the squeegee blade. If it’s too bad I just let the front windows warm up enough, the back windows will sort them selves out on their own, van style. I was very impressed with how quickly the mirrors and rear windscreen cleared. And as a pauper spec, no heated front screen, seats or steering wheel but after maybe 10 minutes running the car was plenty comfortable and I can confirm it’s fine driving the car with ski gloves on, no problem pressing & twiddling heating controls. So glad that’s not done via the touch screen.

My last car type, Disco 3s suffered badly from binding calipers, might be something to do with dragging it through lots of mud. The way I’d check if I suspected they were binding is to carefully test the outer face of the wheel with the back of my hand. Then if it was very hot then the skin and wheel wouldn’t actually make contact. If the wheel was luke warm after a reasonable (>10 miles) then all was well but if one wheel was a warmer/hotter than the others then that was an issue. Once I pulled over and the brake disc was glowing red, was only after a few miles from home so let it cool, turned around and limped home the called out the RAC and had the car recovered to a dealer.

What I was going to suggest. ^^^^^

At last some proper winter weather to see how she behaves when things get a bit cold and slippy. Karoq 2.0 Tdi 4x4 DSG for those that can’t see the profile. There was a bit of snow on the ground from yesterday but that started to melt and go a bit slushy before it got down to -5c this morning and froze the lot solid again. Then it stared to snow and has been snowing off and off all morning. Pics in the Karoq pics bit. And the observations. I was amazed how long, not, it took to get hot air through the blowers. I had been under the impression that it would take a while, from how long she takes to warm up under normal driving, but no, it was really quick. SWMBO’s petrol Jazz warms enough up in a few minutes, Skippy was similar. I don’t have a problem with it but SWMBO was really nervous on the throttle as it’s a but “brick on an elastic band”. It takes a bit getting used to cf her car so we were crawling a bit more than normal under these conditions. Fuel filler was a bit reluctant to open when went for diesel. Tools a few thumps to open and a firm push to close. I worked the plunger bit a couple of times to check it was working so just needed a bit of a coax to engage. Re driving on snow covered ice, absolutely no problem. Nothing was challenging but up our access road is snow over ice and uphill so can get interesting, plus a sharp turn into the drive. No problems. Being on full winter tyres is prob doing more than being a 4x4 version but good having both. No fancy snow mode (no idea how much difference that makes) and no way of knowing if in 4WD or 2WD but it all worked fine. And it’s stopped snowing.

A couple more snowy pics after a bit of a light dusting last night.

I don’t think I have any GPS based system on mine, no satnav apart from my phone which wasn’t connected apart from BT.

Was out on my Contis yesterday to see what they were like now things have turned a little wintery. Happy to find on both compacted snow and ice all was good. I even pulled over into a forestry access to see if I could get some wheel spin on sheet ice, wheel stubbornly refused to spin! Hard braking, where safe to do so, also didn’t even get the ABS kicking in! Well happy.

At least it’s a cheap fix. It is a bit annoying binning a virtually new set of blades but nowhere near as annoying as the racket they made.

Makes sense. Cheers. Not an issue, just a bit odd. Will see what it does next time I’m out.

SWMBO noticed that the clock was on Eurozone time, it was deffo 10am, not 11am when this was taken. I’m assuming that it’s a ghost in the machine but it begs the question, where does the car take it’s time feed from? I deffo didn’t change the time and pretty sure it was correct last time I looked. Basic SE so basic infotainment, if that makes a difference. Plus iphone on correct time.

From discussion with a local chap on a different forum, the verge/side of the road collapsed and he went over. It’s pretty narrow at that part for 2 cars, never mind a truck like that and another vehicle.

Even here we see regular cars in ditches, it often comes as a surprise that their car can’t break the laws of physics. Mind you, not as spectacularly as this plough I came across just S of Tomintoul a while ago. Note no peeps were hurt in the making of this pic.

Hopefully you’ll get a bit of the white stuff to try them out in. A little bit north of you this morning:

Is it fully “clear”, ie not dimmed, in the dark?