pinkpanther

The sun has now disappeared behind a big bank of cloud on the horizon - lucky enough to snap this earlier 👍

Whilst collecting my Karoq from the local Skoda dealer I had a wander round the Mazda garage opposite and thought these looked pretty cheap. Savage depreciation, although limited range. Intriguing option though 🤔 MX-30 (AutoTrader)

Apologies!

The DSG must be considerably more economical than the manual I guess. I recall averaging mid 30's in my first (2009 1.2 TSi Yet). The best I ever managed was only high 30's. I thought it was a tremendous car (I went on the own another 3 of them!) and a considerable upgrade over the 1.6 Petrol Qashqai it replaced, although just not great of fuel.

I placed the order for my Karoq towards the end of November 2023 and it was delivered towards the end of March 2023. From receiving the email from Skoda telling me it had been built to it actually arriving in the UK happened within a matter of days!

From memory I paid £440 to add winter pack+ to a 1.5 SE-L. The heated screen is excellent, as are the heated rear seats (ingenious wiring solution too👍)

Colourful sunset earlier. Not sure what type of clouds they are? Still evident now

Very much appreciate the feedback - gives me confidence I am making the right choice 👍

Many thanks for the suggestion, but not keen on an Up! / Mii EV. I've owned a Mii from new (was £7500 as a pre -reg) and whilst it is a great car, I've had issues with the rear brakes sticking pretty much from six months old. The only Up! I'd consider would either be a GTi (prices are very strong) or a TSi, which are great fun, but are a rare find and still too costly.

Very much appreciate the feedback regarding the Zoe Zoe is likely not for me, as range / charging speed aren't paramount, whereas low purchase price, comfort and a decent boot probably are. Think I've narrowed my search to a 2018 -> Leaf 👍 Strangely I watched this yesterday - whilst I would always trust a Yorkshire man, it's definitely a Leaf I'm looking for 😁

I'm looking for a bit of a sense check regarding my latest crazy motoring idea! It would be useful to have another car available for general urban communting duties (maximum single journey would require a range around 100 miles). We have a new Skoda Karoq (and a Mii and 2 older cars), but the Karoq is likely to be the main family car for the foreseeable future (hopefully at least 5 years like the Suzuki it replaced). I've been looking round for something which would be a runaround for the whole family and as car prices are vastly inflated at the moment, choice / value is therefore limited. I ideally want something inexpensive to run/maintain/insure, which is generally undemanding, safe and smallish. I do not currently have a wall-box charger, but can park another car off-road, with convenient access to facilities (external socket) and I'm also in the process of exploring home EV charging installations. Apparently the home wiring is new enough not to present any issues. Whilst I have experienced several Tesla's recently, I'm not in the position to purchase one as a second car, given even something second hand will be £25-30k and frankly the performance is well in excess of our needs. Budget is around £10k. I did however think an EV may be particularly suited for this role and my mind has turned to the Nissan Leaf, which based on research I understand is a very mature platform and known for reliability? The original (2010-2017) cars are now pretty old and many of them have limited battery capacity, as they appear to suffer degradation owing to a lack of thermal management? Many of the older cars have a range <70 miles, which precludes consideration given our requirements, although despite this many low mileage examples remain in the £5-8k range. The later generation Leaf (2018 ->) still lacks thermal battery management, so I understand isn't suited to daily multiple rapid charging/longer journeys, but the lower battery (40 kWh) model appears to have a genuine 120 (winter) and 160 (summer) range, which would appear ideal for our needs. I gather the Leaf's charging technology (Chademo) is now outdated, but if the vast majority of charging was done at home (overnight) would be no particular limitation, given the car's intended use. I would be looking at an appropriate electricity tariff for home charging overnight. The Tekna models appeal from a tech perspective - leather, Bose, semi autonomous driving and the ability to remotely pre-warm / pre-cool the car whilst charging. I've read numerous user reviews and actual Leaf owners seem very positive, whereas the mainstream motoring press is less so and typically directs you to something new, which is not a consideration given cost. I have spotted a few 2019 40 kWh Tekna models and I understand drivetrain (motor and battery) warranty extends to 8 years / 100k miles, so is covered for a few years/miles yet. For this kind of budget alternative conventional hatchbacks are generally older / higher mileage. Whilst I've owned many (120+) cars over the years I am an EV newbie and therefore grateful for your thoughts on this latest motoring pipedream 👍

Not much chance of any kind of sunset this evening☔, but pretty decent last night👍

Same for me. I seem to recall it relates to the Privacy settings, accessed via the infotainment screen?

Pinkish tinge this evening

Another colourful one this evening.......

Colourful end to the day.........

Colourful sky this evening and the Buck Moon has just put in an appearance 👍

The weather in the east Midlands this evening made for lovely skies 🌈

This may help 👍 (taken from the display board at Danes Hill nature reserve: https://g.co/kgs/dYUAD3)

We've had a few colourful sunsets recently......

And an original Raleigh Chopper!

We had a car show on the local park - no Skoda's in attendance, but lots of lovely examples nonetheless......... The De Tomaso was the star of the show for me 👍

We've just had a visitor 🦔 Hedgehog 27_06_2023~3.mp4

Pretty sky last night.........

Further update - the noise from both the from LHS and steering motor continues and my local dealership have received further information from Skoda technical - I'll keep you posted 👍