Sometimes it’s nice not having much to cover in the news, especially with the way things have been going lately. There wasn’t much to talk about this week besides some facelifts and boring industry news. So I’m turning it over to you lovely people again so we can all check up on each other. How are things on your end? If you got to do something car-related this week that you want to share with your fellow hoon, sound off in the comments.
Have a good weekend.
About
Fall vacation. To get here:
https://i.ibb.co/qxnCy4V/IMG-20201009-201845.jpg
We did this:
https://i.ibb.co/zQzVWQw/IMG-20201009-201609.jpg
But there were a bit too many lights:
https://i.ibb.co/c61n9Tx/IMG-20201009-201745.jpg
So right now, MIL and wife are ganging up on me talking about cars in unmistakeble ways: Buy as new as possible, for the least amount of trouble.
Beautiful scenery!
As for the car advice, while cars have become increasingly reliable in the last decade, I think they generally continue to lose character. There’s an opportunity cost going with old or new.
That looks like it could be just 1 bad abs sensor
I think so, too. Took out all but one (ran out of time) when changing to winter tires tuesday, to clean them. One wheel tends to lock up during hard braking, but otherwise, the brakes look really good. Nobody can read the OBD, not even my Hyundai dealer, so I’ll just change them soon, I guess.
That is a very picturesque holiday home you have there. Is it as old as i looks or was it just built in a frontier-y sort of way?
Actually, we’re in the cabin next to it, which my MIL’s boyfriend built in the 90s, but in the correct traditional style. From the looks of it, this one is about the same age though. Highland summer farms started to get built in this area from around 1860 onwards, but areas like this are dotted with cottages and cabins of all styles and variations now.
Awesome. I love the roofs!
Fight the good fight! Life is too short to drive boring cars!
I’ve made many mentions before, but I live in a very rural, unpopulated area. We never lock our house, or cars – hell, I leave the keys in the ignition in case somebody needs to borrow the truck. So I was very, very surprised when I changed oil on the MiSSus SS, and the DIC showed a ‘Theft Attempted’ message. Thought nothing of it, cleared the message and went on my merry way. Now the next time I started the car, there it was again. Theft Attempted. What? Now, every time I started the car – Theft Attempted.
I turned to the owners’ manual. It makes mention, but gives no indication of how to permanently remove that message. I searched through the Chevy SS forum. Nothing. I even looked to the Camaro forums. Nothing. This has to have happened to somebody right? I was just about at the point of disconnecting the battery to see if that will clear it out – and, then, a thought that had never crossed my mind. What if I locked the doors? Duh. Guess I may be a rube, but I’ll never trade my small-town naivety for that big city sophistication.
If you do end up worried about theft, I suggest installing some of these stickers, or at least the top half:
https://sites.create-cdn.net/siteimages/23/2/2/232266/43/6/3/4363157/350×262.jpg
Unipart are known for very thoroughly immobilizing cars.
Is that a AAA key they have helpfully provided, or is that an upside-down VW key?
The AAA guess is close, but it is instead an older version of the (British) Automobile Association logo.
That’s how I grew up– never locked the house, and keys were always in the ignition of the cars. Back when life was uncomplicated…
For decades I’ve pursued the “better life”, and now in middle age I’ve realized that it’s actually what I left behind. My goals for the coming years are to simplify my activities, environment, and perspective.
The main door to my childhood home had a rather old lock with a skeleton key that we always left inserted in the lock on the inside, which meant we never locked the door unless we were at home and were worried about, for example, storm winds overcoming the worn-out main latch mechanism and blowing the door open in the middle of the night. Even after I was old enough to reach and operate the key it still took quite a while before I realized it was removable instead of just being some sort of skinny, permanently affixed locking knob.
We’ve been looking into the Opel Ampera e and MG ZS Luxury (I need to mention the trim, because it reminds me of the Trabant’s good old “Deluxe”) as our next main family car. A 3 year old Ampera e (or Bolt to you New Worldlers) has the same marked value as the brand new Chinese EV, and about 100-120 kms more range.
Anyway, I learned the other day that MG had to run a software update for Norwegian customers: They designed the car in such a way that you needed to lock it to charge. Customers here got annoyed – who locks cars? Different worlds, really.
My MGs all had charging problems and locking problems, too. I suppose now having them explicitly related to each other constitutes progress.
I wonder how much of their customer care division is devoted to roadster owners with a weird sense of humor.
Not nearly enough, which is no doubt part of what drove me from MG into the waiting arms of Austin.
I like my Bolt. The layout of the menus on the various screens is not always as I would expect, but with the owner’s manual I usually figure out how to make it do ‘that thing I KNOW it can do. For the rest, it’s amazing value for money here (but I won’t make you jealous about US car prices versus Norwegian car prices).
I knew someone here had a Bolt, thanks for self-identifying! 🙂 How long have you had it and how is it holding up? Even in EV rich Norway, the Bolt is an outlier. It’s rare and in the main EV forum online, all you here is crickets about this car. I mean it’s one of the earliest long range EVs and hardly anyone knows it even exists? The one we will probably look at next week has lost a mere 12-15% of its new car value in three years, which is a fantastic deal for the first owner. Opel stopped selling them new in August this year. And I’ve seen the Bolt prices, and with changing it from CCS 1 to CCS 2 an import would make sense, financially. But I also hear that checking your SOH isn’t as straightforward in the Opel as in e.g. a Leaf, as single cell failure gets recorded differently than with a Nissan. Heard of people who missed half their capacity on one cell failure, replaced under warranty.
Mine’s a 2017 Premier that I bought used in June of this year. Battery health on Bolts appears to be fantastic, they lose on average about 1% of their range per year, even with frequent fast-charging (probably due to Chevy’s water cooled instead of air cooled battery and very conservative fast-charging profile: 50 kW max and once above 50% charge that starts tapering off to keep battery temperatures low, minimizing any damage). Mine (true to form) started with 238 miles of range when new and now is about 234 miles max. And the price that I got it at (about half of the as-new price) was a no-brainer.
I asked the dealer to fully charge the car and send me a picture of how many miles the Guess-O-Meter (GOM) showed, which while technically not completely accurate (because it takes driving profile into account, i.e. with lots of highway driving it’s estimate will be reduced about 10% to account for wind resistance) gives at least somewhat of a State of Health. But according to Reddit, there’s actually little chance of reduced range. There were some battery failures in 2017s due to manufacturing defects, but that seems to have been sorted now and was quite obvious: range suddenly became zero on the few cars affected.
The trade-off of course being somewhat slower fast-charging than a Hyundai Kona or Kia Niro.
There’s a lot of good info on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BoltEV/
I think the reason it never took off in Europe is that GM agreed to sell Opel/Vauxhall to PSA just before they launched the Ampera-e, giving neither GM nor PSA (who I presume didn’t want to be stuck with orphan architecture different from any other Opel/Vauxhall) a reason to promote the car. Even here in the US Chevy didn’t promote the car much after 2017 since it’s not profitable yet, but is mainly used for emissions offsets (i.e. one Bolt sold allows something like two giant pickups to be sold).
Of course the carry-on effect of selling Opel/Vauxhall is that GM lost about half the market for Bolts, causing big discounts in the US now to make up sales.
Just check carefully which options packages you want, and how to see in pictures whether a car you have your eye on gas them as dealers appear clueless.
For example: fast charging is an option, it’s not standard and cannot be retro-fitted. Ask the dealer to take a picture of the charge port. If it looks like this: https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/dJkAAOSwQwRb58D5/s-l640.jpg it does NOT have fast charging (the lower ellipse is blanked off, instead of having https://www.wind-works.org/cms/uploads/RTEmagicC_Chevy_Bolt_Charge_Port_Snip.JPG.jpg the extra DC plug fitting).
Similarly, the best way to tell options packages is with a picture of the left side of the steering wheel: https://www.lindsaycars.com/inventoryphotos/4497/1g1fz6s00l4126199/ip/30.jpg?height=400 On the “left arm” of the steering wheel, the buttons on this car show that it has the following: Comfort & Convenience (i.e. heated rear seats and heated steering wheel, proven by the heated steering wheel button at top right of the button cluster), Driver Confidence 1 (blind spot monitoring, lane keeping, and rear cross traffic alert, proven by the lane keeping button at bottom right button), and Driver Confidence 2 (pedestrian detection, automatic collision avoidance braking, as proven by the ‘crashing car button’ between RES and SET).
For more info you can always ask me or download the Owner’s Manual (a pdf available for free online from Chevy).
That is amazingly helpful, thank you! This is the specific car, very close to us:
https://www.finn.no/car/used/ad.html?finnkode=188015147
The fast charging setup is a bit different here. Is the water cooled battery part of a maintenance schedule; like coolant replacement? Do you know specifically what went wrong with the malfunctioning batteries of 2017 models?
I am getting more and more positive towards this vehicle. There are some reviews out there who pit the Bolt against the Tesla 3 and they conclude it is an amazing deal. We don’t get your prices upon purchase, but electricity is almost free here, so running cost are potentially very low – just like with our Leaf. The Nissan accelerated my budgeted savings for a fun car tremendously. If not much else, that’s a solid reason to appreciate these cheap mobility appliances.
I looked at the Tesla 3 but couldn’t fit my dogs through the tiny mail slot like trunk lid, they prefer the big hatch ;-). And price-wise you can get about 2 Bolts for one Model 3 here right now…
Oh and above all: check whether you like the seats! The number one
complaint of the Bolt is about the front seats, as they are narrow
between the bolsters and some people find them uncomfortable. So be sure
to take Mrs. Sjalabais along with you on the test drive! Nothing worse
than buying a new car and the wife hates it…
Also, on the Ampera-e apparently the lane keep assist button is on the center console screen, not the steering wheel. http://i.auto-bild.de/ir_img/1/7/5/6/1/7/5/Opel-Ampera-e-2016-Sitzprobe-1200×800-bd35cab3ee949579.jpg
2017 Bolt Owner’s Manual: https://my.chevrolet.com/content/dam/gmownercenter/gmna/dynamic/manuals/2017/Chevrolet/BOLT%20EV/Owner's%20Manual.pdf Page 254 states that the cooling system basically doesn’t need much owner servicing.
Page 310 is where the Service and Maintenance section starts: service every 12000km (7500 miles) mostly involves inspections, the vehicle coolant circuits are to be drained and filled by the dealer at 240,000 km (150,000 miles)! So that’s a while away…
With the Bolt’s strong engine braking/regenerative brakes, you end up not using the hydraulic brakes much, just the electric ones (except apparently in snow/ice, where it can apparently get somewhat confused?https://www.reddit.com/r/BoltEV/comments/du1glp/winter_tires/ Not an issue here in Southern California, but in Norway you might want to in winter leave it in D instead of L (one-pedal driving)). But since you have a Leaf, you’re probably familiar with that. And if you’re going to have a test-drive, it will be snowy soon I’m sure so you can find out whether there’s any truth to that or not. Chevy doesn’t mention any issues in the Owner’s Manual, so it might have been one person’s opinion.
The malfunctioning batteries were apparently a result of improper clamping together of the various electrode pieces: https://insideevs.com/news/342671/my-chevy-bolt-is-on-third-battery-pack-heres-why/ From what I’ve heard, it was quite rare and if the electrodes were faulty/brittle at manufacture, I think it would have shown itself by now after three years of driving. Chevy also offers an eight year transferable warranty on the battery and electric motor here, I believe, so check with an Opel dealer whether that’s the same in Norway.
Is there a reason you’re not looking at the long-range 2019 and newer Leaf Plus? Over here its range is about 10% less than a Bolt but it has less of a discount (new Bolts here go for $21K to $30K at the dealer, new Leaf-Pluses start at $31K). I guess since the long-range is fairly new it might be much more expensive?
The only thing to consider with the Ampera-e is that it will be somewhat of an orphan car possibly, since there won’t be any GM support in Europe and I’m not sure Opel/PSA will care for it long-term. Here in the US manufacturers are required to continue supporting the car for at least 10 years after the last one is sold, but i’m not sure what the laws are like in Europe.
Thank you so much, making big information leaps here tonight…I’ve read about the front seats, and I agree how bad ergonomics and sitting positions can make or break a car.
The Leaf+ is about 50% above our budget. We were thinking max. 200k NOK/22k USD, but my wife has 300kms range as her minimum demand, too (which excludes the MG). Quite impossible combination for an EV for now, so I am thinking 5-7 years with a cheaper plugin hybrid might be a possible compromise. Looks like we keep both the Leaf and the Centennial, too, so we got good time to think this through. The Bolt/Ampera e is a very strong underdog though, I can like that sort of thing despite dark and deep prejudice towards everything GM.
Ha, yes a lot of Bolt owners feel that GM accidentally made quite a good car! There are bits that are clearly cheap-GM (such as the Fisher-Price style dashboard plastic), but most of the rest of the car is quite solid and with all the (optional) safety controls that HELP the driver instead of ‘grabbing the wheel from him’ (such as with Volvo’s lane departure system) it’s very nice and practical for the price.
That was a helluva deal on your Bolt. I saw one of these when they debuted at the Detroit Auto Show, and I was surprised at how “not-a-penalty-box” it felt.
Little known fact (due to lack of GM advertising): GM still claims the Bolt is $38K for the LT version, and $43K for the more luxurious Premier, but: GM themselves give $8500 off, and dealers add another $5K to $8K in discounts… https://www.cargurus.com/Cars/new/searchresults.action?zip=90210&showNegotiable=true&sortDir=ASC&sourceContext=carGurusHomePageModel&distance=100&sortType=PRICE&entitySelectingHelper.selectedEntity=d2397 Not quite Nissan Versa money, but definitely affordable for a brand-new car.
It’s sad how little the dealers know about these cars though. I just made an appointment for a 30K mile check-up and they proudly announced they would change the oil and oil filter for free. Too bad electric cars don’t have those due to lack of rotating parts needing lubrication… But after I asked them to make sure their EV specialist mechanic would be on site on the given day to do the 30k mile service per the Owner’s Manual, they (an official Chevy dealer) asked if I could print out that page of the Owner’s Manual and take it with me on the day of the appointment.
Wow, guess I’ll have to make sure they don’t accidentally pour oil into the electric motor or windshield washer reservoir.
Cross country road trip update: still most likely going down as planned but I’ll have a co driver on the way out. That should make the 3 days for 2,300 miles plan more doable. On the way back I’ll likely have to make it 4 days since I’ll be solo but we’ll see. Will also depend on whether I-40 through Arizona is snowed in or not by the time I come back in November. Thanks everyone for all the feedback last week
Also, I have a new horn coming for my Mustang. Since day 1 it’s been weak as hell. Like rental car Kia levels of weak. Dealer said it was within spec as they do and that nothing was wrong with it so no warrantied replacement. Turns out they gave 19 GTs a single tone horn as a cost cutting measure I guess. So I’ll be fixing that soon.
So, being that I have the day off and being an pleasantly warm autumn day, I decided to take he Buick to run some errands and grab a burger. The errands went as planned, but on the way back home there was a bang and then the engine started revving like crazy. Seems that the transmission has given up the ghost. Luckily it is a lovely day for the mile long walk into town.
I’m not sure if I should upvote that. “Catastrophic transmission failure? Right On!” just seems off-key.
I’ve only wasted three automatic transmissions, and not with a bang but a whimper. Two of them just needed torque converters. The only “Bang! You’re dead!” moment I ever had was disintegrating the differential on a Dodge 2500 diesel just outside of Beaver, Utah.
Ouch.
Cross country road trip update: still most likely going down as planned but I’ll have a co driver on the way out. That should make the 3 days for 2,300 miles plan more doable. On the way back I’ll likely have to make it 4 days since I’ll be solo but we’ll see. Will also depend on whether I-40 through Arizona is snowed in or not by the time I come back in November. Thanks everyone for all the feedback last week
Also, I have a new horn coming for my Mustang. Since day 1 it’s been weak as hell. Like rental car Kia levels of weak. Dealer said it was within spec as they do and that nothing was wrong with it so no warrantied replacement. Turns out they gave 19 GTs a single tone horn as a cost cutting measure I guess. So I’ll be fixing that soon.
This has to be the first time I’ve ever heard someone complain that their horn was too quiet. How often do you use it that you considered this to be a problem?
Not often. But often enough that when I really have to use it, it just doesn’t seem to do the trick. It’s significantly quieter than a typical horn.
Seeing that Mustangs are naturally attracted to crowds, they should need more of a loud voice than *cough* please move, eventually.
Bringing science to the comment section, you’re welcome.
The fix, I hope…..
Delco 4-note FTW.
I wouldn’t worry about snow in november in AZ. I’ve lived here for 12 years, and anything that’s ever fallen in that month has been minimal. This year is la nina, it hasn’t rained here in months, and we had our driest monsoon in history. I hope, badly, to eat these words, but it’s still summer here.
I humbly suggest the old-school four note Delco horn rig from a 60’s GM product, as shown in the video below.
I have this very setup mounted in my Volvo 240, wired into the factory horn circuit. When I had to junk my ’69 Buick Electra 225, it was the one thing I made sure I held onto. The Horn of the Gods. Sonically transforms any vehicle into a chrome-plated locomotive. Legitimate occasions to use a horn in traffic joyously beckon. Approaching tunnels bring out one’s inner twelve-year-old, begging you to let it loose the second you hit the entrance. Glorious.
Last saturday we did a full brake job on a friend’s Rav4. it was really pretty easy, and a lot of fun wrenching on someone else’s car. I was glad I had my wood maul to get the rotors off, as they’d spent time in multiple snow states. Nothing like a BFH with a 4′ handle on it.
I’m heading down to phx today to get a recall done on the X3, passenger side seat airbag mat. I’ve asked for a rental, and the plan is to get in the rental and drive around the valley until they call that the vehicle is ready. It’s a better experience than sitting in the waiting room.
Spent the bulk of the weekend changing the timing belt on the Tundra. Went fairly uneventfully, which is good. I’ve changed a few timing belts and chains but this one was the most complicated.
New thermostat, water pump, fan bracket, serpentine belt, timing and serpentine belt tentioners, and timing and serpentine belt idler pulleys too.
Last Toyota dealer documented service was 200K miles ago and the belt I removed was a Toyota belt and looked essentially new.
Here’s a picture of some of what had to come off. Not shown is the radiator, fan, fan shroud, water pump, thermostat housing, harmonic balancer, oil cooler piping and skid plate. Oh, and the power steering pump, alternator and a/c compressor which had to be unbolted and set aside in the engine bay. Fun job.
Spent the bulk of the weekend changing the timing belt on the Tundra. Went fairly uneventfully, which is good. I’ve changed a few timing belts and chains but this one was the most complicated.
New thermostat, water pump, fan bracket, serpentine belt, timing and serpentine belt tentioners, and timing and serpentine belt idler pulleys too.
Last Toyota dealer documented service was 200K miles ago and the belt I removed was a Toyota belt and looked essentially new.
Here’s a picture of some of what had to come off. Not shown is the radiator, fan, fan shroud, water pump, thermostat housing, harmonic balancer, oil cooler piping and skid plate. Oh, and the power steering pump, alternator and a/c compressor which had to be unbolted and set aside in the engine bay. Fun job.
I’m ok changing timing chains on older engines, when there’s no fear of mistakes leading to valves hitting pistons, but with interference engines, I’ve left that work to the shop. That, and it’s just a LOT of part removal and mess to accomplish, as you’ve outlined above.
did some chores as i hadn’t touched the cars in a month or two.
i don’t know who designed the parking brake assembly on the W124 but i hate them! hours of grunting and sweating ended with me using a long pair of pliers as a lever, with a jack stand as the fulcrum, and barely managing to get it hooked on. but i got it. now i can just enjoy that car for a bit.
need new tires on my Volvo and it might also be time to consider a water/methanol setup before i take it to the track in November. honestly, if it performs all right, that may be where i call it on the car. lots of good memories but three cars is just too many, especially when they’re that fussy. if it weren’t so useful having a wagon around I’d have sold it months ago. sort of funny to say that if it does its job well I’ll sell it, but it’s been a long and expensive journey to make it a useful performance car, which has been a very deliberate goal. once i get it there maybe it’s best to sell before i start coming up with new ways to throw money and time down the drain.
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