DRIVING

I'm really into cars - I know exactly what I'm looking at when buying so I tend to buy low, drive for 6-months and then sell for profit -  zero maintenance costs for 30 years -  I've only ever changed 2 sets of brake pads - rarely ever service a car - only fitted one exhaust part and 4 tyres - I let other people pick up those tabs before and after me.  

I had a Ibiza Cupra with an odd fault caused by a dodgy fusebox - tricky to find without my ODB scanner.

The XJ40 was when they finally sorted the rear suspension and braking setup -  miles better than the XJ6-derived systems and worth money on the spares market..

When I bought my first one, an old and wise friend said "Don't do it. Better people than you have been broken by jags". The XJ40 turned out to be a winner for me, however, but unfortunately they are now both too old to get fixed easily at a reasonable price by your local non jaguar approved jaguar specialist, and fast appeciating in value, so you can't get a nice runner carrying a fault for a grand now. Of course, when you buy one it will have something going wrong with it, that's why the owner wants to sell it! (Unless yo are very lucky, of course). The trick is to be able to identify the problem (if it isn't obvious) and accurately estimate how much it will cost to get fixed. The last one I bought (from a used car dealer) looked minty, but during the test drive just as I could hear the diff start to whine he turned the radio on. I was happy then because I knew what the fault was, I knew my local garage would have a decent late model used spare in stock, and I now knew he was going to accept some serious haggling in order to drop it onto me. I also knew that on a thousand quid Jaguar, if you are going to use it as a company vehicle which I used to, you need to budget for about £1300 a year for maintenance, and if you actually have that 1300 to spend they just continually improve from when you buy them. (particularly if you can save that money when nothing goes wrong in that year! Which happened a lot more more often than I expected).

BUT only the XJ40 Jaguars seem to work that way... I was lucky, I chose possibly the best model they've ever built... But yes, rust gets them in the end and whilst it is curable, with a specialist rebuild, that would require, being able to save up the unused part of that 1300 quid budget, for ten years and probably still take an extra 5K on top.. Which I've never managed to do. I always have to change them when the rust becomes an issue.   

The rule I learned is that luxury cars break expensive, but nowhere near as often as consumer cars, unless you buy a "lemon" as the car trade them. (Tip: NEVER buy a car with a new looking lemon scented air freshener from a dealer (whether official or an amateur "wheeler dealer") or at auction... It will not go wel. Seriously, that's a thing!

Wow - you're brave - I admire you - I've always fancied one but a couple of my friends got bitten badly with Jags - mostly rust and electrical problems - one friend's XJS turned into a nightmare of rust in hidden places.

I was looking at the newer S-type - too many expensive faults.

The bravest car I ever bought was a Renault Safrane 3,0 RXE - it was like a fighter jet - air suspension, pneumatic electric memory seats - all in leather - 1st gen with the Concorde dash.    

About fifty years ago, I had lessons in a double decker bus for a PSV licence; it had very heavy stearing and a crash gear box... double declutch.

My instructor had formally been with the army where he taught soldiers to drive tanks, His instructions were loudly barked commands using a somewhat limited vocabulary, usually along the lines of  $%&#@^£"!  etc.  It was hell, I did not become a bus driver.

Some years later I bought an automatic car and found it a whole lot easier. I took my test in torrential rain so, like another poster here, I drove very slowly because of the prevailing conditions and passed easily.

I now have an OAP bus pass and haven't driven for years, Bliss!

Ben

one poor woman you rear ended me went into shock and i had to pull her out of the car  after kicked the door open, I put her on hard shoulder and then drove her car  out of the fast lane before it was hit. 

Then i noticed a child in the back  looking very bemused.

yes accidents are not fun. The sound makes me go cold.  

That would put me off driving completely. I've reversed my car into someone else with my clutch only in a tight car park so no major damage and I've swung my own car into a car park pillar (my own fault for being a creature of habit at work and expecting to be in one of my usual spaces). I've never been hit by someone else and I'd probably be a wreck if I was!!!

Shy David, Speaking as one of those (deleted by mod) you refer to, since I take great pride in managing to do my hattery without causing myself or anyone else to be endangered, to have to brake, sound their horn or take avoiding action, might I politely ask that you "law abiding types" do the following?

1.PLEASE keep to the left when the road conditions are appropriate and don't cruise down the centre lane blithely making a three lane motorway into a dual carriage way for all, except the "undertakers"!

I go up the M40 somedays and there is a mile of empty uphill carriage way on the left with one lorry at the end of it and the two right hand lanes full to bursting. Learn how to use that left hand lane, and how to safely pull back out when you actually get close to the lorry.. Yes that strategy does carry a small risk of getting stuck behind the lorry if people won't let you out again, but an a55hole like me always respects someone who's been indicating to pull out from the left lane for a while, because we know there's almost 100% .chance that when we let you out you'll get back into the left again when it's appropriate.    

2.Please don't cruise down the overtaking lane enforcing the speed limit like a little unpaid policeman, at spot on what your (slightly overreading because they make them that way) speedo tells you is the exact speed limit.

It's just being needlessly annoying. It causes some people to want to tail gate you. I wouldn't do that of course, it's way too dangerous for my taste and I actually do prioritise safety over speed every time. If you try to deliberately prevent ME from using the overtaking lane when I need to, and I am sure you are doing it deliberately, (it's pretty obvious when it happens) I'll get straight into the left lane, and find your blind spot and slowly creep in and out of it until the growing uncertainly of your situation makes you do the RIGHT THING. And I'll keep it up for bloody miles if neccesary! It's no skin off my nose, you are making me drive slower than my comfort speed anyway so I have oodles of spare capacity to waste giving you something else to think about rather than how entitled you are to play "policeman" with me.  I'm not going to endanger myself "undertaking" or "tailgating" I'm just going to do my thing until you break psychologically, and LET ME PAST!! 

3. When two lanes are merging into one, please do not sail down middle of the two lanes thus blocking people from merging correctly in a zipper like fashion at the end, as the manual says we should do, it just makes the tail back longer, which makes things more hazardous in some cases for the poor sods way back. 

The moral of this story, is let the police do their job and concentrate on your OWN driving skills, performance and attitude, NOT MINE. Driving is hard enough, without taking up arms against and winding up the other motorists who choose to do it a little differently. You can't stop the reckless speeders anyway, (that's what we pay the police for! and the reckless and stupid ones will just blast past on the inside, of get up on your rear bumper)

You can make everyone's journey a bit less stressful by focussing on your own task, And if you are a speed demon like myself, you can make life a hell of a lot more pleasant and safe, by being a bit more patient with the slowcoaches and at least give them a fair chance to notice you and get out of the way. ALWAYS remember if you are speeding YOU have a much greater responsibility for any accident or incident, and thus you simply need to drive MUCH better than they do otherwise, you justify being called an (deleted by mod) by the less competent. Speed does not kill, that's just silly propaganda, it's the rapid decelleration that occurs if you drive faster than your competence and the road conditions allow. 

It's all about judgement and competence for some people, not slavish adherence to arbitrary rules. Whilst they might have put speed cameras in the spots where they rake in the money a decade ago by way of a stealth tax, they always put those little illuminated speed indicating signs there for safety reasons. (Which is why speed cameras tend to "spontaneously combust" whereas those little signs never do)   

And that's why my car is a (fairly well maintained) LPG fuelled 1990's Daimler 4.0 Auto... It's been a total bargain! (I've driven old XJ40's for about 20 years, Way underrated in my opinion, and much more durable and fixable than anything Jaguar have made since, from what I can gather from friends who have attempted to go "one-up" on my choice...)  

Yeah, and it's MUCH harder to maintain good situational awareness in a car.

thats also very good driving technique 

Indicating I know!!! It’s so annoying. I say, just indicate every time you need to then you don’t have to go through the thought process: ‘should I indicate or not’ = saving unnecessary use of brain power! Much more efficient

i so agree 

yes i have a roundabout on my daily commute where u spiral outwards as u go around and they added traffic lights ---- so u have to watch lights and spiral out smoothly at same time.

Even thought i drive through it every day i have to be on the watch for people suddenly jumping lanes in order to get onto their exit ---- its a nightmare of a roundabout i give way to anyone near my car because they will drive into to u.

It's not worth the hassle and paperwork.  I have had to draw maps of accidents etc to make sure the other drivers insurance paid up.

 In the UK there are also so many badly-designed, junctions. I understand traffic-light controlled junctions, and I understand roundabouts, but traffic-light controlled roundabouts, what?! We have one where I live that also has a tramway running through it - on road level. cutting across traffic lanes. Just madness.

oh my thats adds quite an extra risk

Three times?! Good gods! I wonder what the average is.

I have had two vehicles turn left in front of me, destroying my automobiles. (In the UK that would be "turn right.") Though in the USA there is the added problem of the victims of an automobile crash being gunned down.

i much preferred motorbikes as well as i could escape from dangerous situations. I had a trial style bike and if necessary could ride on the grass banks ( not advised at speed )

i have been hit 3 times in the rear by other drivers.  Luckily none of my kids have been hurt. 

LibstheHobbit said:

If you are autistic and can drive could you tell me about your experiences?

The chief problem with autistic people driving, in my experience, is other drivers. But this is true of everyone except the (deleted by mod) who refuse to obey the moving-vehicle laws. Almost all drivers are careful, observant, and courteous; it is the tiny minority that terrifies me. I see no benefit from racing around and among other cars on the highway; no profit in "tail-gating" mere inches behind other vehicles.

possibly try an automatic? If I ever try again it will be auto as it’s less to think about. I got stuck on the test with driving with someone I didn’t know and it was just an added thing. I think they say to make sure you declare that you have an asd too, as they make sure they give you clearer instructions in the test. 

Aidie was desperately trying to be clever posting the usual 'nothing burgers' everywhere but demonstrated complete ignorance on this thread.

I corrected with facts - but Aidie, so desperate for attention, edited their post to try to hide the error - not understanding they are talking garbage about a completely wrong technology in every way.       Sooooo needy.

LIDAR uses multiple lasers to construct a 3D environment of the street scene - it's more accurate and better suited to the job - it's faster too..  AI is needed to interpret the data..      Truck cams are just dashcams videoing the corners-  usually for insurance purposes - not smart in any way..

The problem with self-drive vehicles is all the random things going on either side of the road - in a cluttered street scene, can the computer work out if a child is going to suddenly cross the road?      Humans are quite good at spotting pattern and we have experience to predict behaviours - computers can't do it fast enough so have to take shortcuts and commit to passing the risk at the same speed as surrounding traffic - and they are bad at it.

The most we really have these days are lane-followers - on a motorway, they can usually follow the lines to keep you in your lane - but get confused in roadworks.

We also have adaptive cruise - it keeps a safe distance to the car in front but speeds up and slows down with the general traffic - but it's dependant on the driver in front - Top Gear showed how fallible it was.

Self-drivers are a good few years away.