Safety Engineer

I shall still be here and about, have at least one Citroen in the family, convinced father to buy a Xsara 2.0HDi estate in jan, he was looking for a cheap estate and that's what he got Y reg, 25K on the clock and the full Citroen used warranty, he's a happy bunny with it. I pick up my new car (I say new is the dealers demo car with only a few thousand on the clock) (had a choice of a brand new Ambiente spec or this as an Elegance) on Monday, had a test drive and very nice quiet and smooth - not as revvy as the C4 2.0 diesel, 1.9 105hp diesel but can be adjusted by Skoda to 130hp so nearly there. But the boot is bloody huge compared to the C4, plenty of space for the gear. :P :D :D

As of next friday, I finish with my current employer and go onto greener pastures, so the C4 goes back, after 21,000 miles have been very impressed with it, given that it's a new car platform It hasn't had as many problems as some well established cars I've had the misfortune to own. My new employer runs Skoda Octavias. Cue Skoda jokes....

Those three magic letters - PFI, bloody good earner if you are a PFI stakeholder raking in the cost over-runs but not so hot for the taxpayer, have yet to hear of a PFI project coming in on budget.

Golden Goose or as New Labour puts it Goldon Motorist...

As someone who does at 20-60k a year driving a year, I honestly believe that we need to do something about congestion. But at present the bulk of road tax goes into general gvt funds to be spent balancing the books, NHS, schools, war in Iraq etc. If it were spent on providing a good public transport system then great. Here is an example of the idiocy and lack of thought on alternatives: I live in Chelsmford Essex, it has a station that goes into Liverpool Street station so the obvious thing to do would be to hop on the train for a meeting at spitalfields. It's actually quicker and cheaper (using cost of fuel, parking and train fare) to drive down the A12 to J28 of the M25 round to J27 come off, go down the A127, park at Upminster catch train to Fenchurch Street, then catch the tube round to Liverpool Street. if we are going to get people out of cars, we need to provide cheap, reliable and practical alternatives, road pricing, limiting new build houses to only one car parking space will not do it. What it does provide is an oppurtunity for vehicle tracking (thin end of the wedge for ID systems, and helps maximise the potential revenue form the motorist). As for the Kamikaze politcs comment, don't believe it for a moment, Paul Eddington the author of the report is now saying that he only advocated road pricing in certain 'congestion hotspots' another Labour idea, get the public wound up about a big tax hike, then they won't scream (some will actually be relieved) when a small tax hike comes in, but at the end of the day it's still a tax hike. Me cynical?? I was involved in a contract that actually would have compromised safety to cause congestion in our capital, exactly the congestion being used to justify the congestion charge and road pricing...

Which is probably why he is going to get Gordon Brown to implement it... His e-mail response says something very different, and given the huge amounts of revenue that HMG make from the motorist, they cannot afford to let road pricing slip, it is too good a scheme to fleece the motorist with. HMG doesn't want people to stop driving or give up cars, it wants to maximise sustainable revenue from the current (and future) levels of traffic. This weeks Private Eye has a very good breakdown of road pricing in it's article 'Road Rage' and having worke for TfL I would be very surprised if this is going to just quietly die.

Well Tony Blair has tried to ignore the first No to Road Pricing petition despite the nearly 2 million signatures. Under the rules of the petition website the creator of the petition is allowed two 300 word response e-mails to the the signatories, in another display of contempt for the public the originator of this petition has not been allowed his two responses, yet Tony Blair has sent all signatories the HMG response at 1200 words. In answer to this there is a new petition: Road Pricing Petition Mark 2

The moral of your story Welshguy is that no good deed goes unpunished...

Got some strange looks of the neighbours when I came out with a broom and swept the snow of my car this morning. :D Just got back from the local car park, no snow but plenty of ice so have had an entertaining hour throwing the car around with the ESP on and off to feel the difference. Quite impressed.

Throwing my Two penneth in, now I've done a few hundred miles with the new Premacys I would say they are not as good as the Exaltos, I've let a few psi out so am now on 33psi on the front and will see if that improves them.

Got it back this afternoon, all ok, no vibration. Lease company wasn't happy at forking out for it. Had a bit of a moan at them and told them next time get it done properly, not by cowboys...

Thanks for the heads up, have been convinced they are a bunch of cowboys, this latest encounter has done little to change that opinion.

Had a new set of tyres from Quick Fit, I wanted to wait until my service this thursday and get my Citroen dealer to do it, but the lease company don't want to pay Citroen prices. Get to QF last friday, didn't have any tyres my size in stock, monday am told that they have Michelins in the C4's size, find out after they have replaced them that they didn't have the Exalto's so have fitted Premacys, told that they are not as good as the Exalto but the lease company have approved them. To add insult to injury, there is now a very definate vibration in the steering. I noticed some posts that talked about wheel balance problems, as I'm putting the car into Citroens thursday anything I need to point out to them (in addition to getting them to check the wheel balance)?? This reminds me of why I never used S!*t Fit when I had my own car. :blink:

Mine goes in on Thursday for it's 20K service - 2.0HDi.

132mph on an airfield near me. Quite impressed.