parthiban

Ours is actually on springs, not on air. And it's definitely a broken spring as in the pic below. Can this just happen Tony? Bit scary to think I had the car on the motorway the day before we flew out, and if this had happened at motorway speed I'm guessing it may have been a one way ticket to the central reservation.

Hmm so something that can happen, thankfully corrosion is much improved on the CLS (W219) but I should jack it up and see what's going on underneath.

Beautiful pics And happy birthday!

Ahh cool that looks quite similar to mine, I'll grab that if I can't get mine working properly. I've noticed that most panels have cig lighter connections - isn't the cig lighter switched in most cars? In which case this wouldn't work? Only thing that got me thinking is that Porsche official trickle chargers plug into the cig socket, and I'm pretty sure that the sockets in Porsches are switched too so do these chargers somehow still work?

Haha did get me thinking about getting it lowered - looks a bit ridiculous right now though, like a hot rod slammed at the front and high at the rear

Sorry about the late reply, been away the last 2 weeks. I didn't actually install my mirror closure unit so need to stick my head in there and see what's about - I should be able to just identify the positive and negative cables on the solar panel and scotchlock them in to these cables? Think I forgot the link to the panel, this is the one I have: https://www.amazon.co.uk/AA-Solar-Powered-Car-Battery-Charger/dp/B00AC1LLQY/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1465990682&sr=8-7&keywords=solar+battery+charger

Haha I was thinking the same thing lol

Can that just happen? The car was only recently serviced too so wouldn't they have spotted it if it was about to go?

Got back yesterday to find the Merc looking like this - has the front suspension collapsed? Haven't had a chance to jack it up yet but considering it's been sitting still for 2 weeks and was absolutely fine beforehand, any ideas as to what could have happened?

This is the panel that I currently have, I'm still not completely sure if it's working or not but the LED on the front is flashing meaning the solar part still works. How would I hook this up to the mirror closure unit? Thanks!

2.8 seconds This, there isn't much else quicker off the line

The feature is in beta, the owner is supposed to keep an eye on the car and kill it if it does something wrong. Owner deliberately causes the car to crash and then complains about it. Even the self parking systems in a lot of cars nowadays could hit something, which is why you still need to be in control and stop it if it is about to.

No cure for stupid operators - which is why things have to go all health and safety crazy and install all kinds of safety backups, which we then also complain about I love how much data Tesla had though and how specific it is! http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/11/11658226/tesla-model-s-summon-autopilot-crash-letter

As I don't use the car a lot it's not a major hassle to take it on and off, so it's fine to sit on the dash if that's easier. So running the cable into the drivers or passenger footwell would be fine - somewhere easily accessible to plug it in.

That is appalling, guess that's what having no crash test laws does. Can't believe that they're only bringing regulations in at the end of 2017. What's even more disappointing is that companies like Renault and Hyundai who produce cars for other markets to meet crash regulations (and even use safety in their marketing in those areas) could not have a sense of responsibility to offer similar crash standards in all markets. Yes I agree there's a cost implication but how a company could sell safe cars in one place and death traps in another is quite depressing.

Haha yeah I've been through so many batteries it's ridiculous! Do you know if there's an easy place to hardwire in a connection to the battery to give the solar charger another go first?

Is it the key that's magnetic or the lock?

If you don't use a car for 2 months the battery will go flat, and if it sits flat for a while that kills a battery. I wonder how difficult it would be to fit battery kill switch. That might make more sense for me to switch the car off when I don't use it for long periods. I don't really care about the alarm being off and otherwise all I lose is the radio presets and the trip mileage which again doesn't matter.

It just wouldn't be you if you didn't squeeze that last bit of energy out of a poor battery! Lol, rather appallingly this is now I think my 4th battery in 4 years, this one should still be under warranty so if it has died I'll have to go and try and get a replacement. I use the car so infrequently now that I just keep eating through batteries, I need to think about getting another solar charger if I can and this time hardwiring it in, not sure what happened with the last one but I think the OBD port connection must not work all the time or potentially goes to sleep if not used for a while.

Unless you already have quite a smart battery charger then it's not the same at all, the one I have anyway applies a constant current to the battery while it's plugged in. The CTEK on the other hand does something very different, not sure if you've seen this page below but it goes through various cycles through each phase, altering the current or voltage or both. I would leave it plugged in for a week without touching it or switching it off. If that doesn't work then the battery is probably dead. In terms of current draw I'm guessing it's probably the amount it's feeding into the battery at any given time?

The CTEK is designed really for use as a tender, so most likely it'll be used in a garage. It really isn't designed to be a battery charger, it's supposed to be used to maintain a battery and occasionally recover it (like I mentioned my 360 is permanently plugged into it). You need to leave it on consistently, it is the specific process it goes through that revives the health of the battery. Leave it for a week and see what happens, if it doesn't go past step 2 then the battery is dead, that happened with my old Lexus battery. My current one got all the way through to the end so fingers crossed it still has some life in it! Good to know I haven't been doing harm!

Good thinking! I have a feeling I might have asked this before but is it stupidly expensive to get a genuine key from Mazda?

Hmmm, interesting, don't think I've ever read that lol. I just hooked mine up straight to the battery!

No I haven't, prob don't buy enough from Amazon at the moment to bother (when I do I usually need something quick) but I might sign up for that for when I might buy a large item

Lol how does that make any sense!