Oh dear, what have I done

[nowty]

Had a drive to London and back over the weekend.

On the return journey this afternoon down the M3, I ended up in a convoy of 3 TM3's back to back. I reckon we were all in self drive mode and when the conditions allowed, I kept upping the max speed limit value and all 3 of us just drove along as if we were connected together, all smack bang in the middle of the lane with the same distance apart.

Felt a little surreal.

Oh, and we tried the heated seats for the first time, SWMBO has a bad lower back and we were very surprised that the seats heat the lower back as well as the bottom part.

[nowty]

Shopped at Sainsburys yesterday and was given a double points fuel voucher.

Never going to use it.

[Bugtownboy]

Think the fuel pump graphic on the ticket says it all

[AE-NMidlands]

Yet more subsidies for drivers - paid for by all customers in their bills, including the people who walk or cycle to the shop, and - to add insult to injury - by those who pay a premium to go by bus. Never mind that you won't use your voucher, you could instead shop somewhere that my purchases give you a free electric re-charge. Just don't knock me or my wife off our bikes when we are lugging our shopping home...
It's getting difficult to find a supermarket which doesn't subsidise drivers. Free car-parking was just the start of it.
A

[Stinsy]

Why couldn’t they give you 50kWh of free rapid charging on your next visit?

Tesco offer everyone free “fast” charging and reasonably-priced (24p/kWh) rapid charging.

Sainsbury’s near me don’t offer any EV charging facilities.


Don’t forget, every time you open your wallet you are voting for the policies of that organisation.

[nowty]

The thing that really annoys me with this Sainsburys is that they recently had an almost complete rebuild / revamp including the car park. I was 100% convinced they would add EV chargers like the local Tesco and Lidl did but they did not.

[AE-NMidlands]

Good for them, I would say! Why should I pay through my bills for BEV users to shop? It's already bad enough that my rates and (indirectly) my bus fares pay for the free car parking.
A

[nowty]

The TM3 still comes up with pleasant surprises. I assumed mine had a heated steering wheel but I have never found how to turn it on or even cared that it had one.

One great thing the car does is pre heats the cabin normally in about 2 mins, but this morning was freezing and I had an early dentist appointment. Whilst in the house I turned on the preheat from the APP and noticed that the graphics on the APP showed the steering wheel had turned red, ooohhhh, never seen that before.

I gave the car an extra couple of mins before I got in it and OMG once you feel that warm steering wheel on a frosty morning, its one of those things you thought you never wanted or needed, but now its a must have for me.

[AE-NMidlands]

Rather than wasting energy, can't you just put on a pair of gloves? If the "cabin" is so warm, why not start off in gloves and take them off after a few minutes? Electricity needs to be hoarded and used for the most important purposes, not wasted on ludicrous gimmicks.
If you run out of range don't ask if you can plug in at my house...

On second thoughts, I could rig up a bicycle generator and you could donate your heat to my house while you are charging up your tonne of tin.
A

[Mr Gus]

The octopump is very effective,
Likely you only need a minute to get it comfortable.
I went out, it was 0c I was in shorts (normal) & the interior was warm from just a minute of pre-heat, I understand the seat warmers are low draw, so AE can sleep easily, compare 10 minutes to heat up the small cabin of the smart car the other night (glass roof slightly insulated)