Hi All,
We just got back from our hols, and as the trusty c-class suffered from a failure I thought I'd post the details of the trip. It was this car's first long trip (in my hands) and I was really pleased with it.
Basically We drove to Bordeaux, tooled around near the Dordogne for a week, then drove down to the Spanish border between Biarritz and San Sebastion and tooled round in the Basque Country for a week.
Pluspoints -
We did 2,300 miles on the trip, 500 of which were in one go on the last day.
Aircon was fab, could get a shiver on even at 35 degrees outside.
Stability and ride good up to 100mph with one bike and a luggage box on the roof.
Without the luggage 120mph was comfy and quiet enough that no-one noticed.
I had the alignment re-done before leaving so no steering input required to go straight, and wheel dead level.
I got a best of 30mpg, general use, and still saw 25mpg on the last day which was pegged at 90mph with a roof load.
In-car DVD is a must for 2 kids under 10.
Blaupunkt TravelPilot was worth its weight in gold and a big improvement over the Garmin and a laptop. Best for avoiding huge traffic probs near Spain, and allowed me to be fearless in driving straight into cities.
Drove up a few mountains, no bother.
Bad points -
The car got quite dirty and required to be cleaned twice.
The car was so quiet I could hear the Mercedes 12v cooler box in the boot.
Burned/leaked/evaporated?? 1.5 litres of oil.
The failure -
One nozzle of driver's side screen washer got blocked, so I popped it out, cleared it, and the when I went to pop it back in it broke!!! No probs thought I, I tried to angle of one of the the pax side jets over, and snapped off the pin in the nozzle. getting a bit frsutrated I did exactly the same thing in the last remaining pax side nozzle. Great I thought, now I have to drive the length of France to get home with no squirters. So I used some gaffer tape to point the delivery hose at the screen, but couldn't get the angle right - each squirt (of about half a litre!) went straight over the roof. So I found a cocktail stick, and taped it in front of the delivery hose. The water stream now hit the cocktail stick, and fanned out over the screen. Perfick!! All thst remained was to use my touch-up paint to colour-code the cocktail stick and we were off!! And you know what? It works better than the proper jets!!
Hmm, sorry that's so long - I am suffering from post-holiday blues
We just got back from our hols, and as the trusty c-class suffered from a failure I thought I'd post the details of the trip. It was this car's first long trip (in my hands) and I was really pleased with it.
Basically We drove to Bordeaux, tooled around near the Dordogne for a week, then drove down to the Spanish border between Biarritz and San Sebastion and tooled round in the Basque Country for a week.
Pluspoints -
We did 2,300 miles on the trip, 500 of which were in one go on the last day.
Aircon was fab, could get a shiver on even at 35 degrees outside.
Stability and ride good up to 100mph with one bike and a luggage box on the roof.
Without the luggage 120mph was comfy and quiet enough that no-one noticed.
I had the alignment re-done before leaving so no steering input required to go straight, and wheel dead level.
I got a best of 30mpg, general use, and still saw 25mpg on the last day which was pegged at 90mph with a roof load.
In-car DVD is a must for 2 kids under 10.
Blaupunkt TravelPilot was worth its weight in gold and a big improvement over the Garmin and a laptop. Best for avoiding huge traffic probs near Spain, and allowed me to be fearless in driving straight into cities.
Drove up a few mountains, no bother.
Bad points -
The car got quite dirty and required to be cleaned twice.
The car was so quiet I could hear the Mercedes 12v cooler box in the boot.
Burned/leaked/evaporated?? 1.5 litres of oil.
The failure -
One nozzle of driver's side screen washer got blocked, so I popped it out, cleared it, and the when I went to pop it back in it broke!!! No probs thought I, I tried to angle of one of the the pax side jets over, and snapped off the pin in the nozzle. getting a bit frsutrated I did exactly the same thing in the last remaining pax side nozzle. Great I thought, now I have to drive the length of France to get home with no squirters. So I used some gaffer tape to point the delivery hose at the screen, but couldn't get the angle right - each squirt (of about half a litre!) went straight over the roof. So I found a cocktail stick, and taped it in front of the delivery hose. The water stream now hit the cocktail stick, and fanned out over the screen. Perfick!! All thst remained was to use my touch-up paint to colour-code the cocktail stick and we were off!! And you know what? It works better than the proper jets!!
Hmm, sorry that's so long - I am suffering from post-holiday blues
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trusty c-class done you proud!
