To hate modern cars?

[Sandflea9900]

Just got a new car after having our previous one for about 9 years. It’s a disaster. Too damn clever for its own good with automatic everything. The problem is that all these automatic features don’t work properly to the point where I think they’re actually making the car more dangerous. Examples:

a) Automatic headlines on, driving at night on the motorway, car changes from dipped headlights to full beam despite there being oncoming traffic on the other side of the motorway.

b) Driving along a residential road at the speed limit of 20mph, late at night. No other road users on the road, no pedestrians, cats etc. The anti collision system does an emergency stop for no reason.

c) Car randomly beeps warnings with no visual warning light/symbol/message so I have no idea what it’s warning me about. Car manual doesn’t explain.

AIBU to want to go back to a simpler car without all these magical gadgets? DH insists all cars are like this now. I know I can turn off automatic lights (and have done so) but I’m thinking I need to turn off all the other safety features if this is how the car is going to behave.

As long as there is an option to do this then I doubt there's a problem.

Clearly, if you were to "hack" your car to switch off a safety feature you might have a problem if the insurer found out

Totally agree with you! You can turn a lot of the features off. I have said for the past few years some of these features are a lot more dangerous.

I went to pull out of a junction with my 2 older DC in the car not long after I got my new car, absolutely nothing in front of me & my cars breaks slammed on! DC8 was in the back & really hurt his neck flying forward. Thankfully nothing was coming towards us as would have caused a crash for sure! & the auto stop start throws me. I’ve switched it all of.

I tried to flash someone the other day, which didn't flash them, but turned on the auto full beam instead and took me an age to turn off! Unless you drive on country roads constantly, the feature is a nothing but a menace

I am insured to drive my mum's car and did that on it a few weeks ago. And it's 10 years old! It also took me a while to work out how to turn it off again!

I have a Skoda Fabia III that does what it likes with about six faults that come and go randomly. One of these is emergency braking with no warning whatsoever. Nobody in the VAG group can fix this car.

I have a routine that I have to follow before I drive to ensure at least some level of safe driving.

Nobody can stop it misbehaving. The manufacturers in Czechia say it’s nothing to do with them. Brave new world, eh?

Up yours VW!

I have a brand new car and you can just turn these features off. It’s not hard.

Turn the automatic lights off.
Turn the anti collision system.

and the thing beeping at you could be the speed thing that goes off if you are going over the limit. You can turn that off too but you have to do it every journey on my car. This is mandatory now but again simple to turn off.

It’s all really simple stuff.

Some of the new convenience and comfort features are nice. Heated steering wheel and aircon seats which means I don't burn my bare legs on the leather.

But the safety stuff is a nightmare. Mine will flash up and big red BRAKE! warning when I'm nowhere near a car that is turning in front or slam on the brakes at a passing carrier bag blowing in front of me.

It all makes for a very detached driving experience which I think has the opposite effect.

90’s cars were peak motoring.
best combination of mechanical with enough electronics to help but not hinder. Built to last and interesting with a few creature comforta

Modern cars are like the nanny state on wheels. I had a VW on hire recently and it would not shut up with the passive aggressive gear change instructions. Lane assist is downright dangerous IMO.

You need a specialist not the main dealer. There will be a fabia owners Facebook club, ask for recommendations on there.
theres a batch of Fabias which are renowned for having issues. Post 2016 they seemed to have sorted them out (when they shared the Volkswagen up engine). The first ones and newest are brilliant there’s just an age range of 2013ish to 15/16 that seems to cause issues.

Maybe Jaguar's rebranding will fix this 😆

There isn't a new car on the market that can compare to the reliability of our sturdy old petrol 90s hatchback.

You are joking?? Maps were bloody awful! How the hell we ever got anywhere without having to leave a week before is a total mystery to me

I haven't the patience to list everything that's been done, and the money spent to try and fix it. It's a 2018 model.

Never fixed under warranty and then never fixed after. Dealers and independents/generic 'specialists'.

I call it HAL 9000. I call it lots of other names too.

I definitely don't miss the days of having to study a map book and write out all the instructions so I had easy reference when I was driving alone!

I once drove to rural Hampshire for work and for some reason looked at a map and thought "yup - got it - I know where I'm going", then of course spent ages going round the wrong place as I took the M3 instead of the A3!

I do remember the first time I used SatNav and being really freaked out that I was in the middle of nowhere in the Peak District without having a clue where I was.

Now I like to do somewhere in between - trust the SatNav (Waze) to come up with a decent journey, but research it in advance so I have an idea of where I'm going.

Absolutely. And AA route planner when that arrivesd. Now it drives me nuts when DH insists the satnav knows best when it’s blatantly obvious that it doesn’t!

Mine has all that, and it doesn't misbehave. Auto headlights behave well, but I can turn them off easily simply by moving the light switch, as I would do if I were turning the lights on in an older car. It's so nice not to have to bother about dipping when driving at night along a windy country road where I've got far more things to be thinking about than managing my headlights.

Anti collision system has never come on inappropriately.

The only "random" beeps I get are from the lane assist, but that can be turned off, either by turning it off, or by either indicating before I overtake a parked car, or by a definite turn out rather than a random drift.

I positively welcome all the other features - spotting speed limit signs, audible warning of obstacles while maneuvering at slow speed in a small space. Being able to recharge my phone on the move. Being able to use my phone as a satnav, automatic re-set of the trip mileage counter when I fill up, automatic turning off of headlights when I close driver's door after getting out. even the automatic wipers.

It should have been one of the better ones and they are honestly one of the better cars out there. You’ve unfortunately got a Friday car haven’t you.
id part ex it for a Yaris.

What was AA route planner if not a non-tech "satnav".

Usually when the satnav blatantly"doesn't know", it's that it's detected a hold up on the sensible route.Annoying thing is it will take you on a detour as soon as the detour route is less than the normal route rather than saying detour only if you'll save 5 minutes/10 minutes whatever.

@BourbonsAreOverated you'd love their choices a 90s TD pug 306 and a Toyota starlet. 90s are peak motoring cars they just keep going 200k and beyond and amazing cars to drive.

That's not universal.

We have two relatively new cars, different makes. They both have similar features, but vary as to what you can turn off, and whether you can turn them off permanently or have to remember to turn them off each time you start the car.

It's a bit of a lottery really as to what features are optional between brands.

And don’t talk to me about the constant bleeping, the grumpy refusal to do anything unless you’re doing it in the ‘right’ (Hah) order, the fact that apparently if the brake cable breaks the have to remove half the engine to replace it. And now dh has bought an electric car. He picked it up at the weekend and had to stop halfway to charge it, which took an hour and a half and cost as much as filling a tank with petrol…and he doesn’t understand why I want to hang on to my ancient, totally reliable Polo…

Maps were OK if you had a passenger who could read them. Same if you had a list of directions. Useless if you were on your own unless you had a photographic memory.

My car doesn't have a CD player, but it can take cassettes. It also has an ashtray which isn't much use to me.

I have a fabia iii, but presumably a more basic version than the pp as mine doesn't have many fancy features. No lane assist, automatic braking automatic wipers, automatic lights, parking sensors/cameras, etc.

Nowadays I dread hiring a car on holiday, because it takes forever to understand the various features and the random beeps, vibrating steering wheel etc are quite disconcerting if you don't know what it means.

I'm with you OP, I don't even like electric windows.

Ash tray is handy for coins for parking machines!