When the Clutch Costs More than the Car

i love my little car, yes. i’m one of the smart car drivers! :)

she’s been super reliable, cost effective, rarely let me down, been a true little workhorse when i needed her most between cities and towns and villages and it’s nearly six years since i’ve had her. i’ve put 20,000 miles on her little clock and it’s getting to decision time with her. kinda feels like i’m putting my favourite dog down - i’m kinda torn what to do, do i go with what i know and extend the life, get a fix and sell or what? - i’m stuck. ..

i’ve had my monies worth

i’ve really had a good run with this car unlike many other of the cars before her (she is a her, a he would never be as reliable!) and that is one of the main factors of me not wanting to get rid of her. i do feel however like i’m keeping someone on life support by keep on repairing, patching, replacing - not that i have had too so far but if i do have to change the clutch that is a big cost, almost the value of what the car is now. seems not worth it, also i tend to notice when you replace something the rest of the car parts seems to know and they suddenly stop working! - if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it right?

i did pay a super reasonable amount for the car (in cash) to a bloke at derby train station who had recently lost his wife, the car was perfect, only 10k miles and just great condition, it even had a valued private plate on it which i would eventually be able to re-sell for £800 thus giving me back a chunk of change off the original payout after four years of having the car - trust me, that money (or should i say investment) came in useful.

everything now is a cost to keep alive

be it transport, food, health the older i get the harder it seems to be able to sustain myself if i don’t go down the conventional way of working a job that i hate with people that drive me crazy. i’ve enjoyed eating less thou at times before it does make me more hungry (ironic) in other areas of life, when you get those funds for food it’s so easy to just eat literally your way through them. you can have a drink or eat anywhere so why is it that the majority of us stay in one place? safety?

i’ve never been very good (probably not wanted too) at building up to the next phase or chapter, i’ve always just slid into the next thing even if it took a while to come about or happen, at some point something just clicks and i make a decision and go for it - it’s been ultra hard lately to make that happen but i’m trying other things all the time to get the spark!

transition is hard when transport is important

kinda feel tied to the way that i’ve been doing things for years, they become like a security blanket. the usual methods that are tried and tested that have been working, changing the energy flow and having to guess what the potential outcomes are if you make changes that are going to be out of control - right now, taking the car off the road really limits me because apart from random buses that are often 2 hrs apart i’m really stuck - also means that food costs goes up because fetching and transporting the cheaper stuff can no longer happen, or does it?

that electric life thou

that’s why the electric van/car really appeals to me. obviously the biggest issue with any of the electric cars right now is the range but you can get some interesting hybrid beasts in between the gaps if your willing to gamble your money and time. the idea of never having to go to a petrol station in my life again has massive appeal and i’m super interested in what the next generation of electric charge stations will look like and who (aside from tesla) will build them into their brand offer.

personally a van right now would be the perfect option if i could afford to buy one outright. especially because i could find a reasonable amount of places close by where i could charge it. hell, i’ve even come up with a way of bartering my skills for usage of the electric power points at private places that i’ve managed to find by looking at electric car charge mapping - it would be basically be just the upkeep of the car maintenance costs and free fuel effectively.

backup mobility - small, medium and large!

so what are my super short options for transportation (again, if the weather is ok and i’m not going to be carrying that much, including another person!) if i’m gonna be without a car. i could go back to buses, it’s not THAT bad it’s just an adjustment phase i guess, don’t want to really have a car marked off-road doing nothing however.

THE SMALL

Any method of electric transport that's fast, light, powered by electric and have a fairly fast speed and range is a good stop gap in the middle of emergencies. I've looked at some of the electric skateboards that you can get and while they seem like a good idea the price and the fact that i would probably come off and kill myself put me off even including them in this list.

I'm more inclined therefore to have something with a stand on plate with handlebars, horn and lights - honestly it's more for everyone else around me than it is for myself. You can find some pretty decent options around for this kinda thing so I'm not going to bore you with the details but your look around a grand for something with a 48v 1000watt motor from eBay.

I would not rely on it however as my main transport. You might end up on a rainy night with it broke down and needing to take a cab as it lets you down but for short runs to the shop it might be exactly what you need, especially if you have one in the office and one at the home that way you always have one charged up ready to go.

THE MEDIUM

In the medium sized department I'm really interested in the rad rover beast that I've seen. It's designed almost like a proper heavy duty electric bike to get things moved around, additional seating on the back and the ability to carry supplies on the panniers at the back - it looks a beast and i could certainly jump for something like this especially if i was using it for part work and part free time.

With all of these it's gotta be electric, the next logical stage/step for me would be to then develop some kind of battery bank/solar charging system that allows me to basically run the bikes for free instead of relying on electric supply, when you get to the next section for the large size transports you'll see what i mean about having your own electric power sources.

Like most things cutting edge you have to take in the 'unknown factor' of new technology. Expect the batteries to act weird, electronics systems in general to work weird without any rational reason and that things can go wrong - because of this always try riding or using the transport without any electric powering at all.

i had a great electric bike until the power ran out and then it was a nightmare to ride at all without power. Make sure you can pedal the thing without being powered otherwise your pushing or carrying home that really heavy transport that you bought to help you offset the walking!

The moral of the story is go super light when it comes to bike frames, always carry some wd40, carry a spare longlife mobile phone and a bloody good torch in case of emergencies, especially if you need to rely on the transport. Also make sure you schedule in quarterly/half year optimising to make sure the wheels, motors and general wear and tear are not going to suddenly fail when your zipping along at 25mph in the early morning somewhere.

THE LARGE - THE ST2 S PREMIUM MODEL

Modelle MY 16 | Stromer - 180km (close!)
price : around 9000 euros. .. but. . better than a car?

i mean look at it, what a beast.

i’ve been told to ‘avoid’ the hype and that ‘batteries’ never perform like they say they will (which obviously, i know the score there) - i’ve even had the usual communication that ‘my battery is bigger’ blah blah. the truth is you can never tell if something is going to live up to your needs until you try it and try it regular, when it becomes part of your daily commute, is it reliable, can you track the battery usage, can you get updates after your trip on efficiency, etc etc.

sure it’s an expensive bike but i feel that when i company makes a big statement, understand social media and has a fresh new company design and pedigree, they have to live up to some of the hype and you as a customer have a perfect way out if things go wrong. i got super excited when i saw the battery power and range on this thing.

one of the spots i wanted to go co-working was a few hours away by car and i wondered how realistic it would be to do the journey by bike, it’s probably insanity to even try but the idea of that level of freedom, even having a shack/storage near to a local airport and an electric bike in storage ready to go was super appealing - range really does bring about interesting storytelling but practical uses to an exploring video blogger!

the ultimate

if i was to pick my perfect country commuting car it would have to be the tesla purely on range. nothing more, not about the styling, nothing like that before the fact that the model3 really does hit the spot when it comes to pricing, the problem is right now is that some countries on the route that i would need to take don’t have charging points so that makes getting it juiced up a bit problematic compared to some countries that are literally covered with power ups.

i’ve even seen a whole sub culture of people using them to actually sleep in because they have this hardcore hepa filtering system and starting to see a lot of home-brew use cases and interesting ways to interact with the car in terms of keeping the battery on to keep the air con or filtering on over night - i could certainly see myself living, commuting and streaming from one. that would be a trip! :)

in conclusion

in just over two weeks from this post i’ll be in a bit of a sticky situation transport wise, i’m not sure how i’ll pick up my daughter from school or even do the shopping, maybe i need to consider stocking up on things soon otherwise it’s the expensive shop down the road to get supplies which will compound the problem.

i dislike putting myself into these positions. i have to get it fixed even if i want to sell it (which i don’t, my daughter and i both love the car) but it does bring about thoughts about the things we get attached too and why - we get used to things, they are there, seemingly always been there, they fit in the right place, they shape around us and become part of the fabric of our daily lives.

do you have anything in your day to day commuting life you have to have else your life falls apart? what’s is your one thing that your hoping lasts and that you are keeping on life support (please, no human or family examples) and just cannot bear to be without?

ok, time for coffee no2 i think! :)

we can dream right? :)

p.s - the garage said they charge £75 an hour to diag the car regarding the reverse, if it is the clutch it’s gonna be 800 (so i think talk 1000 here) to get it sorted out worst case, i’m hoping not for worse case but you never know how garages work out - i need to know regardless! feel like i might be putting my dog (car) to sleep. . .

cha cha changes. . ..

TRUST AND AUTHENTICATION. .

^{http://socialgandalf.com/legacy → pinterest epic wins pinboard → i was a brand advocate for nokia, 1000heads, verisign → won a vloggie for involvement in node666 (san francisco 2006) → on television for time team history hunters 1999 (burton on trent) → sold me.dm to evan williams (twitter) in april 2011 for 5 figures → went to phil campbell, alabama to help repair/recovery/help raise money month after a tornado ripped through the town (was on sky news, bbc news, al jazeeza, nightly news, alabama weather channel?!) → CNN for sxsw 2013 about austin south by southwest event → video chat with robert scoble from rackspace → i was in a music video can you spot me? → won the digital derry contest for 5k euros to kickstart web tv studio → did project work with sleepydog indirectly for nesta (responder) → crowdfunded digital signage concept called the pi street (do it for steem?)}