Carrie went to the local vinyl installer on Friday and he did a great job. He asked what we paid for the stripes and said he would have made them and installed them for $60. So I have him designing me something for the side, I shall be interested to see what he (actually its his cute French assistant) comes up with….
Month: October 2005
How to Combine Two of My Favourite Things
Cheaper Gas
Went to CostCo last night and paid $2.84, a whopping 22c less than last Friday’s fill-up at the Shell. I only just made it over $30 for a tank of gas. Whoo hoo!
Recent Mods
Completed my final mod today, got the auto-up window circuit installed. I wasn’t able to do it using the ‘blind’ method but I did manage it without removing the downtubes, just moved them out of the way a little, so it took very little time at all. Its good to have my window circuit back.
Only mod left is the stripes and I’ll be getting a local professional installer to do those for me in the next week or two. In the meantime, here’s some pictures of the latest and greatest:
Wet Okole Seat Covers
XM Direct
Nodding Bulldog
Fuel Consumption After 10 Fillups
2996 miles and ten fillups since getting Carrie and thought I’d post some stats, none of them real good really.
- Average Fuel Economy – 24.6 MPG
- Best Fuel Economy – 27.1 MPG
- Worst Fuel Economy – 22.88 MPG
- Average Gas Price – $3.126
- Most Expensive Gas – $3.249
- Cheapest Gas – $2.979
Some Progress
[Comment posting is now fixed]
Had some success with my projects at the weekend, got the XM Direct unit installed and I have to say I am very pleased with it. For some reason, the radio isn’t yet activated so I haven’t been able to actually tune in to any channels but the preview channel comes in nice and clear! Had one minor scare during installation – the top stopped working, it would not go past sunroof mode. After much panic and swearing I read the manual which said to check the position of the parcel shelf. I did and sure enough I had nudged it off its position and I guess some sensor picked that up. Phew!
I had tried the “blind install” method for the window circuit in the morning but to no success and so decided to do it the hard way. The screws holding the downtubes have changed and I didn’t have a T40 screwdriver so decided to leave it until Sunday. Sunday came and we had torrential rain with thunder and lightning all day so I didn’t get to do anything. Hopefully I’ll get to that next weekend.
Projects
Now that I’m back from the funeral its time to get on with the projects that seem to be hanging around, no more “its too hot” excuses:
- Bonnet Stripes: the new stripes came whilst I was away but I’m going to find a professional to do the installation this time
- Auto-Window Up circuit: been putting this off as it looks a lot trickier on the ’05 than on the ’02.
- XM Direct: couldn’t remove the cover that is hiding the CD changer port before but I know the trick now (and have large hacksaw!) so think this is doable. I still don’t know how I will get the cable from the boot to the antenna on the dashboard, might be for the local audio pro to do.
- Nodding Dog: Whilst in England my sister gave me a nodding British bulldog to sit on the dash (in lieu of the hula girl) but I fear it is too large to sit there
Well, plenty to keep me busy, hopefully I can knock these off pretty soon.