Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Morgan Plus Four, Supersport & Plus Six (CX & CXV Generation Vehicles) Odd noises

There is an increasing onus being placed on car producers by governments to emsure emission performance is sustained over the life of the vehicle and I expect the locking of ECUs by OEMs is part of this.

Who mentioned privacy...? That would seem to be but another aspect of human existence and expectations that has been consigned to the history books..?

By way of an example, my internet connection failed and in the hours of providing proof of my identity to various employees of my i.s.p. in an attempt to restore comms, a letter directly addressed to me arrived in a pre postage paid printed Royal Mail envelope, from Karpenko Elishchuk tel +380 947 125 482 email karpenkoelishchuk@gmail.com, presenting me with a partnership proposal, though as there was only a $26.7million security bond mentioned I decided not to get involved...

As to John`s point, I suspect I have often typed that I was involved with a mix of old school and leading edge technology in an airport environment for almost forty years as the technology increased at an ever increasing rate of change, an exciting environment in which to operate, providing all sorts of challenges. I suspect one of my main frustrations was the seemingly ever increasing rate of change and degree of complexity that digitisation brought into the control of electromechanical equipment, the repair of which was hampered by that rate of change, along with the degree of manufacturers of equipment to fail to provide enough information on circuitry to ease repair processes, and using the term intellectual copyright, to shield them from the possibility that their equipment might have design issues, found by those who were tasked to repair and maintain the equipment... It seemed to me that "progress" perhaps involved acceptance that we were entering into a far more controlled state of affairs than ever before, and likewise at an ever increasing rate of knots..

There is a great deal to be said for an old carb fed Trad, compared to all that is associated with the amount of complexity and of course convenience built into more modern ICE machinery...(-:

Types a selective Luddite who currently enjoys a Tesla as a personal transportation device.... (-:

I suspect my Tesla`s software knows much more about the person that I am, than I might ever remember myself...!

Earlier this year my Kia put up a message about a software expiry looming in the infotainment system ( touchscreen in the dash) I contacted the dealer and got an appointment with their "expert". Took the car in and he had a look. £40 to to an upgrade. In the meantime I looked it up. Instructions on how to do it on a Kia website and a download to fix it. Simple enough. Downliad the fix to a memory stick, plug it into the car ( dashboard usb ) and start the process. A few minutes and job done.
Kia has the 7 year warranty but this wasn't covered. Kia service said it was ok to diy the fix. It was based on the satnav not any other functions.
That reminds me, I need to upgrade my Garmin before a trip to Scotland in the Morgan in a couple of weeks.

A friends wife got into her 4 week old Volvo hybrid, began manoeuvring it in their driveway when it stopped, it would neither drive forward or reverse, and displayed software update required.... Long story short, it seems there was a software update for the radio display on the touch screen display, seemingly, the advisory notification inhibited selection of fwd or rev gear....Dealership when phoned said to contact Volvo direct, which he did, and they provided info to allow him to perform the software update via the touchscreen.... Technology, doncha just love it...?

Disturbing that it performed a full lock on being able to use the car as a car when the real issue was being to select the babal that you wanted. That's not fail safe.

I collected the WRp4 from Krazy Horse today, and discussed the locked ecu issue at length with Dan. Bottom line is that I won’t be letting anyone near my OBD port. In fact a cap for the socket, several layers of gaffer tape, a “do not touch sticker” and a carefully positioned spring-loaded mouse trap are all going to be installed before the annual service. That and a few words with the tech hopefully should see me alright. Fingers crossed.

Our Kia has the handbrake linked to the driver's seatbelt. Basically stopping you driving off if you aren't belted.
That seems ok if you want to stop people driving without a seatbelt. It doesn't seem to work on other seats so perhaps seat pressure sensors are linked in as well? Mrs sospan can sit in the passenger seat and I can move with just a warning sound and light on the dash screen. Similar for rear seats.
So, thinking about it over breakfast, what happens if the connection between brake/driver's seatbelt is lost? Switch or sensor failure for example. Is there a failsafe that kicks in? I haven't tested it by unclipping the belt whilst moving. I could do that off road. How would the system react and what would the fix be? My guess is that the it should only cause brake lock when on stop. So, if you stop at a junction, lights, traffic queue would being stationary lock the brakes on? The car has auto lock braking which I like as it's great on hills etc but will that be affected by any system component failures? I would hope that the software developers would put enough checks in place to tecognise the varying situations! I am not 100% convinced though.
Have Kia built in a warning to say there is a problem whilst you are driving? Doing 70 on a M'way? Brake triggered or just a warning? I would hope the fail-safe would be a warning light/sound not braking!
I am sure I have read that Tesla are continuously collecting real world data from the on-board cameras to build a database of varying situations imagery to be used in the autonomous driving management. It needs a huge image bank of objects to be able to identify them and feed a suitable reaction into the car.
Oh the joys of a simple car you just have basics built in!

Its amazing what the cars are conditioned to react to. For example the wife's Mercedes on board camera if it detects certain body movements such as your head dropping down/forwards as if nodding off, an error message and alarm goes off. Sometimes its all to easy to trigger id you look down at something.

Update. Just got the Mog out of the garage to go to play golf. Tested the handbrake locking on.
Cold start, me in the seat, no seatbelt. Handbrake locked on. Warnings activated.
Seatbelt in, handbrake released so car moved.
Engine still running, my seatbelt not in, handbrake did not lock on. It appears the system cancels after the initial locking on.
I'll try the effect of the footbrake and auto lock next time.

I have come across a few software programming errors in my time, and in general my thinking tends to be along the lines of, "The man that never made a mistake never MADE anything" but when aircraft fall out of the sky killing hundreds of folk and more than once, seemingly related to digitised control systems, and perhaps creating a "We never thought of that" response...? It seems there has ever been a price to be paid for ..err.. progress..?

As a self confessed selective Luddite who drives a Tesla on occasion and delights in the simple technology of his carb fed Trad Morgan, my opinions must be suspect... ? (-: