The Dodge Charger is a big car that looks really cool and goes fast. It's famous for being powerful and is often seen in movies and TV shows, which makes people talk about it a lot.
The Volkswagen e-Up is a small electric car that's great for driving around the city. It doesn't go very far on a single charge, especially when it's cold, so it's best for short trips.
An on-board charger helps charge electric cars by changing the electricity from a wall outlet into a form the car's battery can use. The numbers like 3.3 or 6.6 tell you how fast it can charge the battery.
The Hyundai Ioniq is a small car that can save you money on gas because it comes in versions that use less fuel or run on electricity. It's a good choice if you care about the environment.
The Thunderbird is a stylish car made by Ford that was popular in the past. It was known for its luxury features and unique look, making it a favorite among car enthusiasts.
The Ford Mustang is a classic American car that many people love because it looks great and drives fast. It's often mentioned in songs and movies, which shows how popular and special it is.
The Ford Cortina is an older family car that many people used to drive. It was known for being reliable and affordable, and it brings back memories for those who grew up with it.
Anti-roll bars are parts of a car's suspension that help keep it stable when turning. They connect the left and right sides of the car, making it less likely to tip over during sharp turns.
Dampers are parts of a car's suspension that help smooth out the ride by controlling how the car moves up and down. They make sure the tires stay in contact with the road for better handling.
The Ferrari 456M GTA is a luxury sports car with a powerful engine and a stylish design. It's built for both comfort and speed, making it a popular choice for car lovers.
Rust is what happens when metal gets wet and starts to break down, making it look bad and potentially causing problems with the car. It's important to fix rust issues to keep the car safe and looking good.
Electrical issues are problems with the car's electrical system, like the battery or wiring. They can cause things like lights not working or trouble starting the car, and usually need a mechanic to fix.
The Bentley Azure is a fancy car that you can drive with the top down. It's very luxurious inside and is made for people who want the best of the best in a car.
The Vauxhall VX220 is a small sports car that is very light and fast. It was made in the early 2000s and is similar to another car called the Lotus Elise.
The Eaton M62 Supercharger is a device that helps an engine produce more power by pushing more air into it. This makes the car go faster and perform better.
The Lotus VX220 is a small, fast sports car that is very light and fun to drive. The Lightning Edition is a special version that is bright yellow and has some unique features.
The Toyota MR2 is a small sports car that has its engine in the middle, making it fun to drive. The third generation is called the MR2 Spyder and is known for being light and quick.
A charge cooler is a part that cools the air going into the engine, making it work better and more efficiently. It helps the engine get more power by keeping the air cool.
A hub carrier is a part that holds the wheel in place and connects it to the car's suspension. It helps the wheels turn smoothly while supporting the car's weight.
The timing chain is a part of the engine that makes sure everything moves in sync. It helps the engine run smoothly by controlling when the valves open and close.
Suspension is the part of a car that helps it ride smoothly over bumps and keeps it stable while driving. It includes springs and shock absorbers that work together to make the ride comfortable.
When a car is described as 'mechanically sound', it means that everything under the hood is working well and there are no big problems that could cause it to break down.
The Lada 110 is a basic car from Russia that many people could afford. It's not very fancy, but it gets the job done for those who need a simple vehicle.
The Porsche Boxster is a stylish sports car that you can drive every day. It's known for being fun to drive and looks really nice, making it a favorite among car enthusiasts.
A pre-purchase inspection is when a mechanic checks a car before you buy it. This helps you find out if there are any problems with the car that you might not see yourself.
The Ford Ranger is a tough truck that can carry things and drive on rough roads. It's popular for people who need a vehicle for work or like to go on adventures.
LIVE
I'm Richard Porter, I'm Johnny Smith, and this is On the Other Side of Things, the Smith and Sniff spin-off in which we answer your questions.
Hello again. Here we are answering your questions as we do in our sort of spin-off show.
If I may, I'm going to dive in with a question from a listener called Mike who describes himself in brackets as a grateful Patreon member.
Grateful. Wow, we should be the grateful ones. Come on.
I know, that feels the wrong way around, but thank you, Mike. We are also grateful back at you.
Mike says, good morning, you finely tuned spouts, gentlemen.
A couple of my friends have first-generation Nissan Leafs for their short commutes.
Leafs.
I have become very tempted to get my own as they are raving mad about them.
Yeah.
The commute to work is only seven miles, approximately three and a half thousand miles a year.
And I currently run a sweet 2015 VW high up with 75 of the finest three-cylinder horsepower.
I'm not sure whether this would be a sensible move in terms of vehicle longevity.
There are plenty of Leafs around for circa £3,700 with very good battery health,
which would essentially be a straight swap with some equity when parting with my up.
Charging at home wouldn't be an issue, but I would need to swap the tariff, etc, etc.
But what would you do if you were in my specific situation?
Also, given the fact EVs will be taxed per mile in a couple of years,
any thoughts, recommendations or things to look out for very much appreciated?
Well, the first-gen Leaf is not a looker.
It's not.
But it's actually surprisingly nippy.
It catches a few people out.
So if you're just doing that sort of journey with it, so it's a very journey-specific purchase,
and I didn't know if there's another car that he has access to.
So I don't know.
When you go and see Granny in Glasgow every other month,
are you having to drive that car?
Yeah, that bit of information not there, which would be useful
because I definitely wouldn't switch to a sort of ageing Leaf if you do, like you say,
every couple of months have a massive cross-britten motorway trek.
Might get a bit tiresome.
Agree.
I think if you've got a two-car setup, I would almost certainly swap.
What were you saying last week? Two CG?
Yes, two-car garage.
Apparently that's off Chris Harris' podcast, but I don't remember them ever saying it.
I know they do that feature, but I don't remember hearing them say two CG.
I've not heard the two CG bit, but I know of the two-car garage setup.
And I find two-car garage decisions increasingly hard to make
because for me, it should be three.
But anyway, that's not the question here, is it?
And this is Osasau.
So we could talk about that on the main podcast, maybe.
Yeah.
So I had a Leaf for a little bit, the first gen one,
and I commuted in it for about that distance, and it was perfect.
Yeah.
I had the added benefit of being able to charge for nought at work
by dint of it being the old Grand Tour office in Chiswick.
And you could park right outside the side door
and then just run the granny charger with the three-pin plug on it through the side door,
and there was a socket just there.
Brilliant.
Perfect.
Stunt three.
And I managed to sort of...
Well, you know, everyone knew I was doing it.
It was all fine.
Although every so often, TV's Jeremy Clarkson would walk by and go,
are you stealing my electricity again?
Because it was the presenter's production company, so they paid the bills.
But that, I mean, obviously that dramatically reduces your running costs
if you're using Jeremy Clarkson's electricity.
Well, yeah.
Even if you're not, I don't know, just charging at home,
get one of those low tariffs that are meant for electric cars.
Yeah.
And charge it overnight.
And it probably will save you money.
Not masses, because I imagine the up's not a thirsty car over a seven-mile commute.
No.
But then there are certain other little things about having an electric car.
Everyone complains that the range takes a dive in winter, which it does.
But on the plus side, the heater starts working straight away.
And even on those leafs, you can program them to warm themselves up
before you get in.
And that's delightful.
That's right.
Yeah.
And the pre-heat, I mean, even on my old Chevy Volta, I used to use the pre-heat.
It was great.
I have a sort of split the difference suggestion for Mike.
Which is, obviously, he currently has the up, he's thinking of going electric.
Has he considered finding a cheap e-up?
I was about to, what, the first gen, which do about 50 miles on a charge?
Well, that's it.
The range is not amazing.
We had an e-up, but it was the larger battery later model.
And that, genuinely, even in cold weather, you'd get 120 out of that maybe.
That's good.
In warm weather, it was beyond its claimed range.
It sort of, you know, I saw like almost 180 on the rangeometer, which seemed to be pretty
accurate.
Rangeometer.
In the summer.
So that, now the trouble is, I think even those early small battery e-ups are not quite
within budget yet.
So it would be a bit of a push to budget.
But the e-up is fundamentally a really nice car to drive.
Much nicer looking than the first gen leaf.
Yeah.
I don't know.
I think this hinges on whether Mike has another car.
Yeah, it does.
But I would finish by saying, Mike, if the priority when you buy a second hand leaf is state
of health of the battery, which it kind of is really, why not find one even cheaper by
finding a really smashed up one?
I would get one that's been badly driven up a wall.
So there's loads of badly parked incidents involving leaves, which I've seen, sleeves
and this unsleeve.
And I would get one that's just been gouged up one side and then just pretty much gone
through co-part.
Nobody wants it.
You'll get it for like 600 quid.
If it's got a decent state of health, the airbags haven't gone off and the charging system
is uninterrupted.
Just nail it around.
To celebrate the fact, it's an absolute white good.
And then with all the money that you saved, you could buy something stupid.
Good buying advice there from Johnny Smith, the master of recommending badly smashed
up.
When I say badly smashed up, badly, cosmetically smashed up, I don't want the wheels all pointing
in different directions and the front's caved in.
But I mean, yeah, you know, if someone's backed it into a wall or caught a post at
a very acute angle and accelerated at the same time, that's what you want.
If the back arch is wanked, who cares?
There's a funny quirk with those leafs of that generation.
As standard for the kind of charging you'd be able to do at home, the on-board charger
can only take 3.3 kilowatts and there was an optional 6.6, which obviously gets close
to sort of about seven that the home charger will top out at.
That's right.
So it's useful to have, but it is almost impossible to work out which one your car has.
What you have to do is get a torch and sort of peer into the under the bonnet between
some gubbins and there's a sticker on a bit of some bit of the charging gubbins, which
will tell you which one you've got because that's how I found out that the leaf I had
was a 6.6.
But I didn't know that.
I suppose the other way would be to plug it in somewhere that tells you what rate you're
getting.
But it's a weird quirk of those cars that there's no obvious way to figure this out.
So when you're looking to buy, you have to use the torch method.
This is the same with trying to work out if a honed Ioniq fire has a heat pump when you're
buying a second hand one.
It's extremely hard.
You need the VIN and you basically need a dealer and there's not really any other way
around it.
It's daft.
Come on, car makers.
Yeah, it's just daft.
Stop being opaque, you wazix.
Shall we move on to another question?
Yeah, let's move on to another question.
Hi, guys.
On a recent commute, the track has it come to this by the streets played on the radio.
Oh, yeah.
It contains the line, Tony's got a new motor, SR Nova, driving like a joy rider.
And it got me thinking.
Most songs reference cars with some glamour, Mustangs, Thunderbirds and the like.
But can you think of other songs that make reference to less exotic cars?
For some reason, it immediately comes to mind that there's a song by the Wombats on I think
their first album called Metro Song, which is genuinely about a metro.
Unlike Crying on the Metro by Girls Aloud, which I believe is about some kind of urban
railway system.
Because you don't want to cry on a metro.
I mean, they're quite rust-prone anyway, so moisture is really not welcome.
Salty tears would create a suspicious hole in the middle of the wing.
Maybe that's what happened to my metro, because you know, it's got a sort of slight bubbling
at the front of the wings.
I think perhaps maybe one of Girls Aloud just wept over it.
I can imagine one of them draped across it in quite a theatrical manner.
Other mundane songs.
Because we've had this.
We've had loads of messages since last week when we were asked about car brands name-checked
in songs.
People have been sending us a lot of messages of sort of lost control of that particular
inbox.
So there's probably some really good suggestions in there.
I just haven't prepared any, but...
No, we need to digest that, don't we?
No, I was just hoping.
I saw some here.
I was hoping they might have an answer in here.
Alex Brunstens has said Pink Cadillac by Bruce Springsteen as a car song.
It also mentions Honduran Subaru.
P.S. didn't know Bruce did the original.
I only knew the version by Natalie Cole.
No, I didn't.
That sounded quite a local radio, then, didn't it?
Yeah, it did actually.
Oh, guys.
Oh, well, here we go.
OK, thank you.
Tim Cave has got us out of this hole, because he says one of the best car songs has to be
Grey Cortina by the Tom Robinson band.
See, I've never heard that song, or I don't think.
I'm only dimly aware of it.
I have a feeling that Gareth Jones played it to me once, because he loves cortinas.
Yeah.
Well, yeah, Elton Johnson made in England references.
Yes.
I was made in England like a blue cortina, and I thought, yeah, OK.
I can't see Elton as a cortina guy, but maybe Elton did have one at some point.
But I guess that is an unglamorous car, especially if it was base model.
Yeah.
You know, like the Mark III with the single headlights and no side trim at all and very
bare dash would be like a 1.6L or a 1.3L.
The 1.3 would have been so ghastly slow in that body shell.
And noisy.
It would have just been really sad, just a really dismal experience, wouldn't it?
Because Ford in those days were the masters of leaving out items for cost reasons, but
their costs, not yours.
I mean, obviously, the purchase price was probably attractively low, but in return, they took
away stuff.
So I bet that didn't have any anti-roll bars and things like the cheapest dampers that
could possibly get away with.
So the handling was absolutely horrid.
I think what's funny is that like markets of that car, like the Australian market, the
probably they got the 3.0L engine and all that kind of thing, the South Africans, they'd
probably be crying with laughter knowing that some people in this country bought the exact
same weight car with a 1.3L engine.
You'd be like, is that for children?
No, no, that's for actually driving everywhere, for doing all the duties of a car.
That's what that was.
That's just reminded me of a weird fact about the Mark III Cortina is that it was sold in
Japan.
Was it?
But you know how Japanese car taxes are based on the size of the car, hence the K cars and
everything like that.
So the Cortina sat just over some car tax threshold based on width.
So Cortina's for Japan, they smushed the arches in slightly so that it just slipped under that
threshold so they could get it into a different tax category.
What did they just drive it up a wall on the way out?
I think it was so marginal that it was just basically like they just got a big lad to
lean on it or something.
But it was official, like Ford did it so that they could say to the Japanese authorities,
no it goes in this tax bracket, but then of course they were obliged to repeat that on
every single Cortina they sent there, which seems a lot of effort.
Imagine many Japanese people would want a Cortina.
No, I'm just thinking about it.
Thanks, I've got a bluebird and it works properly and it doesn't handle like a shopping trunk.
That's amazing.
Right, there was a question which I really wanted to answer from 2024.
I stumbled across it this morning.
While you look for that, I'll just do a quick one here from a listener called James and
I'm picking him out because he lives near me as he identifies in his signature.
He says a friend invited me to your live show in Bristol a few months back.
I loved it and I'm now very much hooked on the podcasts.
This is a development.
Never had that before that somebody came to a live show cold and didn't sit there going,
what the bloody hell is this?
Well, thank you James.
Yeah, well James.
He says a few years ago I was lucky enough to be able to buy my dream car a blue Ferrari 456M GTA.
At the time I justified the purchase by convincing my wife and to some extent myself that it would
at least break even in terms of running costs versus holding its value.
Obviously the last five years have confirmed that was nonsense.
I'm currently facing a bill for sorting out some rust and electrical issues.
I need to disguise that cost from my wife to maintain the charade of having both car knowledge
and financial prudency.
I'm currently siphoning off small parcels of money from our joint account into a secret car fund
to ensure I don't have to pay all the bills through the account she has visibility on.
What this is for a Ferrari?
You're siphoning.
How much are you siphoning like 12 quid an hour?
These are small parcels but I mean it feels like you did a big package to pay for a Ferrari.
Anyway, James' question is what's the best and worst secret car spend that you've had to hide?
Well, quite well documented I think on the podcast that that Panda 100 horsepower that I had was
a little bit of a money hole.
It wasn't a secret.
My wife knew that it was making regular trips to the garage.
She could sort of guess as much because she would notice that it wasn't outside the house for a bit
and occasionally she would ask, where's that stupid fear of yours?
Oh, it's had to go and have some work done on it.
At one point I did say to her, oh yeah, it's just a bit broken and I didn't elaborate that the bit that was broken was the engine
and it needed a new one.
So it was more of a kind of, I just didn't want to worry with the amount that I was spending.
And in the general scheme of things, it wasn't Ferrari money.
It was small fear money, but it's just that, you know, when you pay two grand for a small fear and then have to slap down that
and quite a bit again, it sort of hurts a bit because I could have, for the amount I spent on that car,
I could have just gone and bought the nicest 100 horsepower in the country from the off and probably been up on the deal.
So yeah, there's that.
I think mine is probably one that happened just before autumn last year.
I won't go into too much detail because the actual car hasn't been revealed on the late break show yet.
But put it like this, I was getting very disillusioned with house buying failures.
And I think one thing led to another and I just went, oh, FFS and ended up buying a really not practical, classic race car.
And then, and I just, and I thought, I'm just going to do it.
And I did it because I thought there was no chance of buying a house.
And then the house situation was back on about three weeks after this damn car got put on the ship to ship across some water to here.
And Lisa, who works with us and with me on the late break show doing various things involving bookkeeping as well and liaising with accountancy.
She just went, Johnny, there's a significant amount of money that's gone from the account.
I need to talk to you about it, what's happened.
And I just went, I'll talk to you about it when I'm back in the office.
And so I've completely...
The significant amounts of money.
I completely pissed at myself thinking that the house was never going to happen.
And then it did.
And then I realized I've got a big monetary hole.
But I'll talk more about that another day.
Here's a letter from a person called Steve Cooper.
Guys, listen, just wondering if any of your listeners work for Microsoft, specifically in the teams relating to their Azure product.
The reason I ask is on a number of teams' messages, the oddsot phrase keeps getting mentioned.
So wonder if it's a Microsoft thing or fans of the show squeezing the phrase in.
There's no mention of jet towels or piss fisters though, although Windows Vista is a bit at piss.
But we don't talk about that anymore.
On a side note, do you remember which show number the network queue hidden pornography stashes on?
Was it around the same time as the Ken Morse adventures?
I don't remember.
So does anybody, I bet somebody listening to either on the other side of things or the main podcast, works in Microsoft?
They must do.
What Azure? I don't know.
I don't know what Azure is, Rich, because I am quite scared of Microsoft products.
So I don't really take much notice of it.
Well, I was going to say, I didn't really use Word.
You and I have a shared loathing of Excel.
Oh, gosh.
Also, because we're just, we're fuckwits and we can't understand it.
But although the other day, I had to do an Excel thing, but it was Excel online.
Yeah.
And I wanted to add another line to the stupid frigging spreadsheet that I was having to use.
And my wife is a bit of an Excel expert.
And I was getting driven more and more mad by her, then she came in the room and went,
I cannot, she's going to have to show me this makes no sense.
There's an insert option, but there's no option within that to insert a line,
which is like surely one of the most common things you want to do.
And she just went, oh yeah, the online version of shit.
And even she had to admit that there's a cockeyed and there's not a really obvious way to add a line.
So, you know, they never underestimate Microsoft's ability to make things more complicated.
But Word, which I use all the time.
Yeah.
It is, we just sort of accept it.
And it's almost like it's like having an alpha or a male or something.
You just go, oh yeah, it always does that.
I'm just kind of used to it now.
I accept it as character, isn't it?
Except it's not character in a piece of software.
It's just irritating.
And my favorite thing with Word is when you just go,
I'm just going to paste in something here.
But I think we've established that I've already written 3,000 words in Times New Roman.
And then I've written 12 points.
I'm just going to paste in this little guy here and, oh look,
you've changed the whole fucking thing to Wingdings for no apparent reason.
It's fioriating.
I just don't understand.
Don't give me a start.
Because sometimes we write scripts for TV.
Sometimes in tables, if you just do it in Word.
So you have two columns, essentially you can have the words being said on screen
or the voice over and then on the other side.
You have to find what the action is.
Oh yes, yes.
A really simple way of doing it.
Yeah.
Tables, oh my Christ, sometimes the word will just go, hey, I tell you what, we're halfway
down this page.
I'm just going to bounce everything onto the next page now, I want it to go to the bottom
because that's just stupid.
It doesn't look right.
Can't help me mate, can't fix that, sorry, rules is, it's the rules, isn't it?
What rules?
Your rules, the rules you've made up, then it changes everything to Helvetica even though
I didn't ask it to.
I genuinely, I've got no input really on Microsoft, but Microsoft Vista, I have heard
of it but I can't remember what it does.
Microsoft Gentile will be amazing, I don't know what that would be though.
Imagine, well though because it would probably blow warm piss on your hands or something
by mistake.
Microsoft Azure is cloud computing services.
Oh, okay, okay, nothing to do with a Bentley.
This doesn't say that it says Otsos.
Well no, the reason I ask is on a number of Teams meetings the Otsos phrase keeps being
mentioned, so I wonder if it's a Microsoft thing or fans of the show.
So it's people saying on that side of things a lot when in a Microsoft Teams meeting.
Oh right, I see.
I think it's Microsoft people, I'm convinced.
Maybe, they do have UK offices don't they?
Yes.
On a side note, do you remember which show the Network Q Hidden Grottsdash was on?
I don't have this feeling that the Network Q Grottsdash was the title of the show or
something similar.
Yeah, I think it was.
It may have been one of those titles I regretted giving the show because in fact several platforms
then censored it because it said Grotts or something, I don't know.
You learn these things from the way, don't you?
I'm going to move on to a question from a listener called Ashley who says, God we're
doing Steve right here.
Firstly, your podcast is the only thing that makes my crushing three and a half to four
hour daily commute bearable.
Wow, that's a commute.
That is a commute.
You're not doing that in a first gen leaf are you, son?
I don't know.
Well actually I don't know because I don't think he's doing it in the car that he's
about to reference in this message that I'm going to read out now.
Ashley says, I recently bought a Vauxhall VX220.
It's a lightning edition number 44 and has been equipped with an Eton M62 Supercharger.
Oh wow.
Essentially it's bright yellow and bastard fast.
I remember that lightning edition.
I don't but I want to.
It was bright yellow and I remember it because I did a telly thing with someone else that
we know and he turned up in one of those VX220 lightning editions and we ended up talking
about it on camera.
That sounds, I mean I've driven a yellow VX220 but I don't remember the mention of the word
lightning.
Hmm, well I don't know, maybe he could get one non-lightening in yellow as well.
Anyway, Ashley says, for additional context I got this car for a very good price.
I traded in an MR2 and he's talking about a third gen one here I think that he bought
for £300 and then spent £1,500 commissioning and a Twingo RS Cup that I won in one of those
car competition things and £4,000.
So he traded two cars and four grand for the Vauxhall if I'm reading that right.
Yeah, it's quite a convoluted trade but yeah I like those.
Yeah but you know it's also quite nice, it's tidying up, go yeah two for one, two out one
in, that's good.
Anyway Ashley says at that price I didn't inspect it too closely, it is also impossible
to inspect a VX closely without a full workshop.
I was comforted by the £7,000 invoice from a supposed specialist just over two years
ago.
Fast forward to late January when I had it transported to the VX220 specialist for a
full health check.
It needs, charge cooler, pump and hoses, all bushes, arms, wishbones, tie rods, various
clam repairs, this I knew, hub carriers and hubs if the bolts are shagged as they look,
steering rack engine mounts, water pump timing chain covers, leaks rectifying, all new suspension.
What?
Anodising is disappeared from the Nitro unit, brake lines and fuel lines, all consumables
and lots more my brain is blocking out to protect my sanity.
The projected cost is £10,000 to £15,000, as in the purchase cost of £5,800 and I've
spent over £20,000 on a car that will be worth around £12,000.
After it's mechanically sound it still needs a full re-trim and some paint.
What?
Do I commit and see it as a long term vehicle that can be enjoyed for many years once rectified
or cut my losses?
CMTNB, Ashley.
I would probably get a second opinion before I make such, that sounds like an awful, it
is.
Yeah, I don't know, he says the VX220 specialist, so I don't know who that is, I'm not well
versed in the VX220 world but you'd assume that they're the trusted people who know these
cars inside out.
Yeah, I don't know, I suppose the question is Ashley, do you like it?
Can you see yourself in five years time still enjoying it, not being bored with it, not
idly looking around and going, oh, well, P&A 110s are nice, oh, I've always fancied
a Boxster.
Because if any of those thoughts are creeping into your mind, get out now and just go and
get one of those.
Yeah.
It sounds like a lot of money.
If you spread out that lot of money over the course of, let's say, 18 months, and you
enjoyed the journey, like you've said, the actual journey and the process of just improving
it in increments and putting miles under it and enjoying it, making some memories, then
do it.
But I don't want to be, I don't want to sound like one of those guys, but please, people,
can you get your cars inspected before you buy them by the relevant specialist?
Because you're tempting, too tempting, because I mean...
I don't buy cars for more than under $1,500 without getting them inspected.
I would risk up to about $1,500 to $1,800 quid.
Really?
Yeah.
I feel like I'm a bit of a caution to the wind sort of person and this has come to bite
me, for example, P&A 100 horsepower, but then, you know, I wasn't going to get it inspected.
It was just foolish me going, what's the cheapest 100 horsepower I could buy?
And sometimes that works out delightfully.
I don't know.
See, as far as Ashley's concerned, the converse of this is if you really love the car, then
you just have to put the money out of your mind, assuming that you're good for it and
it's not going to financially ruin you in other ways, like buying food or trousers.
Then don't look at it as, well, I'll never get this back at resale time, look at this
as investing in something that you love and that you want to be as good as it can be and
you just have to sort of put the money out of your mind.
Absolutely.
If you don't absolutely adore the car and you can't see yourself in it in five, ten
years time, tread carefully and, you know, other sports cars are available.
Yeah.
You could even get just a better VX220, potentially.
That's the one, isn't it?
I was all into it until you said it also needs paint and it also needs re-upholstering.
You're like, goodness me.
That's the thing, isn't it?
That's everything.
You'll have spent a twatting fortune on mechanical things and the car will still look like you
haven't and that'll be annoying until you sort it out.
Yeah, it will.
What do you think?
Yeah, it will.
Right.
I've got a question from, oh, it's actually, I was about to say it was 2022 but it's not.
I think it's in the last three months.
Oh.
Hi, you pair of leaky big ends.
This is from Chris Price.
I appeared to have synchronized my evening commute home with this particular specimen.
He's enclosed a photo of a folds ranger raptor pickup and the number plate really does just
say U-tossers or U-tossers.
It's U, big space, T-O, five S-A-Z, U-tossers.
Even probably.
How have they achieved this?
What's the original plate?
Well, I guess it's U-t-o-5, five or five, one of them says, one of them looks like a
five, one of them looks like an S.
Well, anyway.
I don't know.
Is there a cheeky black screw head cover on it?
There looks like there's some screw heads but it's a bit blurry.
He's put, I'm sure he's calling me a tosser.
Given the complimentary ranger raptor, I think I'm on solid ground with this assumption.
I will admit that this does slightly bore my piss as I'm forced to crawl behind him at
snail's pace as I drive home.
So my question to you guys is, have you ever suffered any inexplicable rage at a private
plate or any signage slash writing on a vehicle?
Keep up the stiller work.
Keeps the red mist at bay mostly, CM, TMB.
Oh, and Chris is also a patron.
He puts, if that helps, getting this read out.
Well, Chris, it does.
Thanks, Chris.
And thanks for...
Clearly, it does.
Thanks for patroning us.
Even though you read it out and then noticed that he was a patron, sort of undermines our
own claim.
No, no.
It's all part of the theatrics fit.
Ah, I see.
It's the theatre of the podcast.
So I've never been reduced to rage that I can think of a private plate.
I think boss number plates, I think an aggressively driven Range Rover SVR type of vehicle or an
Audi, a murdered Audi with the number plate boss on it.
I just think you are so not the boss.
You're so not the boss.
No, that's the thing, isn't it?
It's like anyone who has to declare themselves the boss is plainly not the boss.
Bruce Springsteen does not have a boss number plate because it's accepted wisdom that he
is in some way the boss.
Yeah, that's true.
One that always used to not make me rage, but it just, honestly, it's just an eye roll
was the, there was a Range Rover, a first gen Range Rover, but when they were still current
that drove around my hometown in the 80s and into the 90s, that had another plate that
said classy.
Oh, yeah.
So I think it was CLA 55 Y.
Yes.
And I just thought, there's a sort of, you've entered an infinite loop because it's the
least classy thing you could do is have a plate that says classy.
Yes.
That's right.
Stay classy, San Diego.
That's right.
Exactly.
It's just, and I always used to go, what, what, what are you hoping to achieve here?
Because unless it was ironic, maybe it was ironic, but it didn't feel ironic.
It felt like it had gone.
Made a few quits, got myself a Range Rover, gonna put a plate on it, show people what,
you know, got a bit of class.
It's bad.
I think the thing that I get more rage about with signage, signwriting on vehicles is rogue
apostrophes, which I know you and I, you and I have both pedants for this sort of thing.
Yeah, yeah.
Or when you've got a large van, so you've got a perfect blank canvas for doing something
artistic, eye-grabbing that would really promote your business.
And you've picked such a spindly thin, wispy font, and it's very, very italic.
And it doesn't, it doesn't work.
It just simply doesn't work.
And it makes me want to actually redesign it for them and then send it to them, F-O-C,
and just go, I think I've done it.
It's way better.
And I'm not even qualified to do this shit.
I've done a better job, use it.
So I think, yeah, personal plates, they don't really boil my peers as such.
But I think the ones where the boss self-proclamations are probably the one for me.
Yeah, for me.
Although you tosses, it comes close.
It's quite bad.
I just, I don't.
Anyway.
Well, yeah.
If you've got a rage-inducing plate that you'd like to share with us, hello at smithandsniff.com.
Or if you've got a question for this show, also hello at smithandsniff.com, put Ottosot
in the subject line.
If there's a question, help us to find them.
We'll do it all again next Friday.
Until then, goodbye.
Bye, everybody.
Bye.
About this episode
Richard Porter and Johnny Smith tackle listener questions in a lively discussion about the practicality of first-generation Nissan Leafs for short commutes. They weigh the pros and cons of switching from a VW Up to an electric vehicle, considering factors like battery health and charging options. The conversation also touches on the quirks of electric car ownership, including winter range issues and pre-heating benefits. Additionally, they explore songs that reference less glamorous cars, sharing humorous anecdotes and listener suggestions along the way.
Jonny and Richard answer listeners’ questions about swapping an Up for a Leaf, unglamorous cars in songs, covering up painful car expenses, Microsoft OTSOT, a VX220 dilemma, and private plates that anger you.
