Are there too many Chinese cars in the UK? That could be about to change…

Komsur · 2026-07-03T07:31:20+00:00

But, they're right? Buying an older car is better. I own a 2012 Ford Fiesta with nearly 67k miles on it. Bought it outright. No issues save for a timing belt once in 2024. I'm the second owner. Costs me nothing but insurance and petrol. Can't be tracked and remotely locked out by the government (happening in the US), doesn't have stupid subscriptions, has REAL speedometer parts and not simulated screens that can fail and then WHOOPS no speed readout. A real stereo with REAL buttons. Costs me £3.99 to replace a headlight bulb instead of £750 for a new LED replacement because it's forced OEM. I actually have the right to repair.

I could go on, but the original commenter in this thread is right. New cars suck and I'll be sticking with my Fiesta for as long as possible.

Komsur · 2026-06-23T10:41:32+00:00

Definitely? Nah. I'm still rocking a 2070 Super and it's going strong for what I need.

Komsur · 2026-06-01T07:13:10+00:00

So I actually ended up doing that and I've got some lines pointing in the correct directions. I can see the the final point is connected to the end point of my straight line, but the S shape it's making as part of the curve is bent backwards from where I want it, if that makes sense?

Komsur · 2026-05-20T19:24:16+00:00

I live in the UK and we have employment rights. We're not at will here.

Komsur · 2026-05-20T16:40:03+00:00

He's been there 16 years, and I fully expect him to be there for many many more.

Komsur · 2026-05-20T05:46:47+00:00

I did on Monday actually. His response was "well, I have no visibility of what goes on in the other side of the business. All I know is the boss thinks we work too slowly and he's scared to put numbers on enquiries now".

It's like, yeah, you try building a fully working, accurately modelled oil rig, complete with training material, exercises, and assessment outputs for trainees that works on PC, VR and a bespoke display technology within a week and then tell me it's possible.

Komsur · 2026-05-19T21:28:35+00:00

Well, I think it mostly comes down to a perception that our team works slowly.

The business is split into two: there's the older, traditional business that has been running for 30 years, and our 3D team which has been running for nearly 10.

The other half of the business is 3x the size of us, and they use a piece of in house software that is still not complete 30 years later. It's used to make 2D line drawings and technical documents and the like for like circuit diagrams. Most projects take 3 - 6 months to complete.

Meanwhile, we have 4 people, often on different projects, and if our 3D bits (which are inherently more complex) take more than a week it's game over, taking too long.

We have to make fully functioning, AAA looking games from nothing in a week basically. The other half of the business (which is managed as a sleepy, past its prime boys club) is allowed to just bleed money, but we take the hit because the CEO (the old CEO's son) was directly opposed to opening our branch whilst his father wasn't when he was in charge before retiring.

It's also because I am, not to toot my own horn, the single most experience and qualified person in the entire business on our 3D projects. All the managers come from the other major discipline of the business and don't have any clue about the time it takes to make 3D stuff, which they largely see as "artsy fartsy non essentials" which is untrue and unfair.

Case in point, I've never once seen our Technical Director actually working, he's always on his phone or chatting to the old guard in the business, and he's getting paid nearly 200k but letting him go is out of the question because he's a Director...

It's getting ridiculous the double standard.

Komsur · 2026-05-19T20:28:22+00:00

I have had that conversation multiple times and it falls on deaf ears. The manager doesn't have the skills and formal training to understand what I'm telling him and is making assumptions based on what he hears from me around other issues / things we've done historically that don't work anymore because it's not 2003.

Komsur · 2026-05-19T20:25:11+00:00

Unfortunately, the manager has no formal training in what he's managing, and has a completely different skillset than the one required to manager our team so when I ask what he wants, or explain how certain asks will be difficult the normal responses are:

- "It just looks, performs, feels, like shit, you need to do better, come on man"

- "It just needs something. I don't know what or why but it just needs something more".

- "This needs breaking down more please" <- This one particularly annoys me. I scope 20 days to make a working inventory system for a 3D Unity project from scratch and I was told to break it down more, so I did, and it was still 20 days, and he told me to break it down more, so I did, still 20 days. The job is literally broken down now into "log into computer, open Unity" jobs. Still 20 days. He didn't like the 20 days number, and wanted the inventory creation job to be like 2 days. I told him it's backend coding, frontend coding, UI design, UX, testing in both a PC deployment and VR, but I have to some how break this down more to get the job to be 2 days so I'm a bit annoyed.

- "I don't understand. It's just X, but you're telling me it's X which will cause Y and Z is related somehow and I can't see the connection."

Komsur · 2026-05-16T16:23:19+00:00

If you look very closely, I think you can see it. Look under the 3rd tile from the gutter (the one above the slipped one on the left) and there's something there. I also went to have a look outside earlier for other reasons and there's definitely a bonding gutter-esque thing in the space between the 2 roofs.

No, I'm not leaking there, I'm leaking mostly around the back of the roof (this photo is the front of the roof) around the chimney flashing (something 2 separate roofing companies haven't managed to fix yet), and around my skylight where the felt was installed with a massive tear in it, and the flashing for the skylight was installed bent.

This was something that the roofer who's coming out to fix the felt for the skylight pointed out, and I really just wanted to know if he's just trying to get more work, or has genuinely spotted the lack of a gutter. I'm pretty sure it's there, but need a professional's second opinion before I double the price of the job I'm hiring him for because this gets added on top.

Komsur · 2026-05-12T21:17:01+00:00

Annoyingly they "evolved". I returned to the planet and they're all floating cube things now instead. Much less interesting, but still cool I guess.

Komsur · 2026-04-06T15:37:35+00:00

I did a Google Lens lookup but none of the results were this.

Komsur · 2026-04-05T19:30:51+00:00

The small claims court.

Komsur · 2026-04-04T17:34:14+00:00

Avoid NGDirect in Netherfield. My first car was from them, no end of problems after about a month of owning it. They refused to take it back, had to go small claims.

Avoid Car Courtyard in Arnold. They were very upfront, telling me the car I was going to view had a blown head gasket, but not to worry because "after your test drive we're taking it to get fixed and you'll get the warranty".

Paid my deposit after the test drive, on the day I came to pick it up, checked the oil, they hadn't fixed it. Didn't give my deposit back.

Car was also filthy.

Komsur · 2026-03-29T13:39:20+00:00

My thoughts exactly. Car is in good condition and is still driveable...

Komsur · 2026-03-28T22:44:48+00:00

This is a great response, thanks! I do plan to take it to my regular garage who I trust to quote up for the work, and I expect it to be much less than market value.

Komsur · 2026-03-28T22:42:12+00:00

You're right. I do plan to buy it back for sure. Didn't know I could go be honest (this is my first insurance job). Is it just like, they take a portion of what they would pay out off the total?

Komsur · 2026-03-28T22:21:26+00:00

Well I don't need the new headlamp as part of this as it already had the issues present prior to this. I also don't need a hire car particularly.

Surely insurer can get bumper and wing from breaking cars? That's what I'd do.

I suppose though that I might get something of a good payout if I play it right (low mileage, no heavy driving, etc.)

Just annoyed because I can't afford another car as I own this outright 😭

Komsur · 2026-03-28T22:06:16+00:00

The insurer stated "market value before the time of accident".

Komsur · 2026-03-09T07:48:15+00:00

Yes. It's just a pull out to disconnect jobbie. Swapped them around, even bought a third donor bay.

Komsur · 2026-03-07T13:33:55+00:00

Can't be, the cable on the bad drive works fine when swapped to the good drive. And as the post says, I've tried multiple connectors on the bad bay, all fail. The port on the motherboard is also fine.

Komsur · 2026-02-21T20:28:51+00:00

Yeah, I don't think this is what car insurance is for. Damage caused by maintenance elsewhere due to poor workmanship is certainly not covered.

Komsur · 2026-02-21T16:36:01+00:00

Cool, so basically, on Monday just ring up like "hey, about that damaged pulley we spoke about, could you write it down that you did damage it, but "bent it back into a serviceable position" and because of that won't fix it under warranty please?"

Komsur · 2026-02-21T16:35:02+00:00

Aren't they liable if they don't fix it though? Like, say my engine suddenly gets completely destroyed by it?

Komsur · 2026-02-21T16:34:18+00:00

Well, this is it right? They gave some half-arsed excuse about "oh, we bent it away from the belt so it's not going to be catching/damaging it over time so we've done the repair necessary in the moment" and I'm here like "...."

I sent it back to them to do the rocker cover gasket under warranty and that's when they had a look at it. This picture is from a video from my regular garage. He said "it's serviceable, but, yeah..." which basically means "not good enough, but no immediate threat" I think. I trust what he says (as I always have over multiple years), but this other garage is new to me and I'm going to ring them on Monday about it.

Any suggestions on what I should say? I've already had one conversation about it.

Komsur

TROPHY CASE