Grumpy

BIGRUPE01 No wonder the shop was out of windbreaks when I went to buy one!

What was your fuel concumption at those speeds?

I started using a Galaxy for my tow car this year after using a Citroen Xantia for the last 3 years. The Galaxy makes a good tow car, I thaught I would miss the Citroens self leveling suspension but this was not a problem, apart from the drop in performance I could not feel the caravan behind me at all.

We are off tomorrow for another outing (cue the rain!), I keep meaning to try out some CL's but we tend to use the main club sites as the kids like the play areas and alwasy seem to buddy up with the other childeren.

Looks nice, like the blue Gal. Do you get out with it much?

As far as I am aware, you dont need extended mirrors if you can see down the side of the trailer. I do use a pair of strap on mirrors when towing my caravan as it gives me much more visability behind (albeit they wobble around like crazy sometines!) especially when I want to pull out to overtake and then pull in again. I would recomend fitting a pair.

Ah happy days, grinding up long inclines with the heater set to full and the family gasping for air all the time nervously watching the temp gauge climbing round the dial! That was with my previous tow car, Im hoping the Gal will be better.

Bleeno A modern caravan then! mine is a 1995 Abbey Vogue 416 GTS (a bit of a mouthfull!), the wife fell in love with the end bathroom. I cant believe that the engine didnt empty its oil, the bloke in the Ford parts department said it was a good design, I told him yes, by VW! The oil level warning came on the night before we set off so I trapsed around town before we set off to get a top up, from threads on this site I undersood I needed 5W40 (VW approved 505 01) the only place I could get any was a 5L can from Halfords, that nearly melted my wallet. When I realised that I had left the cap off I had fears of needing to buy another can as I had left the first one at home. Luckilly the level was mid way between max & min.

I would imagine that the max torque would be around 2,000 - 2,200, but thats only a guess.

2 outings now and the MPG averaged 31 on mainly fast roads. Topped up the oil before departure and left the cap on top of the engine, only realised 120+ miles later whilst driving around the New Forest, luckily the engine didnt jettison all its lubricant over the M27! Local Ford dealer ordered me one so at least it was sorted for the journey home today.

Not too many Fords in my automotive history 1979 Cortina 1.6L (Mk 5) 1984 Capri 1.6GL 1986 Capri 2.8i Special (the car I always promised myself!) 2001 Galaxy 1.9TDI Ghia Auto But there again isnt the Galaxy a VW not a Ford?

I would second the sat-nav approach. That way you get a device that will do exactly what the GPS camera warning devices will plus it ends any navigation arguments with SWMBO, also if it is based on a PDA you get the benefits of that as well. A sat-nav doesnt cost much more than a GPS speed camera device. Note that whereas devices that detect speed traps are/will be banned, GPS systems wont (yet!), also some speed trap detectors also have the facility to detect laser traps, however if it can detect the laser then the laser has just clocked you so not much point really! Its true that to avoid getting caught speeding a good solution is not to speed , but who can honestly say they have never broken the speed limit or have never approached a speed camera and wasnt quite sure what the limit actually was? The number of cars I have seen brake sharply for a camera and then crawl past at just under 30MPH in a 40 limit is incredible/frustrating.

Hi all Just completed the first outing with my Galaxy and caravan, the Gal towed just fine, more poke than my Zantia, I only held up traffic whilst being stuck behind slow traffic! We had a long weekend in Bognor at the Caravan Club site, weather was great, kids had fun and lots of beer was drunk. Happy days. Next weekend is the New Forest and then its Malvern, Winchester, Cirencester and Lowestoft. With the rear 2 seats out the luggage just gets lost in the boot!

Hi Once you have braked and want to resume, its about 50:50 wether it will resume or if not you have to accelerate back to the desired speed then re-set it, it does seem a bit of an intermittant fault. Once it is engaged it seems to work fine untill you dissengage it. Well wouldnt you know it, it worked fine every time today

Just got back from 4 nights in a campsite outside Bognor. Galaxy was great towing our 1200kg caravan plus all the luggage etc. Cross country (so lots of stopping and accelerating) with air con on our mpg was around 28, didnt seem too bad.

Hi all My cruise control seems to work fine (and has done so for the last 7 months) but now after dissengaging it it wont resume. Anyone have any sugestions? Nick

If I was being paranoid I could think that the garage had simply hidden the fault by adjusting the bonnet switch so that it never closed and 6 months later were a bit put out to hear from me. I dont know what the cost is to replace the instrument panel, but I can assume its not cheap, the garage probably hoped I would be fobbed off by their first response. Likewise the credit card company (jointly liable under section 75 of consumer credit act as I part paid for the car with my card) also responded initially with a "sorry cant help" but this changed after my second contact with them. The fact remains though that if I hadnt posed the query about the indicators not flashing on locking the car on this forum I would probably still be driving around without realising the fault was still present. Thanks everybody!

Hi all This may be a bit long winded but I will try to keep it brief. October last year I saw & test drove a Galaxy at a local used car dealers. When I test drove the car a warning was displayed on the dashboard "CHECK BRAKE PADS", the salesman said that the brakes were OK and that the problem would be fixed. I signed a sales form and paid a deposit. 2 weeks later the car hadnt been fixed and I cancelled the sale and had my deposit refunded. 5 days later I got a call to say the car was now fixed and did I still want it, after a dicussion with s.w.m.b.o. I agreed to buy the car after assurances that the problem was indeed fixed. I drove it away the same day. 2 days afterwards, once again the "CHECK BRAKE PADS" warning displayed again, I returned the car and was lent one to use. Whilst the car was at the garage, I was phoned to ask if I had opened the bonnet as the warning would not display whilst the car was in the workshop with the bonnet open. I was then told that the bonnet switch was being replaced and all was well. Around 6 months later I queried on this site why my indicators only flashed when the car was unlocked and not when locked, I was told that this could be due to bonnet or boot not shut properly. I checked this by opening the bonnet, depressing the switch and operating the remote control, sure enough the lights now flashed when the car locked. But guess what also happened with the switch properly adjusted and the car started, yep, proudly emblazened accross the dash was the warning "CHECK BRAKE PADS" I wrote to the garage (recorded delivery) asking to be contacted to discuss how this was going to be resolved, I gave a 7 day deadlind for response. After 8 days I contacted Trading Standards and asked for advice, they informed me of my rights, basically as I only bought the car after the problem was supposed to have been fixed, this repair then became part of the contract. I wrote to the garage again explaining this breach of contract and just after I posted this I recieved a response from the first letter which basically stated that sorry I was having a problem but it was not their problem. Anyway, after the 3rd letter I was contacted to arrange a time for me to bring the car in, no loan car was available and no timescale could be given. After the 4th letter, a loan car became available and a deadline of 1 week was agreed. I now have my car back complete with a Ford supplied exchange instrument panel fitted and (so far) no false brake warning message. Its a pain but you can fight for your rights and you can win!

I use a PDA, Mio168, which has a built in GPS reciever. This runs TomTom which as far as I can see is the same as the dedicated TomTom units but additionally has programs such as Microsoft Excel, Word etc and can play MP3's, games etc (when you are not using it to navigate naturally). It is suposed to be able to play movies but I havent tried this yet. I chose this as I didnt want to buy something that would ony get occasional use, this way I get the benefit of all the PDA functions & navigation in one gadget. Price for this is a little more than your limit but it does give you more options.

Good work. The auction has been stopped.

MM Thats an interesting link, I will suggest my daughters nursery looks at that before giving any phones to phones4schools. I tried to get a quote for my phone but it seems its too old.

I have appealed for phones over the last week on behalf of my daughters nursery and to date have collected 0.00 phones. I do wonder how much profit the organisation collecting the phones makes, from the donations.

1. Nick 2. Crawley (W Sussex) 3. See Below 4. 7 Months 5. Yes 6. 2 Tyres @

If the postman brings a begging letter from the scamera partnership responsible then you could do worse than take a look at www.pepipoo.com for advice

The garage decided it must be the bonnet switch as the "check pads" warning would not come on in their workshop whilst the bonnet was open but as soon as the bonnet was shut the warning re-occured. They told me that a new switch cured the problem, but they must have just bent back the actuator flap. The indicators have never flashed on locking since I have had the car, this I now realise is because the bonnet switch was not working