Ask The Guide

The C-TEK brand has a huge reputation for performance and safety. I've personally had such a charger for more than 20 years which has been in use almost every single day of that time and still works perfectly. They're more expensive than some chargers, but the inbuilt protections against incorrect connection and overheating are worth the price, not to mention that longevity.

Some mechanics recommend connecting the two leads from the charger directly to the battery terminals, but conventional wisdom says that connecting the red cable to the positive terminal first and then the black cable to an earth somewhere in the engine bay is a better idea. This method means less chance of a spark igniting gasses emitted by the battery as it charges and discharges.

The indicator lights on the C-TEK unit will tell you when you've achieved a good connection. Using a metal part of the car for the negative attachment point works because the whole car is essentially one big negative terminal. Just make sure your attachment point isn't painted or coated with a chemical that prevents the flow of current. Or that it's not a plastic part (increasingly common these days). Many cars have a dedicated post or connection point within the engine bay.

This is not unheard of, but it's a very dangerous thing to be happening, especially if there are other cars around. Having the car suddenly apply the brakes as if it was mid-emergency has obvious hazards, including actually causing an accident that wasn't about to happen in the first place.

Honda (to name just one manufacturer) has had a lengthy legal battle in the USA over its cars that would confuse roadside items (like rubbish bins) as a car entering from the side, and would apply the brakes suddenly as a result. But it's not just Honda, and a RAM utility we tested recently also had the habit of confusing the smallest leaf or driveway twig with a major obstacle that had to be avoided at all costs.

At its best, it's an annoying (and heart-stopping) phenomenon and at its worst, it could cause a crash. And you can't simply disengage the Autonomous Emergency Braking system as it's an integral part of the car that contributes to its safety rating.

It needs to be sorted out and made safe. That may require the whole system, including its sensors, to be examined and possibly parts replaced. But such an essential safety system demands to be working properly.

I'd be ignoring the Nissan dealer in question and taking the car to an auto electrician. You might just find that the problem is something much simpler than all four windows needing replacement. Generic parts will probably not be an option, but wrecking yards are full of Tiidas with electric windows waiting to be fitted to other Tiidas.

Meantime, I'd be very suspicious of the Nissan dealer's quote. For a start, replacing the windows really shouldn't cost that much. Also, why do all four windows need replacing? Did they all fail together? If they did, it's far more likely the problem is with a fuse, relay, a switch or the body computer, rather than four individual assemblies failing in unison. If the dealer doesn't want to do the job (which is what the quote is telling me) they should just say so, and not come up with ridiculous quotes like this one.

You have at least two separate problems here. The first is the error code suggesting the camshafts are out of phase (retarded). This is often the result of the cam-chain having stretched and requiring replacement. Fundamentally, once the chain stretches, the on-board computer detects this and illuminates the check-engine light as well as logging the fault code. If this is the case, the repairs could easily run into the thousands. However, it could also be a fault with the sensor that reads the camshaft position or something else altogether, but the timing chain would be the prime suspect. It could also cause a slow idle such as you've noted.

The second problem is that the check-engine light was either broken or deliberately disabled to disguise the fault with the cam-chain. I'm certainly not accusing the seller of doing this, but it can't be ruled out. And yes, an illuminated check-engine light is a roadworthy item, so the car would (or should) not have passed a roadworthy inspection with the lamp illuminated.

Whether the roadworthy tester is at fault will come down to whether they knew the check-engine light was faulty or not. Of course, if the light was already broken when the car was presented for inspection, that would muddy the waters further.

I sincerely hope you bought the car from a licensed car dealer and not a private seller. If it was the latter, you'll have little to no chance of gaining compensation for what could be a very expensive problem. But if you bought the car from a dealer, then you should have some come-back, especially once you prove that the check-engine light was either broken or disabled at the time you inspected the car prior to purchase. That's partly because of Australian consumer laws as well as the fact that the dealer needs to provide the roadworthy certificate and is responsible for its accuracy.

You're right in that Australia has no lemon laws, but we do have Australian Consumer Laws which are aimed at protecting consumers against these sorts of problems. It's frustrating that some car dealers are still using the old ‘oh, they all do that' defence to explain away problems that need to be fixed. Car companies would do well to crack down on any of their dealers who give such glib answers.

So the advice is to go straight over the dealer's head and talk to Hyundai's customer service department. A modern car shouldn't surge at any speed, and since your car is covered by its factory warranty, you need to give Hyundai every chance to put it right. Only after Hyundai has given up without a resolution should you talk to the ACCC on the basis of the car not being fit for purpose.

My experience is that Hyundai has been very diligent in fixing problems like this and looking after its customers, so forget the dealer and go straight to head office.

These add-ons have traditionally been a huge cash-cow for new-car dealers who will urge you into buying paint protection, interior treatments, window tint and more at huge mark-ups in their favour. It's your choice, obviously, but here's the reality: If a car maker can't sell you a car, in 2022, that has a painted exterior finish that will survive in the world, it doesn't deserve to sell you, or anybody else, that car. Fundamentally, any brand-new car should be as durable as possible, fresh from the factory. And if these add-on treatments are so good, why don't car-makers use them at the factory?

Again, it's your money, so your choice, but not buying them won't affect your warranty if something does go wrong with the paint and you need to make a claim.

I'm not sure what vehicle you're talking about, as Ford stopped making the Falcon ute in 2016, regardless of what fuel it ran on.

But, if your ute was made by Ford as a gas-dedicated vehicle (it was a factory option) then changing it back to petrol would be an enormous job with – as you have noted – the need to source a fuel tank and all the fuel-injection gear to work with petrol as opposed to LPG. Even making the fuel gauge work with petrol instead of LPG would require changes.

If your ute was dual-fuel (with the ability to run on either LPG and petrol) you could simply leave it as is and just run it on petrol, but a gas-dedicated ute needs to be converted to use petrol.

You'd almost certainly be better to sell your car and buy a Falcon ute that already runs on petrol. That said, don't write LPG off yet. As petrol and diesel prices continue to rise, LPG might just come back into fashion as a cheaper alternative fuel.

I'm not sure where you read that LPG would be phased out in the next two years, but the internet is full of misinformation and conspiracy theories. Be very careful what you believe. That said, since Australia isn't making any more cars, there won't be any LPG cars sold new, and anecdotally, finding a service station with LPG is becoming more difficult as electric cars become the new default alternative to petrol.

In a very broad sense, these components should last the life of the vehicle. Certainly, by the time you need to replace any of these major components, the cost of doing so is likely to be more than the value of the whole vehicle. That's often when cars get scrapped.

I'll take a stab in the dark and suggest that the warranty you're being offered is from a car dealer attempting to sell you the vehicle and the warranty as an up-sell. So here's the bottom line: With very, very few exceptions, these aftermarket warranties are not worth the paper they're printed on. The fine-print will exclude just about any fault or problem that is likely to occur, meaning that real world problems won't be covered.

In any case, a 2021 Suzuki Swift will still be covered by Suzuki's factory warranty which will cover problems with these components. Why would you need two warranties to cover the same components? Or is the dealer suggesting that Suzuki's factory warranty is not sufficient? Suzuki might be interested to hear that.

The official response from Toyota Australia was that orders were not yet being taken. The closest I could pin the Toyota spokesperson down to was that an announcement will be made closer to the on-sale date of the car itself which will be in the fourth quarter of this year.

In the meantime, it would be a wise move to keep a close eye out for that announcement as Toyota's popular models are all experiencing huge waiting lists of months or even years. In some cases (the 70 Series commercial range, for instance) Toyota has even – temporarily - stopped taking orders because it knows it simply can't fill them.

Other sought-after models such as the RAV 4 Hybrid and the new 300 Series SUV are also experiencing huge waiting times. With that in mind, the closer you can be to the head of the order queue, the less time you'll have to wait.

Meantime, Toyota has confirmed that Australian-delivered Corolla Cross variants will have the American-Thai market single frame-style front end, rather than the double-frame set-up destined for Japanese and European-market versions. Rest assured, Carsguide will be lining up to drive and review the new Toyota the moment head office throws us the keys.

The experience over the decades has been that the more you do to make a car secure, the more damage the bad guys will do to it in the name of gaining access. Making the door locks harder to remove will lead to the crooks using a bigger screwdriver to pop the locks out, or simply lead them to smash a window if they really want to get inside. When cars were easy to steal without the key, many did, in fact, disappear overnight. But now the coded ignition key is required, many car thefts now begin with an aggravated burglary so the thieves can get hold of that key, terrorising the owners in the process. It's a sad truth, but a truth nonetheless.

The best advice is to park the car somewhere secure or at least under a light source (a street light can make all the difference). And, of course, never leave anything you value inside the car. That's not always easy, but, again, it's a fact of life.