Ask The Guide

This is a more common problem than you might imagine and applies to a lot of cars besides Nissan Navaras. It’s not always caused by people with constantly wet hands or those who work with chemicals, either; a lot of pampered vehicles have seen this type of problem.

As well as being pretty ordinary to look at day after day, this sort of damage also devalues a car when you go to sell it. The warranty on your Navara would have been for the first three years (Nissan shifted to a five-year warranty mid-2019) but because it was a demonstrator, the warranty period would have started from the date it was first registered or reported as sold, not the day you bought it.

Most new-car warranties also state that `normal wear and tear’ is not covered, but there’s an argument that normal wear and tear shouldn’t be visible on a steering wheel after just four years and 60,000km of use.

If it really bothers you, there are motor trimmers who can stitch on a new leather covering which I would expect to last a lot longer than four years. You would, of course, have to remove the wheel from the car which requires somebody who knows their air-bag safety drills and procedures.

Yes you can. According to the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industry’s guide, all Australian-delivered Mitsubishis with fuel-injected petrol engines built after 1986 can use either E5 (five per cent ethanol) or E10 (10 per cent) safely. By using this fuel, you stand to reduce your tailpipe emissions a little, use a percentage of renewable fuel (ethanol is largely made from farmed crops) and you may even save a few dollars over a year as E10 ULP is often a little cheaper at the pump.

Just as oils aint oils, batteries aint batteries. The correct battery for your car will not be based on brand, but rather its capacity and output (does it have enough grunt to turn your engine) as well as its physically layout (are, for instance, the negative and positive terminals on the correct ends of the battery for your battery terminals to connect properly).

By `kick out’ I’ll assume you mean the starter motor doesn’t spin the car’s engine when you turn the key. There are lots of causes for this. The first is that you do, indeed, have the incorrect battery that doesn’t have enough cranking amperes to spin your engine and provide enough power to the vehicle’s ignition for the engine to fire. Or, you may simply have fitted a battery that’s low on charge for the same results. Buying a brand-new battery from a shop is no guarantee that the thing will be fully charged up. It’s always a good idea to charge any new battery overnight before trying to start a car with it, in case the battery has lost charge while sitting on the store’s shelf for weeks or months.

Beyond that, there are still plenty of reasons for a car to refuse to turn over. I’d start with checking the earth connections from the battery to the car’s body and engine and then do a test on the battery to see if it’s in decent health or not. Most workshops can do this simple test for you if you’re in doubt.

While turbo-diesels aren’t perfect for everybody, when it comes to towing trailers, they do a pretty impressive job. The combination of a torquey diesel engine with an automatic transmission is a pretty handy one when you have a decent sized trailer hooked up. The caveat with a modern diesel, however, is that if most of your driving is urban running about, then the diesel is probably not for you. That’s because the emissions system on a modern diesel (the particulate filter) needs regular longer runs at freeway speeds to avoid giving trouble. But if, as you say, you tow a trailer often, then that should provide the load on the engine the diesel requires to remain trouble-free.

The good news is that the dominance of the SUV right now means that just about every car-maker has a mid-sized SUV in its showrooms right now. So really, you’re spoiled for choice. I’m not surprised the X-Trail is found a bit wanting at times; even brand-new, that version of the petrol-engined X-Trail could feel a bit underdone. You’ll be amazed at how good newer vehicles have become.

If you have a look through the owner’s manual of the vehicle, you might find a method of using the info-screen menus to achieve this. It’s more likely, however, that you’ll need to plug the appropriate scanning tool into the car’s diagnostic port to reset this reminder light. At which point it’s not a home-driveway job.

I’m guessing that you had the car serviced at an independent workshop rather than a Haval dealership, as the latter would have known the procedure to reset the light. Which is fair enough as Haval does not have the dealership coverage of a car-maker like, say, Toyota or Ford. The point being that you need to make sure that any workshop you use for servicing while the car is under factory warranty, is licensed and certified to stamp your service handbook to keep your warranty valid. You don’t have to use a Haval dealer, but the workshop you choose needs to be a professional operation or you stand to kiss your warranty goodbye.

If you have a look through the owner’s manual of the vehicle, you might find a method of using the info-screen menus to achieve this. It’s more likely, however, that you’ll need to plug the appropriate scanning tool into the car’s diagnostic port to reset this reminder light. At which point it’s not a home-driveway job.

I’m guessing that you had the car serviced at an independent workshop rather than a Haval dealership, as the latter would have known the procedure to reset the light. Which is fair enough as Haval does not have the dealership coverage of a car-maker like, say, Toyota or Ford. The point being that you need to make sure that any workshop you use for servicing while the car is under factory warranty, is licensed and certified to stamp your service handbook to keep your warranty valid. You don’t have to use a Haval dealer, but the workshop you choose needs to be a professional operation or you stand to kiss your warranty goodbye.

Home servicing is a great way to learn about your car and get a better idea of what makes it tick. It also means you might even become a more `mechanically sympathetic’ driver and be kinder to the car in a long-term sense.

The service booklet in the car’s glove-box will tell you a lot about what you need to know when it comes to what’s required for a service. But remember that not all services are the same: Some are minor services and some are major. Others require one-off actions such as changing a timing belt or checking the tension of a timing chain, but you can’t afford to ignore any of these things. Other things required by the factory service schedule include checking the thickness of brake material, changing fluid beyond just the oil and plenty of other tasks that might not occur to you naturally. Most of these tasks are either time or distance-covered dependent (sometimes both).

The bottom line is that you really need to be on top of these tasks and know how to do them before you rip the car apart in the driveway one Saturday and then discover you don’t know how it all goes back together. Home maintenance extends way beyond just oil changing, particularly on a modern design such as the Mercedes A-Class. Modern cars are very complex devices and keeping them running sweetly and safely is often the work of a specialist. That said, I’m loathe to try to dissuade you from tackling a job that can be very satisfying and could save you money in the process.

A lot of TAFE colleges once offered car-maintenance courses for the home mechanic, but sadly, many of these seem to have disappeared due to budget cuts across the education system. It would still be worth talking to your local TAFE, though, to see if there’s a short course that might help you out.

All Audi A3 variants in the current Audi Australia line-up feature both Apple CarPlay and Android Auto connectivity. Audi A3 Apple CarPlay works wirelessly, while the Android Auto Audi A3 fitment still requires a cable to connect.

Some owners like to upgrade their car’s stereo and, in that case, the advice would be to go for a head unit that allowed wireless Android Auto as a worthwhile improvement.

The Audi system is not a simple retrofit to older Audi models thanks to the high degree of integration within the car’s controls and the system itself. That’s not to say it couldn’t be done, but it would probably not be cost effective compared with an aftermarket unit for an older car that still offered the desired functions.

Doing your own oil changes is a great way to learn a bit about how cars work and develop a relationship with your car. You might even save a few dollars, too, but there are caveats.

The actual act of changing the oil is relatively simple and requires just a couple of hand tools. Basically, you drain the old oil out of the engine via the sump-plug, remove the old oil filter, replace it with a new one and then add fresh oil via the filler cap on top of the engine. If that sounds simple, that’s because that is a very crude, thumbnail sketch of the procedure, but it does cover the basics. Whether you feel confident enough to take the plunge is the next question. A workshop manual is a great investment and will be invaluable down the track.

But other things to consider include the fact that a service is often not just an oil change. There are many other things (transmission, brakes, cooling system etc) to be checked and adjusted at the same time as a scheduled oil change, so doing it all at home requires a reasonably broad idea of what’s going on mechanically. Your service handbook should spell out what tasks are specified for each service (each service is not all the same, either, some are more complex than what’s called a minor service) so that would be a good place to start.

Don’t forget, too, that the old oil and filter has to be disposed of in an environmentally responsible way, something that a professional workshop service takes care of for you. But there’s definitely satisfaction to be gained from this maintenance job and it’s absolutely the best place to start learning.

The brand-new Kia SUV for Australia (due for release in October 2021) has finally brought Kia Sportage Apple CarPlay and Android connectivity to all models across the range. Previously, the base-model missed out on these fitments, but the all-new platform extends these features to every model.

All Sportages will now also get digital radio and multi-device connectivity. The base-model S variant gets an eight-inch touchscreen, while the SX and SX+ models have a 12.3-inch screen. The range-topping GT-Line model will get a curved 12.3-inch screen.

It’s really not viable to retro-fit the new Sportage’s system into an older car, and most owners have found that a more cost effective upgrade to a new aftermarket head unit will offer the features they want, including the ability to enjoy Apple CarPlay and Android Auto Kia Sportage style.