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| Pic courtesy Mazda.com |
In my most recent post about the CX-3, I made reference to the I-Stop feature.
This is just one example of the digital technology that came with this car, and is typical of many vehicles produced during the last five years.
For a boomer who was first licensed to drive in 1964, old driving habits die hard.
So when the I-Stop feature stops the engine, I feel very uneasy. But once you get used to it, it works very well. Whether it actually saves any fuel of consequence is another matter, but it is indeed a reliable piece of tech that functions as intended.
Then there's the "Auto Hold" gismo.
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| P for handbrake |
This is a button the is located below the hand brake actuator (more about that later) on the centre console. When you're waiting at the lights on a slope in neutral, pressing this prevents the car from rolling back. It is a very useful feature, although it comes with a brief delay before it locks on, which is a little disconcerting.
But there's more....
The handbrake (mentioned above) is not one of those sturdy mechanical things typical of Mazdas of old, which made a welcome ratcheting sound when you pulled them on. Instead there is another (not exactly a button) device which you activate by lifting it slightly, and release by pushing it down. It does work very well, and even makes a slight clunking noise when you set it to "on". I find the mechanical noise reassuring.
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| Mirror folding switch |
One piece of tech that caused me some alarm is the tyre pressure warning system. This is makes a buzzing noise when one or more tyres has lost pressure. Not long after I bought the car, I adjusted the tyre pressures. I always do this, as experience has taught me that some dealers have a very eccentric idea of what constitutes correct tyre pressures.
To my alarm, when I drove away after setting the pressures to slightly above Mazda's recommendation, the buzzer sounded and the warning light stubbornly stayed on. A check with the War and Peace sized instruction manual was not useful, as it simply acknowledged the presence of the feature, so I went to Google.
This showed that after tyre pressures were adjusted, the thing had to be reset. This was a very simple exercise (holding the button down for two seconds until the warning light flashed twice) and it has been happy since. Replacing the tyres elicited the same behaviour, but I was now wise to this particular quirk.
The blind spot warning system and the reversing warning buzzer that kicks in if any vehicle is within cooee when you're backing out of a parking spot is a very useful thing, although it tends to over compensate more than somewhat. But that's OK.
Lastly, I accidentally discovered that the rear vision mirrors fold. Because they didn't automatically do that when the car is locked, I had no idea the feature was present until I had a quiet read of the driver's manual. It simply isn't automatic (or maybe it is and I haven't set it properly).
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| Tyre warning reset button |
This model of the CX-3 doesn't have a lane-keeping feature or radar cruise control. The latter is probably useful, but experience I've had test driving vehicles with the former confirm my belief that they're an abomination.
If you're too dozy to keep the car in the lane, you shouldn't be driving.
