Blogger In ‘Size Queen’ Revelation Shocker
January 28, 2010 at 7:45 am
The time has come to give back the Toyota iQ.
What I’ve loved:
- The way the heating works. Heated seats, especially in recent weather conditions, have been a God send. Windows are all demisted, car is warm and toasty in minutes. A+ for this!
- Nippy parking and sneaking into tight spaces ability. If you’ve seen a black motor squeezing through spaces that you wouldn’t dare touch in your saloon, that’s me in the iQ.
- Paying no more than €30 to fill the tank at the petrol station. A ++ for this!
- Room for fiancé and dog in front seat. This is because there’s no big dashboard/glove compartment.
What I’ve not liked:
- The fact that there is no glove compartment means you’ve got to stick everything into a folder thing that falls apart if you try to put more than a packet of tissues in it.
- Sore botty when driving on roads with speed bumps. I’m told this is the case for all Japanese cars, not just the iQ.
- Having to change gear 3 times to make it up the gentle slope that is the N2. The iQ experience has shown me that I’m a bit of a size queen when it comes to cars. I like a big engine with lots of va va voom!
Overall, it’s been a really enjoyable driving experience. I would recommend a Toyota iQ for anyone who does city driving. It’s nippy enough to get around busy urban streets and you don’t need parking fairies when you’ve got an iQ.
Advice to Toyota
- Update following recent interaction on Twitter (29 Jan): if you’re going to get your agency to use Twitter on your behalf, make sure they do it right. Put in some basic guidelines for how they represent you because the odd misinformed tweet here and there is actually damaging to your brand. After this blog was posted, I got asked by @ToyotaIreland on Twitter if I was going to buy the car. A little direct I thought. But obviously not really Toyota because we’d already been through this (and I decided against buying the motor). When I tried to Direct Message Toyota to let them know about this, I discovered that ToyotaIreland wasn’t even following me! You’d think they’d follow at least their 4 bloggers to keep an ear on them! In fairness, the lovely people I’ve dealt with at Toyota don’t seem that Twitter savvy, but the agency who sold them on this whole blogger/Twitter outreach programme should do. (I’m not naming names, but really you know who you are and you should have a bit more cop on).
- If you’re running this experiment again choose the bloggers wisely, ie. make sure you choose bloggers who not only post frequently but ones who are out and about a lot. I found I did lots of ’selling’ on the car when I was parking it in and around Dublin city centre. Invariably it drew comments from impressed onlookers as they saw me manoeuvre it into tight spaces! This would then spark a conversation about the car, I’d give them a look at the interior, there was many a soft selling opportunity. Actually … we should have a talk about my commission!
- When you’re giving training on the vehicle, it would be helpful to present it in terms of “top 3 points on why it’s green”, “top 3 points on why it’s energy efficient” etc. That is how we bloggers think – in lists – and it took me a little while to get my banter going on when people asked me those questions.
So Mossy the dog says goodbye to the Toyota iQ (and so do I). And thanks to Toyota for giving me free motoring for the last 6 months.
Tags: Toyota IQ
Carbon Tax Budget
December 11, 2009 at 10:17 am
Did I hear it wrong, but did somebody say on the news this morning that we’re having our “Carbon Tax Budget” today? Not two days after the wounds of Wednesday and here we go again? My initial thought was to prepare for the worst, then I remembered I’m driving a Toyota iQ which is fun to drive, but at the same time kind to the planet. I really don’t have to worry at all. The iQ is built to support the environment. I’ve never come across a car handbook that refers to the Kyoto Protocol before! Toyota are all about reducing greenhouse emissions both from their manufacturing plants and from the cars they design. They’re most famous for the Prius and its excellent fuel efficiency and low impact on the environment. The iQ is a new model aimed at the same type of conscious consumer – but going for people who don’t need ‘family wagons’ and are a little more discerning about style.
What makes the iQ so green?
Exterior Design - it’s designed to be light, there’s less metal involved. The torsion beam was reduced in weight by 3.5kg. By adopting ‘cross shaped’ rear wheel flange, another kilo of metal was saved. Perhaps most impressive is the exhaust system that weighs only 6kg. What less weight means is less pressure on the engine to pull the vehicle and therefore using less fuel. I’m filling it up for €28 – €30.
Interior Design - this is where they really went to town. Most cars have a massive heating / air system in the front, between the driver and passenger seat. It takes up a lot of room and harks back to an era when cars were huge beasts (and men dressed like Don Draper in Madmen!). Toyota’s engineers completely rethought the heating system and have placed it in the floor of the iQ.
In our search for space, we developed an ultra-compact air-conditioning unit and repositioned the heater blower unit normally found in the front passenger foot well, to the centre of the instrument panel. Designers went so far as to make the glove box detachable….[Hiroki Nakajima, Chief Engineer of the iQ]
Now I’m not quite down with Hiroki’s detachable glove box – it’s more like fabric folder that a particularly preppy college student would have carried in the 1980’s. It can hold a driving license, a map, an iPod… try stuffing anything into it in a hurry and its press button detaches and it falls to the floor.
While the size of the iQ is A class (smallest of the small), the interior is C class (executive saloon luxury style). And the designers introduced many other innovations designed to enhance the comfort of the driver. An example that jumps to mind are the thinner doors; with no compromise on safety, the space saved gives the driver and passenger more shoulder room.
6 Major Space-Saving Innovations (coming soon to other Toyota models)
- Front-mounted differential
- Centre take-off steering gear
- Flat under-floor fuel tank
- Ultra-slim seat design
- Ultra-compact heater/air conditioning unit
- Asymmetric dashboard design
Car Scrappage Scheme
Car-wise, there were a couple of things announced in Wednesday’s Budget – the hike in petrol/diesel prices (no surprises there) and the car scrappage scheme (which had been leaked to the press and lobbied hard for by the motor industry). I’m no motoring expert, but it just doesn’t seem to stack up to be that attractive. If you own a car that’s more than 10 years old, you can get €1500 of vehicle registration tax relief if you’re buying a new car. It must be certain types of new car – like a nice little planet saver like the iQ. But really – if you’re already driving around a 10+ year old car, you’re not going to be in the market for a brand new car anyway – you’re far more likely to be going for a good second hander.
If I’m missing something that more motoring focused people ‘get’ here, please point it out to me below!
Tags: Car Scrappage Scheme Ireland Budget 2010, Toyota IQ
iQ Says No To Dog Kennels
September 21, 2009 at 4:01 pm
I’m about to get a puppy. And I’ve secured a much loved dog kennel from a family who have no need for one anymore. Today I popped out to pick it up and the dog kennel will not fit into the boot. I would have said it’s a roomy boot in the iQ up to now, but now I have to rethink. And work out how to get a kennel shipped from one side of the city to the other.
But Porsche Says Yes to Iarfhlaith!
This is not pretend. This beauty belongs to the IIA Web Developer of the Year - Iarfhlaith Kelly. He’s obviously doing lots of things right if he’s got himself a porsche well before his 30th birthday. Well done. Much deserved. Now what are you going to aim for before your next birthday?
Tags: dog kennel, Porsche, Toyota IQ
Should This Be You?
August 24, 2009 at 12:50 pm
I was racking my brains over the weekend about what to write about the Toyota iQ. I decided to have a little nosy over to the other bloggers to see what they’re writing about and how they’re getting on with their new motors.
- Rob’s been to Dingle and back. And very nippy he found the journey too.
- Keith has fallen in love! His insurance is being suspended and motor tax refunded. “And the IQ will indeed be the only car we use.”
- And Christine?
Christine, the 4th of the bloggers chosen to drive around in a Toyota iQ, doesn’t have a blog. She has a Twitter account, but isn’t that busy on it either. I tweeted her on 14 August to ask her for her blog url so I could link to it in a post, and she only got back to me on 19 August with a reply.
Why did Christine get selected? Is it because she’s in PR
The Toyota iQ that went to Christine could have been given to one of the many hundreds of others who applied. I’m sure they could find someone who actually has a blog.
Do you have a blog and a driving licence? Why don’t you let Toyota know that you’re ready, willing and available to take ownership of an iQ and write about it?
Please note that I’m not just picking on Christine for no reason. I just feel that it needs to be highlighted that 3 out of 4 bloggers are doing their thing about the Toyota iQ. If there is some reason that a non-blogger was selected that I’m not aware of, then please let me know.
Tags: Christine Duggan, Toyota IQ
3 Things That Annoy Me About Toyota iQ
August 14, 2009 at 8:40 am
I’ve been driving the Toyota iQ three weeks now and I’ve come up with three annoying things:
- Over anxious petrol alert – there are four quadrants on the petrol indicator thing. As soon as it reaches the last one, it flashes! Flashing indicates to a user that there is something immediate and urgent that needs to be fixed. Having a quarter of a tank of petrol is not immediate or urgent.
- Over sensitive passenger seat. I am unable to fling my handbag on the passenger seat beside me because the car thinks it’s a person sitting there without a seat belt and it bleeps to express its disgust. I’m not into oversized handbags, I carry normal ones. Admittedly I carry a lot of shit around in them, but they do not weigh the same as a small person. Toyota – please adjust the weight settings. OK, so maybe I shouldn’t be putting my handbag on the passenger seat in the big city (thanks Grannymar for pointing that out!), in that case, the 2nd most annoying thing about the iQ is the horn. If the horn of the iQ had a voice, it would sound like David Beckham! That’s not the kind of voice you need when you’re snarling at big cars who cut you off. Or when you’re giving drivers nodding off at the traffic lights a little nudge to move on.
- Not sensitive enough indicators. A lot of turns I take don’t result in the indicator being switched off automatically. I know that my old car switches off on these turns because they’re ones I take every day. I just have to remember to turn off the indicator, and that’s another thing. This may have something to do with:
But I am loving the fact that in the Toyota iQ I have become a Master of the 1 Point Turn!
This car is so small in length, you can do a complete about turn in a single lane! If you, like me, often try to take a nifty shortcut and end up facing the wrong direction, you’ll love this! No more endless driving looking for a suitable side street to turn around in. Now you can simply do a sharp turn of the driving wheel and be facing the other direction in one go.
Tags: Toyota IQ
It’s All About Perception Baby
August 11, 2009 at 4:56 pm
Driving around in an 09 D motor takes a bit of getting used to. It’s all about perception and I know that people who see me in a brand new car must look and make certain assumptions about who I am, what I’m doing. Maybe I’m a trophy wife who’s traded in the Beamer runaround for something more green and kinder to the environment? Nah. I don’t look the part. Maybe I’m one of those people I read about who live off the credit card and hire purchase agreements and pay on the never never? Nah. Not enough bling in my style.
My neighbours all think I’m doing ‘awfully well’ because I’ve upgraded cars from a 92 D to a 09 D in the middle of a recession!
When I’m on the motorway, assuming my rightful place in the fast lane, other cars (and their owners) are looking at me! “What’s that little smart car doing in the fast lane”, thinks the fat Audi. The BMW thrusts and pulls at its owner to be allowed to ride up my ass and overtake me. Ubiquitous brands merely glance out of their wing mirrors as I flash by at speed.
It’s a nippy little thing the iQ.
The thing is – I would have looked askance at a half-a-car if it flew by me. When I’m driving my MX, I look like I belong in the fast lane. But I forgot that I wasn’t driving the lean machine last weekend, when we took the iQ on a trip up North. I had to be really careful about speed. My old car lets me go up to 140km and then starts to get a bit rattly and loud – so much so it drowns out the stereo. So I kind of keep it in check.
The new baby, Toyota iQ, allows me to creep upwards and upwards. It remains calm, unrattled, and keeps churning out the tunes. I did a double take a few times when I looked at the speedometer and it was on 160km! This is what I believe is comfortable cruising speed (on a fairly deserted motorway in daylight). My Toyota iQ is more than able to handle it. So if you’re considering buying one of these babies for yourself, the nice men in Toyota won’t be able to tell you this, but this speed is more than comfortable and I’m sure you could push it a little higher if you dared:
Tags: Toyota IQ
Getting To Know My iQ
August 4, 2009 at 8:59 am
I’ve spent the last week nipping about town in my new little iQ and this is my first report.
When I picked up the car at Toyota, I had to sit through an engineering/tech spec talk. You know in school when you did those aptitude tests? The ones about colours, words and numbers I always scored really high. But the one about the folded out boxes that are meant to check your spatial awareness? Let’s just say that I would still be in the hall right now trying to work out the answers! So the thought of enduring a talk on it was a little off-putting.
But I’m so glad I did it. Understanding some of the unique features about the iQ has enabled me to talk about the car with interested people. And boy – does everyone want to talk about it! Even non-car people like my mum came over all “petrol pump queen” on me. So being able to tell people that the way the heating/air conditioning system for the iQ was designed is so great, that Toyota are going to roll it out across all future models of car in future – is a good thing. Or to demonstrate how the under leg air bags would work in the event of a crash is comforting; they would push your legs up which would have the effect of pushing you down in the car seat and enabling the seat belt to hold you in more.
Other features I’m liking a lot but which I’m told are standard in all new cars are:
- Bluetooth – my phone hooks up with the car and whenever there’s a call, the music on the stereo lowers down and I can choose to accept or reject the call. It also tells me when there’s a text.
- Heated seats – I will get great value out of them come winter, but yesterday they came in handy to dry my jeans which were wet after a walk on Brittas in which waves came quite close!
- Stereo – the speakers in my own car are blown so when you put the volume above 15, audio gets a little shaky. Not so in the iQ which also comes with a jack for your ipod.
- Smooth – I feel like I’m cruising up high, rather than rumbling down low as in my old car. [My fiance misses the ball caressing vibrations that come with the MX!]
Things I’ve noticed driving:
- I don’t get so many looks as I do in my MX5.
- The car is much shorter in front and back, but yet the same width, so it’s rather like driving a square. Took me a day or two to get used to this new scale.
- There’s no such thing as a 3 point turn in an iQ. Because the car is so short, you can about turn in the middle of the road in one. I used to live in Australia, a country that is very fond of its ‘U-eys’. I developed a dependency on U’eys as a way of navigating, so doing it in one go is sweet.
- iQ is easy to get a park. And I do believe that iQ drivers should only have to pay half price for car spaces – because we only use half a space! My MX5 is half a car – but it’s halved across the top, making it low to the ground. The iQ is also half a car, but it’s halved vertically with bits gone in front and back. Here’s a photo taking on a rainy night last week beside Trinity:
Things I’m not liking:
- The car stereo is controlled by a button the driving wheel. I like the fact that the driver is the only one who gets to control the sounds (!), but I’ve noticed my hand will flick off the button while driving and will change the channel on the radio accidentally. Maybe I just need to get used to this and maybe I need to programme the stereo better…
- I’ve had one go at tuning in the stations on the radio but it’s darned difficult! At the moment, I’m enduring the presets of Q102 and 98FM which are very un-me. I will not be beaten by a car stereo, more time will be devoted to this task this week.
- Overtaking going fast on a motorway… I didn’t feel like I had as much power as I do in my automatic MX5. When I want to overtake in my MX5, I floor it and go. Yesterday on the N11, I found I was willing myself to go faster to overtake a fairly fast moving car. I know that this might be me and getting used to driving a stick again. I will know more next week after I take the car out of the city, we’ll see how she fares then.
- Because it’s all space conscious, there’s only a small round space in the middle of the two front seats for dumping odds and ends. In my old car, this is a long rectangle shape and I use it to keep all the kit a girl needs when driving her car: nail file, spare lip gloss and lipstick, tissues, etc. They all have to live in the driver’s door which makes them not as accessible.
Overall though I’m liking the iQ.
It’s not as good-looking as my MX5, but is not as bone rattling or noisy either. It just doesn’t have the same smile as the MX. If we were to liken the two cars to girls I went to school with, the MX is the good looking popular girl with the long shiny hair and the perfect smile; but when you spend an afternoon hanging out with her, you find she’s a little disappointing. Not so disappointing that you wouldn’t go to her house after school some other day. But the enjoyment of hanging with her is more to do with being seen and the boys she’d attract.
The iQ on the other hand, is one of the quieter girls at school. Not so pretty, in fact her face looks like she got a punch in it and it stuck… but once you spend a little time with her, you find she’s got a quick witted mind, has depth and ideas that the other girls don’t know about. You would enjoy going to her house after school.
First petrol report: €29.90 to fill the tank.
I’ve done about 200 km so far.
Here’s how the others are getting on:
Rob Cumiskey is planning a trip to Dingle in it this weekend
Keith Bohanna has a video showing his parking skills
Christine Duggan who I can only find on Twitter – you got a blog I can link to Christine?
Tags: Christine Duggan, Keith Bohanna, Rob Cumiskey, Toyota IQ, Venntertainment
iQ In The Nick Of Time
July 23, 2009 at 8:00 am
I’m delighted to be one of the 4 bloggers who were selected to drive a Toyota Iq around for the next 6 months. Call me a blog whore if you want, but for me this opportunity came exactly at the right time.
Take a look at my insurance disk:
Note to my MX5: my beloved, you won’t be neglected. Angel has a nice warm garage and will mind you. I’ll come visit on weekends when I want to go far far away.
This Is How To Use Twitter
July 13, 2009 at 3:08 pm
I’m asked the question at least 5 times a week: “Is Twitter any good? Why would I use Twitter? I logged on to the site and frankly I don’t see what all the fuss is about”…
I usually point people to my blog post of a few weeks back – Advice for New Twitterers - but now I’d like to draw your attention to a nice use of Twitter from Toyota.
* * YAY I GOT PICKED * * Picking up my new motor on Monday 27 July.
To promote the new Toyota IQ, they are offering 4 bloggers the chance to drive around one of the IQ’s for 6 months. In return they must blog about their experiences of it. They require at least 1 blog post a week and pictures of you in the car. How did I hear about this? On Twitter. Someone posted a link and it’s been retweeted.
This is really very smart.
- Create a buzz about your car using bloggers (opininated connectors)
- Promote the whole thing on Twitter
- Generate sales through word of mouth (assuming that the bloggers like the car)… assuming that they don’t, at least they’ll tell Toyota why not and give the car company a chance to respond or readjust
- Link love will aid the search engine ranking
- Another first from Toyota. PR plus. If another car company tried this now, it wouldn’t work as well. (Unless of course you’re Jaguar
)
I’ve put myself forward for it.
Anyone who knows me will know I love my little car – it’s an MX5. Here’s a picture:
I have been thinking of changing car. Someday I’m going to need to update my motor and there’s no way I’m going to go for a ubiquitous looking generic model. The iQ is groovy and cool just like my MX, and it’s got the added benefit of not being 17 years old like my car is! I feel awful guilty every time I fill it up; carbon emissions were not on the agenda when my car was being made.
I’d love the idea of getting to test drive a potential buy for 6 months! So watch this space around 20 July and see who gets to drive the Toyota iQ.
Tags: Toyota IQ, Twitter Business Use
