The last couple of weeks have been pretty uneventful for Benny. Family commitments have kept him in use as a shuttle and there hasn’t been any time to do anything exciting.

Running up and down the motorways and freeways with cruise activated Benny took everything in his stride. Nothing was too hard and there was minimal gear shifting even on the long climbs. Next weekend I plan to head into some steeper country and this will give the cruise a good workout.

I had the occasion to try out the cargo area as I had to bring a cradle home last weekend. With the rear seat split there was plenty of room to fit it in. This is why I think all seats should be 60/40 split. With 50/50 you can still only seat one passenger in the back but you lose a substantial portion of your available cargo area. With both seats folded down there is a fair amount of space. I would say it’s comparable with the others in its class. The quoted space from the manufacturer is 2.247m³ with both rows down and 0.969m³ with the 2^nd row up.

Doing the daily commute with Benny has given me time to become more accustomed to him and I am continually pleased by how well he handles. I have started to push his limits on the road and so far the stability control hasn’t kicked in. mind you I don’t see the need to try any harder as most people won’t be pushing one of these that hard.

With the colder weather coming we had our first frost the other morning. This gave me the chance to see how effective the demister is. Within 3 minutes there was warm air coming out of the vents and shortly after that the front window was clear. Within 10 minutes the inside of Benny was at comfortable temperature. The one letdown with the climate control is the lack of heating for third row occupants as the rear is a cold only circuit.

As I said last time I would work out the fuel consumption and to my surprise the gauge in the dash is pretty accurate. It was within 500mL of what I worked out.

I have finally got around to loading up the 6 stacker with music and tuning in the equalizer. The stereo is reasonable quality but I think it could do with some better tuning, speaker selection wise. The speakers in the rear doors seem to be lacking in the volume department and it takes a fair amount of adjustment on the fader to get a balanced sound from the driver’s seat. On the steering wheel the controls are easy to use the only thing that would top off the package would be the ability to change discs. I pod connectivity is another good feature if you’re not like me living in the past.

Another feature that I think is quite handy is the speed sensing door locks. Once you hit 40kph the doors lock automatically. This feature is standard across the entire range.

Now to something that is really getting my goat. The amount that you have to turn the steering wheel to get the indicators to cancel is more than the amount it takes me to turn 90% of corners that I’ve gone around. I feel like a bit of a fool when I’ve been driving down the road with my indicator on for the last kilometre and no turns in site.

That’s it for this update and I hope to have more tales to tell next time. Until then, safe motoring.