[thatguitarguy]

The other night I had a 300 mile trip to do and I didn't have to haul anything so I thought I'd dig the Metro out and take him for a drive. I haven't driven him enough to learn his quirks and what to expect, but he started right up. I did have to shovel a lot of snow to get him out, and after I drove 10 miles I turned around and came back. The air was warm from the defroster vents, but there was cold air blowing from where the radio should be. I switched to recirculating the interior air, and that helped a little, but the windows started frosting up, so I had to switch back to outside air and crack the window.

I knew that the van wasn't going to get nearly as good of mileage, but it just wasn't a good night for the MaEsTRO. I usually watch the trip computer in current mpg mode, but I kept cycling through the other modes to watch the temperature, and it was staying in double digits below zero Fahrenheit. I had the seat heater on high, heat blasting out the vents, headlights on bright most of the time, and I was listening to the stereo, and I was glad that I had an alternator that could handle it all.

I may work on an alternator kill switch for summertime use in MaEsTRO, but completely removing the unit just doesn't seem practical to me. You're not saving any weight, because batteries are going to weigh more, and if it dies, a jump isn't going to help. I think a kill switch for the alternator is as far as I want to go in that mode.