[Canada_Rockies]

It's the revenge of the people who didn't take physics or dynamics or statics. Bigger, heavier, higher center of mass, less aerodynamic. You can't overcome physics. An SUV will be worse handling, worse performance, and have worse gas mileage than a comparable sedan/coupe/wagon. You're trading enjoyment of life for high driving position and fractionally more cargo space.

[RANT]Same thing for pickup trucks (Utes). I drive a 2002 Tundra. The new ones are bigger, use more fuel, have a 5.7 L engine instead of the 4.7 I have that's already overkill, and cannot be safely parked in a supermarket parking lot. Mine is enough trouble in parking lots and it's nearly a foot narrower and two shorter.

I have no intention of ever buying a vehicle with a TV screen in the dash. I can operate all my controls by feel, without taking my eyes off the road, or more specifically the idiots driving on the road. When I need GPS I use Google Maps on my phone and don't look. I just let the charming lady talk me to where I need to go. I don't have to watch a little blue dot on a blue line with an arrowhead. I can see the road, thanks very much. [/RANT]

[jtkratzer]

We’re into diesels for the torque, fuel economy and longevity. On the storage side mentioned above, my Ford Explorer has significantly more volume behind the second row than my BMW 3 series wagon, and it has a third row of seats. 99 Dodge diesel for camping, hunting, yard debris, firewood, etc.

[ThorSanchez]

We’re into diesels for the torque, fuel economy and longevity. On the storage side mentioned above, my Ford Explorer has significantly more volume behind the second row than my BMW 3 series wagon, and it has a third row of seats. 99 Dodge diesel for camping, hunting, yard debris, firewood, etc.

I'm good with the people who go camping, go hunting, haul lots of stuff having a big ol' truck or even an SUV if you like mulch and 88 packs of toilet paper inside your vehicle.

But I'm betting the 95% use case for those 5500-lb, 3-row SUVs that get 14mpg on in the city is one dude, his lunch, and a 26-mile commute on pavement.

My wife has a Jeep Wrangler she loves, but realistically it has the same utility as a VW Golf, just with half the gas mileage and almost comical interior and ride quality. It's been off the pavement for approximately 4 of its 20,000 miles.

---------- Post added 04-26-18 at 01:26 PM ----------

[RANT]Same thing for pickup trucks (Utes). I drive a 2002 Tundra. The new ones are bigger, use more fuel, have a 5.7 L engine instead of the 4.7 I have that's already overkill, and cannot be safely parked in a supermarket parking lot. Mine is enough trouble in parking lots and it's nearly a foot narrower and two shorter.

I have no intention of ever buying a vehicle with a TV screen in the dash. I can operate all my controls by feel, without taking my eyes off the road, or more specifically the idiots driving on the road. When I need GPS I use Google Maps on my phone and don't look. I just let the charming lady talk me to where I need to go. I don't have to watch a little blue dot on a blue line with an arrowhead. I can see the road, thanks very much. [/RANT]

Here in Maryland you still see a fair number of 1980s and 1990s mini pickups being nursed along. They probably have 100s of thousands of miles on them. Some of them appear to be in pretty poor repair. But they meet the owner's requirements. They set two people, and you can pile a bunch of stuff into the 6' bed.


That class of vehicle simply doesn't exist in the United States anymore. You can't buy a truck that's twice that size. The Chevy Colorado is their "small" truck. It weighs 4250 pounds and in standard cab configuration is 212" long. My dad's 1976 full-sized Chevy Cheyenne weighed something like 4000 lbs and was 212" long. And it's because the profit margins on full-sized trucks are huge. A new KingRanchRaptorCrewCabHemi 8.9L Dually probably costs $75,000, but since it weighs 10,000 pounds that's great. Americans buy their cars to maximize pounds per dollar.


One place I diverge from you is the screen. I'm good with integrated controls with good tactile feedback. I just wish someone would get them right. The fact that Android Auto and Apple CarPlay have spread so quickly is evidence that the automakers are absolutely terrible at man-machine interface stuff. That 2018 cars can still be bought with Nav and other systems that aren't regularly updated and demand $100s for new maps is mind blowing. Paying for new maps is worse than just setting the money on fire, because it encourages them to keep acting like it's 1998.

[lesmore49]

I'm good with the people who go camping, go hunting, haul lots of stuff having a big ol' truck or even an SUV if you like mulch and 88 packs of toilet paper inside your vehicle.

But I'm betting the 95% use case for those 5500-lb, 3-row SUVs that get 14mpg on in the city is one dude, his lunch, and a 26-mile commute on pavement.

My wife has a Jeep Wrangler she loves, but realistically it has the same utility as a VW Golf, just with half the gas mileage and almost comical interior and ride quality. It's been off the pavement for approximately 4 of its 20,000 miles.

---------- Post added 04-26-18 at 01:26 PM ----------





Here in Maryland you still see a fair number of 1980s and 1990s mini pickups being nursed along. They probably have 100s of thousands of miles on them. Some of them appear to be in pretty poor repair. But they meet the owner's requirements. They set two people, and you can pile a bunch of stuff into the 6' bed.


That class of vehicle simply doesn't exist in the United States anymore. You can't buy a truck that's twice that size. The Chevy Colorado is their "small" truck. It weighs 4250 pounds and in standard cab configuration is 212" long. My dad's 1976 full-sized Chevy Cheyenne weighed something like 4000 lbs and was 212" long. And it's because the profit margins on full-sized trucks are huge. A new KingRanchRaptorCrewCabHemi 8.9L Dually probably costs $75,000, but since it weighs 10,000 pounds that's great. Americans buy their cars to maximize pounds per dollar.


One place I diverge from you is the screen. I'm good with integrated controls with good tactile feedback. I just wish someone would get them right. The fact that Android Auto and Apple CarPlay have spread so quickly is evidence that the automakers are absolutely terrible at man-machine interface stuff. That 2018 cars can still be bought with Nav and other systems that aren't regularly updated and demand $100s for new maps is mind blowing. Paying for new maps is worse than just setting the money on fire, because it encourages them to keep acting like it's 1998.

I agree with you about most modern pickup trucks being absolutely loaded with options. It's very hard to find any basic, stripper trucks anymore. I checked on the internet and you can still get base Chevy Colorado, but I bet you would have trouble finding one on most dealer lots and probably have to special order it from the factory. Here's a description I found online..digital trucks...I think was the source.

"The Colorado Base is true to its name — it’s a basic truck with minimal trim and not many options. The Base, is available only with an extended cab and long bed, comes standard with the 2.5-liter Ecotec engine, six-speed manual transmission, two vinyl seats in front, 16-inch steel wheels, an AM/FM audio system with six speakers, and power windows and door locks.

The Base trim has a 3.5-inch monochrome driver information center and a four-way power adjustable driver seat. Note that the Base trim does not have a back seat, nor does Chevy offer a rear seat as an option.

2018 Colorado WT

The Colorado Work Truck starts with the same equipment and features as the Base trim, with either the extended or crew cab and short or long box. The WT opens up Chevy’s options list so you can select the V6 engine, automatic transmission, cloth seats, alloy wheels, and a 7-inch color touchscreen with MyLink radio.."

My son's first new vehicle was a 2008 Chevy Colorado LT 2 door . He had the off road Z71 package with skid plates, large over size tires/wheels, heavy duty shocks, automatic, 3.7 liter 5 cylinder DOHC 4 valves per cylinder truck engine. He had it till 2014 and put on about 130,000 Kms on it. It was an excellent truck, think one stereo speaker wire became disconnected and a leak from a p/s hose...that was it, both corrected by warranty. He couldn't plug the block heater in at his job at the time...the truck would have to sit out in temps down to -35 C or colder for his 10 hour shifts...we get brutal winters on the Canadian prairies.

I recall when I was paying my way through school, back in the very early '70's...I worked for a trucking company. They mostly had '70-'71 one ton , commercial Ford E 300 vans with either a 3 speed manual or automatic and invariably the Ford 300 cubic inch, inline truck six...wonderful engine by the way. These were absolute strippers, around 4,000 lbs cargo rating, drivers seat only, no nothing for options...except the few that had automatics. Tough, heavy duty commercial vans that could take a kicking. The one ton GM vans of the period were similar...they usually had the Chevy/GMC 250 or 292 cube inline six.

They would last a long time and there wasn't much to go wrong with them...no power anything.

[GreatFrog]

I have a Porsche that I hardly drive. It's not a collectible model. It's a lot of fun but where I now live I never drive. I do enjoy it. People think they are very expensive, but they are not. They are costly to fix, but this one has been very reliable, although expensive to maintain.

[ChrisPlatt]

Carpocalypse is right. Seems American car companies repeatedly put all their eggs in one basket,
then wind up paying the price in lost business when consumer preference changes faster than they can adapt.

Chris

[Sailor]

I have a Porsche that I hardly drive. It's not a collectible model. It's a lot of fun but where I now live I never drive. I do enjoy it. People think they are very expensive, but they are not. They are costly to fix, but this one has been very reliable, although expensive to maintain.

Hello to a fellow Porsche owner. I'm on my third Porsche, a 2015 911 Cabrio, which was preceded by a 2013 Boxster S and - before that - a base model Boxster (2008). I've avoided special, low-volume cars because I don't want a potentially collectible heirloom; I want cars that I can drive, that I can park at a restaurant for a couple of hours without hyperventilating, and on which I can accept a stone chip or two with equanimity.

Mine have all been reliable, but you're right - they ain't cheap to maintain, and older cars or newer ones beyond warranty coverage can be very expensive to repair if something does go wrong.

What model do you own?

Jer

---

Last edited by Sailor; 04-26-2018 at 04:12 PM.

[jtkratzer]

I'm good with the people who go camping, go hunting, haul lots of stuff having a big ol' truck or even an SUV if you like mulch and 88 packs of toilet paper inside your vehicle.

But I'm betting the 95% use case for those 5500-lb, 3-row SUVs that get 14mpg on in the city is one dude, his lunch, and a 26-mile commute on pavement.

I get about 18-20 combined on the V6 Explorer, mid 20s on highway and it’s certainly not anywhere near 5,500 lbs. It has the same frame as a crossover now. It’s not a real SUV. I can get mid 20s with my nearly 8,000 diesel pickup if I behave. We needed the space for taking our two dogs and it’s hard to get a family of four’s luggage in the truck of a sedan. We get enough snow that 4WD/AWD is nice to have. I will likely always own a pickup. Dead deer, fish and birds don’t belong in the truck or interior of a vehicle and I refuse to use a rack/car and let the road grime get on them.

[monochrome]

I'm good with the people who go camping, go hunting, haul lots of stuff having a big ol' truck or even an SUV if you like mulch and 88 packs of toilet paper inside your vehicle.

But I'm betting the 95% use case for those 5500-lb, 3-row SUVs that get 14mpg on in the city is one dude, his lunch, and a 26-mile commute on pavement.

My wife has a Jeep Wrangler she loves, but realistically it has the same utility as a VW Golf, just with half the gas mileage and almost comical interior and ride quality. It's been off the pavement for approximately 4 of its 20,000 miles.

---------- Post added 04-26-18 at 01:26 PM ----------





Here in Maryland you still see a fair number of 1980s and 1990s mini pickups being nursed along. They probably have 100s of thousands of miles on them. Some of them appear to be in pretty poor repair. But they meet the owner's requirements. They set two people, and you can pile a bunch of stuff into the 6' bed.


That class of vehicle simply doesn't exist in the United States anymore. You can't buy a truck that's twice that size. The Chevy Colorado is their "small" truck. It weighs 4250 pounds and in standard cab configuration is 212" long. My dad's 1976 full-sized Chevy Cheyenne weighed something like 4000 lbs and was 212" long. And it's because the profit margins on full-sized trucks are huge. A new KingRanchRaptorCrewCabHemi 8.9L Dually probably costs $75,000, but since it weighs 10,000 pounds that's great. Americans buy their cars to maximize pounds per dollar.


One place I diverge from you is the screen. I'm good with integrated controls with good tactile feedback. I just wish someone would get them right. The fact that Android Auto and Apple CarPlay have spread so quickly is evidence that the automakers are absolutely terrible at man-machine interface stuff. That 2018 cars can still be bought with Nav and other systems that aren't regularly updated and demand $100s for new maps is mind blowing. Paying for new maps is worse than just setting the money on fire, because it encourages them to keep acting like it's 1998.

None of this is any of your business. Drive what you want. Stay out of my garage.

[ThorSanchez]

Carpocalypse is right. Seems American car companies repeatedly put all their eggs in one basket,
then wind up paying the price in lost business when consumer preference changes faster than they can adapt.

Chris

Its not like gas prices would suddenly shoot up and people would switch to buying smaller, more efficient cars and American companies would be stuck with none of them, but instead endless capacity for 6000 lb trucks that get 14 mpg, and they'd teeter on the verge of bankruptcy and ask for massive taxpayer loans to bail them out. That would never happen.

---------- Post added 04-26-18 at 08:50 PM ----------

None of this is any of your business. Drive what you want. Stay out of my garage.

Nobody's telling you to not buy an impossibly impractical, utterly soulless space shuttle crawler and use it to commute to work by yourself every day. Go for it. But I'm not going to be pleased when you convince 50,000,000 of your fellow Americans to do the same thing and there aren't any more fun cars made for the rest of us.

[monochrome]

Its not like gas prices would suddenly shoot up and people would switch to buying smaller, more efficient cars and American companies would be stuck with none of them, but instead endless capacity for 6000 lb trucks that get 14 mpg, and they'd teeter on the verge of bankruptcy and ask for massive taxpayer loans to bail them out. That would never happen.

---------- Post added 04-26-18 at 08:50 PM ----------



Nobody's telling you to not buy an impossibly impractical, utterly soulless space shuttle crawler and use it to commute to work by yourself every day. Go for it. But I'm not going to be pleased when you convince 50,000,000 of your fellow Americans to do the same thing and there aren't any more fun cars made for the rest of us.

Ford won’t sell ANY traditional sedans in North America after 2019. They just don’t want to accommodate sedan buyers any more. Which is a sure sign that after 2019 gasoline will return tro $4 a gallon and Honda will convert the Birmingham Pilot/Ridgeline plant from 330,000 trucks back to 330,000 Civics and the Windsor, Ont. Canada plant from 80,000 Civics back to 80,000 trucks. It takes Honda 10 days to changeover a plant. It takes Ford 10 months. Union work rules and all that are 10% of the problem.

These business decisions are 90% caused by government regulation. CAFE that exempts trucks, for instance, but not station wagon cars. Ford can’t meet the new fleet rules for cars, so they’re just not going to sell them any more. Good luck with those jobs auto workers. And nice job, government. This is how you get more . . . Populist President.

We own a 2015 Mini Hardtop and a 2012 Honda Accord EX-L V-6. The Honda is too much car, really. 5 passenger sedan that I drive 22 minutes to work and back, alone. I don’t NEED 5 leather seats and I SHOULD HAVE more warning sensors and tracking devices, shouldn’t I? I should trade it for a new Mini Countryman or a Forester. Both of which cost $10,000 more than I paid for the very top end Honda. And my maps are free.

I rent trucks as needed. You can rent a fun car, as needed.

None of which matters. What annoys me is when some people can tell other people what to do, or criticise their choices, so that those people can do what they want to do.

They, Individually, don’t matter to me at all. What I choose is none of their business

[jtkratzer]

None of this is any of your business. Drive what you want. Stay out of my garage.

I’m curious, but already made an assumption, about the political affiliation based on the mentality here, not yours, the imposing of one’s will and opinions on others.

[monochrome]

I’m curious, but already made an assumption, about the political affiliation based on the mentality here, not yours, the imposing of one’s will and opinions on others.

The answer to the question will be entirely dependent on the prior political affiliation of the one upon whom the other’s will is imposed, I suppose.


* No political affiliation, but maybe Classical Liberal or Jefffersonian Democrat if a label is helpful. And Flyover, so an undercurrent of Bitter Clinger and Deplorable.

[jtkratzer]

The answer to the question will be entirely dependent on the prior political affiliation of the one upon whom the other’s will is imposed, I suppose.


* No political affiliation, but maybe Classical Liberal or Jefffersonian Democrat if a label is helpful. And Flyover, so an undercurrent of Bitter Clinger and Deplorable.

I like it. Stopping there as there’s no need to derail this thread with politics.

[builttospill]

The carpocalypse continues apace. At least in the States. Ford announced yesterday that they're discontinuing US sales of the Fiesta, Focus, Fusion, Taurus, etc. If you want a Ford it's going to be a pickup truck, an SUV or a Mustang. Or, I suppose the few hundred GTs they sell to hedge fund managers and Jay Leno.

Which is a sure sign that after 2019 gasoline will return tro $4 a gallon...

I was going to say the same thing about fuel prices. They will rise again and I believe this is a very narrow-minded decision.

I follow the news quite regularly and saw the press event the Ford CEO held about three weeks ago announcing they will only build specialty vehicles, trucks, and SUVs due to those having a larger profit margin. He said they weren't making enough money on the high-volume, low-cost cars. Wait! What!?! Henry Ford is probably rolling over in his grave. Ford rose to popularity due to its ability to mass-produce a vehicle for the average citizen. How can you not make money on the number of fleet vehicles they sell?

Union work rules and all that are 10% of the problem.

Oh, you answered my question. But isn't it 90% of the problem?