As a guy who takes his vehicle off road and up mountains and into backwoods areas to hunt I am intrigued by the new Defender. I know the knock on Range Rovers is they are about as reliable at a Peterman offense, but old Defenders are nails. Not sure how I feel about IFS, as I am a big believer in solid live axles for real off road shit, but I hear they get good travel, and the torque numbers are impressive as shit. I also doubt seriously it is a body on frame construction, which hurts it in my eyes, but my guess, sadly, is that this might be the last generation of Jeeps that are "traditional" off road rigs.
I know we are talking about less than 1% of the car buying public that still actually wants a rig that can legit go anywhere and do anything (not some gravel road that some Seattle fag thinks is "off roading" in his Subaru), but it still sucks that real super capable off road machines are dying out. I guess Razor's probably have something to do with that as well. You can buy a purpose built little nimble trail runner now.
Whatever, give me live axles, body on frame, beadlocks and 4:1 transfer cases or give me death!
Go anywhere is subjective. We talking like Moab and/or Rubicon trail or like some steep off roading where one needs 4WD low and a bit of clearance?
The Throbber has a CX9 - best fucking snow car EVER. AWD, throw some studs on that bad boy...like a snow leopard chasing down its prey.
Mazda's are criminally underrated. For some reason, they are the least expensive of the Japanese line-up. Toyota and Honda (their luxury analogues) carry a higher sticker and get away with it. I haven't owned one but every person I know who has loves their Mazdas and swears by then. Subaru is like that too.
Just perused Mazda's website and came away a little disappointed. Seems their fuel economy has dropped nearly 10 mpg across the board. My brother's 3 gets 40 mpg. Nothing they make gets over 31 combined now. I still think they have one of if not the best design aesthetics for any car you can buy under $60K (maybe higher), and they're dead-nuts reliable, but I commute 70 miles round trip, so I look for cars that are easy on the fuel.
I'm excited to see more ~$40K long range electrics hitting the market. Many Luddites still shit on electric, but to them I say, "Don't knock it 'till you've tried it." Quiet, torque for days, way fewer expensive parts to break or expensive maintenance to do, brakes last forever, and never having to stop at the gas station. Here in my corner of Washington, at 10 cents per kWh, it's like driving for free. In somewhere like Wenatchee, where it's under 3 cents? What idiot with a commute doesn't have one?
I used to be a "car guy." I went full fast strategy and bought a 3-Series new first thing after getting hired at my current job. It was my first new vehicle. Why did I get it? Rear wheel drive (steering input at both ends of the car), inline six (natural first and second order balance), manual transmission, back seat, under $40K. Thanks to broadening my horizons to include other expensive hobbies like home-ownership, I've stopped giving a fuck about any of that shit, and all I care about is lowest TCO. Even the cheapest, shittiest cars on the market today have creature comforts that parallel the most expensive car I've owned. For me, car purchases are a spreadsheet exercise: Purchase price minus depreciated value plus expected maintenance plus consumables over predicted length of ownership. Lowest wins. A $40K electric stacks up surprisingly well against all but the cheapest and most efficient gas car--IF it's from a manufacture that still qualifies for the tax rebate (to bring things back to my original post).
Whoever posted the picture of the Mustang Mach-E above is onto something. If you have to have a car that "looks like" an SUV (because, let's face it, only @Swaye actually uses his SUV for S and/or U...), you could do a lot worse. $36K after rebate for a luxury-adjacent car that will drive your eyes into the back of your skull on acceleration, pretty much run for free as long as you own it, and allow you to never have to stop at a gas station again. And, thanks to the tax rebate, you're calculating resale depreciation from a price $7500 above what you paid (IOW, six or seven years down the road, I'd rather be selling what started as a $40K long range electric than what started as a $25K Corolla).
/woman in Japanese board meeting
I don’t rock crawl per se but have used the shit out of my SUV over the years. Plenty of clearance situations in snow or off road. But yes you’re pretty much on the money.
I think most people would be surprised what modern studless winter tires can do. (@PurpleThrobber: Ditch the studs. They tear up roads, flatten and become pointless quickly, and don't really give you that much more traction these days. People run studless in the Michigan UP just fine.) I've been up to the Baker ski resort sledding hill in January in a sport package RWD 3-series (4" ground clearance) with no chains. Ditto two different minivans. I rarely encounter roads I need to drive on that aren't plowed, but I guess there are times where simply ground clearance over the snow is the difference between moving or not. Those are times it's probably best to stay home anyway.
There's this misconception that you're fucked in the snow without AWD. The reality is that, although AWD is useful for getting started and getting up hills, it does fuck all for helping you stop. That's where proper tires come in. Now, proper tires and AWD? Even better. ATBSJBS, I've driven about a half million miles, and a lack of AWD has prevented me from getting where I wanted to go... once I can recall.
That's just my situation, though. I'm sure if I had a long, steep driveway, I'd feel differently about it.
My dude, I put Bridgestone blizzaks on my wife’s MDX and those suckers grip like a mother fuckers. Studlesss snow tires grip better than studs in like 90 percent of winter driving situations. And in the 10 percent where studs are better (ie straight ice at certain temps) studless are only marginally worse.
The Throbber has a CX9 - best fucking snow car EVER. AWD, throw some studs on that bad boy...like a snow leopard chasing down its prey.
Mazda's are criminally underrated. For some reason, they are the least expensive of the Japanese line-up. Toyota and Honda (their luxury analogues) carry a higher sticker and get away with it. I haven't owned one but every person I know who has loves their Mazdas and swears by then. Subaru is like that too.
Just perused Mazda's website and came away a little disappointed. Seems their fuel economy has dropped nearly 10 mpg across the board. My brother's 3 gets 40 mpg. Nothing they make gets over 31 combined now. I still think they have one of if not the best design aesthetics for any car you can buy under $60K (maybe higher), and they're dead-nuts reliable, but I commute 70 miles round trip, so I look for cars that are easy on the fuel.
I'm excited to see more ~$40K long range electrics hitting the market. Many Luddites still shit on electric, but to them I say, "Don't knock it 'till you've tried it." Quiet, torque for days, way fewer expensive parts to break or expensive maintenance to do, brakes last forever, and never having to stop at the gas station. Here in my corner of Washington, at 10 cents per kWh, it's like driving for free. In somewhere like Wenatchee, where it's under 3 cents? What idiot with a commute doesn't have one?
I used to be a "car guy." I went full fast strategy and bought a 3-Series new first thing after getting hired at my current job. It was my first new vehicle. Why did I get it? Rear wheel drive (steering input at both ends of the car), inline six (natural first and second order balance), manual transmission, back seat, under $40K. Thanks to broadening my horizons to include other expensive hobbies like home-ownership, I've stopped giving a fuck about any of that shit, and all I care about is lowest TCO. Even the cheapest, shittiest cars on the market today have creature comforts that parallel the most expensive car I've owned. For me, car purchases are a spreadsheet exercise: Purchase price minus depreciated value plus expected maintenance plus consumables over predicted length of ownership. Lowest wins. A $40K electric stacks up surprisingly well against all but the cheapest and most efficient gas car--IF it's from a manufacture that still qualifies for the tax rebate (to bring things back to my original post).
Whoever posted the picture of the Mustang Mach-E above is onto something. If you have to have a car that "looks like" an SUV (because, let's face it, only @Swaye actually uses his SUV for S and/or U...), you could do a lot worse. $36K after rebate for a luxury-adjacent car that will drive your eyes into the back of your skull on acceleration, pretty much run for free as long as you own it, and allow you to never have to stop at a gas station again. And, thanks to the tax rebate, you're calculating resale depreciation from a price $7500 above what you paid (IOW, six or seven years down the road, I'd rather be selling what started as a $40K long range electric than what started as a $25K Corolla).
/woman in Japanese board meeting
I don’t rock crawl per se but have used the shit out of my SUV over the years. Plenty of clearance situations in snow or off road. But yes you’re pretty much on the money.
I think most people would be surprised what modern studless winter tires can do. (@PurpleThrobber: Ditch the studs. They tear up roads, flatten and become pointless quickly, and don't really give you that much more traction these days. People run studless in the Michigan UP just fine.) I've been up to the Baker ski resort sledding hill in January in a sport package RWD 3-series (4" ground clearance) with no chains. Ditto two different minivans. I rarely encounter roads I need to drive on that aren't plowed, but I guess there are times where simply ground clearance over the snow is the difference between moving or not. Those are times it's probably best to stay home anyway.
There's this misconception that you're fucked in the snow without AWD. The reality is that, although AWD is useful for getting started and getting up hills, it does fuck all for helping you stop. That's where proper tires come in. Now, proper tires and AWD? Even better. ATBSJBS, I've driven about a half million miles, and a lack of AWD has prevented me from getting where I wanted to go... once I can recall.
That's just my situation, though. I'm sure if I had a long, steep driveway, I'd feel differently about it.
I’ve been a few snow situations where clearance and locking rear differential was needed.
As a guy who takes his vehicle off road and up mountains and into backwoods areas to hunt I am intrigued by the new Defender. I know the knock on Range Rovers is they are about as reliable at a Peterman offense, but old Defenders are nails. Not sure how I feel about IFS, as I am a big believer in solid live axles for real off road shit, but I hear they get good travel, and the torque numbers are impressive as shit. I also doubt seriously it is a body on frame construction, which hurts it in my eyes, but my guess, sadly, is that this might be the last generation of Jeeps that are "traditional" off road rigs.
I know we are talking about less than 1% of the car buying public that still actually wants a rig that can legit go anywhere and do anything (not some gravel road that some Seattle fag thinks is "off roading" in his Subaru), but it still sucks that real super capable off road machines are dying out. I guess Razor's probably have something to do with that as well. You can buy a purpose built little nimble trail runner now.
Whatever, give me live axles, body on frame, beadlocks and 4:1 transfer cases or give me death!
Try more like less than 1% of 1%. Same as all those people who had to buy a BMW GS just because Ewan and Charlie made an adventure doc. It's about the image you want to project to the world.
My brother badly wants a minivan (because they're fucking rad; fight me), but his wife's dick is too small for that. She insists on a Highlander, so that's what they're getting. It will NEVER leave asphalt. Reason? "I can't be seen in a minivan."
As for the rock crawling to get to a hunting spot, my father and brother in law hunt/pick wild huckleberries/scout/etc. all the time in the central Washington Cascades. They do it in one of these:
These things are relatively cheap, fun as hell, and can go ANYWHERE. Increasingly, they're road legal in town, too, so if you're lucky with your location, you can drive them right up to the mountain.
I have a buddy with a pair of RZR sport models. He took me on a drunk white-knuckle blast through his trail system at night. Was like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. The trails are barely wider than the rig itself, and at no point were we not sideways and sliding. And he'd haul ass at these drops that I'm like, "No way we're going over that," and you don't even feel it, the suspension is so tall. I TOTALLY understand why people are ditching two wheels in droves and buying these things up. I was shocked at how much fun they are, and you can haul three more people along with you (or deer carcass, hunting equipment, etc.).
If I were a hunter, fuck the Jeep. I'd just get a flatbed trailer for my truck and an RZR.
As a guy who takes his vehicle off road and up mountains and into backwoods areas to hunt I am intrigued by the new Defender. I know the knock on Range Rovers is they are about as reliable at a Peterman offense, but old Defenders are nails. Not sure how I feel about IFS, as I am a big believer in solid live axles for real off road shit, but I hear they get good travel, and the torque numbers are impressive as shit. I also doubt seriously it is a body on frame construction, which hurts it in my eyes, but my guess, sadly, is that this might be the last generation of Jeeps that are "traditional" off road rigs.
I know we are talking about less than 1% of the car buying public that still actually wants a rig that can legit go anywhere and do anything (not some gravel road that some Seattle fag thinks is "off roading" in his Subaru), but it still sucks that real super capable off road machines are dying out. I guess Razor's probably have something to do with that as well. You can buy a purpose built little nimble trail runner now.
Whatever, give me live axles, body on frame, beadlocks and 4:1 transfer cases or give me death!
Try more like less than 1% of 1%. Same as all those people who had to buy a BMW GS just because Ewan and Charlie made an adventure doc. It's about the image you want to project to the world.
My brother badly wants a minivan (because they're fucking rad; fight me), but his wife's dick is too small for that. She insists on a Highlander, so that's what they're getting. It will NEVER leave asphalt. Reason? "I can't be seen in a minivan."
As for the rock crawling to get to a hunting spot, my father and brother in law hunt/pick wild huckleberries/scout/etc. all the time in the central Washington Cascades. They do it in one of these:
These things are relatively cheap, fun as hell, and can go ANYWHERE. Increasingly, they're road legal in town, too, so if you're lucky with your location, you can drive them right up to the mountain.
I have a buddy with a pair of RZR sport models. He took me on a drunk white-knuckle blast through his trail system at night. Was like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. The trails are barely wider than the rig itself, and at no point were we not sideways and sliding. And he'd haul ass at these drops that I'm like, "No way we're going over that," and you don't even feel it, the suspension is so tall. I TOTALLY understand why people are ditching two wheels in droves and buying these things up. I was shocked at how much fun they are, and you can haul three more people along with you (or deer carcass, hunting equipment, etc.).
If I were a hunter, fuck the Jeep. I'd just get a flatbed trailer for my truck and an RZR.
The Highlander - I call it a Kluger; it’s what I like to do - is a mini van, just with less space.
The Throbber has a CX9 - best fucking snow car EVER. AWD, throw some studs on that bad boy...like a snow leopard chasing down its prey.
Mazda's are criminally underrated. For some reason, they are the least expensive of the Japanese line-up. Toyota and Honda (their luxury analogues) carry a higher sticker and get away with it. I haven't owned one but every person I know who has loves their Mazdas and swears by then. Subaru is like that too.
Just perused Mazda's website and came away a little disappointed. Seems their fuel economy has dropped nearly 10 mpg across the board. My brother's 3 gets 40 mpg. Nothing they make gets over 31 combined now. I still think they have one of if not the best design aesthetics for any car you can buy under $60K (maybe higher), and they're dead-nuts reliable, but I commute 70 miles round trip, so I look for cars that are easy on the fuel.
I'm excited to see more ~$40K long range electrics hitting the market. Many Luddites still shit on electric, but to them I say, "Don't knock it 'till you've tried it." Quiet, torque for days, way fewer expensive parts to break or expensive maintenance to do, brakes last forever, and never having to stop at the gas station. Here in my corner of Washington, at 10 cents per kWh, it's like driving for free. In somewhere like Wenatchee, where it's under 3 cents? What idiot with a commute doesn't have one?
I used to be a "car guy." I went full fast strategy and bought a 3-Series new first thing after getting hired at my current job. It was my first new vehicle. Why did I get it? Rear wheel drive (steering input at both ends of the car), inline six (natural first and second order balance), manual transmission, back seat, under $40K. Thanks to broadening my horizons to include other expensive hobbies like home-ownership, I've stopped giving a fuck about any of that shit, and all I care about is lowest TCO. Even the cheapest, shittiest cars on the market today have creature comforts that parallel the most expensive car I've owned. For me, car purchases are a spreadsheet exercise: Purchase price minus depreciated value plus expected maintenance plus consumables over predicted length of ownership. Lowest wins. A $40K electric stacks up surprisingly well against all but the cheapest and most efficient gas car--IF it's from a manufacture that still qualifies for the tax rebate (to bring things back to my original post).
Whoever posted the picture of the Mustang Mach-E above is onto something. If you have to have a car that "looks like" an SUV (because, let's face it, only @Swaye actually uses his SUV for S and/or U...), you could do a lot worse. $36K after rebate for a luxury-adjacent car that will drive your eyes into the back of your skull on acceleration, pretty much run for free as long as you own it, and allow you to never have to stop at a gas station again. And, thanks to the tax rebate, you're calculating resale depreciation from a price $7500 above what you paid (IOW, six or seven years down the road, I'd rather be selling what started as a $40K long range electric than what started as a $25K Corolla).
/woman in Japanese board meeting
The $7500 rebate thing is mostly no longer available IIRC. There was a diminishing value based on number of electric car sales by the manufacturer.
The Throbber has a CX9 - best fucking snow car EVER. AWD, throw some studs on that bad boy...like a snow leopard chasing down its prey.
Mazda's are criminally underrated. For some reason, they are the least expensive of the Japanese line-up. Toyota and Honda (their luxury analogues) carry a higher sticker and get away with it. I haven't owned one but every person I know who has loves their Mazdas and swears by then. Subaru is like that too.
Just perused Mazda's website and came away a little disappointed. Seems their fuel economy has dropped nearly 10 mpg across the board. My brother's 3 gets 40 mpg. Nothing they make gets over 31 combined now. I still think they have one of if not the best design aesthetics for any car you can buy under $60K (maybe higher), and they're dead-nuts reliable, but I commute 70 miles round trip, so I look for cars that are easy on the fuel.
I'm excited to see more ~$40K long range electrics hitting the market. Many Luddites still shit on electric, but to them I say, "Don't knock it 'till you've tried it." Quiet, torque for days, way fewer expensive parts to break or expensive maintenance to do, brakes last forever, and never having to stop at the gas station. Here in my corner of Washington, at 10 cents per kWh, it's like driving for free. In somewhere like Wenatchee, where it's under 3 cents? What idiot with a commute doesn't have one?
I used to be a "car guy." I went full fast strategy and bought a 3-Series new first thing after getting hired at my current job. It was my first new vehicle. Why did I get it? Rear wheel drive (steering input at both ends of the car), inline six (natural first and second order balance), manual transmission, back seat, under $40K. Thanks to broadening my horizons to include other expensive hobbies like home-ownership, I've stopped giving a fuck about any of that shit, and all I care about is lowest TCO. Even the cheapest, shittiest cars on the market today have creature comforts that parallel the most expensive car I've owned. For me, car purchases are a spreadsheet exercise: Purchase price minus depreciated value plus expected maintenance plus consumables over predicted length of ownership. Lowest wins. A $40K electric stacks up surprisingly well against all but the cheapest and most efficient gas car--IF it's from a manufacture that still qualifies for the tax rebate (to bring things back to my original post).
Whoever posted the picture of the Mustang Mach-E above is onto something. If you have to have a car that "looks like" an SUV (because, let's face it, only @Swaye actually uses his SUV for S and/or U...), you could do a lot worse. $36K after rebate for a luxury-adjacent car that will drive your eyes into the back of your skull on acceleration, pretty much run for free as long as you own it, and allow you to never have to stop at a gas station again. And, thanks to the tax rebate, you're calculating resale depreciation from a price $7500 above what you paid (IOW, six or seven years down the road, I'd rather be selling what started as a $40K long range electric than what started as a $25K Corolla).
/woman in Japanese board meeting
The $7500 rebate thing is mostly no longer available IIRC. There was a diminishing value based on number of electric car sales by the manufacturer.
Meaning it is no longer available for exactly two manufacturers: Tesla and GM. Nissan and then Toyota are close but still not there. And it's not all or nothing. When a manufacturer reaches quota, the subsidy phases out over time (I think dipping in value every six months or something).
As a guy who takes his vehicle off road and up mountains and into backwoods areas to hunt I am intrigued by the new Defender. I know the knock on Range Rovers is they are about as reliable at a Peterman offense, but old Defenders are nails. Not sure how I feel about IFS, as I am a big believer in solid live axles for real off road shit, but I hear they get good travel, and the torque numbers are impressive as shit. I also doubt seriously it is a body on frame construction, which hurts it in my eyes, but my guess, sadly, is that this might be the last generation of Jeeps that are "traditional" off road rigs.
I know we are talking about less than 1% of the car buying public that still actually wants a rig that can legit go anywhere and do anything (not some gravel road that some Seattle fag thinks is "off roading" in his Subaru), but it still sucks that real super capable off road machines are dying out. I guess Razor's probably have something to do with that as well. You can buy a purpose built little nimble trail runner now.
Whatever, give me live axles, body on frame, beadlocks and 4:1 transfer cases or give me death!
Try more like less than 1% of 1%. Same as all those people who had to buy a BMW GS just because Ewan and Charlie made an adventure doc. It's about the image you want to project to the world.
My brother badly wants a minivan (because they're fucking rad; fight me), but his wife's dick is too small for that. She insists on a Highlander, so that's what they're getting. It will NEVER leave asphalt. Reason? "I can't be seen in a minivan."
As for the rock crawling to get to a hunting spot, my father and brother in law hunt/pick wild huckleberries/scout/etc. all the time in the central Washington Cascades. They do it in one of these:
These things are relatively cheap, fun as hell, and can go ANYWHERE. Increasingly, they're road legal in town, too, so if you're lucky with your location, you can drive them right up to the mountain.
I have a buddy with a pair of RZR sport models. He took me on a drunk white-knuckle blast through his trail system at night. Was like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. The trails are barely wider than the rig itself, and at no point were we not sideways and sliding. And he'd haul ass at these drops that I'm like, "No way we're going over that," and you don't even feel it, the suspension is so tall. I TOTALLY understand why people are ditching two wheels in droves and buying these things up. I was shocked at how much fun they are, and you can haul three more people along with you (or deer carcass, hunting equipment, etc.).
If I were a hunter, fuck the Jeep. I'd just get a flatbed trailer for my truck and an RZR.
The Highlander - I call it a Kluger; it’s what I like to do - is a mini van, just with less space.
And you're not wrong. Really, though, how is that different from any SUV? There is a very small sweet spot of people for whom an SUV makes sense: Need to seat more than five and tow a boat. The rest of SUV owners would be better off with either a minivan or truck if they were shopping objectively and not emotionally (marketing-manipulated).
Wife hated the idea of getting an Odyssey until she looked at how little room there is in a Pilot that costs more. "We're not a minivan family" oh yes we are, with three kids and baby/booster seats and strollers and misc. little kid shit that won't all fit in a fucking SUV unless we go with a Chevy SubHuman and I'll Keyser Soze my whole family before I buy a fucking Chevy
16 years later she wants to buy me a VW ID.4 in a year or two to replace the Odyssey which may be one of the bestest things we evar bought
I know this thread wasn't made to be taken seriously, but a real take on new Chevrolets is that they're getting fucked by a poorly crafted tax incentive. A long time ago, I saw a meme that gave me media room big belly laughs. Took me a while to find it, but here it is:
That buck in the middle there is GM. They took electrification seriously, devoted billions to R&D, and were first to market with affordable plug-ins. The problem is that they're now fucked. Being first meant they hit their tax credit quota before any other manufacturer but Tesla (totally different customer target) had even really gotten started. Now, they're having to compete with all of the feet-draggers at a $7500 disadvantage.
I'd be pissed if I were them.
Only at HH.com will you see a deer version of the “Lucky Pierre”. Lulz.
The Throbber has a CX9 - best fucking snow car EVER. AWD, throw some studs on that bad boy...like a snow leopard chasing down its prey.
Mazda's are criminally underrated. For some reason, they are the least expensive of the Japanese line-up. Toyota and Honda (their luxury analogues) carry a higher sticker and get away with it. I haven't owned one but every person I know who has loves their Mazdas and swears by then. Subaru is like that too.
Just perused Mazda's website and came away a little disappointed. Seems their fuel economy has dropped nearly 10 mpg across the board. My brother's 3 gets 40 mpg. Nothing they make gets over 31 combined now. I still think they have one of if not the best design aesthetics for any car you can buy under $60K (maybe higher), and they're dead-nuts reliable, but I commute 70 miles round trip, so I look for cars that are easy on the fuel.
I'm excited to see more ~$40K long range electrics hitting the market. Many Luddites still shit on electric, but to them I say, "Don't knock it 'till you've tried it." Quiet, torque for days, way fewer expensive parts to break or expensive maintenance to do, brakes last forever, and never having to stop at the gas station. Here in my corner of Washington, at 10 cents per kWh, it's like driving for free. In somewhere like Wenatchee, where it's under 3 cents? What idiot with a commute doesn't have one?
I used to be a "car guy." I went full fast strategy and bought a 3-Series new first thing after getting hired at my current job. It was my first new vehicle. Why did I get it? Rear wheel drive (steering input at both ends of the car), inline six (natural first and second order balance), manual transmission, back seat, under $40K. Thanks to broadening my horizons to include other expensive hobbies like home-ownership, I've stopped giving a fuck about any of that shit, and all I care about is lowest TCO. Even the cheapest, shittiest cars on the market today have creature comforts that parallel the most expensive car I've owned. For me, car purchases are a spreadsheet exercise: Purchase price minus depreciated value plus expected maintenance plus consumables over predicted length of ownership. Lowest wins. A $40K electric stacks up surprisingly well against all but the cheapest and most efficient gas car--IF it's from a manufacture that still qualifies for the tax rebate (to bring things back to my original post).
Whoever posted the picture of the Mustang Mach-E above is onto something. If you have to have a car that "looks like" an SUV (because, let's face it, only @Swaye actually uses his SUV for S and/or U...), you could do a lot worse. $36K after rebate for a luxury-adjacent car that will drive your eyes into the back of your skull on acceleration, pretty much run for free as long as you own it, and allow you to never have to stop at a gas station again. And, thanks to the tax rebate, you're calculating resale depreciation from a price $7500 above what you paid (IOW, six or seven years down the road, I'd rather be selling what started as a $40K long range electric than what started as a $25K Corolla).
/woman in Japanese board meeting
I don’t rock crawl per se but have used the shit out of my SUV over the years. Plenty of clearance situations in snow or off road. But yes you’re pretty much on the money.
I think most people would be surprised what modern studless winter tires can do. (@PurpleThrobber: Ditch the studs. They tear up roads, flatten and become pointless quickly, and don't really give you that much more traction these days. People run studless in the Michigan UP just fine.) I've been up to the Baker ski resort sledding hill in January in a sport package RWD 3-series (4" ground clearance) with no chains. Ditto two different minivans. I rarely encounter roads I need to drive on that aren't plowed, but I guess there are times where simply ground clearance over the snow is the difference between moving or not. Those are times it's probably best to stay home anyway.
There's this misconception that you're fucked in the snow without AWD. The reality is that, although AWD is useful for getting started and getting up hills, it does fuck all for helping you stop. That's where proper tires come in. Now, proper tires and AWD? Even better. ATBSJBS, I've driven about a half million miles, and a lack of AWD has prevented me from getting where I wanted to go... once I can recall.
That's just my situation, though. I'm sure if I had a long, steep driveway, I'd feel differently about it.
It's not that vans, can't be kewl. I live in a town where the Mercedes Sprinter Van is ubiquitous and a status symbol and they are practical as hell for outdoor recreating. The VW vans have a cult following too. But the product that Honda, Chrysler, Toyota, etc, put out are these vapid, blobs which have no character. Mind you, I feel the same way about most of the crossover segment as well.
The only minivan my family had which had some degree of tuffness was an AWD 1992 Chevy Astrovan. I used to drive that fucker up rough dirt roads in Utah with 6 to 10" of snow on them. I amazed I never go it stuck but it had a solid AWD system and decent clearance.
Off all the current minivans, only the Sienna has AWD and its ugly as sin.
The Throbber has a CX9 - best fucking snow car EVER. AWD, throw some studs on that bad boy...like a snow leopard chasing down its prey.
Mazda's are criminally underrated. For some reason, they are the least expensive of the Japanese line-up. Toyota and Honda (their luxury analogues) carry a higher sticker and get away with it. I haven't owned one but every person I know who has loves their Mazdas and swears by then. Subaru is like that too.
Just perused Mazda's website and came away a little disappointed. Seems their fuel economy has dropped nearly 10 mpg across the board. My brother's 3 gets 40 mpg. Nothing they make gets over 31 combined now. I still think they have one of if not the best design aesthetics for any car you can buy under $60K (maybe higher), and they're dead-nuts reliable, but I commute 70 miles round trip, so I look for cars that are easy on the fuel.
I'm excited to see more ~$40K long range electrics hitting the market. Many Luddites still shit on electric, but to them I say, "Don't knock it 'till you've tried it." Quiet, torque for days, way fewer expensive parts to break or expensive maintenance to do, brakes last forever, and never having to stop at the gas station. Here in my corner of Washington, at 10 cents per kWh, it's like driving for free. In somewhere like Wenatchee, where it's under 3 cents? What idiot with a commute doesn't have one?
I used to be a "car guy." I went full fast strategy and bought a 3-Series new first thing after getting hired at my current job. It was my first new vehicle. Why did I get it? Rear wheel drive (steering input at both ends of the car), inline six (natural first and second order balance), manual transmission, back seat, under $40K. Thanks to broadening my horizons to include other expensive hobbies like home-ownership, I've stopped giving a fuck about any of that shit, and all I care about is lowest TCO. Even the cheapest, shittiest cars on the market today have creature comforts that parallel the most expensive car I've owned. For me, car purchases are a spreadsheet exercise: Purchase price minus depreciated value plus expected maintenance plus consumables over predicted length of ownership. Lowest wins. A $40K electric stacks up surprisingly well against all but the cheapest and most efficient gas car--IF it's from a manufacture that still qualifies for the tax rebate (to bring things back to my original post).
Whoever posted the picture of the Mustang Mach-E above is onto something. If you have to have a car that "looks like" an SUV (because, let's face it, only @Swaye actually uses his SUV for S and/or U...), you could do a lot worse. $36K after rebate for a luxury-adjacent car that will drive your eyes into the back of your skull on acceleration, pretty much run for free as long as you own it, and allow you to never have to stop at a gas station again. And, thanks to the tax rebate, you're calculating resale depreciation from a price $7500 above what you paid (IOW, six or seven years down the road, I'd rather be selling what started as a $40K long range electric than what started as a $25K Corolla).
/woman in Japanese board meeting
I don’t rock crawl per se but have used the shit out of my SUV over the years. Plenty of clearance situations in snow or off road. But yes you’re pretty much on the money.
I think most people would be surprised what modern studless winter tires can do. (@PurpleThrobber: Ditch the studs. They tear up roads, flatten and become pointless quickly, and don't really give you that much more traction these days. People run studless in the Michigan UP just fine.) I've been up to the Baker ski resort sledding hill in January in a sport package RWD 3-series (4" ground clearance) with no chains. Ditto two different minivans. I rarely encounter roads I need to drive on that aren't plowed, but I guess there are times where simply ground clearance over the snow is the difference between moving or not. Those are times it's probably best to stay home anyway.
There's this misconception that you're fucked in the snow without AWD. The reality is that, although AWD is useful for getting started and getting up hills, it does fuck all for helping you stop. That's where proper tires come in. Now, proper tires and AWD? Even better. ATBSJBS, I've driven about a half million miles, and a lack of AWD has prevented me from getting where I wanted to go... once I can recall.
That's just my situation, though. I'm sure if I had a long, steep driveway, I'd feel differently about it.
It's not that vans, can't be kewl. I live in a town where the Mercedes Sprinter Van is ubiquitous and a status symbol and they are practical as hell for outdoor recreating. The VW vans have a cult following too. But the product that Honda, Chrysler, Toyota, etc, put out are these vapid, blobs which have no character. Mind you, I feel the same way about most of the crossover segment as well.
The only minivan my family had which had some degree of tuffness was an AWD 1992 Chevy Astrovan. I used to drive that fucker up rough dirt roads in Utah with 6 to 10" of snow on them. I amazed I never go it stuck but it had a solid AWD system and decent clearance.
Off all the current minivans, only the Sienna has AWD and its ugly as sin.
Chrysler Pacifica has AWD. I shouldn't really know that...
Comments
Try more like less than 1% of 1%. Same as all those people who had to buy a BMW GS just because Ewan and Charlie made an adventure doc. It's about the image you want to project to the world.
My brother badly wants a minivan (because they're fucking rad; fight me), but his wife's dick is too small for that. She insists on a Highlander, so that's what they're getting. It will NEVER leave asphalt. Reason? "I can't be seen in a minivan."
As for the rock crawling to get to a hunting spot, my father and brother in law hunt/pick wild huckleberries/scout/etc. all the time in the central Washington Cascades. They do it in one of these:
These things are relatively cheap, fun as hell, and can go ANYWHERE. Increasingly, they're road legal in town, too, so if you're lucky with your location, you can drive them right up to the mountain.
I have a buddy with a pair of RZR sport models. He took me on a drunk white-knuckle blast through his trail system at night. Was like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. The trails are barely wider than the rig itself, and at no point were we not sideways and sliding. And he'd haul ass at these drops that I'm like, "No way we're going over that," and you don't even feel it, the suspension is so tall. I TOTALLY understand why people are ditching two wheels in droves and buying these things up. I was shocked at how much fun they are, and you can haul three more people along with you (or deer carcass, hunting equipment, etc.).
If I were a hunter, fuck the Jeep. I'd just get a flatbed trailer for my truck and an RZR.
16 years later she wants to buy me a VW ID.4 in a year or two to replace the Odyssey which may be one of the bestest things we evar bought
I kid.
It's not that vans, can't be kewl. I live in a town where the Mercedes Sprinter Van is ubiquitous and a status symbol and they are practical as hell for outdoor recreating. The VW vans have a cult following too. But the product that Honda, Chrysler, Toyota, etc, put out are these vapid, blobs which have no character. Mind you, I feel the same way about most of the crossover segment as well.
The only minivan my family had which had some degree of tuffness was an AWD 1992 Chevy Astrovan. I used to drive that fucker up rough dirt roads in Utah with 6 to 10" of snow on them. I amazed I never go it stuck but it had a solid AWD system and decent clearance.
Off all the current minivans, only the Sienna has AWD and its ugly as sin.