Car companies still cant get it right

[Vaughn Simon]

Note that several
weigh less and are shorter than a new Camry or Accord

Yet not one of them matches the MPG of an Accord.

True, auto makers are busily downsizing SUVs and otherwise blurring the
distinctions between them and smaller vehicles is a desperate attempt to
maintain sales in the face of today's market .

Further, I honestly realize that there are folks who actually need the
capabilities of a big 4WD vehicle. If I had 4 kids and lived at the end of a
country road that had never seen a snowplow, I would own one. However, the
sight of morning commuter traffic on the Interstate full of bright-clean SUVs
that have never seen an unpaved road, most of them carrying a single occupant,
argues that most folks don't really fit in that category.
[/QUOTE][/QUOTE][/QUOTE]
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Will poofread for food.

 

[Eeyore]

Use your loaf man, if you have two cars already, you are already paying
insurance and costs for two.

So one car costs less, yes ?

Graham

 

[Eeyore]

Per Balanced View:

I'd call 6'2" well within the range of normal.

I'm just shy of 6' and can still be surprisingly close to the roof of a Saab
9000 which is hardly a small car.

Graham

 

[Eeyore]

Hardly, the average male ( USA) is 5 feet 9.2 inches


Never drove one, but I could wear a fedora and drive my 67 MGB with the
top up ;~)

Ah the MGB ! Drove one once, hardly fast but gave the illusion thereof.
Satisfying car though and nice looks.

Graham

 

[Eeyore]

As somebody who's shopped them recently, I can tell you that there are
SUVs, and then there are SUVs... Here's a quick and dirty chart of
specs I put together to compare a few with our previous vehicle
http://www.citlink.net/~wmbjk/carspreadsheet.xls. Note that several
weigh less and are shorter than a new Camry or Accord. People
downsizing from larger sedans or trucks will find the boxy shape of
smaller SUVs an efficient use of space. We recently switched from an
older Camry wagon to a Rav4. It's slightly shorter than our old Camry,
and 8" shorter than a current model, yet is far more useful for
hauling, and a big improvement when zooming over the occasional
grapefruit-sized rock on our mountain road. It almost makes up for its
increased weight with a more efficient powertrain, and we might even
come out ahead because it can tow 3500 lbs. Which means that we'll be
putting fewer miles than ever on our less-thrifty Astro van.

The RAV4 is hardly an SUV though. RAV = recreational active vehicle. Didn't
they make an EV one for a while too ?

Graham

 

[Eeyore]

Why should it be? It's in the UK, *exactly* per *your* specification.

You misread or misunderstood my specification. You might get a job as a turnip picker in
March which wouldn't pay for the house.

Graham

 

[Eeyore]

If the only way you can support your foolish declaration about
millionaires in the UK is to change the venue, then why not do it
properly and declare that he lives in Zimbabwe?

Try anywhere in the South East of England where the best paying jobs are.

Graham

 

[Eeyore]

Yet not one of them matches the MPG of an Accord.

True, auto makers are busily downsizing SUVs and otherwise blurring the
distinctions between them and smaller vehicles is a desperate attempt to
maintain sales in the face of today's market .

Further, I honestly realize that there are folks who actually need the
capabilities of a big 4WD vehicle. If I had 4 kids and lived at the end of a
country road that had never seen a snowplow, I would own one. However, the
sight of morning commuter traffic on the Interstate full of bright-clean SUVs
that have never seen an unpaved road, most of them carrying a single occupant,
argues that most folks don't really fit in that category.

Too damn right.

Someone here has a brand new V8 sport Range Rover. Even at 6' I had to peer up into
it to get a look at its interior.

Pure madness. And there isn't a country road in sight. One thing for sure, he can't
be doing a 'real job' in order to afford one. Probably a banker which is akin to
being a casino employee these days.

Graham

 

[Steve Ackman]

In <[email protected]>,

That depends on where & how you live.

Another NH weigh-in. We generally don't go to the
dump every week, so by the time we do go, we end up
with two bags of trash, a bag of recycle plastic, and
a box of recycle magazine/newspaper. Assorted bits
and pieces of cardboard, and broken down boxes also
go to recycle. Cans usually go once a month.
The house has an apartment, which is occupied by
our daughter who never seems to bring her garbage
over until she's got at least 100 lbs. or so. Add
it all up, and there's just no way you'd ever get all
that in a typical Saab.

When we lived in outstate MN, the dump was over 30
miles away, so we saved up the trash so we never went
more than once in a couple months (well, maybe once a
month in the heat of the summer). In winter when
everything was *really* frozen, we'd only go once in the
middle of the winter...

Right now I'm in the middle of tearing up the wall
to wall carpet from the very nice hardwood floor in the
living room. That will also need to be hauled to the
dump. Again, there's no way it would ever fit in a
Saab.

I'm between the suburbs and the
country, in an area where building codes required about an acre of
land even for small, inexpensive houses like mine, partly to keep
wells and septic systems separate.

We're at the edge of town. Only one more house
beyond us on town water and sewer. The property is
over an acre, subdivided from a farm in the 19th
century, and the house built in 1900.

I combine trips and rarely come
home without some sort of construction material in or on the SUV
because something always needs doing or fixing,

Littleton Home Depot and Lowes are ~10 miles. Add
another two miles to Littleton proper. Not only was
the house built in 1900, but we bought it as a bank
repo, and it had been empty for a couple of years,
which probably tells you something about its state of
repair when we bought it. I can't begin to even
estimate how often we've "hauled" stuff.

plus I have this
metalworking 'hobby' that can only be satisfied by large chunks of
scrap steel to cut up and weld.

12"x36" lathe in the basement that I have far too
few excuses/time to use, and a welder in the garage.

Everyone has room to park half a dozen
pickup trucks, a boat and their tractor. And that's the front yard,
don't even look out back.

Driveway: 30' RV trailer (caravan for the Brits),
18' Ram Van to tow it, and the diesel Liberty (medium/
small SUV for the Brits). Daughter's car in the two
bay carport.
Yes, 4-wheel-drive is a often a necessity in the
White Mountains, especially as my wife drives to
Waterbury VT over the Green Mountains three times a
week. We live up a hill, 150' above the Ammonusuc
River. In this situation, if you didn't have 4WD,
you'd sure wish you did.

And yeah, the driveway is ~100' so we could easily
park another 4 or 5 cars if necessary.

 

[Balanced View]

In <[email protected]>,


Another NH weigh-in. We generally don't go to the
dump every week, so by the time we do go, we end up
with two bags of trash, a bag of recycle plastic, and
a box of recycle magazine/newspaper. Assorted bits
and pieces of cardboard, and broken down boxes also
go to recycle. Cans usually go once a month.
The house has an apartment, which is occupied by
our daughter who never seems to bring her garbage
over until she's got at least 100 lbs. or so. Add
it all up, and there's just no way you'd ever get all
that in a typical Saab.

I had a half ton I kept just for that purpose that just sat in the drive
most of the time once I got
the Saturn and cost a fortune to drive when I did take it out. I sold it
and bought a 4x8
utility trailer, the difference between 15 mpg and 36 mpg is very
noticeable at the end
of the month ;~)

 

[Balanced View]

4 wheel traction is very useful in the cities, Nashua, Manchester and
Concord, after snow and ice storms. They don't plow nearly as well as
the smaller towns, partly because they raise the blades to clear
manhole covers. They can't dump snow in the river any more and have
lost other open space to development so they may leave up to half a
foot of slush on the streets. The State claims it makes the pavement
less slippery overall than a thin layer of ice and sometimes does that
on the Interstates.

When I took night classes in Boston I used 4WD to climb up onto snow-
filled parking spaces which were the only ones open.

Then there are the no-salt areas where plants are more important than
people and only the snowbanks keep drivers from sliding into the
swamp. Those probably push buyers into large 'safe' SUVs as much as
anything. A large fraction of those SUV drivers are women who clearly
never learned how to drive on slippery roads. The guys who drive fast
on them have BMWs or Audis and know how to drift around a corner,
which most 4WD does poorly. I don't recommend the practice but I
learned in the 1970's when the back roads were impassable for rear
wheel drive for a few hours after a storm and the snowmobiles, dirt
bikes and front wheel drives would go out and play.

Sometimes a few places are bad enough that 4WD isn't enough. I slid a
few times and then put Michelin Arctic Alpins on the CRV. They have
amazing straight-line traction on ice but don't corner too well and
float on deep slush. They stop on ice as well as on packed snow, thus
I don't realize it's slippery, get out and fall.

Yes, an SUV or at least 4WD is very useful around here even if the
only time you leave the pavement is when you are 2" above it on a
layer of ice. SAABs and Subarus were very common when only hard-riding
pickups had 4WD. I looked hard at the CRV's predecessor, the 1980's
Civic wagon, but it needed more development badly.

Jim Wilkins

I live in the snow belt along Lake Ontario,where it is not uncommon to
get two feet of snow overnight and I've
have never been stuck with just front wheel drive. In many cases 4wd
just gives people a false sense of
security and gets them stuck twice as deep ;~) I've lost track of how
many times I've seen suv's in ditches on the
way home on roads that only had a foot of snow on them....

 

[[email protected]]

Yet not one of them matches the MPG of an Accord.

True for the lightest '08 Accord, which weights 3250lbs and gets 21
city/30 highway mpg ('08 EPA method). But the V-6 manual version
weighs more like 3500 and gets 17/25, which isn't very impressive, and
is less than several small SUVs. Which means that in terms of judging
sedans versus small SUVs, one can't identify the most efficient
without knowing the exact model and equipment. About all one can say
is that small SUVs tend to get a little less mpg than otherwise
similar sedans, which isn't too surprising considering that small
SUVs are mostly boxier versions of cars. In some markets dealers don't
even stock the 4WD variants.

True, auto makers are busily downsizing SUVs and otherwise blurring the
distinctions between them and smaller vehicles is a desperate attempt to
maintain sales in the face of today's market .

A lot of the small SUVs have been around for more than a decade. And
current models are actually *larger* than those from just a few years
ago. I did notice when shopping that some markets trend toward the 4
cylinder versions, but in the Rav4's case, the 6 gets better highway
mileage.

Further, I honestly realize that there are folks who actually need the
capabilities of a big 4WD vehicle. If I had 4 kids and lived at the end of a
country road that had never seen a snowplow, I would own one.

I wouldn't. My most recent cars when I lived in serious snow country:
FWD Accord and later a 626, plus an old Land Cruiser with a plow.
Anyway, very few people need large vehicles of any kind. Most every
small vehicle can carry 5 passengers, and lots of them have sufficient
ground clearance and traction for snow. I find that a whole lot of
people who remember one time when a 3 ton vehicle was truly necessary
use that as an excuse to drive one every time they need to pick up a
pack of Marlboros.

However, the
sight of morning commuter traffic on the Interstate full of bright-clean SUVs
that have never seen an unpaved road, most of them carrying a single occupant,
argues that most folks don't really fit in that category.

Exactly right. I put 100k miles on my old Camry, about 30% of it
driving our dirt roads. So they're not difficult roads. And yet I can
think of a couple of cases where visitors brought something other than
their shiny 4X4, because they didn't want to get it dusty. As well,
not long ago I gave directions to some folks in a Ford Expedition or
some such. They were lost on a 30 mile long dirt road, and complained
bitterly about how it was the worst thing they'd ever seen. Everybody
else drives it at about 60 mph, using anything from motorcycles to
semis.

Wayne

 

[[email protected]]

You misread or misunderstood my specification.

Baloney. The whole St.Albans thing was just your attempt to weasel out
of a BS declaration, which in turn was made to support your silly
argument that owning 2 cars is difficult or impossible. You're wasting
your time projecting your limitations onto others anyway, since few of
them are as helpless.

Wayne

 

[Vaughn Simon]

4 wheel traction is very useful in the cities, Nashua, Manchester and
Concord, after snow and ice storms.

I live, and learned to drive in, south Florida, so I certainly can't claim
any special expertise in snow driving. My most recent snow driving experience
involved a Denver blizzard that paralyzed the city. The first thing that we
found is that, driven conservatively (if inexpertly), our rental FWD Neon did
just fine. The second thing we noticed is that most of the stuck and obviously
abandoned vehicles we saw beside the road were SUVs.

Our conclusion; SUVs give inexperienced drivers a false sense of security in
bad conditions.
[/QUOTE][/QUOTE][/QUOTE]
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your message. Google refuses to control the flood of spam messages originating
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need is access to an NNTP server (AKA "news server") and a news reader program.
You probably already have a news reader program in your computer (Hint: Outlook
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http://news.aioe.org/ for free and/or http://www.teranews.com/ for a one-time
$3.95 setup fee.
Will poofread for food.

 

[RW Salnick]

Vaughn Simon brought forth on stone tablets:

I live, and learned to drive in, south Florida, so I certainly can't claim
any special expertise in snow driving. My most recent snow driving experience
involved a Denver blizzard that paralyzed the city. The first thing that we
found is that, driven conservatively (if inexpertly), our rental FWD Neon did
just fine. The second thing we noticed is that most of the stuck and obviously
abandoned vehicles we saw beside the road were SUVs.

Our conclusion; SUVs give inexperienced drivers a false sense of security in
bad conditions.

Having moved from severe snow country to Seattle, I can absolutely
concur with you. I would amplify by adding that those with 4WD (or the
marketing-driven alternative names for same) do not seem to learn that
although 4WD gives more "go" traction, it doesn't help much at all with
"stop" traction. Thus, the inexperienced drivers with 4WD vehicles all
drive way too fast.

bob

 

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per Balanced View:

I live in the snow belt along Lake Ontario,where it is not uncommon to
get two feet of snow overnight and I've
have never been stuck with just front wheel drive. In many cases 4wd
just gives people a false sense of
security and gets them stuck twice as deep ;~) I've lost track of how
many times I've seen suv's in ditches on the
way home on roads that only had a foot of snow on them....

I don't live in an area with that much snow, but I've done my
share of driving in the Pocono mountains in 2+ feet of snow.

Never got stuck once with 2wd and posi-traction. Had to put the
chains on a couple of times, but still never got stuck.

Having said that, I find 4wd in the winter around Philadelphia PA
makes driving a *lot* less stressful.

Used to be I'd get stuck behind some guy who was obviously doing
his best to get stuck (gunning it on hills, coming to a dead stop
in ruts, stopping on the flat when he could have stopped on a
downhill.... and so-forth) and I'd be all knotted up waiting for
myself to get stuck too when he led both of us into some
boneheaded situation.

Now I'm completely relaxed. Just wait for him to get stuck.
Come to a stop. Drop it in 4wd, smile, and ease around the guy.

Only happens rarely, but it's quite nice when it does.... -)

 

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per Vaughn Simon:

Our conclusion; SUVs give inexperienced drivers a false sense of security in
bad conditions.

I'd concur.... and add that 4wd, adding some 500+ pounds to the
vehicles weight, has got to compromise stopping and cornering.

 

[Eeyore]

Another NH weigh-in. We generally don't go to the
dump every week

Don't you have contractors with specialist vehicles to collect your trash ? We do
in the UK.

Graham

 

[Vaughn Simon]

True for the lightest '08 Accord, which weights 3250lbs and gets 21
city/30 highway mpg ('08 EPA method). But the V-6 manual version
weighs more like 3500 and gets 17/25,...

My reference was to the base Accord.

I know that Honda sells plenty of the V-6 Accords, but I can't understand why
anyone would want to spend MORE money for the same car just to get LESS MPG. I
guess it's just me.

Vaughn

 

[[email protected]]

My reference was to the base Accord.

I know that Honda sells plenty of the V-6 Accords, but I can't understand why
anyone would want to spend MORE money for the same car just to get LESS MPG. I
guess it's just me.

I started out ignoring the 6's, but it was an easy decision to pay
extra for one in the Rav4. 1mpg better highway, 3500lbs towing, 5
speed transmission, and 100 extra horsepower on tap for
short-opportunity passing on hilly 2-lanes (most of my pavement
driving). Way more fun to drive as well, particularly for anyone who
enjoys surprising the phony-rear-wing crowd. Tech article here.
http://www.themotorreport.com.au/2446/toyota-release-201kw-rav4-v6/

Wayne