Car lovers?

For various lockdown-related reasons, my Porsche 911 had to go last year. (I still miss it, but it was absolutely the right decision.) But after 12 months as a pedestrian, my 'new' car arrives on Friday.

BMW 440i coupe. I flirted briefly with the idea of buying an M4, but then common sense intervened - a MY2018 440i is nearly half the price of an M4 of the same age, and much cheaper to insure. The specification is very good. And the performance isn't bad either.

It's not as pretty as the Porsche. I can't see myself turning back to look at it after I've parked it. But I suppose it's handsome, in a bland/generic way.

I think this will be my car for many years or until I can go electric.

Love this video. Have owned one since new:'

I love this idea of the truck that can power your house for several days. Considering the weather down here, that would have been handy any b number of times!

Only thing is, I don't want a pick-up (I know, take my Texan card). A midsize SUV with this would be hard to say no to.

Drove my Tacoma on HWY 101 from Newport, OR down to Eureka, CA and back this week to help out at a store down there. A drive doesn't get more beautiful than that. Did the optional redwoods parkway both ways. Took a 30 minute nap parked by the side of the road on the way back this afternoon, and it was the most rejuvenating nap I've ever had.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/VyWP6zj.jpeg)

Great little vehicle. Stupid how Tacomas retain value. That whole market is bizarre...

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Great little vehicle. Stupid how Tacomas retain value. That whole market is bizarre...

Amen. As much as I hate the idea of being a Truck Person, we need one to pull our camper. Kit's 2015 Explorer Sport can officially pull it numbers-wise, but it's not a comfortable pull in any kind of wind or weather.

I've been searching for a truck for months and keep nope-ing out because of the stupidness of truck pricing right now. Our hope is an electric truck in about 7-10 years will have the range to pull a 5000# trailer 250+ miles before needing a charge. We need something to hold us over until then, though.

The current mental fight is between picking up one of these:
A) a 1-year used F-150 Hybrid next year, which would become my daily driver
B) a used older F-150 for less than $20k, which would be an extra vehicle and I'd keep my 2011 Challenger R/T

The thing I care about most at the moment is resale value vs. my cost. "B" is probably where we'll end up since this isn't a "keep forever" vehicle, but I'd have to up that number to $25k -$30K to get one now that has the year and mileage that I will accept. I'm really banking on the prices going back to semi-normal by mid next year. I've been watching the local places for the last few months and their used truck inventories have quadrupled and their prices are going down. They're starting to take a bath on the ones they bought at auction and can't get rid of for what they paid for them.

Until any of these EVs in the video below hit the road, they're vapor-ware to me, but the video was informative on at least what automakers are striving for right now. If I could get an EV Hummer or F-150 with the towing and range promises of the top end Cyber Truck, I'd be OK with dropping $75K on one.

-BEP

I still wonder how long the range will be on electric vehicles and towing. I assume enough batteries solve everything, but near term the range might be tough. See this video:

Don't think I've seen what Ford has claimed (if they have).

Thanks for the video share, MB. I need that guy to post a spreadsheet so I can plug in numbers (because I'm lazy). No sane person is going to pull 14k lbs with a Cybertruck or 13k lbs with an F-150. I'd like to see those 2 vehicles with a 5k or 6k trailer + normal cargo.

I should show the video to @Zair88. He'd spreadsheet it out in 2 minutes.

Edit: Ask and ye shall somewhat receive.
This guy upped the battery capacity a little and changed the weight to 10k lbs, which is still pretty high. Time marks in the description of the video.

-BEP

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Drove my Tacoma on HWY 101 from Newport, OR down to Eureka, CA and back this week to help out at a store down there. A drive doesn't get more beautiful than that.

That's one of the dream drives for me. My girlfriend and I have a vacation bumping around in our heads where we take the California Zephyr train from Chicago to San Francisco and then drive a car up the 101 all the way into Oregon over the course of a couple weeks. It keeps getting postponed for some reason. From 2021 to '22, now looking more like '23. We hope. Also, with the availability of rental cars lately, could bump into 2025 even. Haha everything is falling apart!

skeletonframes wrote:
tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Drove my Tacoma on HWY 101 from Newport, OR down to Eureka, CA and back this week to help out at a store down there. A drive doesn't get more beautiful than that.

That's one of the dream drives for me. My girlfriend and I have a vacation bumping around in our heads where we take the California Zephyr train from Chicago to San Francisco and then drive a car up the 101 all the way into Oregon over the course of a couple weeks. It keeps getting postponed for some reason. From 2021 to '22, now looking more like '23. We hope. Also, with the availability of rental cars lately, could bump into 2025 even. Haha everything is falling apart!

I rode that route on my motorcycle many times. I liked to take CA1 between San Francisco and Leggett, though that adds many hours to the journey. The Benbow Inn is my favorite hotel in that part of the world. The Lost Coast road (Mattole Road between Ferndale and Weott) is also a gorgeous and little traveled route.

The coastal drive on Hwy 1 From San Francisco all the way to Oregon is great. But so is the drive up Oregon's coast if you have the time to continue. From SF to to Washington along Hwy 1 is about a 17-18 hr drive so if you have a few days to a week you can see some beautiful scenery along the coast.

My friend (who we will be staying with for a couple days in San Francisco) suggested we drive all the way up into Washington. Said that one of the National Parks up there is especially beautiful. We'll have about 7 days for the drive from San Francisco, so it's definitely do-able. Just have to wait for the auto industry to right itself before we even think about detailed plans. I am a Costco member, and even rental cars through them are ridiculous right now.

skeletonframes wrote:

My friend (who we will be staying with for a couple days in San Francisco) suggested we drive all the way up into Washington. Said that one of the National Parks up there is especially beautiful. We'll have about 7 days for the drive from San Francisco, so it's definitely do-able. Just have to wait for the auto industry to right itself before we even think about detailed plans. I am a Costco member, and even rental cars through them are ridiculous right now.

I'm assuming they're talking about Mount Rainier National Park? Cos the other two (Olympic National Park and North Cascades National Park) are less "wow" and more "here is a large area of mostly untamed forests", which is great and all, but lacks the singular wow factor of a big-ass mountain in the middle of it.

Don't get me wrong, Olympic and North Cascades are great, and there's plenty of spectacular nature to be found there, but they don't have the same tourist magnetism.

Okay, I have a serious car issue I'm dealing with.

Two weeks ago, my wife's minivan got caught in a flash flood and it stalled and ultimately ruined the engine. Never try starting a car that has been flooded; have it towed and inspected by a mechanic first, apparently. No water entered the cabin as far as we know.

Our insurance has approved just under $14k for repairs, which will give us a used, rebuilt engine, and various other repairs to get it roadworthy again.

I'm wondering if we should just take that money and put it towards a replacement car for her. She was already thinking that the minivan phase was over as our kids are bigger now (12 and 9) and that she'd like to go back to an SUV. An SUV would certainly be less likely to flood, and our city and particularly our neighborhood are notorious for flooding issues.

We could repair the car and then see how much longer she can stand driving it, but I'm not certain what the market for a once-flooded car will be when it comes time to sell; I frankly wonder if we'd get less than $14k at that point. I honestly don't even know if dealers or places like Carmax will touch a car like that.

I also assume - and please chime in if you know anything about this - that we could sell her messed up, unrepaired minivan right now for some small amount of money that we could add to that $14k and put towards a new SUV.

Any thoughts, or helpful tips? Thanks!

Yeah, hydrolocking an engine is bad. Piston rods break if you try to run it, etc. Another tip from my off roading days in my old Jeep, you can often be under water past the exhaust, just don't shut the engine off or you won't start it again due to back pressure from the water in the pipes So if it's running, don't shut it off if possible. Try to get it pulled out still running.

I suspect that $14K is more than just a rebuilt engine. Did the estimate include a bunch of electronics as well? Engine computers, etc?

Flood cars are always potential trouble down the road. Stuff that seems fine today may be corroded two months from now and leave you stranded.

Another question, what's your carfax going to look like? Are they marking it as flood damaged title? Salvage, etc? that will hurt the value when you go to get rid of it later if they do. Something to ask about.

Normal times I'd probably take the money and run, or see if the insurance company would total it and buy it from me. But with the used car market being as crazy as it is, it's a hard call and it depends on what the value is vs the estimate, etc.

Yeah my wife did a little looking and we found out that cars are in short supply right now thanks to COVID. We weren't expecting to buy one anytime soon. I'm planning to drive my Jeep GC longer than any car I've owned for years because it's a great vehicle and has everything I need.

So now we're looking at 14k bird in the hand vs complete unknown in the future, PLUS cars may go back down in price in the future (which could cut both ways, but I imagine would be mostly helpful to our situation).

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Yeah my wife did a little looking and we found out that cars are in short supply right now thanks to COVID. We weren't expecting to buy one anytime soon. I'm planning to drive my Jeep GC longer than any car I've owned for years because it's a great vehicle and has everything I need.

So now we're looking at 14k bird in the hand vs complete unknown in the future, PLUS cars may go back down in price in the future (which could cut both ways, but I imagine would be mostly helpful to our situation).

I worked for Carmax for a little while and they may buy your car, even if you don't purchase one from them, but they will not resell it on any of their lots and will most likely sell it again in an auto auction. I would highly recommend putting that money over to something else, as the resell is likely going to be pretty low even with $14K in repairs/updates.

An example of a Mazda CX5 that is just under 100K miles for $17K: https://www.carmax.com/car/21307664
at a Carmax on Gulf Freeway on the way to Galveston. Carmax does offer optional MaxCare for up to 150K miles and you can choose how much coverage you want, according to your budget (I would recommend this, for piece of mind).

Anyone here familiar with the Subaru Ascent? My wife is looking at them to replace the aforementioned minivan.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Anyone here familiar with the Subaru Ascent? My wife is looking at them to replace the aforementioned minivan.

Just bought a new (2021) one in August, straight from factory. New car market is pretty crazy too with chip shortage.

That was an upgrade from the Mazda CX-5. We just assumed we'd go to the CX-9 for more room for the kids, but 1, the trunk space is tiny, and 2, they didn't have any in stock with the features we wanted. We ended up at the same local group of dealership, just their Subaru place. They brought us a new one for an overnight test drive, and we loved it. Have taken it back and forth from the beach (3.5 hours) and Nashville ( 7 hours) already and it's been great on the road trips. A little extra room than the CX-9. Air vents in the ceilings, which was something we were looking for as my oldest daughter got car sick back in May on the drive to my parents' house. But better airflow kept her feeling great on both trips so far. Excellent safety ratings. All-wheel drive is nice I guess? I'm not planning to off-road.

We've pretty much left the 3rd row folded down for now since it's just the 4 of us, and no one is visiting much these days. So extreme trunk space is convenient for groceries, strollers, etc.

Met my realtor for lunch a couple weeks ago to discuss some house stuff, and he's driving a 2020 Ascent now too. Haha, they are everywhere. Seemed like the perfect family SUV for us. I recommend you test drive one for sure. They are nice.

The Ascent has (had? haven't check since 2019) 19 cup holders. No idea why.

Having gone from a Subaru Impreza with AWD to a Honda Odyssey with only front wheel drive, the difference is astounding even on the road as when I give it even a tad more than a moderate amount of gas while trying to turn from a stop, there's noise from the tires. I even had issues while driving in heavy rain if the transmission decided to downshift, I would start to lose traction. Not exactly something you want happening at 55+. I was able to quickly regain traction, though.

Wife wants me back in something more practical and the market has me motivated (selling my car for 6k more than I bought it for last fall).

Anyone have thoughts on a Golf R? Earlier one probably, 2015-17 or so.

If it was my money I'd pick the Focus RS over the Golf R. But it's really easy to spend other peoples money.

The Focus RS isn’t right for me, for three reasons.

Most importantly the price for the ones available isn’t really comparable for me. I can have a 2015 Golf R for $30k, with 38k miles, vs a 2017 Focus RS for $34k and 71k miles. Most of the other Fords are pushing $40k.

Second, I believe Focus RS is manual only, or at least the ones available to me. I do miss a manual sometimes but my wife doesn’t like them, and now that I’m a dad it is a lot to row with a toddler in the car. It’s also less fun in crowded New England than it was in North Carolina.

Lastly, I generally just don’t find Ford palatable. My high school friend and later roommate had a couple Mustangs and I just can’t shake the negative association. The subtler styling on the VW vs. the Ford is also a plus as I’m getting closer to 40.

The Golf GTI / R of those years are great cars. Four door version right? Only thing I can think of is check if there is any extra maintenance or known problems with the R vs the GTI because of the different engine / drivetrain / etc. Also how stiff the ride is vs the GTI.

Yeah it would be the 4 door. Funnily enough it would have more space and cargo than my wife’s GLC. Nothing jumps out about reliability from what I’ve read.

Regarding stiffness, you see people in reviews and the like say that the dynamic chassis control modes help - comfort vs sport, etc. I had that on my 2016 Jaguar and the only difference I really noticed was throttle response. Maybe I’m just not a sophisticated enough driver to tell.

I’m gonna try and go drive one on Monday.

Nice, good luck!

On the Mk7 golf platform, I can tell you that the stock US market side mirrors have huge blind spots. Fortunately, the fix is really easy; get imported genuine VW aspherical mirrors. I got a set made by/for VW China that I installed on my GSW along with my power folding mirrors from there. I think the R might already have power folding mirrors, and that is more a fun/cool thing than a necessity, but I wouldn't want to drive a Mk7 without the aspherical mirrors. The difference is enormous.

With any VW/VAG vehicle, getting a VCSD scan done by someone who knows what they are doing is not a bad idea. You can get a lot more info than a regular OBD2 scan. Also, just fun to be able to mess around with settings and customization.

Blind_Evil wrote:

Wife wants me back in something more practical and the market has me motivated (selling my car for 6k more than I bought it for last fall).

Anyone have thoughts on a Golf R? Earlier one probably, 2015-17 or so.

I love the Golf R. Almost wish I'd have gotten one or an S3 instead of my S4. Just like the smaller sized car.

What about a CTS Sport Wagon?

https://www.cargurus.com/Cars/link/3...

I’ve owned two CTS. Love them but I want something new.

ElectricPi wrote:

On the Mk7 golf platform, I can tell you that the stock US market side mirrors have huge blind spots. Fortunately, the fix is really easy; get imported genuine VW aspherical mirrors. I got a set made by/for VW China that I installed on my GSW along with my power folding mirrors from there. I think the R might already have power folding mirrors, and that is more a fun/cool thing than a necessity, but I wouldn't want to drive a Mk7 without the aspherical mirrors. The difference is enormous.

With any VW/VAG vehicle, getting a VCSD scan done by someone who knows what they are doing is not a bad idea. You can get a lot more info than a regular OBD2 scan. Also, just fun to be able to mess around with settings and customization.

Thanks for the tip. These?: https://www.shopdap.com/european-bli...