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However, if you get a 3.0 model with just RWD, curb weight's down to 3171 pounds, and GVWR is 4600. That might be a misprint though, as I'm seeing a base regular cab model with a 2.3 coming in at 3012 pounds. I'd think that the extended cab and V-6 would ad more than 159 pounds!
If you want to get real stripper on a Tacoma, there's a model wit ha 2.7 4-cyl, regular cab, regular bed, that's 3180 pounds and has a GVWR of 4550 pounds.
Still, these are a far cry from stuff like the '72 Chevy LUV that my grandparents had as a spare vehicle! It had a camper shell on it, and I remember Granddad wanted to take it off to save weight, but Grandmom tried to get him to leave it on because she thought it made the truck look bigger!
You are absolutely correct in that the person that wanted a compact truck has been abandoned. And this is the second failure for Subaru on introducing a compact truck.
I thought the BRAT was kinda successful for awhile as a niche vehicle? Ultimately it went away, but I thought it had a good, solid run.
I think the Subaru Baja was doomed from the start though. It just tried to be too many things at once, and ended up not being very good at any of them. And IIRC, it was pretty expensive as well. I'm sure there were a few buyers out there who found the Baja's package of features and utility appealing, but just not enough to keep it viable.
My grandparents had a D50, too, which replaced their LUV in 1980. Back then gas was scarce, and rumors of $3.00 per gallon gas were looming on the horizon (it would just take 25 years to get there!). Their other two vehicles were a 1972 Impala with a 350 and a 1976 GMC crew cab 3/4 ton truck that was about 21 feet long. So in their case, I guess a little runabout made sense. My grandparents wanted to get a stick, but I think you could only get the stick with bucket seats, and they wanted a bench, like the LUV had.
I had a friend in HS who co-owned one with his brother. They had ripped out the OEM seats and installed Recaros with 5-point harnesses. We drove it up to Laguna Seca back in the mid 80's to check out the IMSA races up there. Was a long, long ride up and back in one day. We lived just north of LA at the time.
I'm not so sure much has changed. Whenever I defrost the windows in my 1992 Mazda 323, the passenger side defrosts first. Why? Probably because the car was never properly adapted to left hand side, North American driving.
In the new crops of subcompacts, I look at the Fit and I see indications that Honda has not properly redesigned the car for left hand side drivers. For example, to me there seems to be a lack of space for the left foot in the driver’s foot well. Maybe this is deliberate, but the passenger side's foot well sure feels spacious!
Many of these subcompacts are originally designed for other markets and right hand side drivers. They are also made outside North America in factories producing mainly right hand side versions of the car. To me, these cars still don’t seem to be properly tailored to North American driving.
There seems to be more room for feet and for pedals on the right side of the car.
I first noticed it when I bought a 1969 Dart GT with bucket seats and a column shift. The driveshaft and transmission hump were shifted over about an inch off center from the driver's side. The main reason it was so noticeable was because you could look down between the bucket seats and tell that the passenger seat was closer. With a bench seat though, or if there had been a center console filling that space, it wouldn't have been as noticeable.
I've also seen cars where the floor on the passenger side is shallower, because in the 70's they had to make room for the catalytic converter, and it was on that side up under there. I think on dual exhaust cars, they just let the driver's side converter hang down more and take its chances.
I've never noticed the passenger side being noticeably different in FWD cars, though, although with my Intrepid, the passenger side feels a bit shallower somehow. I never measured it or got under the car to look at it to see if it really is, though.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
At one time there was this vast universe of difference when you jumped from a subcompact into a "regular" car, just like there was once this vast universe of difference between a "sports car" and a "regular car" (can you imagine going from a 1965 Alfa Romeo to a 1965 Impala???).
Now all those lines are blurred. A modern subcompact can perform just as well as 95% of the cars out there in 95% of the situations.
Aside from the heavy feeling of a luxury car, or a few radical sports car, and a few decibels less interior noise, I really don't feel any difference when I jump from one modern passenger car or small pickup to another. They are remarkably uniform in experience these days.
Corolla, Ranger, Eclipse, Solara, Civic, Focus, Mazda3, Subaru....it's all the same most of the time.
Modern cars are all merging to uniformity of experience except for the top 'o the line cars. It seems to parallel the trend in "fashion jeans" and other "once-luxury, now mass-consumed" items.
This is mainly an issue with FWD cars though, I've noticed. RWD cars usually have the front wheels far enough ahead that they don't intrude into the passenger compartment, so the floor/lower part of the firewall area is flat. I would not benefit from a dead pedal with any of the RWD cars I've ever owned, although a shorter driver might, as the firewall might be too far away to rest your foot on.
If I was to put my left foot under the brake pedal of my Intrepid, I could stretch out pretty nicely, but that's not exactly a safe way to drive! :surprise:
I may just be used to the positioning of the pedals in my 1992 Mazda 323. The pedals are forward of the lift and the lift itself seems to be located more deeply in the foot well.
I also sat in the Toyota Yaris hatchback and thought the pedals were somewhat recessed, like the Fit. However, resting my left foot on the lift was a bit more comfortable.
I think part of the problem with the Fit is that lift is not shaped, so when you rest your foot on it, the angle is wrong. The fabric ‘bump’ seemed to be sticking out more at the top than at the bottom, so the angle works against the natural positioning of the foot. I felt that my foot was being forced into an 80-degree angle, instead of a 100-degree angle (if I remember my high school geometry correctly!).
Anyway, that was my impression. :confuse:
Aside from the heavy feeling of a luxury car, or a few radical sports car, and a few decibels less interior noise, I really don't feel any difference when I jump from one modern passenger car or small pickup to another. They are remarkably uniform in experience these days.
Corolla, Ranger, Eclipse, Solara, Civic, Focus, Mazda3, Subaru....it's all the same most of the time.
Very true, but that is because most of the old subcompacts got bigger and heavier and faster, which means that they are quieter, more comfortable and easier to live with on a day-to-day basis.
Several posters have decried that very trend.
Last night I was behind a 1978-79 Chevrolet Chevette four-door sedan at a red light. What struck me was how diminutive that car looked today. It was short, narrow and low (but despite a height lower than most modern sedans, it somehow came across as "spindly" in its basic proportions). It seemed like a Matchbox car in traffic - even compared to a Civic or Mazda3.
It struck me that my 1977 Honda Civic was about the same size (if anything, probably smaller). That car was great at the time, but I would not buy anything that small today. I would, however, consider a new 2006 Civic sedan.
I seriously doubt that Honda would be selling 300,000+ Civics today if it had not reguarly enlarged the car for greater room, comfort and safety.
I was in St. Louis last year with my friend who was driving his 1992 Camry. He parked it between a new Camry and a new Corolla. The 2006 Corolla was as large as the 1992 Camry.
On the Chevette, the car was small, but teh amount of cargo that you could cram in the vehicle and still see out the hatch was unbelievable.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
$12.5k for starters is a bargain, but in their own commercial it says $17.3k as tested, yikes! Price creeps up a bit too quickly.
-juice
that is until your heating bill shows up. :P
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
As a general trend, cars are getting higher. Our old '93 Civic (51.7") is 5" shorter than the new one (56.5") which is considered "sleek". The '06 Ford 500 (74.5") is over a foot higher than the '86 Taurus (54.1"). Even sedans are turning into SUVs.
Well, in a nutshell, if you don't need the extra space then it's going to be useless to you. But if you have a need for it, then it's essential.
Well, I was thinking in terms of space in general, not just load space. The way I see it, a slow car that I can fit comfortably in is more useful than a faster car that I'm not comfortable in.
We chose the Civic over our "big" car because the adjustable rear seat was more comfortable for our daughter.
And pure HP numbers are overrated anyway. My big car is a Ford Freestyle and the reviews always state that it's underpowered, but after driving it for almost 2 years and over 40K miles it's never felt underpowered for my needs. Granted I wasn't carrying seven 200lb adults and towing a boat up in the Rocky mountains, but I've had 7 people in the car and luggage doing normal driving and situations where I lacked power never came up.
If I had a smaller car I we would've had to do ship a bunch of stuff down separate, like what they did with their luggage, Little Ricky, and Mother MacGillicuddy! :P
The Fit is an undeniably useful layout, if it were only closer to the Civic's 1950lbm, I'd have few gripes.
I think I would've had problems stuffing this much luggage into the cargo area of just about any car, short of a good-sized station wagon, SUV, or minivan. Part of the problem is not just the actual cargo volume, but the shape of the cargo area and the shape of the cargo going into it. If we were talking about stuff that's easily deformed like pillows, sleeping bags, etc, then I'd have no problem. I think the biggest problem with my Intrepid was the shape of the trunk opening. That seems to be a problem with many modern cars today, especially as you get these sleeker rooflines where much of the trunk space is underneath the rear window and package shelf. And the designs with the struts that hold the trunk open seem to make for a smaller trunk opening, whereas those old torsion bars would just rob you of trunk space (and smash your luggage if improperly placed)
The FIT does seem to have a roomy cargo area, but I have a feeling that my Florida trip would have easily filled this to capacity
This cooler I had was a big, bulky old fashioned metal thing, too. With both parts of the back seat up, it would take up the majority of the floor space of that FIT. And I doubt if I would've been able to lay down and sleep in the back seat of a FIT!
Also, I end up hating my uncle's '03 Corolla after about 10 minutes of driving it, so unless the FIT is orders of magnitude ahead of that, I doubt if I'd be able to handle it for hours at a time.
Now years before this trip, when I was married, we went on our honeymoon from Maryland to Washington State in a 1988 LeBaron turbo coupe. We just had the cooler in the back seat. We also had a puppy, who grew too damn fast. I swear, in the 2 1/2 weeks we were out there he grew enough to take up most of that back seat! That was a L-O-N-G trip, too. Seems like we ended up having to stop about every 60-90 minutes because either the wife or the puppy had to pee!
I used to work with a guy who has one of those Honda Civic wagons, the style with the raised roof, which I think was an '88-91 model. That thing was probbaly the spiritual ancestor of the FIT. I rode in it a couple times, and it really shocked me how flimsy it was. You could feel the body/chassis flexing as it went down the road, the cowl/hood shake was a bit disconcerting, and the thing quivered like a clapped-out mid-70's 4-door hardtop when you closed the doors!
Sure, it might have been lightweight, but I don't think the Jell-O body would be tolerable by today's standards. No doubt that much of the additional weight went into stiffening the structure.
I wonder if newer Hondas use thicker sheetmetal these days? I've heard some rumors that Honda sheetmetal tends to be thinner and easier to dent/ding than the competition, but I think that's ALL cars these days! This Civic wagon did feel extra thin, though.
Is 100 pounds a good rule-of-thumb for how much weight an automatic transmission adds over a manual? I've always wondered about that.
As far as the Matrix, I think that Honda and Toyota quality and reliability are comparable, and the cargo space behind the 2nd row of the Matrix is 21.8 vs 21.3 for the Fit, so I don't consider that way, way more. The difference is bigger when you fold down the rear seats, but I'm more interested in max space behind the 2nd row for trips when the 2nd row is occupied.