Edmunds Members - Cars and Conversations (Archived)

Mr_Shiftright

dino001 said:

Mr_Shiftright said:

Seems to me that "driving enthusiasts" are becoming a very niche market, at least in No. America. Not so sure as a CEO that that's where I would spend my marketing dollars or my engineering talent. BMW has often given us "dumbed-down" versions of their Euro specs cars anyway.

At this point, improvements in things like "handling" and "0-60" are incremental anyway, so up or down in an increment shouldn't affect sales very much I would think, if at all.

I think BMWs and Audis were usually kept very similar to their Euro siblings. Benz was notorious for changing suspension on its US-spec models to mooshy foam.

Oh I don't know...U.S. Audis had the absolute deadest steering feel for the longest time, and of course we often got lower HP models for obvious reasons.

ab348

I just can't get too excited about anything Ford produces. Even a car like the Mustang, which I want to really like, leaves me cold when I sit in one and look closely at the interior quality. Plus 99% of them around here are coal-mine black inside. With the other models they make, the designs are stale and the a lot of the engineering seems questionable - Focus/Fiesta automatic transmissions, Fusions quitting, etc. It seems like engineering has never been their strong suit. And up here at least, their reputation is that they are notably tough on warranty claims that most other makes would honor.

imidazol97

dino001 said:

I say one thing - C&D has a specific type of preference - a driver-oriented car, as they understand it. For years GM and Ford simply refused to design their vehicles in that way, Buick would be on the opposite side of that preference. It's not that it's worse, it's just not C&D's "type". Now Buick is trying to get into that kind of audience so it is met with a bit of skepticism and perhaps some snickering here and there. That's because of the track record. However, the suggestion is, if Buick delivers on what they like, they'll say good things about it. If not, they'll poo poo it as a fake.

They don't mention that the Accord is based on the Civic platform. I believe I read that earlier. I may be wrong. LOL

Now I can accept that logic. I know the two articles are completely different in tone: one's like Saturday Night Live, in my opinion.

I will have to find their Camry, update for 2018, and see how it's written.

I expect facts that a science, math, engineering person can gather from articles like this. But the Regal article didn't meet that goal well and contained lots of opinion comments. Maybe I should look up the 2018 Malibu article from C&D. No. Maybe I shouldn't. I might give me heartburn. LOL

imidazol97

berri said:

then I read about continual Stabilitrak issues that have gone on for around a decade and still seems to appear on late models.

Isn't that primarily in the large SUVs. I see requests for fixing those in models several years old posted in the help wanted topics here on Edmunds. Two things: First, it looks to me like the problems give stabilitrak as a code for the symptom, but I'm not convinced that is the usual problem area. Second, is that the people seem to resist taking it in to a dealer to be diagnosed and fixed. It's like they don't do maintenance and then when things go bad as a result, they want someone else to diagnose it free from a distance over the internet with a sometimes poor set of data reported about the problem.

My first thought is wheel bearings.

carnaught

DELETED

ab348

imidazol97 said:

I expect facts that a science, math, engineering person can gather from articles like this. But the Regal article didn't meet that goal well and contained lots of opinion comments.

I find that it's not just C&D when it comes to Buick articles. It seems to be a requirement for every Buick article to begin with a discussion of the old-man image, the kind of cars they used to make, the age demographic, etc etc. It seems endemic. I do wish auto writers would come up with a new angle.

oldfarmer50

ab348 said:

I just can't get too excited about anything Ford produces. Even a car like the Mustang, which I want to really like, leaves me cold when I sit in one and look closely at the interior quality. Plus 99% of them around here are coal-mine black inside. With the other models they make, the designs are stale and the a lot of the engineering seems questionable - Focus/Fiesta automatic transmissions, Fusions quitting, etc. It seems like engineering has never been their strong suit. And up here at least, their reputation is that they are notably tough on warranty claims that most other makes would honor.

Got to admit, when the paint on my hood started bubbling I was disappointed in Ford quality but the dealer stepped right up and fixed it free. Those other issues are troubling too. A bad tranny design for 5 years is unacceptable. I'd also shy away from any older Ford with a 3.8L 6 because of head gaskets.

Having said that, I see the same issues and stonewalling with almost every car company both foreign and domestic so it's tough to know what might happen.

Maybe leasing like you do is the best bet.

driver100

ab348 said:

imidazol97 said:

I expect facts that a science, math, engineering person can gather from articles like this. But the Regal article didn't meet that goal well and contained lots of opinion comments.

I find that it's not just C&D when it comes to Buick articles. It seems to be a requirement for every Buick article to begin with a discussion of the old-man image, the kind of cars they used to make, the age demographic, etc etc. It seems endemic. I do wish auto writers would come up with a new angle.

Because that is their image and the reality. Lincoln has the oldest buyers at 61, Buick is second oldest at 60.3 and that is a bit younger only because of some of the newer SUV models. It is hard to leave that fact out of an article, as it is important when discussing a particular make.

stickguy

car and driver is also not the place to go for boring, dry, facts only writing!

abacomike

Tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM, one of my friends is taking me over to the hospital for my surgery.  I am hoping to be back at home by 3:00 PM, assuming all goes well.

Also just heard from my son that the PET Scan and MRI of his brain was negative for recurrence of cancer.  Just waiting on the blood test results to try to figure out what is making him ill.

Hopefully I'll be able to post something tomorrow if I am able.

imidazol97

abacomike said:

Tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM, one of my friends is taking me over to the hospital for my surgery.  I am hoping to be back at home by 3:00 PM, assuming all goes well.

Also just heard from my son that the PET Scan and MRI of his brain was negative for recurrence of cancer.  Just waiting on the blood test results to try to figure out what is making him ill.

Hopefully I'll be able to post something tomorrow if I am able.

Wishing you the best outcome for the surgery.

imidazol97

stickguy said:

car and driver is also not the place to go for boring, dry, facts only writing!

But their article on the Accord was drier than the article on the Regal. Shouldn't both contain some zingers for that to have been their writing style. Oh well.

sda

abacomike said:

Tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM, one of my friends is taking me over to the hospital for my surgery.  I am hoping to be back at home by 3:00 PM, assuming all goes well.

Also just heard from my son that the PET Scan and MRI of his brain was negative for recurrence of cancer.  Just waiting on the blood test results to try to figure out what is making him ill.

Hopefully I'll be able to post something tomorrow if I am able.

All the best to you and your son. Blessings your way.

carnaught

@abacomike, tomorrow's surgery for you should be a piece of cake compared to everything you've gone through. Here's hopping for an easy time, fast recovery and great report. So happy about your son's negative imaging studies too!

stickguy

The Accord was not a test, it was just a recap of the Honda release. So not really anything to report, other than what was in the press release, and what you can see in pictures. Not sure if the Regal review you are talking about was the same, or an actual road test?

And IMO from decades of reading, while they are predisposed to like certain types of cars (sporty!), if something sucks, they will skewer it. Most of the time the ones that get raves get them because they deserve it! Though certainly they like to get digs in based on reputation in some cases.

driver100

imidazol97 said:

abacomike said:

Tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM, one of my friends is taking me over to the hospital for my surgery.  I am hoping to be back at home by 3:00 PM, assuming all goes well.

Also just heard from my son that the PET Scan and MRI of his brain was negative for recurrence of cancer.  Just waiting on the blood test results to try to figure out what is making him ill.

Hopefully I'll be able to post something tomorrow if I am able.

Wishing you the best outcome for the surgery.

+1

driver100

carnaught said:

@abacomike, tomorrow's surgery for you should be a piece of cake compared to everything you've gone through. Here's hopping for an easy time, fast recovery and great report. So happy about your son's negative imaging studies too!

+1

berri

Aba - best to you and your son

fintail

You'll be fine aba, just think positive. Routine procedure, you'll be out of there in no time.

28firefighter

Good luck, @abacomike - you will do great!

roadburner

28firefighter said:

Good luck, @abacomike - you will do great!

Ditto!

roadburner

Most of today was spent at Hole 11 of Valhalla Golf Club during a charity golf scramble. Our store sponsored a hole-in-one contest with the prize being a new 750i xDrive sedan. Myself and another salesperson stayed with the car. Fortunately it was a nice day and we received the same fancy box lunches the golfers enjoyed. We were also provided with a golf cart so we didn't have to hoof it to the clubhouse. No one collected the car, but one guy put his ball about four feet from the pin.

When we got back to the dealer a sales guy wanted me to help demo a manual 340i for a customer. There is a road with a couple of 90 degree corners not too far from the store and I decided I'd show the customer what even a base 340i could do. I blasted through the first corner and took the second even faster. What I didn't know was that the sale guy seated behind me hadn't buckled in; when I nailed the second corner he slid over to the other side of the car. All's well that ends well; the customer thought it was really funny and when I left she was discussing ordering a 2018 340i...

nyccarguy

Thinking of you always Mike.  This is nothing compared to some of the other crap you've been through.

graphicguy

Abacomike.....I'm confident you'll be fine!

stickguy

I think there was a discussion of Ebikes a while back. Which reminds me of something funny (well, to me) that happened saturday. Wife and I were heading to the store, pulling up to a light on a 4 lane road, and a white Cayenne pulled out of a parking lot and pulled up next to me (both 1st at the light). The bike part, he had 2 red bikes up on the roof, front tires off (fork in the clips). I think it was called an S bike? In any case, had a real fat center bar so I assume it had to be an E bike. How he got them up there, no clue, since I assume they are heavy!

anyway, Bradd reminded me of the amusing part. Light changes, I just go normally (and this road shortly after the light has a real sharp kink to navigate, and cars cheating the turn lane often hanging over into our lane). So I just go at a moderate speed, do the zig, and head out. The Porsche though, dude nails it, and whips through the kink, and takes off (pretty sure the SL there was no more than 40). Well, shortly after, I get passed by a black explorer hauling butt. Who then pulls up behind the Porsche at the next light. soon as it changes, yup, light bars come on, and when last seen the Porshce was pulling into a parking lot with the cop behind him. Oops.

and not like he got far. I just caught up to him at the next light anyway after he passed me.

roadburner

I drove the Club Sport to work to work today- still tight and buttoned down after 22 years. The Motronic ECU and the ABS system are the only electronics on the car. On the way home I had a bit of a play with a BRZ; I was able to hang with him up to around 95 mph. Acceleration was roughly equal as well, due in large part to my Turner Motorsport/Conforti chip and the fact that 5th gear in my car is direct and not overdriven.

oldfarmer50

abacomike said:

Tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM, one of my friends is taking me over to the hospital for my surgery.  I am hoping to be back at home by 3:00 PM, assuming all goes well.

Also just heard from my son that the PET Scan and MRI of his brain was negative for recurrence of cancer.  Just waiting on the blood test results to try to figure out what is making him ill.

Hopefully I'll be able to post something tomorrow if I am able.

Good news on your son. One less worry while you go through your own ordeal.

bwia

nyccarguy said:

Thinking of you always Mike.  This is nothing compared to some of the other crap you've been through.

Ditto 

oldfarmer50

roadburner said:

Most of today was spent at Hole 11 of Valhalla Golf Club during a charity golf scramble. Our store sponsored a hole-in-one contest with the prize being a new 750i xDrive sedan. Myself and another salesperson stayed with the car. Fortunately it was a nice day and we received the same fancy box lunches the golfers enjoyed. We were also provided with a golf cart so we didn't have to hoof it to the clubhouse. No one collected the car, but one guy put his ball about four feet from the pin.

When we got back to the dealer a sales guy wanted me to help demo a manual 340i for a customer. There is a road with a couple of 90 degree corners not too far from the store and I decided I'd show the customer what even a base 340i could do. I blasted through the first corner and took the second even faster. What I didn't know was that the sale guy seated behind me hadn't buckled in; when I nailed the second corner he slid over to the other side of the car. All's well that ends well; the customer thought it was really funny and when I left she was discussing ordering a 2018 340i...

Now that's the way to demo a car. When I test drove my Ford I wanted to test out sport mode and took a few turns in a spirited manner. I could see from the look on the salesman's face that he was worried. You'd make a much better ride along.

imidazol97

roadburner said:

... she...

Nice surprise you set up there. I was expecting that the buyer was a guy.

imidazol97

stickguy said:

The Accord was not a test, it was just a recap of the Honda release. So not really anything to report, other than what was in the press release, and what you can see in pictures. Not sure if the Regal review you are talking about was the same, or an actual road test?

And IMO from decades of reading, while they are predisposed to like certain types of cars (sporty!), if something sucks, they will skewer it. Most of the time the ones that get raves get them because they deserve it! Though certainly they like to get digs in based on reputation in some cases.

It seems they have different levels or reportage. I tried to pick initial info not the road tests, which are more thorough. It's the image they try to carry that I have trouble with, especially when it is not deserved based on woes of cars in the past. If it were, they wouldn't pick Honda because of tranny problems in the past.

Reading C&D on paper I don't do. The doctor offices I visit don't have that. In fact, most don't have car mags like they did 10 years ago.

What source gives the best evaluations? I know I found two guys doing youtube video reviews that were more evenhanded that the performance car oriented mags. One of the guys does the trunk thing where he crawls into the trunk to evaluate how competent it is.

imidazol97

Has anyone else had the forced upgrade of Windows 10 to the "Creators" version, 1703? My first laptop was forced into starting it yesterday; couldn't delay the upgrade any longer.

driver100

I find most car reviews are pretty fair....they seem to be objective. We all have some bias's so one writer may prefer European cars, another may like American metal.

This Review of a MBW M2 VS a Mustang GT350 couldn't be any fairer.

driver100

roadburner said:

Most of today was spent at Hole 11 of Valhalla Golf Club during a charity golf scramble. Our store sponsored a hole-in-one contest with the prize being a new 750i xDrive sedan. Myself and another salesperson stayed with the car. Fortunately it was a nice day and we received the same fancy box lunches the golfers enjoyed. We were also provided with a golf cart so we didn't have to hoof it to the clubhouse. No one collected the car, but one guy put his ball about four feet from the pin.

When we got back to the dealer a sales guy wanted me to help demo a manual 340i for a customer. There is a road with a couple of 90 degree corners not too far from the store and I decided I'd show the customer what even a base 340i could do. I blasted through the first corner and took the second even faster. What I didn't know was that the sale guy seated behind me hadn't buckled in; when I nailed the second corner he slid over to the other side of the car. All's well that ends well; the customer thought it was really funny and when I left she was discussing ordering a 2018 340i...

Might not be funny for the salesman in the back seat...who has to get his pants cleaned!

berri

Has anyone else had the forced upgrade of Windows 10 to the "Creators" version, 1703? My first laptop was forced into starting it yesterday; couldn't delay the upgrade any longer.

Ironic - same thing happened to mine yesterday. Seems to be working alright, so maybe delaying it all this time allowed time for Microsoft to clean up the earlier upgrade problems before we were stuck with it.

nyccarguy

@roadburner

Front Seat or Back Seat, I ALWAYS buckle up. No matter what.

fintail

But don't people complain that the Breeze is underpowered?

95 on a public road, be careful! Unless one has a get out of jail free card, the badge wearers sometimes harshly frown upon that.

roadburner said:

I drove the Club Sport to work to work today- still tight and buttoned down after 22 years. The Motronic ECU and the ABS system are the only electronics on the car. On the way home I had a bit of a play with a BRZ; I was able to hang with him up to around 95 mph. Acceleration was roughly equal as well, due in large part to my Turner Motorsport/Conforti chip and the fact that 5th gear in my car is direct and not overdriven.

roadburner

The road was limited access and relatively deserted. My main fear of getting tagged that was the county I was in has a County Attorney that runs a "Traffic School" that only exists to rake in money to fund his office- thus no amendments or deferrals- the only option is to pay the extortion fee.

roadburner

nyccarguy said:

@roadburner

Front Seat or Back Seat, I ALWAYS buckle up. No matter what.

Me too.

nyccarguy

roadburner said:

The road was limited access and relatively deserted. My main fear of getting tagged that was the county I was in has a County Attorney that runs a "Traffic School" that only exists to rake in money to fund his office- thus no amendments or deferrals- the only option is to pay the extortion fee.

Tax write off for a work related expense? LOL!

Mr_Shiftright

imidazol97 said:

berri said:

then I read about continual Stabilitrak issues that have gone on for around a decade and still seems to appear on late models.

Isn't that primarily in the large SUVs. I see requests for fixing those in models several years old posted in the help wanted topics here on Edmunds. Two things: First, it looks to me like the problems give stabilitrak as a code for the symptom, but I'm not convinced that is the usual problem area. Second, is that the people seem to resist taking it in to a dealer to be diagnosed and fixed. It's like they don't do maintenance and then when things go bad as a result, they want someone else to diagnose it free from a distance over the internet with a sometimes poor set of data reported about the problem.

My first thought is wheel bearings.

One problem is conceptual..."Stabilitrak" actually doesn't exist...it's not a thing, it's a system.

ab348

imidazol97 said:

Has anyone else had the forced upgrade of Windows 10 to the "Creators" version, 1703? My first laptop was forced into starting it yesterday; couldn't delay the upgrade any longer.

Both of mine had it done. The first was fairly painless but the other one seemed to take days, kept failing before several reboots got it jump-started. As is typical with M$, I see no benefit or real difference.

berri

Microsoft, including Office, updates and new versions seem to add a few geek features, but cause extra steps for everyone else; or at least new learning effort for little, if any, real return. I think it is a mediocre company, but basically we are stuck with it. Honestly, it seems Apple has also gotten more mediocre.

imidazol97

roadburner said:

The road was limited access and relatively deserted. My main fear of getting tagged that was the county I was in has a County Attorney that runs a "Traffic School" that only exists to rake in money to fund his office- thus no amendments or deferrals- the only option is to pay the extortion fee.

Corruption. On the part of a government official ... a judge. Tell me it's not so!

oldfarmer50

driver100 said:

I find most car reviews are pretty fair....they seem to be objective. We all have some bias's so one writer may prefer European cars, another may like American metal.

This Review of a MBW M2 VS a Mustang GT350 couldn't be any fairer.

I don't know about that. The compliments for the Mustang seemed almost begrudging, as if the author was looking for something to criticize but couldn't.

Of course I may be biased.

fintail

I've heard of municipalities and PDs forcefully dissolved over speedtrap shenanigans, maybe it should happen to counties too. Especially in the "small government" south, where there are seemingly millions of postage stamp-sized counties full of good old boys and endless redundancy. These are often the people who are the first to preach about personal responsibility.

roadburner said:

The road was limited access and relatively deserted. My main fear of getting tagged that was the county I was in has a County Attorney that runs a "Traffic School" that only exists to rake in money to fund his office- thus no amendments or deferrals- the only option is to pay the extortion fee.

driver100

oldfarmer50 said:

driver100 said:

I find most car reviews are pretty fair....they seem to be objective. We all have some bias's so one writer may prefer European cars, another may like American metal.

This Review of a MBW M2 VS a Mustang GT350 couldn't be any fairer.

I don't know about that. The compliments for the Mustang seemed almost begrudging, as if the author was looking for something to criticize but couldn't.

Of course I may be biased.

Do you think? I think the article was very fair, they mentioned the good points about each car, but, acknowledged what the differences were....and there wasn't a real winner, depended on the readers priorities.
I think the people who criticize many reviews are just too sensitive. Maybe, they take criticism or a negative and take it as a personal insult - blow it out of proportion.

cdnpinhead

Everything's different and nothing is better.

stickguy

Hey people. Homework help. Need value propositions for mini and the mustang. a positioning statement to explain benefit for who, and how you supply uniquely.

Anybody got creative juices flowing tonight?

explorerx4

The only thing I took from that "review" was that I liked the blue on the BMW better.