Edmunds Members - Cars and Conversations (Archived)

abacomike

carnaught said:

@ab348, We do long trips and really like for that. I enjoy listening to games on a trip. Local radio stations are just annoying. If I had a memory stick with a bunch of songs on it, I would never hear a new one. The only time I listen to a radio is when I'm driving. I usually call the cancel number and tell them I'd like to keep their service, but it's too expensive. Then we go from there. In Canada, it could work differently.

I do something similar, but I usually have to hear what sounds like 2 or 3 rehearsed canned spiels to get me to pay more, I have to say "No Thank You" 3 times to get to the $5/month rate usually.

What I’m doing most recently is say to them that I want the $30 per 6 mos. “promotional plan” (now $60 per year) or else I’ll cancel. Easy peasy...

Hey, carnaught- what’s with the “nut” in your new pic logo?  Why the change?

carnaught

@abacomike, I guess it’s cause the name is more about a tool related nut than a food one, and it’s shinier .

abacomike

carnaught said:

@abacomike, I guess it’s cause the name is more about a tool related nut than a food one, and it’s shinier .

Shinier - agreed.  But a “nut” is still a “nut”, no matter what the logo may delineate.  Ask any psychiatrist or almond farmer or car mechanic! 

imidazol97

pensfan83 said:

What's a landline?

Is that from the TV show The Millionaire? Contestants who aren't sure of the answer can use a landline? LOL

imidazol97

andres3 said:

1. Banks, including leasing banks like GMAC for GM aka Ally Bank.
   
2. 
   
3. Insurers, including AIG.
   
4. 
   
5. And of course, GM & Chrysler.
   
6. 
   

You need to add the UAW to that list. They benefited greatly from the largess.

jmonroe

abacomike said:

carnaught said:

@abacomike, I guess it’s cause the name is more about a tool related nut than a food one, and it’s shinier .

Shinier - agreed.  But a “nut” is still a “nut”, no matter what the logo may delineate.  Ask any psychiatrist or almond farmer or car mechanic! 

I think our poster buddy has violated the Edmunds bylaws for this forum by using a new pic. About the only way he can avoid a whopping dues increase is to change his handle by deleting the second "a" along with the "g" and "h". That would be a more descriptive/appropriate handle for him now.

jmonroe

carnaught

@jmonroe, too late, they already received my assessment payment. :@ It came at no surprise after being warned by @abacomike, who has changed his pic. yearly with his yearly new car.

explorerx4

@carnaught,
For a while I thought that meant you didn't own car.

oldfarmer50

stickguy said:

Michaell said:

@oldfarmer50 - let me also add my congratulations on your new part time gig.

Now we'll have two folks regularly contributing their thoughts about the cars they drive for their work.

"Canadian border to NJ" - that's a pretty big stretch. How long are the days you'll be working?

Not for him. NJ is about 2 hours (or less). And Canada is about 3. So not quite local, but not that crazy. Seems odd though they would move cars that far.

Exactly. I might be going to the border one day and NJ the next but not both on the same day. Hours seem a little flexible 5:30-6:45 am to 5 pm. Depending on length of trip. Might even get to visit the Manhiem auction in PA. I think a lot of the action is transporting to sales locations. Enterprise retails many if not all their own units I guess.

cdnpinhead

OF -- So far as I know, you and I are among the few on this board who have actually been paid to drive, in my case for over two years and $160K (the truck had to be paid from that). Either way, I'll be very interested in hearing how it goes with Enterprise (part of the same company that runs National, BTW). Moving cars around and getting paid for it would work for me in a few years.

Good luck, and keep us posted.

abacomike

explorerx4 said:

@carnaught, For a while I thought that meant you didn't own car.

Better that my pictures reveal my car(s) and not my mug shots! 

driver100

Maybe I will change my name to "Car Bolt".

oldfarmer50

cdnpinhead said:

OF -- So far as I know, you and I are among the few on this board who have actually been paid to drive, in my case for over two years and $160K (the truck had to be paid from that). Either way, I'll be very interested in hearing how it goes with Enterprise (part of the same company that runs National, BTW). Moving cars around and getting paid for it would work for me in a few years.

Good luck, and keep us posted.

I won't be making $160k. This is strictly peanuts. Maybe $200/wk. just enough to keep me out of trouble.

jmonroe

driver100 said:

Maybe I will change my name to "Car Bolt".

A nut would be more fitting.

BTW, that bolt is used on a dishwasher.

jmonroe

jmonroe

oldfarmer50 said:

cdnpinhead said:

OF -- So far as I know, you and I are among the few on this board who have actually been paid to drive, in my case for over two years and $160K (the truck had to be paid from that). Either way, I'll be very interested in hearing how it goes with Enterprise (part of the same company that runs National, BTW). Moving cars around and getting paid for it would work for me in a few years.

Good luck, and keep us posted.

I won't be making $160k. This is strictly peanuts. Maybe $200/wk. just enough to keep me out of trouble.

Good luck with the new gig.

$200 a week, is that all. After the first day of my retirement, Mrs. j offered me $500 if I'd put my head in a bucket of water for an hour.

jmonroe

roadburner

Congrats, OF!

tbirdmarco

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=huFo6dVj318

roadburner

BMW NA was kind enough to provide us with an entertaining loaner:

The big sled repeals the laws of physics- it weighs 5300 pounds yet it runs from 0 to 60 in 3.8 seconds, takes only 153 feet to stop from 70 mph, and pulls 0.98 g. I floored it to merge onto an interstate, looked down and was already doing 100 mph.
Way too much fun...

stickguy

X5M? What engine is in that, a turbo V8?

roadburner

Twin turbo V8- 567 hp, 553 lb-ft of torque.

28firefighter

roadburner said:

Twin turbo V8- 567 hp, 553 lb-ft of torque.

Want. 

stickguy

without looking, I assume with a few options you are up over 100K on one of those.

Michaell

stickguy said:

without looking, I assume with a few options you are up over 100K on one of those.

Oh, no - $100K before you even glance at the option sheet.

Imagine the deal someone will get in 6-9 months with 4000 miles on it?

fintail

Prior X5M was a darling of the mysteriously monied new arrival set in this area. Depreciation will be fun.

qbrozen

After testing a Cayenne Turbo, I decided vehicles that heavy and tall should not accelerate that rapidly.

driver100

jmonroe said:

driver100 said:

Maybe I will change my name to "Car Bolt".

A nut would be more fitting.

BTW, that bolt is used on a dishwasher.

jmonroe

Used on a dishwasher? How do you know that? You must be a conspiracy theorist....take a known truth (the item is a bolt) and then say it is from a dishwasher (make a statement that no one can prove).

driver100

roadburner said:

BMW NA was kind enough to provide us with an entertaining loaner:

The big sled repeals the laws of physics- it weighs 5300 pounds yet it runs from 0 to 60 in 3.8 seconds, takes only 153 feet to stop from 70 mph, and pulls 0.98 g. I floored it to merge onto an interstate, looked down and was already doing 100 mph.
Way too much fun...

Nice...and a very pretty blue.

oldfarmer50

Michaell said:

stickguy said:

without looking, I assume with a few options you are up over 100K on one of those.

Oh, no - $100K before you even glance at the option sheet.

Imagine the deal someone will get in 6-9 months with 4000 miles on it?

Yeah, but would you want to buy it after RB flogged it for those 4000?

tjc78

oldfarmer50 said:

Michaell said:

stickguy said:

without looking, I assume with a few options you are up over 100K on one of those.

Oh, no - $100K before you even glance at the option sheet.

Imagine the deal someone will get in 6-9 months with 4000 miles on it?

Yeah, but would you want to buy it after RB flogged it for those 4000?

Wouldn’t scare me.... cars are made to be driven! Drive it like you stole it....

cdnpinhead

oldfarmer50 said:

I won't be making $160k.

By the time you figure that the 160 was for two years, fuel (when I started driving fuel was 44 to 60 cents a gallon; by the time I quit it had more than doubled), maintenance, tires, permits, tolls and the loan payment, I had enough to live on, but just.

nyccarguy

qbrozen said:

After testing a Cayenne Turbo, I decided vehicles that heavy and tall should not accelerate that rapidly.

Porsches are not for the faint of wallet heart

oldfarmer50

tbirdmarco said:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=huFo6dVj318

A car without steering wheel or pedals is a crime against nature. Why not just call Uber?

roadburner

tjc78 said:

without looking, I assume with a few options you are up over 100K on one of those.

Oh, no - $100K before you even glance at the option sheet. Imagine the deal someone will get in 6-9 months with 4000 miles on it?

Yeah, but would you want to buy it after RB flogged it for those 4000?

Wouldn’t scare me.... cars are made to be driven! Drive it like you stole it....

I never have trouble selling my cars. When I posted On Facebook that the X3 was for sale I was contacted by a friend who wanted it. I have three guys waiting in line to buy my Jeep and a couple more who would like the Club Sport. 

imidazol97

oldfarmer50 said:

tbirdmarco said:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=huFo6dVj318

A car without steering wheel or pedals is a crime against nature. Why not just call Uber?

I believe that's the first step in the target market IIRC the story I read a few days ago.

GM deserves accolades for being the FIRST of those to actually do what the autonomous cheering section claims is their goal--no driver. So why keep the extra parts for a driver if the vehicle if there is not to be a driver?

Like a couple others on here, I recall the Popular Science mags and others in the 50s and 60s who promised flying cars, self-driving cars, cars that washed themselves, repaired their own engines, etc., from decades ago. Still waitin'. I'll believe it when I see it.

As to the video's fawning over which vehicles will get the awards at the Detroit International Auto Show, that's a bunch of self-serving folks like the west coast Hollywood types picking awards for themselves and their friends. Who cares which pickup truck gets the award. Or which car?--they predict the Accord. Odd, though, I'm hearing advertisements for Accords on the radio. Honda in the past always self-righteously pointed out how their products were so wonderful when introduced that they didn't have to promote them, rather they had people waiting in line because they started production slowly for some reason making them hard-to-get for the fans. Just my opinion.

graphicguy

roadburner said:

BMW NA was kind enough to provide us with an entertaining loaner:

The big sled repeals the laws of physics- it weighs 5300 pounds yet it runs from 0 to 60 in 3.8 seconds, takes only 153 feet to stop from 70 mph, and pulls 0.98 g. I floored it to merge onto an interstate, looked down and was already doing 100 mph.
Way too much fun...

Fastest COSTCO runner I’ve ever seen. Very cool!

abacomike

oldfarmer50 said:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=huFo6dVj318

A car without steering wheel or pedals is a crime against nature. Why not just call Uber?

A car without a steering wheel and no pedals is probably still in production or the manufacturer left a few things out like they did on my 2015 E400!

28firefighter

qbrozen said:

After testing a Cayenne Turbo, I decided vehicles that heavy and tall should not accelerate that rapidly.

Agree. Naturally my Dad loved it and recently went totally insane and bought a CPO Turbo S. 

snakeweasel

stickguy said:

my Sonata lease ended the same way. I got an email about having to make the last payment. they stopped at 35. I called to question it, and the answer made little sense, but I was able to do it online. Not a big deal, just weird.

The reason you get that is that the payment for $X at Y% for Z months rarely comes out to an even amount, it may come out to $423.86835742 so it will be rounded out and the difference is made up on the last payment. So with a 36 month loan you will have 35 payments at one amount and one payment at a slightly different amount. 

Now when you have direct withdrawal from your account they only have authority to take out a certain amount so they cannot takeout that last payment without additional authority to do so. 

snakeweasel

driver100 said:l.p.

roadburner said:

Mr_Shiftright said:

isellhondas said:

I think you're on to something! Shame on me! How a BMW could tell that I had committed a mortal sin by buying a bulb at NAPA instead of at the dealer I'll never know! It took the car a few hours to figure out it had been violated!

I know that I’ve explained this before, but that issue has absolutely nothing to with whether the bulbs are OEM; the problem is the TYPE of bulb. European manufacturers use bulbs with a silver base instead of a brass base. BMW at that time had designed the bulb check system to monitor bulbs by sending a very low current to the bulbs to detect continuity. The copper bases corroded and or had too high of a resistance. BMW has yet to learn that US drivers never read the OM and will try to use the cheapest generic part whenever possible. 

Silver? Why not gold? It's an excellent conductor!

There is not being practical.....and then there is being ridiculous.

Actually gold is not as good a conductor as copper, but has the advantage that it doesn't tarnish. So that would be the only advantage in a car. Silver is a better conductor than either but corrodes, as does copper. So really, gold plated BMW bulbs are not that far-fetched as a solution to a problem--and think of the marketing potential!

is corrosion on the bulb really that much of a problem? I really can't think of a time when I had a bulb stop working due to corrosion. 

The bulbs still illuminated; the corrosion was enough to block the trickle of current the car sent to the bulb to verify continuity, so the system reported a burned out bulb.

To me it seems like BMW was just engineering a vehicle that needs to have officially sanctioned BMW parts to run. 

I call it brilliant marketing. Most of the money for dealerships is made selling parts and service. The foreign luxury brands found a way for dealerships to make money, and found a way to keep their finely engineered cars running properly....by having trained technicians and proprietary equipment. Maybe if the other auto makers did that they wouldn't have to have been bailed out.


How much corrosion can be had on a brand new bulb? Not much if any. Sorry all this is telling me is that BMW engineered their cars to need OEM parts and will punish you if you don't. Remind me how the car tells you there is an issue.How well trained do you have to be to change a bulb? And I will wage next month's mortgage payment that if this was the case with a GM or Ford people would be screaming their heads off about it.if it were properly engineered this wouldn't be an issue. 

fintail

Look at the average driver, and think of a flying car. Are you sure you want that? How strong is the roof on your house?

Yep, it's all a west coast elitist conspiracy.

imidazol97 said:

Like a couple others on here, I recall the Popular Science mags and others in the 50s and 60s who promised flying cars, self-driving cars, cars that washed themselves, repaired their own engines, etc., from decades ago. Still waitin'. I'll believe it when I see it.

As to the video's fawning over which vehicles will get the awards at the Detroit International Auto Show, that's a bunch of self-serving folks like the west coast Hollywood types picking awards for themselves and their friends. Who cares which pickup truck gets the award. Or which car?--they predict the Accord. Odd, though, I'm hearing advertisements for Accords on the radio. Honda in the past always self-righteously pointed out how their products were so wonderful when introduced that they didn't have to promote them, rather they had people waiting in line because they started production slowly for some reason making them hard-to-get for the fans. Just my opinion.

Mr_Shiftright

I don't see how you could have driverless cars without a "closed system" roadway, where there is no outside interference and you have traffic controls interacting with the vehicles.

snakeweasel

oldfarmer50 said:

Is there much news coverage down in the USA about the romaine lettuce/E-coli scare? It is all over the news up here and the two main supermarket chains have taken all romaine off their shelves in response. I am going through salad withdrawal, especially caesar salad which is my main choice, because of this. I may have to try some other type of salad greens, which at my age isn't easy...

I haven't followed that story in detail but if it is regular old e-coli that's no big deal. That's the main bacteria floating around the guts of most mammals. There's only one strain (0157) that produces a toxin that really is dangerous. Usually that strain is associated with crops grown with organic cow manure based fertilizer and improperly washed. Switch to that evil chemical fertilizer grown lettuce and you won't have the problem....unless it's a case of deliberate sabatoge.

While we do have e-coli in our guts the problem is when it's in other places. Your body is awash with bacteria doing specific jobs in specific places if it gets in other parts of the body it can cause issues. This is why it is advised that you wash your hands after going to the bathroom.

So any strain of e-coli can cause serious illness. 

driver100

Mr_Shiftright said:

I don't see how you could have driverless cars without a "closed system" roadway, where there is no outside interference and you have traffic controls interacting with the vehicles.

I think, these vehicles are supposed to be able to get along with other vehicles. It learns what to watch for - in other driverless cars and cars with drivers.

driver100

snakeweasel said:

oldfarmer50 said:

Is there much news coverage down in the USA about the romaine lettuce/E-coli scare? It is all over the news up here and the two main supermarket chains have taken all romaine off their shelves in response. I am going through salad withdrawal, especially caesar salad which is my main choice, because of this. I may have to try some other type of salad greens, which at my age isn't easy...

I haven't followed that story in detail but if it is regular old e-coli that's no big deal. That's the main bacteria floating around the guts of most mammals. There's only one strain (0157) that produces a toxin that really is dangerous. Usually that strain is associated with crops grown with organic cow manure based fertilizer and improperly washed. Switch to that evil chemical fertilizer grown lettuce and you won't have the problem....unless it's a case of deliberate sabatoge.

While we do have e-coli in our guts the problem is when it's in other places. Your body is awash with bacteria doing specific jobs in specific places if it gets in other parts of the body it can cause issues. This is why it is advised that you wash your hands after going to the bathroom.

So any strain of e-coli can cause serious illness

. 

Let's get off this topic about e-coli....I am getting stomach pains hearing about it.

Maybe that makes the case we should only eat refined and processed foods...nothing will survive in them!

abacomike

Just got back from having lunch at the casino.  They were giving away 750ml bottles of Macallum Gold Scotch - so I got a bottle which came with a Macallum Glass Decanter.  

Anyone familiar with with this brand of scotch?  It says it is a single malt scotch aged for 10-15 years in Sherry Oak Casks.  That’s all I know about it - no idea what these bottles sell for.

tjc78

A buddy of mine at work swears by that stuff ... I’ve never had it.  Only one way to find out!

abacomike

tjc78 said:

A buddy of mine at work swears by that stuff ... I’ve never had it.  Only one way to find out!

I’ll report on my experience with the brand later on tonight or tomorrow morning. 

tjc78

Now that’s the way to do it!!

oldfarmer50

snakeweasel said:

stickguy said:

my Sonata lease ended the same way. I got an email about having to make the last payment. they stopped at 35. I called to question it, and the answer made little sense, but I was able to do it online. Not a big deal, just weird.

The reason you get that is that the payment for $X at Y% for Z months rarely comes out to an even amount, it may come out to $423.86835742 so it will be rounded out and the difference is made up on the last payment. So with a 36 month loan you will have 35 payments at one amount and one payment at a slightly different amount. 

Now when you have direct withdrawal from your account they only have authority to take out a certain amount so they cannot takeout that last payment without additional authority to do so. 

You got me thinking so I looked at my payment book. Sure enough, the last slip says"call for final payment".

Just hope there's no surprise.

oldfarmer50

snakeweasel said:

oldfarmer50 said:

Is there much news coverage down in the USA about the romaine lettuce/E-coli scare? It is all over the news up here and the two main supermarket chains have taken all romaine off their shelves in response. I am going through salad withdrawal, especially caesar salad which is my main choice, because of this. I may have to try some other type of salad greens, which at my age isn't easy...

I haven't followed that story in detail but if it is regular old e-coli that's no big deal. That's the main bacteria floating around the guts of most mammals. There's only one strain (0157) that produces a toxin that really is dangerous. Usually that strain is associated with crops grown with organic cow manure based fertilizer and improperly washed. Switch to that evil chemical fertilizer grown lettuce and you won't have the problem....unless it's a case of deliberate sabatoge.

While we do have e-coli in our guts the problem is when it's in other places. Your body is awash with bacteria doing specific jobs in specific places if it gets in other parts of the body it can cause issues. This is why it is advised that you wash your hands after going to the bathroom.

So any strain of e-coli can cause serious illness. 

True, so don't go injecting it into your arm. What makes 0157 so nasty as I understand it, is that it produces a toxin that destroys blood cells. When the body tries to flush the dead cells out through the kidneys they clog up the tubing resulting in kidney failure. From what I've read that's the real killer.