Chronic Car Buyers Anonymous (Archived)

roadburner

mjfloyd1 said:

xwesx said:

mjfloyd1 said:

Drop a tire is dropping a tire off the pavement / track onto grass/ shoulder

Oooooh. okay, thanks! LOL

I make my 15 year old drop a tire off of the road and get back on as practice for when it happens on accident when she is driving on her own. 

At HPDEs we tell students to drive straight off in most situations- attempting to jerk the car back onto the road usually results in a spin at best and a crash at worst.

mjfloyd1

I put Michelin Premier LTX on my wife’s MB GL 350 diesel and they were totally bald after 14k miles. Michelin was good about refund since they had 60k mile warranty.

i had it serviced in Naples FL after Thanksgiving and the MB dealer said my brake pads were at 4mm. They recommended rotors and pads on the front (48k miles) for $860. I passed. I ordered akebono ceramic pads ($70) and put them on the day after we got back. Pads were 6-8 mm though. I won’t miss the black wheels from the stock pads though. 

tbirdmarco

@sandman_6472 sounds good fun fun car go for what you want and like when the time is rite! no I have said that over and over in hear cool co y not if you have an cupon now get the owial changed now and tires rotated!

tbirdmarco

@nyccarguy they have same oial change intervals as my moms maxima and my brothers Altima! most other car makes are longer! witch is fine! since you do a lot of driving can easly do over 5k like you have bin doing!

mjfloyd1

roadburner said:

xwesx said:

Drop a tire is dropping a tire off the pavement / track onto grass/ shoulder

Oooooh. okay, thanks! LOL

I make my 15 year old drop a tire off of the road and get back on as practice for when it happens on accident when she is driving on her own. 

At HPDEs we tell students to drive straight off in most situations- attempting to jerk the car back onto the road usually results in a spin at best and a crash at worst.

Yep. I’m teaching her to gradually get back on instead of trying to jerk the wheel abruptly. 

stickguy

my new car has the Ventus Nobles on it, low profile. I assume they will be lousy in the snow, but have no intention of actually driving on it, so not much of a worry to me! If I was having to worry about commuting and actually dealing with snow, I would do a -1 snow tire/wheel package on it (and will do it for the princess if I pass the car down to her).

The Jetta is going in with probably about 9,200 miles on it for the next change. Hard to be too exact since I have to deal with it when it is home, and each round trip to NC is about 900 miles, plus usage while there.

roadburner

suydam said:

I think anywhere between 7500 and 10,000 is fine. It was 10k for the Accord generally with their maintenance minder, and around 9k for the Buick with theirs. Anything earlier is just a waste of oil and bad for the environment to boot. No idea how long the Volt should go between oil changes as I’m not using any gas around town. I’ll ask when I get the tires rotated next month.

The i3 REx requires an annual oil change.

stickguy

I thought just about every car had that time requirement too (usually 1 year, regardless of mileage). I was actually surprised that the manual calls for such frequent changes on my Elantra (6 months/7,500 for normal, and 3/3,750 for "severe" which seems to be just about everyone!)

suydam

No, most everyone should be normal, 7500.

ab348

mjfloyd1 said:

I put Michelin Premier LTX on my wife’s MB GL 350 diesel and they were totally bald after 14k miles. Michelin was good about refund since they had 60k mile warranty.

Wow, that seems really low mileage. Bad set of tires or some other thing?

stickguy

suydam said:

No, most everyone should be normal, 7500.

one of the condition IIRC is "frequent trips of less than 5 miles". Which probably includes a whole lotta people.

suydam

One of a whole bunch of factors.

stickguy

only takes one. that is how they write it up. If you meet ANY of the list, should follow the severe schedule.

suydam

From Edmunds itself: https://www.edmunds.com/car-news/tips-advice/stop-changing-your-oil.html

“ Our oil-change addiction also comes from the erroneous argument that nearly all cars should be serviced under the "severe" schedule found in the owner's manual. In fact, a quiz on the Web site maintained by Jiffy Lube International Inc. (owned by petrochemical giant Shell Oil Company) recommends the severe maintenance schedule for virtually every kind of driving pattern.

The argument that most people drive under severe conditions is losing its footing, however. A number of automakers, including Ford and GM, have contacted Edmunds data editors to request that the maintenance section of Edmunds' site substitute the normal maintenance schedule for the severe schedule that had been displayed.“

stickguy

Well, the manual says what it says. And wanna bet that if you don't follow it, and they can pull data out of the car that indicates you qualify, they would void the warranty?

suydam

I just follow the Maintenance Minders. That’s based on actual conditions for you.

tjc78

suydam said:

I just follow the Maintenance Minders. That’s based on actual conditions for you.

That’s what I’ve been doing with my GM vehicles.  It has always been right around 5-6k miles.  

fintail

Running synthetic, my modern MBs have had oil changes yearly. I used to do it bi-yearly in the E55, but my indy mechanic said that was overkill (as I wasn't hitting 10K miles/year). The fintail also gets a yearly change with conventional oil, but that's 2K miles on a good year these days.

corvette

qbrozen said:

I'll be discovering how good or bad the tires on the f150 are in the snow.

I'd expect them to be adequate, at a minimum. I don't think they could get away with putting an all season tire that was truly awful in snow on a full-size truck, given the competitiveness of the segment.

corvette

suydam said:

I think anywhere between 7500 and 10,000 is fine. It was 10k for the Accord generally with their maintenance minder, and around 9k for the Buick with theirs. Anything earlier is just a waste of oil and bad for the environment to boot. No idea how long the Volt should go between oil changes as I’m not using any gas around town. I’ll ask when I get the tires rotated next month.

I think the oil life monitor in the Volts will call for an oil change every 12-24 months, even if the gas engine isn't being used much. You should be able to pull up an oil life percentage on the on board computer.

suydam

Yes it’s on my Chevy app. After nearly a year, oil life is still over 50%.

stickguy

for some odd reason, even on a 2018 Hyundai still does not have a maintenance minder. My 2013 RDX has that. As did my 2005 Odyssey. Both of which seem to go right around 7,000 miles before calling for service (though the RDX the last couple of years I have only put 5-6,000 miles on it, so I have taken it in at 1 year mark.) problem with that is, the codes don't come up so am doing service based on what think it needs (beyond normal oil change of course).

I plan on just following the normal schedule, which for me, means every 6 months. Only about $30 at the dealer, and every 4th one free so 2x year to make sure Hyundai can never pull a JMonroe on me!

if the princess buys it from me at some point, I will have to put reminders in my phone to remind me to remind her!

the other interesting item on that car is they call for a bottle of fuel system additive every 6 months, unless you normally use top tier gas (which I plan to do anyway). Have never seen that before. no clue how much they charge for that, since I am sure it is not part of their discount 1 hour oil change.

qbrozen

stickguy said:

No, most everyone should be normal, 7500.

one of the condition IIRC is "frequent trips of less than 5 miles". Which probably includes a whole lotta people.

I can get to my kid's school in less than 5 miles. That is pretty much it. Takes us 20 mins just to get to a grocery store.

stickguy

I would say most of my trips are under 5 miles. Heck, there must be at least 4 supermarkets within 3 miles.
plus a Target. There is a reason I still have not cracked 400 miles on the new car.

Made the mistake of looking at the extended weather forecast today. There are about 6 days in the next 15 where they included some version of snowflake. I think it is the Gods telling me to just go get new tires. Of course, there won't be one flake in that time if I do.

mjfloyd1

ab348 said:

I put Michelin Premier LTX on my wife’s MB GL 350 diesel and they were totally bald after 14k miles. Michelin was good about refund since they had 60k mile warranty.

Wow, that seems really low mileage. Bad set of tires or some other thing?

Beats me. Have 12k mikes on Firestone destination LE2 and they are holding up great. 

tjc78

stickguy said:

I would say most of my trips are under 5 miles. Heck, there must be at least 4 supermarkets within 3 miles. plus a Target. There is a reason I still have not cracked 400 miles on the new car. Made the mistake of looking at the extended weather forecast today. There are about 6 days in the next 15 where they included some version of snowflake. I think it is the Gods telling me to just go get new tires. Of course, there won't be one flake in that time if I do.

My Elantra went a grand total of 2.5 miles this week!  The only reason it moved was to pick up take out last night because my SIL blocked the Enclave in!

I am glad that we need to jump on 42 / ACX in the morning for a short distance otherwise our cars would rarely ever see the highway.   We really should take Evesham to the WHP on non school days, but I just can’t take all the lights even though it’s much less mileage.

Mom wants to buy me a snowblower since my stepbrother took the one from her house, I’m sure that would also ensure no snow here!   

stickguy

we at least use it for running around doing stuff. Big trips to Westmont on Friday for dinner, and up to BJs! The RDX is probably worse, but that gets a few long trips a year to help clear out the gunk (though with only 1 more trip to NC left before the princess graduates, those will be much less frequent).

Sometimes I just go out and take a drive around that includes some highway to give it some exercise.

cdnpinhead

.

ab348

cdnpinhead said:

.

Responding to @toomanyfumes post from the other day?

cdnpinhead

Turns out there's no way to delete a post, so this is as good as it gets -- result of looking up something to be sure it was right AFTER posting rather than before. Lesson learned, maybe.

corvette

stickguy said:

for some odd reason, even on a 2018 Hyundai still does not have a maintenance minder. My 2013 RDX has that. As did my 2005 Odyssey. Both of which seem to go right around 7,000 miles before calling for service (though the RDX the last couple of years I have only put 5-6,000 miles on it, so I have taken it in at 1 year mark.) problem with that is, the codes don't come up so am doing service based on what think it needs (beyond normal oil change of course). I plan on just following the normal schedule, which for me, means every 6 months. Only about $30 at the dealer, and every 4th one free so 2x year to make sure Hyundai can never pull a JMonroe on me! if the princess buys it from me at some point, I will have to put reminders in my phone to remind me to remind her! the other interesting item on that car is they call for a bottle of fuel system additive every 6 months, unless you normally use top tier gas (which I plan to do anyway). Have never seen that before. no clue how much they charge for that, since I am sure it is not part of their discount 1 hour oil change.

If you’re taking it to the Acura dealer, they should be able to plug in the computer and pull the codes for the next recommended service, even if it’s not displaying on the gauge cluster. 

stickguy

the service writer just looked at my history and the normal schedule and knew what should be coming up. I usually keep track on my own, and do things when I think they should be done (often more frequent than the car would ask for).

qbrozen

stickguy said:

the service writer just looked at my history and the normal schedule and knew what should be coming up. I usually keep track on my own, and do things when I think they should be done (often more frequent than the car would ask for).

You mean your advisor did not try to push transmission flush, brake flush, coolant flush, fuel injector flush? That is pretty amazing.

tbirdmarco

@stickguy would just follow the book like you are doing! works best!

tbirdmarco

@stickguy I am like you do things mor offen than the car would call for!

tbirdmarco

@tjc78 nice Cristmess gift mom wants to get for you!

tbirdmarco

and those flushes are bad bad just drane and fill is all you do nead!

tjc78

qbrozen said:

stickguy said:

the service writer just looked at my history and the normal schedule and knew what should be coming up. I usually keep track on my own, and do things when I think they should be done (often more frequent than the car would ask for).

You mean your advisor did not try to push transmission flush, brake flush, coolant flush, fuel injector flush? That is pretty amazing.

I must be flagged in the computer at Burns Buick/GMC as a no up sell.  After the first few times they don’t even ask me. 

They are both leased cars.  LOF and rotations only 

tjc78

Marcothecarguy1986 said:

@tjc78 nice Cristmess gift mom wants to get for you!

Yes it is.   

tbirdmarco

@tjc78 nice nice glad they don't try to upsell you! the Nissan dealer we whent to did try that with my brother told him don't worry they are trying to take every dime from you! if the flewide still looks the bright color it is don't worry about it! except for oial lollol

corvette

Drove my first Prius today. A second gen, 2008 I think. Drove like a normal economy car from that era, but actually seemed a little quieter on the highway. CEL and TPMS lights were on, but it seemed to drive fine. Also, the fuel gauge didn’t work. So much for that vaunted Toyota reliability.  I couldn’t really tell much difference from a conventional vehicle, which is probably what Toyota intended. I was impressed, but won’t be buying one soon. 

stickguy

qbrozen said:

stickguy said:

the service writer just looked at my history and the normal schedule and knew what should be coming up. I usually keep track on my own, and do things when I think they should be done (often more frequent than the car would ask for).

You mean your advisor did not try to push transmission flush, brake flush, coolant flush, fuel injector flush? That is pretty amazing.

that dealer is actually pretty chill on that. Though they really thought I needed new wiper blades last time. But, I already had done the trans and brake fluid once, so definitely not due for that. Might be calling for a diff fluid change next service visit.

mjfloyd1

corvette said:

Drove my first Prius today. A second gen, 2008 I think. Drove like a normal economy car from that era, but actually seemed a little quieter on the highway. CEL and TPMS lights were on, but it seemed to drive fine. Also, the fuel gauge didn’t work. So much for that vaunted Toyota reliability.  I couldn’t really tell much difference from a conventional vehicle, which is probably what Toyota intended. I was impressed, but won’t be buying one soon. 

I drove my friend’s P85 RWD Tesla. It’s quick but it’s strange not having any engine noise - I prefer the “loud pedal”.  Also the car braking when you let off the accelerator is hard to get used to.  Interior is really cheesy (other than the giant iPad Center stack) for the price range that it is in. 

He wants me to drive it for a weekend to see if it changes my mind but I just don’t like it well enough to do it. 

tbirdmarco

@corvette nice nice so the pries was just ok an an aconmy car not for me but good for most lollol

xwesx

fintail said:

Running synthetic, my modern MBs have had oil changes yearly. I used to do it bi-yearly in the E55, but my indy mechanic said that was overkill (as I wasn't hitting 10K miles/year). The fintail also gets a yearly change with conventional oil, but that's 2K miles on a good year these days.

Annual is an excellent choice for most vehicles/owners, as it is easy to remember and the oil is still in good shape at then end of the time. If anyone has reservations about "going that long," just pull an oil sample once or twice and have an analysis done. The cost isn't terrible (if you get TBN with the analysis, it is probably going to run you $35), and the peace of mind is priceless.

tifighter

xwesx said:

iluvmysephia1 said:

stick if you ever need snows get Michelin X-ICE iE3's. Incredible plowing power and confidence through turns and stopping. Makes the other snow tires seem like child's play.

Somewhat disagree.... They are really good on packed snow or ice, but not very good at all in deep snow. Way better than any all-season, mind you! I mostly don't like how fast they wear - these are very much similar to Blizzak in that respect. Their longevity is terrible. I wouldn't really mind that if they cost a lot less, but when I can get other tires for less that last longer and perform better, I'm not sure why I would buy another set of X-Ice.

@xwesx I've been looking to get some winter tires for the ski season and had been considering the X-ice, Blizzak WS80 and the Conti WinterContacts. I'd be curious if you have any thoughts there; sounds like you are meh on the X-ice.

xwesx

tifighter said:

@xwesx I've been looking to get some winter tires for the ski season and had been considering the X-ice, Blizzak WS80 and the Conti WinterContacts. I'd be curious if you have any thoughts there; sounds like you are meh on the X-ice.

I have used all three of these tires! The good news here is that I found all three of them to exhibit very similar wear characteristics... that is to say, they all wear quite quickly. On mixed dry/snow/ice roads, you can likely expect about 12,000 miles of life out of them (in terms of being any good on snow/ice; they'll likely be at about 7/32" depth at that point). My results were about 16-18,000 miles with almost exclusive use on snow/ice, as we really don't have much "dry" road here between October and April.

Subjective, of course, but of the three, the Blizzak is the best overall performer. It's the best on ice and is okay in deep snow. The X-Ice is excellent on ice as well (not as grippy as Blizzak, though), but kinda squirrelly in deep snow (I guess the best way to describe this is that these tend to "float" easier than other tires I've tried - control just feels more limited). Conti is pretty good on ice - not as good as the other two, but has much better directional control than the X-Ice in snow.

Other tires that I like: Goodyear UGI - wonderful tread life (30K+), great in deep snow, decent on ice (not as good as any of those above); Yokohama iG - good tread life (estimate at ~30K; I haven't worn mine out yet, as these are a current set), also great in deep snow, very good on ice (better than UGI, not as good as other three).

Since we have long winters and we grow quite accustomed to the slippery surfaces, a long tread life is important to me: I like my tires to last four or five years (the three above only give me three years, and are kinda sketchy for part of year three sometimes!). Traction characteristics come in next (obviously a balance is needed here!), and handling in deep snow is important to me because I don't like to be slowed down by the weather. Of anything, snow/slush is most likely do to this, so tires that can do well with 4-6" of snow (e.g., it is nearly like it isn't there) and still allow me good control at 60 mph are going to endear themselves to me.

If you will be winding up mountain roads and are not likely going quickly in the process, then ice grip is likely most important. On your Volvo, I would say the Blizzak or Yokohama iG51V are your best options.

I wanted to like the X-Ice when I bought my set of XI3, but they don't have anything that sets them apart: Cost is like a Blizzak (to say, on the more expensive side), wear/ice handling is comparable there, too, and snow handling is pretty "blah." So, if my only choices were Michelin or Bridgestone, the latter would get my money.

sb55

tifighter said:

stick if you ever need snows get Michelin X-ICE iE3's. Incredible plowing power and confidence through turns and stopping. Makes the other snow tires seem like child's play.

Somewhat disagree.... They are really good on packed snow or ice, but not very good at all in deep snow. Way better than any all-season, mind you! I mostly don't like how fast they wear - these are very much similar to Blizzak in that respect. Their longevity is terrible. I wouldn't really mind that if they cost a lot less, but when I can get other tires for less that last longer and perform better, I'm not sure why I would buy another set of X-Ice.

@xwesx I've been looking to get some winter tires for the ski season and had been considering the X-ice, Blizzak WS80 and the Conti WinterContacts. I'd be curious if you have any thoughts there; sounds like you are meh on the X-ice.

I put Michelin X-ice I’m my 535d x-drive. I live in Vermont on a dirt road that stays snow covered when not mud. I think that they are great. They’re fine in snow and more importantly, they don’t beat you up on bare pavement. 

xwesx

sb55 said:

I put Michelin X-ice I’m my 535d x-drive. I live in Vermont on a dirt road that stays snow covered when not mud. I think that they are great. They’re fine in snow and more importantly, they don’t beat you up on bare pavement. 

I will say that for them! All of these are fine on bare, but X-Ice and UGI are definitely the most poised of the bunch. Studless winter tires often feel a little "doughy" on dry roads in terms of handling.

tifighter

@xwesx Great write up; thanks. The Michelins weren't originally on my list but I saw that Consumer Reports rated them #1 and wondered if I was missing something. I'll probably go -1 on a spare set of wheels and use them for downhill and nordic ski trips around the BC, WA and OR. I guess I haven't written off a set of Hakkapelitta R2s either, but they are kind of a pain to get around here.

@sb55 brings up a great point about bare pavement performance. My office is moving closer to my house and I won't have to drive at all to get to work in a few weeks, so that takes some of the need for Seattle commuting performance off the table. But wet pavement performance above freezing is still a reality a lot of the time.