Chronic Car Buyers Anonymous

tjc78

I figure if I drive them around Wildwood in a golf cart, they can be in my 5000 lb beast of a truck without a booster.

tjc78

Nice Friday off… the last two weeks of school is a joke (and a half day today) so we played the cool parent and held them home today since they have done really well this year. They still have to go in everyday next week half days.

Luckily the air quality isn’t bad here and mostly back to normal.

I paid a boat load of money for season passes to the water park. I’m getting my monies worth!

28firefighter

@tjc78 said:
Nice Friday off… the last two weeks of school is a joke (and a half day today) so we played the cool parent and held them home today since they have done really well this year. They still have to go in everyday next week half days.

Luckily the air quality isn’t bad here and mostly back to normal.

I paid a boat load of money for season passes to the water park. I’m getting my monies worth!

They’ll remember you making the time. Fun!

pensfan83

Yesterday was our school district's picnic at our local amusement park. An overall mild and pleasant day. We went out as a family but about an hour after we arrived and rode a few rides together the oldest was off with his group of friends for most of the day. The youngest and his group of friends had supervision from a rotating parent chaperone. Fun day overall.

au1994

Man how times change. I remember being 6 years old and bouncing around in the back of my dads Olds 98. No car seat, no seatbelt. He was probably smoking too but he would at least crack the window.

oldfarmer50

qbrozen said:

oldfarmer50 said:

Gee, you can’t trust an agreement with a stranger who can’t borrow $500 from everybody he know? Does he understand you can’t enforce a court judgement on somebody who doesn’t even have $500?

He hit me up again this morning! He asks, "So what can we agree on?"
I replied that I gave him all the options and he should ask someone close to borrow $500.

Tell him to wait until he graduates high school and can get a full time job.

oldfarmer50

au1994 said:

Man how times change. I remember being 6 years old and bouncing around in the back of my dads Olds 98. No car seat, no seatbelt. He was probably smoking too but he would at least crack the window.

Same with me in my mom’s 53’ Ford. Standing on the back seat or laying on the rear package shelf looking up at the sky while mom smoked. Ah, good times.

I almost broke down and bought an overpriced 4x4 Ford Ranger that was for sale at a dealer near me. A low mile Sport trim and loaded for its time but it was sold. It seems there are still people willing to pay outrageous prices for old pick ups.

stickguy

Just buy a new one and never have to do it again.

corvette

stickguy said:

Just buy a new one and never have to do it again.

Or two!

jmonroe1

@28firefighter said:
My dude is tall but not heavy - joke is by following the rules to a T, he'll be going on his first date in a booster seat.

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Look at it on the bright side. If things don’t change you can drive him to be sure his date doesn’t try to take advantage of a skinny kid.

jmonroe

jmonroe1

@au1994 said:
Man how times change. I remember being 6 years old and bouncing around in the back of my dads Olds 98. No car seat, no seatbelt. He was probably smoking too but he would at least crack the window.

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I gotta slowdown a little when I read these posts. I saw “smoking” and “crack”. Then I realized this was a father from years ago who had a big car without A/C. I know all about those days. How did we survive?

jmonroe

jmonroe1

@pensfan83 said:
Yesterday was our school district's picnic at our local amusement park. An overall mild and pleasant day. We went out as a family but about an hour after we arrived and rode a few rides together the oldest was off with his group of friends for most of the day. The youngest and his group of friends had supervision from a rotating parent chaperone. Fun day overall.

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I’ll bet that park was Kennywood. That was the most fun day of the school year when I was in grade school. Back at that age I couldn’t understand the popularity of the ride Laugh in the Dark, thought it was very boring (not sure if that ride is still there). Then came high school and it was the best ride in the park.

It was also a big day for my sons all through their school years. Now the grandkids like it.

It’s good that some things never change.

jmonroe

jmonroe1

@corvette said:
Or two!

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I don’t think he’d recognize them without at least a little rocker panel rust. Maybe he could get a rattle can that looks like rust. That’s might actually work.

jmonroe

xwesx

My son actually found the boosters far more comfortable, and it took a long time before he was willing to sit in the seat without any sort of added support. I think the most important aspect of the boosters, from a practical safety perspective, is getting the kids' hips up higher so the belt sits snug in the crease of their hips/legs rather than above their pelvis. Even a minor frontal crash can cause substantial abdominal injury if the belt is too high. Of course, bad/casual posture in the car can result in the same injuries, regardless of the person's size or age, so there's only so much a booster can do.

I think we went from five point belts to using the car's three point belt over the full front-facing seat at around five or six for each of them, and we went to a bottom-only booster for my daughter at six and my son at nine (his choice). I don't recall how long they used the bottom-only boosters... maybe another three years? They were a dream in terms of size and simplicity compared to the other options.

The funny thing is that when I sold the booster seats after "retiring" them in favor of bottom only boosters, I had some crazy gal contact me on my Craigslist ad saying that it was "dangerous, irresponsible, and illegal" for me to sell the old boosters because of their age and the fact that the really nice seat we had was in an accident (the booster was strapped and unoccupied at the time, and took no damage). I told her, "lady, I appreciate your enthusiasm, but the way I see it, these things are perfectly usable, I'm done with them, and I've fully disclosed their history. If a buyer wants them, they are fully capable of making a reasonable and informed decision about their own child's safety. Live or die, it's none of your business."

LOL She got really riled up after that. I had to block her email and reported her to CL for harassment.

oldfarmer50

jmonroe1 said:

@corvette said:

Or two!

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I don’t think he’d recognize them without at least a little rocker panel rust. Maybe he could get a rattle can that looks like rust. That’s might actually work.

jmonroe

As I mentioned before, three out of four vehicles I own are rust free. The van is a rust bucket so I see no reason to spend $15k to replace it with another rust bucket. I did find a bargain Ranger in ME with only 70k miles for $5500 but when I looked at the pictures I could see the rust bubbling all over.

xwesx

I found out today that one of my employees has a 2001 Audi TT convertible with a manual transmission. 45,000 miles. I told her, "You need to hang onto that one; that's a collectible now and the value is likely to keep going up at a reasonable clip!" She said, "Really? I paid $5,000 for back in 2015, and my husband told me it is worth twice that now, but I thought he was pulling my leg. He's always trying to get me to sell it."

I told her that he may have been exaggerating a little on that, but it is definitely worth more now and is probably outpacing inflation from the price she paid.

ab348

xwesx said:

The funny thing is that when I sold the booster seats after "retiring" them in favor of bottom only boosters, I had some crazy gal contact me on my Craigslist ad saying that it was "dangerous, irresponsible, and illegal" for me to sell the old boosters because of their age and the fact that the really nice seat we had was in an accident (the booster was strapped and unoccupied at the time, and took no damage). I told her, "lady, I appreciate your enthusiasm, but the way I see it, these things are perfectly usable, I'm done with them, and I've fully disclosed their history. If a buyer wants them, they are fully capable of making a reasonable and informed decision about their own child's safety. Live or die, it's none of your business."

LOL She got really riled up after that. I had to block her email and reported her to CL for harassment.

I’m not totally certain but she may not be totally wrong. I seem to recall some legislation here at least that established lifespans for car safety seats and after that date they were illegal to use and had to be replaced with new. Why, I do not know.

28firefighter

We’ve given away a couple of my guy’s early seats. I gave the same caveats that you did - someone was more than happy to make use of them. And if not I’d have recycled them. Live and let live…

roadburner

We had a some friends over for a cookout and one of the guys is a long time BMW enthusiast. He has an E36 M3 for track days and has also had a few diesels and an i3. He wanted to go for a ride in the C43; After we got back he agreed that it felt more like an E39 M5 than a Mercedes- especially with respect to the ride/handling as well as the engine response.

fintail

roadburner said:

We had a some friends over for a cookout and one of the guys is a long time BMW enthusiast. He has an E36 M3 for track days and has also had a few diesels and an i3. He wanted to go for a ride in the C43; After we got back he agreed that it felt more like an E39 M5 than a Mercedes- especially with respect to the ride/handling as well as the engine response.

There's kind of saying out there that with time, MB has adopted some old BMW attributes, and BMW has decided on some MB attributes. I think there's something to that - the tuned MBs can be pretty hot, and some BMWs exist for comfort first.

jmonroe1

@roadburner said:
We had a some friends over for a cookout and one of the guys is a long time BMW enthusiast. He has an E36 M3 for track days and has also had a few diesels and an i3. He wanted to go for a ride in the C43; After we got back he agreed that it felt more like an E39 M5 than a Mercedes- especially with respect to the ride/handling as well as the engine response.

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Have you ever thought that your C43 is just a rebadged BMW?

That being the case I wonder if there is a BMW that is a rebadged Benz. I think @fintail might be alluding to this.

jmonroe

fintail

jmonroe1 said:

@roadburner said:

We had a some friends over for a cookout and one of the guys is a long time BMW enthusiast. He has an E36 M3 for track days and has also had a few diesels and an i3. He wanted to go for a ride in the C43; After we got back he agreed that it felt more like an E39 M5 than a Mercedes- especially with respect to the ride/handling as well as the engine response.

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Have you ever thought that your C43 is just a rebadged BMW?

That being the case I wonder if there is a BMW that is a rebadged Benz. I think @fintail might be alluding to this.

jmonroe

Thankfully no rebadges out there. I think maybe it can all be summed up as in recent years many MBs have become more engaging to drive, and many BMWs have become a little more cushy. On that thought, in the late 50s, MB made an attempt to buy BMW (which was barely treading water due to having a not very diversified lineup) - almost happened, but I think the family ownership of BMW ultimately resisted.

roadburner

Yes the Quandt family stepped in and gave the company enough time to develop the Neue Klasse sedans-a design and engine family which endured for three decades.

fintail

roadburner said:

Yes the Quandt family stepped in and gave the company enough time to develop the Neue Klasse sedans-a design and engine family which endured for three decades.

It's pretty amazing how the BMW lineup evolved. Before the takeover attempt, they had the expensive fancy 500 series cars, the then-new small 700, and the bubble cars/microcars. No volume range. MB had a full lineup from thrifty diesels to middle class sedans to posh coupes/cabrios to sports cars to limos that weren't much cheaper than a Rolls-Royce - and that's not counting the semis, buses, military vehicles, etc.

xwesx

ab348 said:

I’m not totally certain but she may not be totally wrong. I seem to recall some legislation here at least that established lifespans for car safety seats and after that date they were illegal to use and had to be replaced with new. Why, I do not know.

No, that's true. But, at the end of the day, your kids, your choice.

ab348

Was browsing YouTube on my TV app and for whatever reason, this time their algorithm that suggests things for me to watch presented a bunch of Nurburgring videos of people taking their own cars onto the track and then crashing. It was remarkable that the crashes seemed to involve BMWs most often, followed by Porsches, and then a few Japanese models, typically the Yaris Gazoo and the Toyota GR86/Subie BRZ. Man, those track days must get expensive in a hurry when those owners run out of talent.

nyccarguy

ab348 said:

Was browsing YouTube on my TV app and for whatever reason, this time their algorithm that suggests things for me to watch presented a bunch of Nurburgring videos of people taking their own cars onto the track and then crashing. It was remarkable that the crashes seemed to involve BMWs most often, followed by Porsches, and then a few Japanese models, typically the Yaris Gazoo and the Toyota GR86/Subie BRZ. Man, those track days must get expensive in a hurry when those owners run out of talent.

A friend of a friend used to have a heavily modified VIPER GTS coupe that he raced on the track. My friend went with him to a race one day. He watched a guy in a Ferrari (Maybe it was an F355 or F360) crash the car, then went to a trailer and pulled another one out like it was a "stick of gum."

kyfdx

A friend is in France, and sent me this picture.

stickguy

Cleaned up the truck and put on the tailgate letters. I think it makes a big difference. Should have come like this from the factory.

Even spelled it right!

Sandman6472

Don't remember who but think someone in here said they used to own a 1975 Pontiac Grand Prix. My folks traded their 1972 Lincoln Continental 2-door in for the Grand Prix when I was in college. Nice enough vehicle with that deep red velour that was all the rage back then. From what I gather, it was a demo for one of the big whigs at JM Pontiac in Hollywood Florida and since the folks knew the owner of the dealership, got it with super low miles. That was their first Pontiac and they proceeded to get a few more over the next 10 years, with one of them being that horrid diesel which came from the Oldsmobile division.
Found this pic of me & my twin next to it during our summer break as I recall.

Sandman6472

Had no Sirius/XM on Thursday morning. Had it after work on Tuesday and didn't use the car on Wednesday. Took off Thursday morning & had no signal and it kept reading "acquiring signal". Called up & the first person was clueless on what to do. She was reading from a script & had me turn the car on & off, then open the front door a few times with no success. She transferred me to the tech department and took almost another 45 minutes of doing more things from their end plus mine until my service was restored. Thought the whole thing was a bit strange but was happy just to get my service back.
Wanted to un-pair my phone from the Golf but had no luck doing this. Wonder if anyone knows how to un-pair a smart phone from a car?

jmonroe1

@nyccarguy said:
A friend of a friend used to have a heavily modified VIPER GTS coupe that he raced on the track. My friend went with him to a race one day. He watched a guy in a Ferrari (Maybe it was an F355 or F360) crash the car, then went to a trailer and pulled another one out like it was a "stick of gum."

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I believe the saying for that is…”more money than brains”.

jmonroe

stickguy

sandy, usually just go into the phone app on the screen (same place you pair one) and select the phone and hit delete phone (or uninstall, whatever they call it).

roadburner

nyccarguy said:

ab348 said:

Was browsing YouTube on my TV app and for whatever reason, this time their algorithm that suggests things for me to watch presented a bunch of Nurburgring videos of people taking their own cars onto the track and then crashing. It was remarkable that the crashes seemed to involve BMWs most often, followed by Porsches, and then a few Japanese models, typically the Yaris Gazoo and the Toyota GR86/Subie BRZ. Man, those track days must get expensive in a hurry when those owners run out of talent.

A friend of a friend used to have a heavily modified VIPER GTS coupe that he raced on the track. My friend went with him to a race one day. He watched a guy in a Ferrari (Maybe it was an F355 or F360) crash the car, then went to a trailer and pulled another one out like it was a "stick of gum."

I've spun a few times at HPDEs but I've never hit anything. I use Lockton Affinity for my track coverage just in case. I'll have to take the C43 out at least once- if for no other reason than to try out the built in Track Pace app.

roadburner

Speaking of the C43, I was driving it last night and the RF tire began losing air at an extremely fast rate. I pulled into a gas station with the TMPS reading 0 psi. The tire would not hold any air. The tires are MOE(Mercedes-speak for their run flats) but I decided to go ahead and call MB Roadside Assistance. The entire experience was first-rate and the car was picked up in under 45 minutes. The silver lining is that I had scheduled a Service A for a couple of weeks out so I'll just have it performed while the tire issue is sorted.
It's really odd; the tire pressure was spot on when I left home and it dropped like a rock after about 7 miles. I didn't hit anything and I'm the only person that drives it. No vibrations or other indications of a problem either.

corvette

I had that happen at least once when a nail or other debris was lodged in the tire. Everything worked fine until the nail got thrown out of the tire and all the air followed soon thereafter.

jmonroe1

Sandman6472 said:

Don't remember who but think someone in here said they used to own a 1975 Pontiac Grand Prix. My folks traded their 1972 Lincoln Continental 2-door in for the Grand Prix when I was in college. Nice enough vehicle with that deep red velour that was all the rage back then. From what I gather, it was a demo for one of the big whigs at JM Pontiac in Hollywood Florida and since the folks knew the owner of the dealership, got it with super low miles. That was their first Pontiac and they proceeded to get a few more over the next 10 years, with one of them being that horrid diesel which came from the Oldsmobile division.
Found this pic of me & my twin next to it during our summer break as I recall.

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There you go again, rubbing it in.

jmonroe

jmonroe1

roadburner said:

Speaking of the C43, I was driving it last night and the RF tire began losing air at an extremely fast rate. I pulled into a gas station with the TMPS reading 0 psi. The tire would not hold any air. The tires are MOE(Mercedes-speak for their run flats) but I decided to go ahead and call MB Roadside Assistance. The entire experience was first-rate and the car was picked up in under 45 minutes. The silver lining is that I had scheduled a Service A for a couple of weeks out so I'll just have it performed while the tire issue is sorted.
It's really odd; the tire pressure was spot on when I left home and it dropped like a rock after about 7 miles. I didn't hit anything and I'm the only person that drives it. No vibrations or other indications of a problem either.

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It must be that time of the month.

I had Mrs. j’s Subie inspected this past Monday and everything was OK but the guy said I’d need rear tires by the time I get the car inspected next year. The next night coming home from the restaurant the TPMS for the right rear tire comes on and shows 15 PSI. I guess I missed it when it first came on. I pull into a parking lot about 2 miles from home and get out my cheapie Harbor Freight inflator. As it’s pumping up the tire I feel all around the tread area but I don’t feel anything. Then I noticed a small nail (the head was about 3/16 of and inch in diameter) in the sidewall about an inch down from the edge of the tread. I pumped the tire up to 30 PSI and made it home with 15 PSI showing.

I called the shop early Wednesday morning and they said they'd have 2 tires first thing the next morning. The shop was about 10 miles away so I pumped it up to about 45 pounds and hoped I’d get there before I lost all the air. It’s interesting driving knowing that you have a tire that has a leak and watching the tire pressure slowly dropping. As I pulled into the shops driveway it showed 21 PSI. Whew.

I was thinking about pumping it up more than 45 PSI but I didn’t want to pump it up too much more and have the nail blow out if I hit even the smallest pot hole.

Thankfully it was one of the rear tires that were going to be replaced soon anyway. Sometimes you get lucky.

jmonroe

Michaell

@jmonroe1 - what was the tread depth on the other two tires? It's my understanding that when you run AWD, you should replace all 4 tires at the same time, so as not to bind up the AWD system.

jmonroe1

Michaell said:

@jmonroe1 - what was the tread depth on the other two tires? It's my understanding that when you run AWD, you should replace all 4 tires at the same time, so as not to bind up the AWD system.

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I didn’t measure them but the fronts only have 5K miles on them.

I called 2 Subie dealerships and they both said if the tires are the same brand and model as long as the difference in tread depth isn’t more than 6/32 you’re OK.

For the fun of it I called two inspection stations and they said the same thing but followed that up with, “that’s Subaru’s party line but I’ve never had a problem mismatching tires on later model Subaru’s. When I asked what a later model was they both said, “since about 2010”. Are the indie shops blowing smoke? I don’t know but it sure is a good way for tire shops to sell 4 tires if you only want 2.

I think I told this tale the first Winter I had my of 2009 Genny. I went to Firestone to see if they had Blizzak winter tires but they were out of my size and wouldn’t be able to get them for about a week. Off to NTB to see if they had them. They did but the guy said I had to buy 4 tires. When I told him my car wasn’t front wheel drive or AWD he arrogantly said he didn’t care and if I wanted the tires I had to buy all 4 or nothing. That meant nothing for me so I went to an indie shop I bought from before since they always said while they primarily sold Cooper tires they could get any tire a customer wanted. They didn’t have Blzzak’s and couldn’t get them either for about a week but the guy said something like, “since you seem to be willing to spend a little more to get a good tire like Blizzak’s, would you be willing to spend about 10 bucks more per tire to get Nokian’s? Because I can get those for you from our warehouse by tomorrow morning”. When I asked if he had to sell me 4 tires he said, “why, you don’t have a front wheel or AWD car”. I told him the NTB story and he said, “we don’t jerk our customers around like that. We want them to come back here and continue buying tires from us”. So, I got 2 Nokian’s and they are very good winter tires and I wouldn’t hesitate buying them again.

jmonroe

stickguy

the rear snows might get you moving, but the fronts do all the steering and most of the braking. Given a choice, I would rather have the winters on the front than the back. But I also would not cheap out and put 4 on if I was putting any (which I never have bothered to do)

note this did not apply in HS/college when I had semi-bald bias ply snows on the rear wheels of my Duster!

jmonroe1

stickguy said:

the rear snows might get you moving, but the fronts do all the steering and most of the braking. Given a choice, I would rather have the winters on the front than the back. But I also would not cheap out and put 4 on if I was putting any (which I never have bothered to do)

note this did not apply in HS/college when I had semi-bald bias ply snows on the rear wheels of my Duster!

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I guess you can say I’m old school and when I was growing up nobody put 4 snow tires on a car. I also remember chains and all the work they were to maintain and put them on then off then on then…The invention of snow tires were the cats meow and when they came out everyone bought them. like I said no one, at least no one I knew, ever put 4 of them on their cars. Then came studded snow tires in the late 60’s and a lot of folks I knew jumped at the chance to get them. They were very good but noisy.

I never had them but there were retread snow tires made with saw dust that provided good traction. While I heard they were good from several guys I worked with in the mid 60’s they were done after one year but cheap enough not to bother anyone from buying 2 more the next year. I never bought into that.

jmonroe

kyfdx

The old snow tires weren't really made for handling. Just getting traction. No one put them on the front, because you might be more dangerous than without.

For the last 30 years, winter tires are made to go on all four corners. It's all or none.

My '77 Cobra II was a really interesting drive with studded snow tires on the rear. Very tail happy..

nyccarguy

stickguy said:

the rear snows might get you moving, but the fronts do all the steering and most of the braking. Given a choice, I would rather have the winters on the front than the back. But I also would not cheap out and put 4 on if I was putting any (which I never have bothered to do)

note this did not apply in HS/college when I had semi-bald bias ply snows on the rear wheels of my Duster!

I agree with you @stickguy, but some people make it work. When I had my 2015 Legacy, I was looking for Winter Tires. I did some research on Tire Rack and then called the Subaru dealer (In Rye, NY) where I bought and serviced the car. The parts guy on the phone said he recommends Nokians. He said he drives a RWD, 6-Speed, V6 Mustang to work every day and puts these Nokians on the rear in the winter. He lives up north off of 684 and has never gotten stuck nor missed a day of work. That was enough of a ringing endorsement for me.

I have replaced just 1 tire on an AWD vehicle before. When I do replace a tire, I do use common sense and will replace 2 if the 2nd tire on the axle is going to need replacement in the not too distant future.

roadburner

@xwesx said:
No, that's true. But, at the end of the day, your kids, your choice.

In 1995 I had a friend who often flew overseas for a shipping company pick up a BMW car seat for me while he was in Germany. He didn’t have to go through Customs so the idiot bureaucrats couldn’t try to save me from myself. I had no doubt that the German safety standards were likely tougher than whatever the US safety cabal was requiring.

28firefighter

@roadburner said:

@xwesx said:
No, that's true. But, at the end of the day, your kids, your choice.

In 1995 I had a friend who often flew overseas for a shipping company pick up a BMW car seat for me while he was in Germany. He didn’t have to go through Customs so the idiot bureaucrats couldn’t try to save me from myself. I had no doubt that the German safety standards were likely tougher than whatever the US safety cabal was requiring.

We bought the Cybex infant carrier we did because it was the only tested, at the time, to European standards. Same logic for me - figured it was more stringent.

tifighter

Now I don’t feel so bad about shipping my infant seat over from Denmark.

28firefighter

@tifighter said:
Now I don’t feel so bad about shipping my infant seat over from Denmark.

Nah. Definitely not. Only trouble the true euro seats might give is if they don’t have the FAA marking on it for use on a plane.

roadburner

So the Mercedes dealer's service department opens at 7:30 am; at 7:27 am my service advisor had texted me to let me know that they were checking the RF tire issue. I texted back that I would like to go ahead and have the Service A performed. He said that was no problem.. At 9:00 am he advised that the tire had a hole in the sidewall and that the rear brake pads were close to the minimums; I authorized replacing them. At 11:18 am the car was washed and ready to be picked up.
Overall it was an impressive experience.

stickguy

Mavericks still seem hot. At least carvana is moving them even at their premium prices.

Last time I checked (last week) they had 33 lariats with a bunch in process of selling. Today they are down to 23 with 10 in process.