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Comments
wow, that sounds fatalistic, doesn't it?
Then yesterday I saw a 2002 VDC Outback with well established surface rust on the right rear quarter, looks to be creeping up from behind the bumper. Car is origional paint and no accident only has 53000 Kilos. on the odometer. This is unacceptable in a 3 year old car that cost new in excess of 45K dollars CDN.
So much for the false security of double galvanised panels.
Cheers Pat.
Our thoughts go out to your parents and their loss of many friends.
Serge
tom
Glad your parents are safe. Although it will take time to heal emotionally.
Jim
It will take time for all involved.
Steve
In the States there are separate warranties for rust-- it's 5yr/60k miles for Subaru. I think if you never washed off the road salt it would be possible to rust out a car like that.
~Colin
Pat: strange, I wonder how it was used?
I saw a photo of a relatively new Toyota pickup on a lift, and the rear half of the vehicle basically folded over, frame rails and all. It had been used as a salt truck, though, so the frame rails rusted all the way through.
I've seen some rust on early 90s Legacys, but that's about it. The Loyales had more rust issues. And they do use salt on the roads around here.
-juice
This is a cop out, since surface rust left to it's own devices will become a perforation.
Cheers Pat.
I recall CR did a test of aftermarket panels for collision repair, and they put small surface scratches on them and then sprayed them with a salt/chemical mix. The aftermarket ones rusted, but the OE ones did not.
I also wonder if the panels were ever repainted?
-juice
Cheers Pat.
Rust never sleeps....
Steve
The wife's 96 Outback did not have a single spot of rust when we traded it. At the time, this car was 7 years old and had almost 90k.
Both cars were subjected to some pretty bad New England weather, with a high salt diet. I do hand wash them as the weather permits.
I put a hitch on my Forester, but it wasn't that old. The nice thing was it used holes used for the exhaust hangers, so they were sealed up and rust-free.
My friend bought a brand-new Wrangler and we looked at the under carriage only to reveal several rusty bolts - on a brand new Jeep! He was so disappointed.
-juice
Cheers Pat.
Steve
They take a while to get used to. At firts you hop on and it feels totally awkward, like it's hard to keep your balance and stay still.
You get used to it after only a minute or two, and then you can get around pretty well. It's actually kinda "fun to drive", I guess.
I still don't see many of them around, but if you get a chance, try one out, it's definitely memorable.
To bring the topic back to cars, I wonder if the technology could be used to assist a disabled person in driving. Basically you're using your feet to accelerate, brake, and turn left and right. Your hands only help you keep your balance.
We're so used to two (or three) foot pedals and a steering wheel, but I wonder if a little out-of-the-box thinking could benefit folks with limited use of their arms. Just a thought.
Anyone else ever try one?
-juice
-juice
Interesting idea about applying it to a handicap situation. I wonder how difficult it would be to send the same control input from a seated position.
Ken
-juice
Cheers Pat.
Subaru Crew chat is open!
Steve, Host
I'm moving some beds back and forth from the beach condo to the house. Should be a good test of long-range towing since it's about a 3 hour drive.
He also gave me a set of snow tires for the Forester, just in time for spring. :P
Just teasing. I'll put them to good use next winter. Probably early December they'll be mounted.
-juice
Bob
-juice
tom
-juice
It was geared towards students, so they had a WRX TR and an Outback Sport SE opened up for people to crawl in and out of. The cars seemed to be getting plenty of attention.
They handed out stickers for the Impreza Challenge (I had plenty of those), frisbees, cups, and pens, all with the logo. They were all out of brochures, but they said it would mostly be an e-mail campaign anyway.
I signed up for the raffle ($100 or something), it was funny when they asked what school I went to. University of Maryland, um, more than a decade ago!
They even had free food, though I was a bit late for that. Burgers, chips, and Red Bull. I guess they co-market, but the funny thing was the Red Bull vehicle was a old Chevy Tracker.
They also had a Twister area and some badminton courts.
Any how, good to see them out there getting the word out. They were GWU students, too, so Subaru must be pretty smart about getting help with these events.
-juice
I did get a hard time from a friend about tempting the gods, however, as I put away the snowblower earlier in the week. So when we get that foot in early April, I'm to blame.
Tonight I took them to see Ice Age (Meltdown). Very funny for adults as well as kids.
Steve
The Blizzaks have one more winter season left. Still plenty of tread depth.
MNSteve
Subaru, a subsidiary of Fiji Heavy Industries, commented on the merger that it would help Japanese automakers to penetrate a lucrative Russian auto market. "Notoriously bad Russian roads will help us to improve rallying qualities of our cars" - said one of the highly placed Fiji executives who preferred to remain unnamed.
AutoVAZ officials were not immediately available for comment as they were celebrating the closing of the deal in an undisclosed location.
Bob
No car buying story from Juice this year?
tom
Steve, Host
Seeing Steve's note, makes me very aware of the differences in the seasons between North and South sides of the world. April 1st brought the first flush of snow (okay, not very much) to the ski slopes near us. I was bringing in the pool toys as the temperature is dropping enough to make it unlikely any kids will use the pool for the rest of the season. I even turned on the central heating for the first time this year. This heralds the dog moving from guarding warm sofas, to looking after a central heating duct where she drapes her front paws and nose. The kids claims she is "Toasting her Toes".
spring break ...
temps were in 60's yesterday, and in 40's today ... 60 tomorrow and 25 monday night ... what a mess ...
we did go wander around a home show at the joyce center (notre dame) ... that was 'fun', although we saw too many things we can't afford but would be nice to have ...
the thing i probably drooled over the most was a digital piano with all the bells and whistles .. even with the 'show price' it was about $10,000 .... lol
i have work to do on our tutoring business ... a power point presentation to prepare for the informational open houses ...
23 more IEP's to write for kids on my caseload so we can have conferences (about an hour each) ... and clean up the paperwork on the 6 we already had ...
and a funeral to attend .. probably on wed ... DH's uncle ... in just over 3 years, his dad has lost a daughter, a mother-in-law, his mother (last summer), and now his younger brother ... sad ...
at least i'm out of school to do this stuff this week!
see ya down the road ...
tom
Happy April 1st!!
Steve
MNSteve: I did the opposite - picked up a pair of snows from Bob. Someone had given him some for his wife's Forester, but she never drives in the snow. I do, all the time actually, so I hope to put them to good use next winter.
They're Dunlop Graspics. The tread is so soft it's unbelievable!
Kate: thanks for filling in for me, I was out of town at the beach! 70 degrees and we were outta here. :shades:
I'm glad to see IL has a sense of humor. Elise pickup, LOL!
-juice
I still have tread depth left on my winter tires but I think they will only be effective for one more year. If I get two out of them, that second year might be a bit sketchy towards the end. Not sure what I'm going with next for winter tires, but at $245 each for the OE summer tires I'm pretty sure I'll be going a different route on those!
~Colin
I liked the price I paid: free. Zip. Nada. Zero cents per mile.
-juice
Bob's trailer came in handy. We loaded up 2 single beds plus their frames and a few other things in the 5'x8' trailer and drove all the way to Ocean City, about 3 hours driving.
The Forester handled it very well, the temp guage never even moved and you only noticed there was a trailer back there due to slower acceleration and longer braking distances.
Coming back, we loaded up a queen bed, the frame, plus two single bed headboards and a couple of extra rails we had there.
Again, Sandy didn't complain at all, got us home safely and managed 21 mpg carrying all that weight plus 4 people and a dog. That was even with the A/C on, since it got a bit hot.
I took some pics but they're still in the camera at home, so I'll try to remember to upload them tonight.
-juice
juice...when did you get a dog???
(j/k)...how is Hadji?
Dina just turned 8 a couple of weeks ago...had her annual and shots; the vet said she is very, very healthy..alway good news.
The old pup is 13, that's 91 in dog years!
-juice
-juice
Bummer. Wifey got the license plates, so we called our insurance company to help locate the truck owner. She said the driver probably didn't even realize it happened. I suppose it could have been worse.
-juice
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