Dateline 8 June, 2009
At 5:00 I came out of work and climbed in Black Kate. Put my key fob in the socket (she doesn't have a proper key) and pushed the start button. Kate fired up and dinged that I needed to fasten my seat belt which I was doing. Then she tossed a funny little trill in at the end of her song causing me to look around. New cars are like that; they occasionally surprise you. I noted the low tire pressure light was one. Then I noticed it was RED. Now the low pressure light comes in two flavors: red and yellow. Yellow means low. Red means flat. Oh damn.
My first assumption was that I had somehow mis-re-calibrated the sensor when I was working through the instruction book Saturday. So I drove across the street to Motomart where there is free air. Now you may be wondering why didn't he just look at the tires? Remember, Kate has run-flats so you can't SEE a flat tire. Checked pressure on the driver's front and it was fine. Checked the driver's rear and it was fine. Checked the passenger front and it was flat. Found a large bolt/screw in the tire. Frak! Car is less than 48 hours old and I have a flat. But I bought the extended tire warranty and my tire's are covered against this for the first 50K miles or some such. I call the MINI dealer (sales) to advise them of the situation. Why sales? Well, they still had my paperwork on the warranty I bought and I had their number. I was told to bring the car right in and not to pull out the whatever it was. So off I go across town in Rush Hour with a flat tire (meaning no more than 50 mph) to the MINI dealer. I arrive at 6:05.
I then find out that service closed at 6:00. Moreover, service is at a different building about 4 blocks away. While I was told when we bought the car that they had 30 or so loaner MINI's to lend to people during service, those are controlled exclusively by the service department; sales cannot give me one. So I'm stuck at the MINI dealer 40+ minutes from home, still with a flat tire, and no way to fix it until tomorrow. Moreover, because this is a run-flat, it will probably require replacement, not repair. Sales guy tries to get his boss to give me a demo, but there are none to be given or permission is refused. I call my wife and asked her to drive 40 minutes to come get me while i cool my heels at the MINI dealership. The salesman suggests that the only thing he can think of is that I could drive my MINI home and once I got there, I can call the Roadside Assistance (which is free while the car is under warranty) who will come to my house and either tow Kate back to the dealer or put the spare tire on for me. This seems silly so I drive her to the service department and the salesman drive me back to wait for Cinda. Cinda arrives. Car fixed by 10:15 the next morning. If it hadn't been that would have been a WHOLE new issue. No problems since then.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Friday, June 5, 2009
ARRRRGHH! Thar be Black Kate!
Dateline 5 June, 2009
Black Kate, my new MINI Cooper arrived today. She’s a sophisticated little thing with beige leather interior, black body, white roof, and chrome trim bits. We even got the black and silver union jack side scuttle because Cinda liked the idea of a Pirate themed car and seemed to think the “Black Jack” scuttle was pirate themed. I don’t have white sport stripes because she threatened to call it Pepe’ because it looked like a skink. Likewise, I was not able to get yellow because then it “looked like a taxi” or “looked like a school bus.” I was also prevented from sky blue. Cinda probably would have gone with hunter green (“British Racing Green”) which would have looked sharp with the beige leather, but Green is a very common color of MINI and I wanted to avoid that. I’m also leery that green might lower resale. Red was way to common and I don’t favor pure metallic colors (silver, gold, etc.). The white wasn’t white; it was sort of a cream color. Went with a base Cooper because those still have spare tires but I upgraded to the 16 inch wheels which come with run-flats because there are more replacement options for the 16 inch size when the time comes. Because I had run-flats though, I opted for buying the tire maintenance warranty --- more on that later. Anyway, here she is … Black Kate. 2009 MINI Cooper Hardtop. Midnight Black with a white roof and chrome line package. Tuscan Leather interior with Piano Black trim. 6 speed manual transmission on a 1.6L engine putting out 118 horsepower and lots of torque. Automatic climate control, xenon headlights, front and rear fog lights, and 16” white bridgestone wheels. More pictures here.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
I'm a hawk apparently
Maybe I'm crazy, but it seems to me that the response to piracy is well established. Failed state or not, vessels departing from the coast of Somolia are attacking vessels of other nations. We should blockade their coast and sink any vessel that sails from Somolia. Any pirate caught is hung. Activate the Iowa Class and shell any ports from which the pirates sail. A nation does not need a functional government to make war.
Friday, April 10, 2009
MINI??
So Cinda and I spent 5 hours in the MINI dealer and I think I bought a MINI. It's not the MINI I would have thought I would buy. In the last two weeks, I've been thinking Clubman then Convertible then Clubman then Convertible. Either the practical choice, Clubman, with it's slightly more cargo room, usable back seat, level cargo floor, etc. or the funner Convertible. I also have been playing with all the MINI colors from yellow to green to blue to brown to black. But I always came back to green, classic British Racing Green with tan leather and wood trim. All the other colors were play designs.
So today I decided to get a black MINI Cooper hardtop with a white roof and tan interior. This seems odd to me too.
So Cinda didn't prefer the yellow and the blue and I thought the bright red was too common and too likely to fade, which took out all the $0 colors. Cinda liked the green and so did I. But I also liked my black and white MINI and looking at all the MINIs on the lot, I decided that the silver trim looked better on the black than the green. I even added some chrome. The white roof was far enough away from chrome not to interfere and the white wheels looked sharp. Black is also a lot less common of a color than green, probably because it is not a MINI color i.e. colorful.
I also found out that all the Coopers and the Clubman (not the S's) come with a space saver spare, even when they have run flats. So we got the 16 inch wheels which necessarily are going to come with run-flats. BUT, once the run flats run out, I can switch to a normal tire and I'll have a spare. And there are a lot more options for the 16" rim than the 15" rim. Just look at tirerack.com
Still paying more that I'd like, but when you opt for leather seats, you pay more and I wanted the lumbar support that made me get the leather.
Anyway, that was my night.
http://ur-manadu.mybrute.com
So today I decided to get a black MINI Cooper hardtop with a white roof and tan interior. This seems odd to me too.
So Cinda didn't prefer the yellow and the blue and I thought the bright red was too common and too likely to fade, which took out all the $0 colors. Cinda liked the green and so did I. But I also liked my black and white MINI and looking at all the MINIs on the lot, I decided that the silver trim looked better on the black than the green. I even added some chrome. The white roof was far enough away from chrome not to interfere and the white wheels looked sharp. Black is also a lot less common of a color than green, probably because it is not a MINI color i.e. colorful.
I also found out that all the Coopers and the Clubman (not the S's) come with a space saver spare, even when they have run flats. So we got the 16 inch wheels which necessarily are going to come with run-flats. BUT, once the run flats run out, I can switch to a normal tire and I'll have a spare. And there are a lot more options for the 16" rim than the 15" rim. Just look at tirerack.com
Still paying more that I'd like, but when you opt for leather seats, you pay more and I wanted the lumbar support that made me get the leather.
Anyway, that was my night.
http://ur-manadu.mybrute.com
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Buy American?
Back in 2001, my American made Mercury Sable shot craps by blowing its engine seals at about 90,000 miles. Suddenly without a car, I went car shopping and I knew what I wanted. I wanted a AWD or 4WD vehicle with some amount of cargo room, a manual transmission, and an engine that would deliver some performance at 70 MPH.
Detroit didn't make a car like that because they assumed that if you wanted a stick shift, you obviously only wanted it for fuel economy reasons. Thus, they only combined it with their most economical (translate smallest and least HP)engines on their most economical cars (Ford Focus anyone?). Alternately, you could get a stick on a two door sports car like a Mustang. Jeep was just debuting the Liberty which could come with a manual... in about 3-6 months. I ended up getting a Subaru.
FAST FORWARD to 2009. I'm car shopping again in the middle of a recession. The radio is replete with news stories that the Big Three are in Big Trouble and advertisements telling me that I should go buy American because most of the money from foreign cars goes to foreign places. After all, loyal Americans support America by buying American products.
Of course this ignores that in the interconnected 21st Century, we need the other country's economies to rebound too if we want to re-achieve a 90's like prosperity. It also ignores that having people over here with jobs is probably more important than where the money finally goes. I'd rather see an entire Subaru plant over here running flat-out than Dodge making its cars in Mexico and selling them here. It also ignores something else, something philosophical.
Once more when I'm shopping for cars, I am having difficulty finding what I want from an American manufacturer. This is not a quality issue; american cars are as good as any import and better than many... well maybe not Chryslers. But Ford and GM are. This has to do with what I want in a car, and I admit I'm not typical. I don't want a sun/moonroof. I do want a comfortable seat. I don't care about the stereo, but I like my stick shift. I like cars that are fun to drive; cars with character. And once again, Detroit just doesn't make them. Ford does AWD, but with low ceilings and assumes that if you want AWD, you MUST want the sunroof. Chevy assumes that you don't want AWD. Buick assumes you want large, FWD, and a low ceiling, probably with a sunroof. Etc.
So here I am, looking at MINI's and Subarus and Toyotas and getting guilt tripped about not being a "loyal" American. And that makes me mad. Detroit's argument is that you should buy what they make because they make it. Even if it is not what you want, you should buy it. Logically then, if it was a $30,000 scooter with a terrible reliability, you should buy it because they make it and you are a loyal American. "What's good for General Motors is good for America." Oh wait, that kind of arrogance was supposed to have died in the late 70's. My bad. No wait. Their bad.
In the almost 30 years since 1979, they still haven't shed that corporate culture and institutional American car maker arrogance. This recession may be the only way they will learn, can learn. And maybe they can't learn, can't change. Either way they still don't get it and I think GM thinks that we will not allow them to fail because GM = America. We'll come around any minute and buy their cars in droves, even if they go back to making the cream of 1978. Except we won't. Americans demand quality, performance, and choice. In this iPod, MyMusic, MyDocuments, MyWay world, maybe shooting for the largest common denominator doesn't sell cars. It doesn't sell them to me anyway.
No, it's not that "loyal Americans" will rescue GM/America by buying American made cars. Loyal Americans companies would have managed to make the cars that Americans want to buy. It is a shame when it is the foreign car companies who seem able to best read the American consumer.
Detroit didn't make a car like that because they assumed that if you wanted a stick shift, you obviously only wanted it for fuel economy reasons. Thus, they only combined it with their most economical (translate smallest and least HP)engines on their most economical cars (Ford Focus anyone?). Alternately, you could get a stick on a two door sports car like a Mustang. Jeep was just debuting the Liberty which could come with a manual... in about 3-6 months. I ended up getting a Subaru.
FAST FORWARD to 2009. I'm car shopping again in the middle of a recession. The radio is replete with news stories that the Big Three are in Big Trouble and advertisements telling me that I should go buy American because most of the money from foreign cars goes to foreign places. After all, loyal Americans support America by buying American products.
Of course this ignores that in the interconnected 21st Century, we need the other country's economies to rebound too if we want to re-achieve a 90's like prosperity. It also ignores that having people over here with jobs is probably more important than where the money finally goes. I'd rather see an entire Subaru plant over here running flat-out than Dodge making its cars in Mexico and selling them here. It also ignores something else, something philosophical.
Once more when I'm shopping for cars, I am having difficulty finding what I want from an American manufacturer. This is not a quality issue; american cars are as good as any import and better than many... well maybe not Chryslers. But Ford and GM are. This has to do with what I want in a car, and I admit I'm not typical. I don't want a sun/moonroof. I do want a comfortable seat. I don't care about the stereo, but I like my stick shift. I like cars that are fun to drive; cars with character. And once again, Detroit just doesn't make them. Ford does AWD, but with low ceilings and assumes that if you want AWD, you MUST want the sunroof. Chevy assumes that you don't want AWD. Buick assumes you want large, FWD, and a low ceiling, probably with a sunroof. Etc.
So here I am, looking at MINI's and Subarus and Toyotas and getting guilt tripped about not being a "loyal" American. And that makes me mad. Detroit's argument is that you should buy what they make because they make it. Even if it is not what you want, you should buy it. Logically then, if it was a $30,000 scooter with a terrible reliability, you should buy it because they make it and you are a loyal American. "What's good for General Motors is good for America." Oh wait, that kind of arrogance was supposed to have died in the late 70's. My bad. No wait. Their bad.
In the almost 30 years since 1979, they still haven't shed that corporate culture and institutional American car maker arrogance. This recession may be the only way they will learn, can learn. And maybe they can't learn, can't change. Either way they still don't get it and I think GM thinks that we will not allow them to fail because GM = America. We'll come around any minute and buy their cars in droves, even if they go back to making the cream of 1978. Except we won't. Americans demand quality, performance, and choice. In this iPod, MyMusic, MyDocuments, MyWay world, maybe shooting for the largest common denominator doesn't sell cars. It doesn't sell them to me anyway.
No, it's not that "loyal Americans" will rescue GM/America by buying American made cars. Loyal Americans companies would have managed to make the cars that Americans want to buy. It is a shame when it is the foreign car companies who seem able to best read the American consumer.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
MINI's part 2
Found out more over lunch.
My local mechanic thinks that the brakes on a MINI are like any other brakes. And some transmissions require special manufacturer created tools to drain/flush. VW & Porsche for example.
Tires is where the rubber met the road so to speak. The standard MINI tires are 16" run-flats in a non standard size. They cost about $1200 for four and last about 30K miles. By contrast, my Subaru's tires, for 4 would cost me about $680 and they would come warranted for 80K miles. I've gotten more like 120K from the current set. The absolute base MINI hardtop has 15" air tires in a non-standard size. They also only come in performance tires while the run-flats come as all-season if you want them to. However, 4 15" tires cost only about $570.
What that boils down to is that the MINI has twice as expensive tires that will need changing twice as often in all likelihood which means the overall tire cost is 4 times as much as the Subaru. With no run-flats, the MINI costs only slightly less than twice as much as the Subaru assuming the tires wear as fast as the run-flats.
I wonder if you can put 15" tires on the convertible after you get one.
Some one please explain to me why you'd build a car with great fuel economy... 28/36 but not have an economy variant. Why would you think that folks who are willing to pay for all the costly brakes, tires, and whatever else would care? If you have the gold to pay for the maintenance, you have the gold to pay for a car that gets 15/22 in MPG. If you car about the cost of fuel, you might also be shopping for some other economy features. I'd think MINI would at least have 1 car pitched to the economy minded.
Instead they have a car which over 100,000 miles will save about $3,000 in gas over the Lincoln MKZ. They then turn right around and have the same car eat $3,800 in tires, another $3,000 in brakes, and who knows what else. It obliterates the illusion of gas savings.
My local mechanic thinks that the brakes on a MINI are like any other brakes. And some transmissions require special manufacturer created tools to drain/flush. VW & Porsche for example.
Tires is where the rubber met the road so to speak. The standard MINI tires are 16" run-flats in a non standard size. They cost about $1200 for four and last about 30K miles. By contrast, my Subaru's tires, for 4 would cost me about $680 and they would come warranted for 80K miles. I've gotten more like 120K from the current set. The absolute base MINI hardtop has 15" air tires in a non-standard size. They also only come in performance tires while the run-flats come as all-season if you want them to. However, 4 15" tires cost only about $570.
What that boils down to is that the MINI has twice as expensive tires that will need changing twice as often in all likelihood which means the overall tire cost is 4 times as much as the Subaru. With no run-flats, the MINI costs only slightly less than twice as much as the Subaru assuming the tires wear as fast as the run-flats.
I wonder if you can put 15" tires on the convertible after you get one.
Some one please explain to me why you'd build a car with great fuel economy... 28/36 but not have an economy variant. Why would you think that folks who are willing to pay for all the costly brakes, tires, and whatever else would care? If you have the gold to pay for the maintenance, you have the gold to pay for a car that gets 15/22 in MPG. If you car about the cost of fuel, you might also be shopping for some other economy features. I'd think MINI would at least have 1 car pitched to the economy minded.
Instead they have a car which over 100,000 miles will save about $3,000 in gas over the Lincoln MKZ. They then turn right around and have the same car eat $3,800 in tires, another $3,000 in brakes, and who knows what else. It obliterates the illusion of gas savings.
Car shopping saga -- LONG!!
So lately I’m car shopping. I started out looking at cars because my Subaru has 180,000 miles and it is a good time to buy a car. The original requirements were all-wheel drive, fog lights, comfy seats, heated seats (which usually means leather), climate control, and the ability to hold adult passengers. We also needed it to be an automatic transmission so my wife can drive it. Over time, I’ve changed that to decide that AWD is not necessarily a requirement; I just want the car to be sure footed. Likewise, I don’t use fog lights that often (dark rainy nights mostly) and many fog lights don’t do much. Then I realized that with my wife’s Aztek, I don’t need a car that will take adult backseat passengers or that has significant cargo capacity. For all of that we can use the existing AWD Aztek. So what do I need my car to do?
Well, I drive to work and back. I drive to the store and back. Occasionally I drive to a conference or something that is several hours away. My parents live two hours away. My sister lives eight hours away. Most LARPs I go to are either twenty minutes, thirty minutes, or an hour and fifteen minutes away. Every blue moon or so, I go three to five hours to LARP. About once a year I go on an eight to twelve hour drive. Most of the time, it’s just me in the car, or, slightly less often, me and my wife. After some thought, I decided I can opt for a more “fun” car.
I should note that during the original test drives, I started with the Ford Fusion/Mercury Milan/Lincoln MKZ triplets. They are AWD sedans. Then I found out that they have a fairly low ceiling and I have a long torso. This means that when you put a moonroof in one and thus drop the ceiling by 1.5 inches, it starts brushing my head. This bothers me after five minutes, let alone five hours. I also found out that Ford assumes that if you want AWD, you clearly want things like the moonroof. Finding AWD without the moonroof is really hard. I found one used Lincoln about 70 miles away, but when I test drove it, its brakes seemed off and it had a funny vibration that none of the other Lincolns had. Twice, I got to meet the nice people who had just bought the car I had come to look at. Once a dealer found an MKZ, AWD, no moonroof… in the one color I can’t stand. Milans with AWD are scarce, let alone one with AWD and no moonroof. Of course I could ORDER the Milan or Lincoln I want, but then a lot of the dealer created discounts seem to dry up. Plus as Lincoln MKZ program car AWD with no moonroof comes in at about $25,000 with about 15K miles. A NEW Lincoln starts at about $34,000 (and would have to be a ’10, not an ’09). I don’t want to pay more than $30,000; I get itchy past about $22,000.
Fords also offers the Taurus and (at least in ’09) the Sable with AWD. Not too pricy. My wife, Cinda, did not like them though. They were “just a car” meaning (I think) not exciting… boring. Next year the Sable dies and the new Taurus comes out. Price jump anyone?
I looked hard at Subarus too. I have one and it’s been a good car for 180,000 miles but it is beginning to wear out. But Subaru has only two engines, an boxer 4 that gives about 175 HP and a boxer 6 that needs premium gas. More to the point, the Subarus don’t have a six speed transmission or even a five speed automatic transmission; they have a four speed automatic transmission. The Lincoln/Mercury/Ford has a six. That four speed hurts the Subaru’s performance and its fuel economy. AWD also hurts fuel economy. The only Subaru with rear adult sized room is the Forrester. Drove one and it was okay, but not great. The console seems made of cheap plastic and the pickup was okay, but not great. I also don’t like the placement of the heated seat controls. Forresters don’t get much discount’ they are popular. Cinda wasn’t crazy about them either. Of course the Legacy is being redesigned for ’10 and is supposed to be more Audi-like as far as I can tell. It certainly has a more Audi-like price as it jumps $10,000 to START at $34,000 ish.
GM doesn’t seem to like putting AWD in anything that isn’t at least vaguely truck like (small wagons being “vaguely” truck-like). In fact, they seem to be moving back to RWD for sedans which is, IMO, double bad from a “sure-footedness” point of view. Since s-f is very important to me, I’m not liking that. In ’10 they will introduce the Buick LaCrosse remake which will offer AWD for probably around $30,000. I am tempted to wait because there is a lot of this car I like in it’s pictures and it might just be in my price range, but it will be a year before that car becomes discounted at all; it’s highly anticipated. Still, I actually like the Buick ride.
We tried the Hondas, but Honda thinks Americans are narrower than I am, making their seats decidedly uncomfortable even on short test drives. The side flanges of the seat press into my ribs. The CRV is the only test drive that actually cause me pain.
We also tried the RAV4. Loved the RAV4. Great pick up, small turning radius, good gas mileage, and even with a moonroof, I had head clearance. But right at $30,000 and I’m not sure I liked the back door which opens sideways, not up. I don’t need that big of a car and it feels much bigger than it actually is. Good reliability because it is a Toyota, but you are paying for it. My brother-in-law doesn’t approve of SUV’s, even with good gas mileage, on the principle that it encourages the manufacturers to make SUVs generally. Apparently that is a bad thing. Still, really liked the RAV4 and if we were replacing the Aztek, this would be both Cinda and my first choice. Also to avoid getting the extra expensive white paint job and the moonroof, we’d have to order. If we don’t order, we’d have to pay over $1000 for features we don’t want.
So we took the AWD requirement out and the world got much bigger.
Tried the Mazdas. Mazda 5 gives you a lot for a low price, but misses some core things too. Cinda thought it rocker side to side too much. Liked the Mazda 6. Cinda thought its braking was scary and on her second drive in one she said the suspension was making her sick in the stomach. I still really liked the car though.
Tried the MKZ out again and it’s quieter with AWD, but now Cinda complains that the dashboard is so high. I’m not sure I like the button arrangement. Neither of us likes the analog clock. I notice that the ’10 MKZ will have a digital clock and many other things that I regard as improvements. It also boasts 1950’s styling.
Non-sequitor: My parents grew up in the 50’s and they don’t see the MKZ as a real Lincoln; it’s not boxy enough or big enough. They would never consider one. Their friends the Moodys are the same except the Moody’s OWN a Lincoln – Towncar. The people who buy MKZs are in their 40’s, or like me, are 37. We are the younger buys that Lincoln wants to attract and needs to attract to survive. Yet, these 50’s ish design features are things my parents would like, not me. I prefer the ’09 and earlier exterior. So does Cinda. Lincoln doesn’t understand their buyers.
Anyway, Cinda flunked the MKZ on the second drive of one which seems odd to me since she didn’t on the first drive of one. So we went and looked at Buicks. I like the Buick’s ride; always have. My grandparents had a Buick LeSabre and I have fond memories of that car. It was a good car too. And Buick keeps topping or coming close to the top of J.D. Power’s quality report. The problems with Buick starts with General Motors though. Don’t get me wrong, I like the Buick dealer we found and their salesman, Jackson Anderson, is wonderful. If we get a Buick, it will likely come from there. There are two Buicks that make the running, both pretty much as program cars because the new price tag is just too high. The Buick Lucerne is the top of the line and comes in at about $25,000 with about 10K miles on it. Sweet floaty ride. Poor fuel economy. Large, boat like turning radius. Spacious cabin and back seats with tons of leg room. Up until 2006, it would have been a Cadillac. Tons of amenities like cornering lights, cooled seats (only otherwise found on the Lincoln), extra spiffy wipers with the automatic dog on the wiper arm, not the hood, decent pick up. But the Lurcerne, at the top of the line has some things missing, some odd things. Unlike every other car we considered, Lucerne’s steering wheel doesn’t telescope. Even the lesser Buick LaCrosse telescopes. The Lucerne has only a narrow pass through from the trunk; the back seats do not flip down. Storage space in terms of nooks, cubby holes, pockets, bins, etc. is very limited. Again, compared with the lesser LaCrosse, the Lucerne suffers by comparison. Neither car can have fog lights though except for the top of the line V8 super models with HORRIBLE fuel efficiency.
The LaCrosse has a telescoping wheel, good storage compartments, an arm rest that is comfortable, and it is smaller, especially in the back seats. But it is also narrower meaning adjusting the seats while driving is more difficult. Also, the LaCrosse doesn’t have the same ability to get lumbar support and the passenger seat does not offer nearly as many amenities as the driver’s seat.
Still, the $35K Lucerene for $25K was almost too good a bargain to pass up and we were about to say yes to it. I went up to test drive it once more and see if it had problems getting in my driveway (it doesn’t) and was told that another couple was also looking at it and if they said they wanted it immediately, they would get it. I was astonished that I felt relieved. I felt relieved that this bargain was almost slipping out of my fingers? Went to dinner that night with my parents and showed the pictures of the Lucerne. Mom asked me what I wanted the car for? Thought about it and talked to Cinda about it later that night.
I don’t need the car to do much more than get me to work and the occasional longer trip. I don’t need the back seat room the Lucerne offers. I realized I wanted sure footedness and that I could get a lot less “practical” in my thinking. So we re-evaluated and I began looking for “fun” cars too. I’ve never been a fan of outright speed, but I do like the occasional twisty road in a car that is fun to do twisty roads in. We had a Cavalier convertible when I was in high school and that car was a lot of fun. Maybe a convertible. What are the affordable convertibles?
Chrysler stopped making the PT Cruiser as a convertible in ’09 which is fine, I don’t believe Chrysler makes quality cars anyway. They also make the Sebring right at $27K. Ford makes the Mustang which is in the upper to mid 20K range and costs a lot more to insure. GM makes the Saturn Sky/Pontiac Solstice roadster twins which reportedly have reliability issues. GM also makes the Pontiac G6 in a convertible for the low 30’s. Mitsubishi makes the Spyder in the $27K range, but I know too many people who had problems with their Mitsubishis. Smart makes a buggy convertible but it sucks on the highway. Mazda makes the Miata and Volkswagen makes the New Beatle. Finally, MINI makes the Cooper convertible.
Tried a Sky roadster; didn’t fit and didn’t like it except it sure was pretty. Miata same problem. Roadsters out. G6 too costly – out. Sebring and PT Cruiser are Chrysler – out. Mustang too expensive to ensure and too big a theft target – probably out. Spyder is Mitsubishi so probably out. So we get down to the New Beatle and the MINI. Drove both. Both Cinda and I prefer the MINI. The VW has metal body at the door sill and more importantly has no trunk space with the top down. Also seems harder to work the top. The MINI has a 5 cubic feet “boot” even with the top down. The MINI is fun to drive. (Cinda thinks it is too easy to get speeding tickets in and won’t be comfortable on long drives. I’m not sure how much of a I don’t like that is versus a I like too much. Regardless she says she can’t take it seriously.) MINI also has no spare it has “run-flat tires” which seem to be less cushy. MINI starts in the mid $20K’s but climbs fast when you start adding equipment to it. And with the MINI, I’m tempted to decorate it with things like stripes and so forth. ARGGGH!
So anyway, I also liked the non-convertible MINI a lot and since the base convertible costs $5350 MORE than the base hardtop, I can get a LOT more car in the hardtop. Plus the hardtop has some additional features. It has 3 grab bars (passengers) and also a full sized second side sun shade for the driver. It has a rear wiper. It has better rear visibility out the back corners. It has more cargo room. It has a spare tire (on the base, base model without the run flats). It has an overhead dome light. But the top doesn’t go down.
By comparison; the G6 convertible costs $7790 more than it non-convertible twin. The Spyder costs $5700 more than the Eclipse. The New Beatle convertible costs $7700 more as a convertible. So the MINI is not out of line in how much more it costs, and the MINI convertible includes a “sunroof” ability. I’m not sure how much you’d use it though; it seems to me that if it’s nice enough to sunroof, you’d want the top down and if its not nice enough to have the top down, you wouldn’t be sunroofing it either. I can also sunroof the hardtop for a not-quite-convertible feel.
Also, if you go for small, sure-footed, hardtops well then we have to put the Subaru Impreza and the Mazda3 in there. Impreza is a wonderful car and I enjoy driving it. But there is that four speed transmission again. The Mazda 3 I drove was a stick and it was a wonderful stick. But the seat needed to go back about 2-3” for me to be comfortable and that would get old fast.
So I’m back to MINI’s. Cinda and I go out and do her test drive (and you saw what she thinks). The salesmen lets slip that the MINI will probably need a brake job at about $30K. Then I find out he means a $1000 brake job. He claims that because the MINI is a performance car it has softer brakes and, depending how you drive it, you will need to replace every 30-40K miles. He also says that BMW makes the dealers do more than most independent car places and that the brakes would probably be about $500 at most places. $500 every 30K miles!? This sounds extreme to me; I only recall one, maybe two times in 180K miles with the Subaru. Not a performance car he says, not like a MINI.
I also find that they sell MINIs at MSRP + $500. No bargaining though for repeat customers or if I get one from the lot, they can waive the preparation fee. Still, ouch. I knew that it would be MSRP, but MSRP + $500?
I do more research and discover there are a LOT of unhappy MINI owners out there. Seems they have transmission/clutch problems. Problems like 3 transmissions in $30K miles that the dealers are saying is driver abuse. How do you abuse an automatic transmission? I study this and notice that all the problems are with either the 5 speed manual’s clutch or the CVT transmission on the base Cooper. After 2007, MINI junked the CVT and went to a 6 speed Getrag for both the manual and the automatic. The number of complaints on 2008 or later models is much less, but of course they don’t have the mileage yet. J.D. Powers rates the MINI as being below average in reliability, but that is based on the 2006 model year. They also find, even then that MINI and Kia are the most improved brands (albeit both still under average). I am reassured but still nervous.
If I want a convertible, the MINI still seems to be in the lead. However, I don’t want to buy a Lemon and I don’t want to see lots of shop time, or more importantly, costs. So I wonder.
Well, I drive to work and back. I drive to the store and back. Occasionally I drive to a conference or something that is several hours away. My parents live two hours away. My sister lives eight hours away. Most LARPs I go to are either twenty minutes, thirty minutes, or an hour and fifteen minutes away. Every blue moon or so, I go three to five hours to LARP. About once a year I go on an eight to twelve hour drive. Most of the time, it’s just me in the car, or, slightly less often, me and my wife. After some thought, I decided I can opt for a more “fun” car.
I should note that during the original test drives, I started with the Ford Fusion/Mercury Milan/Lincoln MKZ triplets. They are AWD sedans. Then I found out that they have a fairly low ceiling and I have a long torso. This means that when you put a moonroof in one and thus drop the ceiling by 1.5 inches, it starts brushing my head. This bothers me after five minutes, let alone five hours. I also found out that Ford assumes that if you want AWD, you clearly want things like the moonroof. Finding AWD without the moonroof is really hard. I found one used Lincoln about 70 miles away, but when I test drove it, its brakes seemed off and it had a funny vibration that none of the other Lincolns had. Twice, I got to meet the nice people who had just bought the car I had come to look at. Once a dealer found an MKZ, AWD, no moonroof… in the one color I can’t stand. Milans with AWD are scarce, let alone one with AWD and no moonroof. Of course I could ORDER the Milan or Lincoln I want, but then a lot of the dealer created discounts seem to dry up. Plus as Lincoln MKZ program car AWD with no moonroof comes in at about $25,000 with about 15K miles. A NEW Lincoln starts at about $34,000 (and would have to be a ’10, not an ’09). I don’t want to pay more than $30,000; I get itchy past about $22,000.
Fords also offers the Taurus and (at least in ’09) the Sable with AWD. Not too pricy. My wife, Cinda, did not like them though. They were “just a car” meaning (I think) not exciting… boring. Next year the Sable dies and the new Taurus comes out. Price jump anyone?
I looked hard at Subarus too. I have one and it’s been a good car for 180,000 miles but it is beginning to wear out. But Subaru has only two engines, an boxer 4 that gives about 175 HP and a boxer 6 that needs premium gas. More to the point, the Subarus don’t have a six speed transmission or even a five speed automatic transmission; they have a four speed automatic transmission. The Lincoln/Mercury/Ford has a six. That four speed hurts the Subaru’s performance and its fuel economy. AWD also hurts fuel economy. The only Subaru with rear adult sized room is the Forrester. Drove one and it was okay, but not great. The console seems made of cheap plastic and the pickup was okay, but not great. I also don’t like the placement of the heated seat controls. Forresters don’t get much discount’ they are popular. Cinda wasn’t crazy about them either. Of course the Legacy is being redesigned for ’10 and is supposed to be more Audi-like as far as I can tell. It certainly has a more Audi-like price as it jumps $10,000 to START at $34,000 ish.
GM doesn’t seem to like putting AWD in anything that isn’t at least vaguely truck like (small wagons being “vaguely” truck-like). In fact, they seem to be moving back to RWD for sedans which is, IMO, double bad from a “sure-footedness” point of view. Since s-f is very important to me, I’m not liking that. In ’10 they will introduce the Buick LaCrosse remake which will offer AWD for probably around $30,000. I am tempted to wait because there is a lot of this car I like in it’s pictures and it might just be in my price range, but it will be a year before that car becomes discounted at all; it’s highly anticipated. Still, I actually like the Buick ride.
We tried the Hondas, but Honda thinks Americans are narrower than I am, making their seats decidedly uncomfortable even on short test drives. The side flanges of the seat press into my ribs. The CRV is the only test drive that actually cause me pain.
We also tried the RAV4. Loved the RAV4. Great pick up, small turning radius, good gas mileage, and even with a moonroof, I had head clearance. But right at $30,000 and I’m not sure I liked the back door which opens sideways, not up. I don’t need that big of a car and it feels much bigger than it actually is. Good reliability because it is a Toyota, but you are paying for it. My brother-in-law doesn’t approve of SUV’s, even with good gas mileage, on the principle that it encourages the manufacturers to make SUVs generally. Apparently that is a bad thing. Still, really liked the RAV4 and if we were replacing the Aztek, this would be both Cinda and my first choice. Also to avoid getting the extra expensive white paint job and the moonroof, we’d have to order. If we don’t order, we’d have to pay over $1000 for features we don’t want.
So we took the AWD requirement out and the world got much bigger.
Tried the Mazdas. Mazda 5 gives you a lot for a low price, but misses some core things too. Cinda thought it rocker side to side too much. Liked the Mazda 6. Cinda thought its braking was scary and on her second drive in one she said the suspension was making her sick in the stomach. I still really liked the car though.
Tried the MKZ out again and it’s quieter with AWD, but now Cinda complains that the dashboard is so high. I’m not sure I like the button arrangement. Neither of us likes the analog clock. I notice that the ’10 MKZ will have a digital clock and many other things that I regard as improvements. It also boasts 1950’s styling.
Non-sequitor: My parents grew up in the 50’s and they don’t see the MKZ as a real Lincoln; it’s not boxy enough or big enough. They would never consider one. Their friends the Moodys are the same except the Moody’s OWN a Lincoln – Towncar. The people who buy MKZs are in their 40’s, or like me, are 37. We are the younger buys that Lincoln wants to attract and needs to attract to survive. Yet, these 50’s ish design features are things my parents would like, not me. I prefer the ’09 and earlier exterior. So does Cinda. Lincoln doesn’t understand their buyers.
Anyway, Cinda flunked the MKZ on the second drive of one which seems odd to me since she didn’t on the first drive of one. So we went and looked at Buicks. I like the Buick’s ride; always have. My grandparents had a Buick LeSabre and I have fond memories of that car. It was a good car too. And Buick keeps topping or coming close to the top of J.D. Power’s quality report. The problems with Buick starts with General Motors though. Don’t get me wrong, I like the Buick dealer we found and their salesman, Jackson Anderson, is wonderful. If we get a Buick, it will likely come from there. There are two Buicks that make the running, both pretty much as program cars because the new price tag is just too high. The Buick Lucerne is the top of the line and comes in at about $25,000 with about 10K miles on it. Sweet floaty ride. Poor fuel economy. Large, boat like turning radius. Spacious cabin and back seats with tons of leg room. Up until 2006, it would have been a Cadillac. Tons of amenities like cornering lights, cooled seats (only otherwise found on the Lincoln), extra spiffy wipers with the automatic dog on the wiper arm, not the hood, decent pick up. But the Lurcerne, at the top of the line has some things missing, some odd things. Unlike every other car we considered, Lucerne’s steering wheel doesn’t telescope. Even the lesser Buick LaCrosse telescopes. The Lucerne has only a narrow pass through from the trunk; the back seats do not flip down. Storage space in terms of nooks, cubby holes, pockets, bins, etc. is very limited. Again, compared with the lesser LaCrosse, the Lucerne suffers by comparison. Neither car can have fog lights though except for the top of the line V8 super models with HORRIBLE fuel efficiency.
The LaCrosse has a telescoping wheel, good storage compartments, an arm rest that is comfortable, and it is smaller, especially in the back seats. But it is also narrower meaning adjusting the seats while driving is more difficult. Also, the LaCrosse doesn’t have the same ability to get lumbar support and the passenger seat does not offer nearly as many amenities as the driver’s seat.
Still, the $35K Lucerene for $25K was almost too good a bargain to pass up and we were about to say yes to it. I went up to test drive it once more and see if it had problems getting in my driveway (it doesn’t) and was told that another couple was also looking at it and if they said they wanted it immediately, they would get it. I was astonished that I felt relieved. I felt relieved that this bargain was almost slipping out of my fingers? Went to dinner that night with my parents and showed the pictures of the Lucerne. Mom asked me what I wanted the car for? Thought about it and talked to Cinda about it later that night.
I don’t need the car to do much more than get me to work and the occasional longer trip. I don’t need the back seat room the Lucerne offers. I realized I wanted sure footedness and that I could get a lot less “practical” in my thinking. So we re-evaluated and I began looking for “fun” cars too. I’ve never been a fan of outright speed, but I do like the occasional twisty road in a car that is fun to do twisty roads in. We had a Cavalier convertible when I was in high school and that car was a lot of fun. Maybe a convertible. What are the affordable convertibles?
Chrysler stopped making the PT Cruiser as a convertible in ’09 which is fine, I don’t believe Chrysler makes quality cars anyway. They also make the Sebring right at $27K. Ford makes the Mustang which is in the upper to mid 20K range and costs a lot more to insure. GM makes the Saturn Sky/Pontiac Solstice roadster twins which reportedly have reliability issues. GM also makes the Pontiac G6 in a convertible for the low 30’s. Mitsubishi makes the Spyder in the $27K range, but I know too many people who had problems with their Mitsubishis. Smart makes a buggy convertible but it sucks on the highway. Mazda makes the Miata and Volkswagen makes the New Beatle. Finally, MINI makes the Cooper convertible.
Tried a Sky roadster; didn’t fit and didn’t like it except it sure was pretty. Miata same problem. Roadsters out. G6 too costly – out. Sebring and PT Cruiser are Chrysler – out. Mustang too expensive to ensure and too big a theft target – probably out. Spyder is Mitsubishi so probably out. So we get down to the New Beatle and the MINI. Drove both. Both Cinda and I prefer the MINI. The VW has metal body at the door sill and more importantly has no trunk space with the top down. Also seems harder to work the top. The MINI has a 5 cubic feet “boot” even with the top down. The MINI is fun to drive. (Cinda thinks it is too easy to get speeding tickets in and won’t be comfortable on long drives. I’m not sure how much of a I don’t like that is versus a I like too much. Regardless she says she can’t take it seriously.) MINI also has no spare it has “run-flat tires” which seem to be less cushy. MINI starts in the mid $20K’s but climbs fast when you start adding equipment to it. And with the MINI, I’m tempted to decorate it with things like stripes and so forth. ARGGGH!
So anyway, I also liked the non-convertible MINI a lot and since the base convertible costs $5350 MORE than the base hardtop, I can get a LOT more car in the hardtop. Plus the hardtop has some additional features. It has 3 grab bars (passengers) and also a full sized second side sun shade for the driver. It has a rear wiper. It has better rear visibility out the back corners. It has more cargo room. It has a spare tire (on the base, base model without the run flats). It has an overhead dome light. But the top doesn’t go down.
By comparison; the G6 convertible costs $7790 more than it non-convertible twin. The Spyder costs $5700 more than the Eclipse. The New Beatle convertible costs $7700 more as a convertible. So the MINI is not out of line in how much more it costs, and the MINI convertible includes a “sunroof” ability. I’m not sure how much you’d use it though; it seems to me that if it’s nice enough to sunroof, you’d want the top down and if its not nice enough to have the top down, you wouldn’t be sunroofing it either. I can also sunroof the hardtop for a not-quite-convertible feel.
Also, if you go for small, sure-footed, hardtops well then we have to put the Subaru Impreza and the Mazda3 in there. Impreza is a wonderful car and I enjoy driving it. But there is that four speed transmission again. The Mazda 3 I drove was a stick and it was a wonderful stick. But the seat needed to go back about 2-3” for me to be comfortable and that would get old fast.
So I’m back to MINI’s. Cinda and I go out and do her test drive (and you saw what she thinks). The salesmen lets slip that the MINI will probably need a brake job at about $30K. Then I find out he means a $1000 brake job. He claims that because the MINI is a performance car it has softer brakes and, depending how you drive it, you will need to replace every 30-40K miles. He also says that BMW makes the dealers do more than most independent car places and that the brakes would probably be about $500 at most places. $500 every 30K miles!? This sounds extreme to me; I only recall one, maybe two times in 180K miles with the Subaru. Not a performance car he says, not like a MINI.
I also find that they sell MINIs at MSRP + $500. No bargaining though for repeat customers or if I get one from the lot, they can waive the preparation fee. Still, ouch. I knew that it would be MSRP, but MSRP + $500?
I do more research and discover there are a LOT of unhappy MINI owners out there. Seems they have transmission/clutch problems. Problems like 3 transmissions in $30K miles that the dealers are saying is driver abuse. How do you abuse an automatic transmission? I study this and notice that all the problems are with either the 5 speed manual’s clutch or the CVT transmission on the base Cooper. After 2007, MINI junked the CVT and went to a 6 speed Getrag for both the manual and the automatic. The number of complaints on 2008 or later models is much less, but of course they don’t have the mileage yet. J.D. Powers rates the MINI as being below average in reliability, but that is based on the 2006 model year. They also find, even then that MINI and Kia are the most improved brands (albeit both still under average). I am reassured but still nervous.
If I want a convertible, the MINI still seems to be in the lead. However, I don’t want to buy a Lemon and I don’t want to see lots of shop time, or more importantly, costs. So I wonder.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
An open letter to the Big Three and all the other car makers
Hey guys,
You might want to think about combining AWD with a Hybrid. Or do you assume that anyone who is interested in the gas saving of a Hybrid would not be interested in the AWD which decreases the MPG? Newflash: AWD is a safety feature that is required in any car I own. Hybrid is a nice option. If there was an AWD that got the Hybrid's boosts, it would be my leading contender for a new car purchase. Just an FYI.
You might want to think about combining AWD with a Hybrid. Or do you assume that anyone who is interested in the gas saving of a Hybrid would not be interested in the AWD which decreases the MPG? Newflash: AWD is a safety feature that is required in any car I own. Hybrid is a nice option. If there was an AWD that got the Hybrid's boosts, it would be my leading contender for a new car purchase. Just an FYI.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Rush Limbaugh and Databasing
I keep thinking of things to put in this blog and I keep not having time to write them up.
In a twist of thought, driving to work today listening to the Obama show, I mean NPR, I thought of something Rush Limbaugh said on his TV show over a decade ago late one night when I had gotten home from my summer job bartending and was flipping channels. He started out by talking about how people are idiots and went into a diatribe for like five minutes on it. He then observed that if you were really conservative, you could not believe that, on the whole, people were idiots. If you did, then you had to believe they needed government to take care of them. Since conservatives believed in keeping government out of your life, they had to also believe that if left alone, people could care for themselves.
That comment has stuck with me for a long time as one of the only “smart” things Rush ever said. It’s like an itch I can’t quite scratch. I am pretty misanthropic. People are cattle and the herd is dumb. They will act selfishly and short sighted and are quite capable of happily running off the cliff and then wondering how they ended up falling (and looking for someone else to blame while they are at it; those damn greedy cliffs). I also believe that government should be small, cheap, and not intrusive. This sets up a bit of a conundrum as you see. How can one believe that people are dumb but not believe they need to be taken care of?
Of late, I have been thinking of something my father said to me. He observed that he was glad he lived south of the (Missouri) River because he felt when he went north of it the society became much more sharply divided between the haves and the have-nots. As a student of history, I know that it was the rise of the middle class that made the Industrial Revolution happen and propelled Western society, particularly England, to dominance. A strong middle class makes for a strong and ultimately wealthy society. Logically, then the whole is better off if the middle class profits and when things begin to get to sharply divided they need to be… corrected. Keep that in mind.
Back to Rush’s syllogism: Today it occurred to me that the piece of the logic that was assumed but unsaid is that if people are too dumb to look out for themselves competently then it falls to others to do it for them. I’m not sure I agree with that. To some extent, redistribution of wealth from the upper tier to the rest of the society creates a strong middle class. That should be good, right? Maybe. In the Industrial Revolution, the middle class became strong because it worked to become so. If wealth is redistributed via taxes, then the growth of the middle class is artificial. It may strengthen the society or it may weaken it as the society is trained that it is entitled to unearned income. From an incentive point of view it really sucks; you “punish” those who are the most productive part of society so you can support the least productive parts. The bottom’s incentive to improve is lessened while the tops incentive to keep producing is also lessened.
Viewed in Darwinistic terms, if you have people who cannot “make it” on their own and need to be “assisted” to survive, and you support them with the surplus created by those who can clearly “make it,” you are acting counter to evolution. You are introducing an element into your society which in good times you can afford to carry, but when the lean times come may create the difference between survival and extinction. You are, in essence, breading in weakness by creating a parasite. So, if as Rush said, you believe people are dumb, maybe the answer is to let them be dumb and see if they survive.
****
My other project is programming a database on my iPhone using the HanDBase program. I’m learning a lot and I almost have my beta ready to go.
In a twist of thought, driving to work today listening to the Obama show, I mean NPR, I thought of something Rush Limbaugh said on his TV show over a decade ago late one night when I had gotten home from my summer job bartending and was flipping channels. He started out by talking about how people are idiots and went into a diatribe for like five minutes on it. He then observed that if you were really conservative, you could not believe that, on the whole, people were idiots. If you did, then you had to believe they needed government to take care of them. Since conservatives believed in keeping government out of your life, they had to also believe that if left alone, people could care for themselves.
That comment has stuck with me for a long time as one of the only “smart” things Rush ever said. It’s like an itch I can’t quite scratch. I am pretty misanthropic. People are cattle and the herd is dumb. They will act selfishly and short sighted and are quite capable of happily running off the cliff and then wondering how they ended up falling (and looking for someone else to blame while they are at it; those damn greedy cliffs). I also believe that government should be small, cheap, and not intrusive. This sets up a bit of a conundrum as you see. How can one believe that people are dumb but not believe they need to be taken care of?
Of late, I have been thinking of something my father said to me. He observed that he was glad he lived south of the (Missouri) River because he felt when he went north of it the society became much more sharply divided between the haves and the have-nots. As a student of history, I know that it was the rise of the middle class that made the Industrial Revolution happen and propelled Western society, particularly England, to dominance. A strong middle class makes for a strong and ultimately wealthy society. Logically, then the whole is better off if the middle class profits and when things begin to get to sharply divided they need to be… corrected. Keep that in mind.
Back to Rush’s syllogism: Today it occurred to me that the piece of the logic that was assumed but unsaid is that if people are too dumb to look out for themselves competently then it falls to others to do it for them. I’m not sure I agree with that. To some extent, redistribution of wealth from the upper tier to the rest of the society creates a strong middle class. That should be good, right? Maybe. In the Industrial Revolution, the middle class became strong because it worked to become so. If wealth is redistributed via taxes, then the growth of the middle class is artificial. It may strengthen the society or it may weaken it as the society is trained that it is entitled to unearned income. From an incentive point of view it really sucks; you “punish” those who are the most productive part of society so you can support the least productive parts. The bottom’s incentive to improve is lessened while the tops incentive to keep producing is also lessened.
Viewed in Darwinistic terms, if you have people who cannot “make it” on their own and need to be “assisted” to survive, and you support them with the surplus created by those who can clearly “make it,” you are acting counter to evolution. You are introducing an element into your society which in good times you can afford to carry, but when the lean times come may create the difference between survival and extinction. You are, in essence, breading in weakness by creating a parasite. So, if as Rush said, you believe people are dumb, maybe the answer is to let them be dumb and see if they survive.
****
My other project is programming a database on my iPhone using the HanDBase program. I’m learning a lot and I almost have my beta ready to go.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Secretary Hillary
I've been busy so I don't have much time, but I wanted to say how disappointed I am with Obama's choice for Secretary of State. Doesn't he realize how many of the Obama votes were anti-Hillary votes. He operates best by divorcing himself of the past partisan legacy, yet has just put Clinton on his cabinet. Feels a lot like treason and a lot less like change.
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