...that second “bedroom” is really a luggage locker that the previous owner converted...

I forgot about the Nomad, but you have to admit the technology was primitive and the performance way substandard to cars of the 21st Century. I still consider the ‘53 Studebaker coupes to be way ahead of their time WRT styling.

Here’s another vote for “nontraditional” gender roles. When I met my then-girlfriend now-wife, she was living at home and her mom did all the cooking. I learned to cook from my mom starting about age 15, so for many years I did all the food shopping and almost all of the cooking. After she went vegetarian in…

I’d be pretty thoroughly screwed. It would be a ‘55 Bel Air with the new 265-CI Chevy V-8 and a three on the tree stick shift. Single master cylinder four wheel drum brakes, lousy handling with lousy bias ply tires, frequent maintenance, etc. A ‘55 Corvette would have the same issues.

...almost everything in that building had a Mitsubishi logo on it, from the elevator to the computers and printers to the microwave in the kitchen.

Funny you should bring that up; in 1986 we bought a 26" direct view CRT Mitsubishi television. It was pretty much SOTA back then, and my WW2-era veteran father was so impressed he bought a Mitsubishi TV a few years later.

I saw the lead photo and the asking price, and thought “Take my money!” Then I kept on reading, and looked over the pictures. The oxidized underhood aluminum suggests this was assembled at least 20 years ago. The mediocre at best engine/transmission is a good foot too far forward. It just looks badly built and poorly…

they should have moved the engine/transmission back about 6 12 inches

The first time I changed the oil myself in one of my old cars, the ShittyLube tech had put the filter on so tight that I couldn’t move it with a filter wrench and an extension.

Great idea either Matrix or Vibe, but in the snowy parts of the country these will have been more prone to rust, and they are all old enough that many/most examples will also be 150K-ish plus in miles.

I say keep the Chum Bucket as the project to learn on and go with the Mazda.

I tried on two generations of Fits and found the seats would not be up to a long drive.

The insurance on my Z06 is cheaper than that for my wife’s 2016 Honda Fit. My agent explained that the newer cars with crumple zones designed to self-destruct to protect the humans are more readily totaled in a collision.

Hard disagree with you there

Thank you for your reply. I aspire to be at least as Green as the next guy, but it is mindlessly short-sighted to design a wiring harness which is expected to become non-functional after 10 or 15 or 20 years. Greenwashing is the worst of corporate malfeasance.

We’re now in a world where wiring harnesses are falling apart after less than a decade

Thank you, this is valuable information for the Jalopnik community. Still, when you say, “14+: 100% just a BMW now” that still raises red flags for reliability and cost of repairs.

Interesting. I knew someone who had a relatively early “New Mini”. His needed a new transmission at 75K and he was told, “That’s not uncommon”. I knew someone else who had one and sold it to buy a Veloster before his Mini became a money pit. To me, the fact that they are cheap now used says “Quickly depreciating used G…

Rear seat access is irrelevant if you are child-free and rarely or never need to carry more than one passenger.

The 2 door hatchback makes 0 sense, especially if you are making a 4 door of the same vehicle...Even if you never have rear seat passengers, it is immensely easier to load and unload that rear area with a separate door.