The soap struck me as the riskier thing. (For context, I’ve had responsibility for GMP drug and device manufacturing in previous lives.) The interaction of a surfactant and/or solvent with a rubber or polymer seal might degrade the seal. Depending on what the seal is made of, and what specifically is in the soap.…

I agree with you there. Tying the deduction to GVWR is an outdated rule. I get why it made sense in 1986, when the only things you could buy with that GVWR were cutaways and box trucks. But it’s just silly in a world of G-Wagens and Escalades and $110k King Ranch duallies.

Porsche Cayenne
Porsche 944 S2

For a lot of people, the trips where we’re towing or hauling are the longest drives we do. If you’re going to be in the truck for 20 hours of your week-long vacation, or repeatedly hauling building materials to the rural property that you’re building that’s a hour away from the nearest lumber yard, it makes some sense…

Yes, there is a lot of sketchiness to Tesla, but where crash safety is concerned, all the prior models got a 5-star rating when NHTSA or NCAP did independent crash testing. Credit where credit is due - there are some engineers that worked really hard on that.

Yes, that’s what I said. Tesla did the test, filed the results, and NHTSA is declining to do an independent re-test for now. The clickbaity headline implies that the CT hasn’t been crash tested by anyone at all, which the video in the article itself shows isn’t true.

It might be possible to see the test results by…

Some key info here: The Cybertruck *was* crash-tested. It had to be, to get licensed for sale by the NHTSA. The results of that test were filed with NHTSA so that Tesla could legally affix the sticker to each CyberTruck that says it conforms to the FMVSS (49 CFR Part 567).

What NHTSA does is *independently* re-tests…

Not as designed, no. The hydraulic rams and pump on these actually aren’t that expensive.  The problem is that there aren’t too many shops that know how to work on them, and labor hours can add up if they’re learning on your dime. (Which I learned the hard way on a W124 of the same vintage, which shares the basic…

We’ve got two trucks for our remodeling business. The extended cab is really helpful because it’s lockable, weatherproof storage space. Great for tool bags and small bundles of materials. Yeah, the drywall and 2x4s go in the bed, but you can fit a stack of 4x8s even in a short-bed truck if you put the tailgate down…

I’d like to know its towing capacity. The previous gen would tow 3500 lbs, which is not *quite* enough for a track car on a trailer, or for the average 4-person camping trailer.

The overall point is true, but is the three-row Defender really the poster child here? It’s got unique styling for the class, it’s still got top-tier off-road capability, and it generally does “real truck” stuff. It’s cool.

Why not pick on, oh, the searingly ugly new Lexus RX? Or that cynically mediocre new Alfa Romeo…

I think you’re right. The Integra was always Civic-based, but (in the US at least) was a separate body design that shared no panels with the Civic. That helped with the perception that it was a junior luxury car.

This is the way. If the car has been sitting, just do everything while you’ve got the front accessory drive apart and the coolant drained.

If the water pump isn’t leaking, it probably will be in the next 25k miles / 2 years. May as well just do it as preventative maintenance, and not have an overheating event that…

That’ll buy you about 1600 square feet of SFR in San Francisco right now. So, yeah, a 2-bedroom or a small 3 bdr.

Yeah, the crusade against drunk driving was the classic slippery slope of regulation. Driving at 0.2% BAC? Definitely impaired, with rare exceptions. Fine, let’s crack down on that. That made sense.

I’m with MarcBee on this. I have a *lot* of Tesla-driving neighbors, and I just can’t get exciting about a UI that is entirely a single touchscreen. I don’t like the seats, I don’t like the interior materials, I don’t like the way they sound or the way the steering wheels feel.

I just got some seat time in a Taycan,…

(1) When the day comes that I can buy the shivering carcass of Jalopnik from GO Media and run it myself, you’re hired.

(2) What’s the upshot for those of us that race cars and not motorcycles? It’s time to replace my SA2020.

I’ve been working on a friend’s 2nd-gen SL1 for a while now. She hates the car but it steadfastly refuses to break in any way that would justify a new car.

Under the hood, you can see they cribbed a lot of (good) ideas from Honda. It’s sort of a base Civic, but with a bigger, torquey-er motor. It’s an admirable bit of…

^^^^ This. Which I have learned the hard way. Even doing the wrenching work myself, all the little parts add up when you’re trying to bring a collectible car up to snuff. Now I’m looking for Hagerty Condition 2 or better.

Brake pads. The difference between the cheapest set and the fanciest, most high-tech set is about$100 on the average car. And they make a *big* difference in stopping distance. More than once, great brakes have kept me from an accident. They might even save your life and the lives of others.