I wrote a procedure once to deal with a 900 lbf spring trapped inside this little enclosure. It had a big red WARNING box on it for a reason.

Or you can apply a different fancy trim to the switch for a "premium" VW. The GTI I have gets some silver accents that look different than a base Golf.

I was astonished that any marketer would allow it to be named something that could be spelled with a profanity at the beginning.

You couldn't even find the autobox ones here when I was shopping.

There has to be a way to make variants profitable. Still, if people are willing to buy the SUV instead, they have no incentive to bring the wagon. Dad wanted a Subaru, but the Legacy wagon is dead, so he got an Outback.

Considering an Escape costs almost as much as an X1, I imagine they'll be incredibly proud of this one too.

Jalop has finally gotten up to date.

I think it's the VW answer to the Fusion Titanium. Similar features and HP. I would have looked more closely at a Passat if they still had HID lights.

I don't know that I'll do the background but inbox zero has kept me sane this last year.

The Golf/Rabbit is the "real" VW from my view. Still, when I looked at pricing on Corollas and the like for my sister, even the decontented Jetta compares very favorably with the Japanese, and within $500 in price.

Spaceflight now, beyond earth, NASA.gov, and io9 cover space topics. Obama has kept funding level, the evisceration was done in a previous administration. Orion as a capsule is still being developed, there are commercial crew efforts underway (latest round recently announced), and there is now money being spent on…

During my interview with GM, things went south when she brought up the Aztek: "the focus groups said the cladding looked tough" I might have had a prayer if I could have covered my horror at that statement.

The funny thing about this is Carhartt is a skater/puffy jacket brand in Japan and Europe.

The problem comes in the various pieces that aren't painted with the car and color matching them. When I was car shopping, nearly every model was guilty of some random swath of black plastic, or gray plastic. I loved the dark blue offered on the car I bought, but not when 1/2 of each mirror was gray plastic instead.…

that's straight up creepy.

Some people intentionally force patina on things. One guy I knew had a crazy ritual for new hats. Other people want their gleaming temple of tech to be a frozen postcard in time. Black anodize - when thick enough - can survive a lot of wear.

I'm disturbed the runabout isn't getting any love. The Rio Grande. I thought they were perfect - you could go nearly anywhere a big ship could go, decent armament, maneuverable.

We haven't had such good luck with their packing. They take care of it, but it sometimes takes two tries to get things since the first gets destroyed.

I presume they took apart the mechatronic unit on a DSG before and after the smoothness fix and took some detailed notes about what changed. No sense in reinventing the wheel when you can measure someone else's.

Yeah, I'd like to get through to the Consumer Reports reviewers who want auto-shifting manuals to feel like a lossy slushbox. I hate normal autos after DSG - the engine should disengage when you're off the gas, just like a regular manual, except the computer runs the clutch for you. It's an *automated* manual, not a…