Confused styling overall. Plus it looks like the exterior and interior designers never spoke to one another.

Totally agree. I have a boring awd 2017 cr-v and love every dull bit of it. I regularly haul huge plants from the nursery, carry tools and lumber to do maintenance on rental properties, haul family and friends and more. And I average around 35mpg, up to 40mpg on the highway. Twice the autobraking system has kicked in…

Why so much hatred for “fake” design? So much about a car exists to camouflage it’s underlying structure. Rear windshields? Only 75% at most is clear. “Bumpers” — mostly plastic covers that conceal a myriad of things. People generally don’t like change so much of car design is a reference to the past to keep us…

A week or so ago I was driving on a Michigan highway and passed a transport vehicle carrying three white Hummer EVs. They were absurdly large. Leave it to GM to make a wasteful EV.

I had a used Toyota Echo for 8 years. It was ugly yet practical and we got it dirt cheap when a dealer accidentally advertised it for the wrong price and honored their ad. 8 years later we sold it for nearly the same amount we paid for it. At first I found the dash horrible and the center cluster ridiculous.…

There was a wealthy girl in my high school who was given a brand-new black Saab by her family. She proceeded to paint something like trees and dragons on it with ordinary acrylic paint (not airbrushed.) Man that ruined a fine car but it sure made a statement.

I had a recent Uber driver who was a mechanic for Enterprise with Uber as his side hustle. I asked him whether he’d buy used from Enterprise. He said the minivans and SUVs were treated best by renters, regular sedans were generally okay but to avoid anything “sporty.”

I lived in Kenya back in ‘88 when the rally came through the small village where I lived. School was canceled for the day so everyone could line the hillsides to watch. There was a rush of anticipation as we could see the red dust rising a mile away and hear the roaring engines approach. In retrospect we were all…

My nephews, farmers in France, race beat up old harvesters. This isn’t one of their races, but you get the idea...

I learned to drive on a ‘76 VW Bug Convertible. The engine regularly caught on fire but we’d just open the engine cover, slam it down and the small flames went out. Amazingly it never caused any real damage other than always having bubbled paint on the vent/slot on the engine cover. That car always kept us alert :)

your comments on why would someone own an ugly car made me chuckle. A decade ago, We needed a cheap 2nd car and snagged a barely-used Toyota Echo for half the price of the cheapest new car (dealer had made a mistake in the ad and had to honor it). Put nearly 100k on it and sold it for only a thousand less than we paid…

I can’t edit my original post, and forgot another amazing thing this guy told me. His division was asked to fine tune certain parts so they would last only past the warranty window then would be susceptible to breaking and thus need repairs...

Oh I forgot to add a very important detail...the main conspiracy point...this “informant” also told me that his unit was charged with designing certain parts for his company that would last through warranty periods but fail shortly after...

About 20 years ago my wife and I were shopping for a used station wagon. One of the important aspects was that it had to fit our tandem bicycle with the backseats down. One day we were looking at a used German wagon and I folded the backseats down to measure the cargo area. Flipping the seats forward, I found an…